Editor's Note: With the 20th anniversary of 9/11 upon us, we republish this On Geopolitics column, which originally ran on April 5, 2021. The U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan just ahead of the symbolic date has raised more questions about U.S. power and international leadership. The attacks took place during the post-Cold War unipolar moment, where the United States considered itself the victor over not only the Soviet Union, but over any challenges to the idea of global liberal democracy. The last 20 years have seen both a reversion of trends toward global liberalism and a reshaping of the global power landscape, with the United States now once again facing peer-power competition. This is perhaps the most significant geopolitical legacy of the 9/11 attacks, namely, that they shifted U.S. attention to an unwinnable war against "terrorism," significantly delayed the U.S. rebalance to the Pacific, and allowed space for China to manage its internal socioeconomic challenges and build out a robust political, economic and military capacity largely unhindered by any U.S. counteractions. China is now exploiting the U.S. "defeat" in Afghanistan after two decades of conflict to reiterate its assertion that Western liberalism is not only unnecessary for the economic success of nations, but actually undermines global stability. The return of a multipolar world, and the rise of China, thus both stand as unintended — and perhaps unexpected — legacies of the 9/11 attacks.

Twenty years ago, the United States and China faced off after a collision of military aircraft. The events of 9/11 rapidly reprioritized Washington's attention several months later, providing Beijing two decades to manage internal problems and reshape its foreign posture. As the United States is once again defining China as a strategic competitor, it does so opposite a China much stronger, more capable and more confident than it was in 2001.

This week marks the 20th anniversary of the EP-3 incident near Hainan Island, the first major international crisis of the then-new George W. Bush administration. Bush had criticized the Clinton administration's description of China as a strategic partner, instead labeling Beijing a strategic competitor. This ran counter to earlier policies that sought to bring China closer through growing trade and investment ties and inclusion in multilateral institutions like the World Trade Organization.

9/11 Delays Reshaping the U.S. Defense Posture

The collision between a Chinese J-8 fighter and U.S. EP-3 signals reconnaissance aircraft appeared to reinforce the sense of rising tensions between Washington and Beijing. The crew was detained until April 11, the plane held until July. Beijing demanded an apology, the United States regretted the breach of its own intelligence-collection tools. A U.S. security policy review, launched with Bush's inauguration, focused on the need to shift attention to the emerging near-peer threat from China. While the Quadrennial Defense Review was published just after the 9/11 attacks, it reflected that broader strategic thinking, and pointed to a reshaping of the U.S. defense posture in what is now thought of as the Indo-Pacific. Many of the issues being discussed around today's Pacific Deterrence Initiative echo discussions in 2001 (including concerns about Chinese island-building and pressure on Taiwan).

Had the 9/11 attacks not reoriented U.S. attention, and had Washington not failed to clearly define and articulate a definition of victory in Afghanistan and later Iraq — locking the United States into two decades of low intensity but seemingly unending conflict — it is quite likely that China's path toward great power status would have been far different, if not curtailed. The United States would have shifted its defense and economic posture much earlier. The complexity of international supply chains, now so integrated into Southern China, may have evolved over more dispersed geography, an early form of "decoupling" rather than the tighter integration of the early 2000s. Socioeconomic tensions in China, including those between the developing coastal provinces and lagging interior provinces, might have been harder for Beijing to manage if coupled with rising outside pressure. 

Alternative histories abound, but the geopolitical context remains. China is a large land power, increasingly connected to international trade, and threatened by the ability of the dominant maritime power, the United States, to interfere with its key maritime trade routes. The Belt and Road Initiative, the island-building campaigns, deep-sea mapping and Arctic transits all reflect in part this core concern. But today, China is in a much different position than it was two decades ago. Its economy has grown significantly (even if unevenly), its dependence on international trade has also grown, its technological development has grown, and its military capacity and capability have grown. That is a lot of growing, and the imbalance of force has eroded over the last two decades. The United States is now playing catch-up, after two decades of false starts in "pivoting" to Asia and refocusing on peer competition.

But before we criticize any specific administrations in the United States, it is worth considering that democracies are notorious for appearing unprepared for the strategic challenge. In his 1919 book Democratic Ideals and Reality, written after the unexpected horrors of World War I, British geographer Sir Halford Mackinder highlighted this, while simultaneously not lamenting it. "Democracy refuses to think strategically unless and until compelled to do so for purposes of defense." It was more a statement of fact than of critique. It was the cost of accepting the ideal of democratic rule.

As Mackinder posited, there are two great types of leaders or leadership, the organizers, and the idealists. While both are necessary to some degree, democracies by their very nature tend toward the idealists, and autocracies toward the organizers. When analysts assert that China thinks in long strategic outlines, that it has a 100-year plan, they are recognizing that idea. When they lament that the United States cannot plan past a four-year (or even two-year) election cycle, they are also recognizing this fundamental difference. Yet China does not achieve all its plans, and the United States can have strategic continuity despite political change. 

Challenging Western Concepts of Democratic Idealism

Today, China is challenging not only the United States in terms of economic heft or strategic posture in the Indo-Pacific, it is challenging the viability of Western concepts of "democratic idealism," as Mackinder would term it. China has apparently made a lie of the Western "truism" that economic growth is intimately tied to free markets and democratic institutions. Beijing has countered that Western-style democracy, and its insistence on demanding adherence to Western norms for inclusion in the international economic exchange, more often leads to instability and delayed economic growth. U.S. social divisions, intra-European squabbles and the relative weakness of the Indian economy compared to China's are all given as proof that Western idealism has reached its limit, and that an alternative form of international order is now due. 

China's assertion of noninterference, of win-win solutions, is a counter to the apparent universalism of Western ideas of democratic rule, open markets and free trade. And Beijing points to many cases where Western powers violate their own principles and engage in protectionist economic policies, or appear to curtail democratic freedoms. In times of economic uncertainty, such as that caused by the global financial crisis or the current COVID-19 crisis, China's message resonates. 

This brings us back to the reality that, 20 years after the EP-3 incident, the United States is only now finding internal consensus that China is a strategic competitor, and thus that shaping a viable counter can no longer be delayed. In that two decades, China has changed substantively, and perceptions of U.S. reliability and leadership have eroded. And it is this that will present the key challenge to Washington as it seeks to build a multifaceted coalition to counter China's military, economic and political expansion. 

When democracies are faced with a threat, they call on Mackinder's organizers to harness their latent strengths, focus their resources and counter the challenge. Government becomes more directly involved in the economy. Personal and societal freedoms are modified to protect national security and reprioritize resources. Deals are made internationally to support autocracies and dictatorships even while asserting the ideals of democracy. The very acts necessary to counter the Chinese challenge also appear to reinforce China's own assertions that international norms are flawed and need to be redrafted to take into consideration alternative approaches and limit assertions of Western universalism. 

The challenge for the United States is not merely one of military might, or of economic strength, but of ideals and ideas. Rebuilding consensus at home will be difficult, ensuring consensus internationally even harder. The greater the perceived threat from China, the more likely it is that some form of cohesion can take hold. For Beijing, then, the primary task is to continue to exploit differences inside the United States and between Washington and its partners and allies, while at the same time strengthening its economic, political and security relations along its periphery. For both, it is a combination of the physical and the ideological. For now, China has narrowed the gap on the former, and appears ahead on the latter.