Three pathways to US-China war

According to the theory of international relations, the world is constantly in a state of anarchy and countries always seek a balance of power to maintain their own security.

With China's rise, the US and its allies fear losing the equilibrium that supports American domination of the global order. Considering China a "revisionist state," they have raised concerns about Beijing's unchecked attempt to change the status quo, to pursue military expansionism and follow a path toward hegemony.

From geo-strategic flashpoints in the South China Sea to Taiwan, to trade wars and technological wars, the likelihood of confrontations seems inevitable. That raises a simple question. Will war between the US and China result from the current tension? If so, what form of war will that be? If history is any indication, three speculations can be made for war between the US and China: World War III, Cold War 2.0, and regional proxy wars.

World War III would be the most extreme. When China is considered a security threat and that seeks hegemony through military expansionism, should one consider it as equivalent to Germany and Japan during the two World Wars?

Has China invaded and occupied any countries? Has China pursued imperialist colonialism? Has it committed a mass atrocity, or is it a terrorist state?

Similarly, if war is to happen between the two superpowers, then what might trigger the United States' involvement? Events like the attack on Pearl Harbor?

The second form of war is Cold War 2.0, which is being hotly debated as the closest to the current realities. But this time it is not about ideologies, space war or nuclear brinkmanship. It is more about a trade war, currency war, technological war, cyber war or even hybrid war that combines elements of some or all of these.

Competition for the domination of multilateral frameworks is one of the possible fronts of Cold War 2.0,

But if Cold War 2.0 does exist, it would be a limited version of Cold War 1.0 with fewer fronts and features owing to China's reluctance to take global leadership on every front as the former Soviet Union tried to do vis-à-vis the US.

Using the word "competition" on multilateral frameworks is not totally right either, because while China is increasing its contribution to multilateral system, the share is still low compared with the US.

It would not constitute a competition either if the US is withdrawing from every multilateral system that it helped built after the World War II. Modern China in fact has benefited from the system created by the domination of the US, and it has yet to create any global governance system, either politically or economically.

China has not tried or at least has not been seen as attempting to impose or spread its own system. Thus far, no country has proclaimed that it is adopting China's governance system.

The next possible type of war is a regional proxy war in the AsiaPacific, which is the main platform of competition between the US and China. Like in Cold War 1.0, the US-China rivalry could result in "hot wars" between peripheral states. Regional flashpoints such as the South China Sea and Taiwan could ignite such hot wars.

For the Mekong region, the likelihood of Vietnam War 2.0 cannot be ruled out while China and Vietnam keep confronting each other in the South China Sea.

Cambodia used to be a sideshow of Vietnam War 1.0. When Cambodia helped Vietnam by allowing it to use the so-called Sihanouk Trail in its territory to provide covert logistic support, the US bombed Cambodia with an estimated more than 2 million metric tons of bombs, leaving a minimum of 100,000 Cambodian civilian casualties and 2 million homeless.

The bombing was said to be one of the major triggers of the consolidation of the Khmer Rouge's power and the genocide that followed.