China Is Not Soviet Union.

The new cold war has reached its climax. China has been challenging the uni-polarity of the US on every front. Countering China has become the supreme interest of the US in the twenty first century. Many scholars are of the view that the new cold war cannot end up in a similar fashion to the first: downfall of erstwhile USSR. Against the backdrop of the dissolution of the USSR, many authors came up with sweeping statements that communism has thrown up the sponge.

In this relation, Francis Fukuyama was on the forefront who compiled his exposition in his notable work-'The End of History and the Last Man'. He concluded, 'The end-point of mankind's ideological evolution and the universalization of Western liberal democracy as the final form of human government.' In fact, the war against communism has never ended as China has taken up the mantle. China is the potential competitor which makes this game challenging for the US. As a matter of fact, there many factors that distinguish China from then USSR.

First of all, there is a difference in the nature of power. The former USSR was obsessed with defence and a major chunk of the economy was diverted to make it a global military hegemon. The excessive focus on defence hampered its economic growth significantly. On the contrary, China has expanded its economic influence globally vis-a-vis the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). According to available statistics, the average defence spending of former USSR was relatively above 15 percent of GDP. However, Chinese defence spending is merely below 6 percent. Owing to high defence spending and low human development, the erstwhile USSR lost the confidence of its own people. Quite the opposite, China's economic focus has improved its soft power even beyond its own boundaries. In a similar vein, the nation of around 1400 million lifted roughly half of the population from poverty in an unprecedented manner.

In the second place, Professor Amitai Etzioni, renowned American Sociologist, said, 'China has always emphasized regional dominance peacefully, but the USSR flagrantly ran after global dominance by hook or by crook.' Historically, China has never tried to invade any nation except for a few border incursions in the recent past. Deng Xiaoping-'Architect of Modern China'-formulated peace and development as the tenet of Chinese foreign policy. Time and again, he used to quote a Chinese proverb, 'Hide your strength, bide your time.' Resultantly, China's global...