How big of a threat is Asian superpower China really?

Last June, during an annual security conference in East Asia, then-Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin underscored that the United States was not seeking conflict with China.

- Daniel DePetris, Tribune News Service

Maintaining a consistent dialogue with Beijing, he hinted, was just as vital to effective deterrence as ensuring the US military was fully equipped and prepared. Fast-forward a year later and the message from Washington is far different. Unlike his predecessor, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth name-dropped China in his speech to the same security conference multiple times, as if to shame the Asian superpower for running roughshod over the so-called rules-based international order.

China, Hegseth warned, was trying to become a hegemon in Asia, where it could dominate its neighbours, exploit the South China Sea's vast natural resources and coerce other countries into accepting Beijing’s demands. In Hegseth’s words, “It has to be clear to all that Beijing is credibly preparing to potentially use military force to alter the balance of power in the Indo-Pacific.” An invasion of Taiwan, he added, could be “imminent.” If this all sounds scary, that’s because it is. His comments raise the rhetorical gamesmanship to a level US officials weren't comfortable with in the past. The Biden administration was no slouch on China policy, but it still didn't want to inflame things unnecessarily. The Pentagon, for instance, repeatedly emphasized that while China’s military drills around Taiwan were aggressive and designed to wear down the island’s will to resist, a conflict in the Taiwan Strait was “neither imminent nor inevitable.”