Whether we like it or not, only the semantically finicky will deny that China is not already a global superpower. In this context, Bloomberg explores China's economic, military, and soft power projection capabilities.
China is catching up fast militarily...
This maritime supremacy map of the Indian Ocean is important given that the Ocean may well turn out to be one of the major battlegrounds for the new world order.
Even with potential slips-ups due to a debt implosion, China will most likely catch up economically and militarily, may be not in terms of parity but reasonably close enough, with the US in the medium-term. However it is very unlikely that China will come anywhere close to the US in terms of its soft power projection capabilities.
And that, in the final analysis, may well be what keeps China from ever scaling the heights America reached with global influence and acceptability. In fact, China's aggressive foreign policy actions involving all its own neighbours in recent years may well have been the last nail on its ambitions to be seen as an acceptable a super power like the US. And the Hambantota-type legacy of its Belt and Road Initiative will, in the medium-term, most likely invite a backlash which even the well-oiled Chinese foreign policy machinery and its deep pockets will struggle to stave off. The decision by the Malaysian Prime Minister Mahathir Mohammed to put on hold large BRI projects and warning about a "new version of colonialism" during his visit to China may only be the begining of the backlash.
And it is here that India can give China a very close run for, at least, regional influence. In fact, given the promising medium to long-term economic prospects of the Indian economy, it may actually be on a strong wicket going forward. So all the more important for the Indian foreign policy establishment to build capacity and engage actively in advancing its soft power.
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