US sizes up rising rival superpower

BEIJING - When President Hu Jintao shakes hands with President George W. Bush in Washington tomorrow and gives one of his fixed grins for photographers, it will not be just another meeting between the leader of a large developing country and the chief executive of the richest nation on earth.

China is rising fast and is expected to eclipse the US economically in the future - its GDP is tipped to overtake that of America by 2045.

While Bush has only given Hu an hour of his time for a state lunch plus three hours of meetings, the global balance of power is changing and in future meetings the Chinese will set the timetable.

The rise of China is posing awkward questions for the US, with the realisation that its days as the world's economic superpower are numbered.

Some analysts see America entering a period of "managed decline" not unlike that which Britain has experienced since the end of World War II and the end of empire.

Since the Chinese economy began to open up a quarter of a century ago, there are 400 million fewer desperately poor people in China.

Now Beijing wants its remarkable growth to count for something in global terms.

China has overtaken Britain and France to become the world's fourth largest economy and Hu's visit to Washington represents a culture clash on a global scale. China is ruled with an iron fist by the Communist Party, which has transformed a centralised economy into a "socialist" free market, "with Chinese characteristics".

What China repeatedly calls its "peaceful rise" represents a major challenge for the US economy and its role as role as global policeman.

China, with its endless supply of goods and its thirst for energy, has contributed more to global growth than America in recent years, and Beijing is well aware of this. Hu's visit is about boosting China's prestige, earning respect for the world's fastest-growing major economy and matching some of that financial muscle with real political influence.

Japan remains the engine of the Asian economy but it is not registering anything like the double-digit growth rates that China is seeing every year.

What makes the rise of China different from Japan's post-war emergence is that China can match its economic growth with a strong army. China is no defeated nation, struggling out of the ashes; it is a proud country which likes to remind others of its millennia of cultural achievements.

More than half of all industrial goods are made in its factories. The export of these goods, their prices kept low by Beijing's manipulation of the renminbi currency, has generated the cash behind China's economic power.

Hu was all business at the start of his tour. Dinner at Bill Gates' house in Seattle, followed by a cafe latte with Howard Schultz, chairman of the Starbucks chain of coffee shops, before moving to the East Coast, with an itinerary that includes a speech at President Bush's alma mater, Yale.

But this opening has been undermined before Hu even arrives.

The Chinese leader is being given full military honours on arrival but his trip is not being labelled an official "state visit" as such, rather it is something further down the chain.

Face matters in Asia, and some are reading this as a loss of face for Hu. A dangerous move perhaps, given the shape of things to come. For the Bush Administration, the key issue is a huge trade imbalance which is turning ever more political. Cheap Chinese exports are flooding the US market and costing American jobs.

And it is ideological too. China is not a democracy, its attitude on human rights leaves a lot to be desired and the Communist Party's treatment of organised religions angers the devoutly Christian Bush.

The feeling in Washington is that Beijing needs to do more to stave off the nuclear threat of North Korea and Iran, while China's courting of oil-rich, but politically suspect, countries in Africa and Asia also rankles.

A mixed bag of complaints, and the perceived absence of a clear line on China has angered some US politicians. The Senate Democrat leader, Harry Reid, said that Bush "still has no coherent strategy for managing this nation's relationship with China".

The war in Iraq or Iran's nuclear ambitions are side issues compared with the question about China's "peaceful rise" and what to do when it decides to flex its muscles.

Keen to keep the spin positive, senior Chinese officials said Hu's visit would "provide an opportunity for Americans to better understand China's policy of seeking sustainable development and peaceful growth".

Hu remains a bit of a mystery three years into his leadership and little is known about his personal life, beyond the fact that he is frugal with money, likes ballroom dancing and has a photographic memory.

When Bush visited China last year, the two leaders reportedly spoke quite frankly to each other but relations could hardly be described as warm.

In the run-up to Hu's visit, the Chinese released some key political prisoners; offered an olive branch to Taiwan, albeit one that Taipei cannot accept; signalled better relations with the Vatican and offered hope that the exiled Tibetan leader, the Dalai Lama, may visit China.

- INDEPENDENT