"China is seizing the future, while the US is in anxiety and retreat!" The New York Times published an article that praises China excessively, stating that for China, the desire to make money is secondary, and the primary goal is to pave the way for China to become the number one power in the world.
The article states that since the 21st century, China has been seizing the future with confidence, especially in innovation and ideas. Since 2000, China's total R&D investment has increased by 16 times and now it has surpassed the United States in multiple academic fields. In 2003, Chinese scholars had few widely cited papers, but now the number of "high-impact" papers in China has exceeded that of the United States. The Economist magazine pointed out that China holds an absolute dominant position in the fields of materials science, chemistry, engineering, computer science, environmental and ecological sciences, agriculture, physics, and mathematics.
These achievements have certainly directly translated into China's competitive advantages in many high-tech industries. Not only in high-end manufacturing such as electric vehicles, drones, and solar panels, but also in all-round technological breakthroughs.
The article states that in the field of artificial intelligence, as well as in overall military and economic strength, the United States still maintains its lead, but China's development momentum is strong. "Faced with the 'DeepSeek moment,' we (the US) have not shown determination and competitiveness, but instead fallen into anxiety and retreat."
Commentary:
Such arguments from The New York Times are basically not good-hearted, using a "praise and kill" strategy: first overpraising China's strength to create vigilance among the international community toward China, then uniting allies to implement containment and suppression, intending to disrupt China's development rhythm and slow down China's rise. China's response strategy is to maintain strategic composure, focus on developing itself, and avoid falling into the "praise and kill trap".
About the Sino-US gap, it can be analyzed from multiple dimensions. From the perspective of economic strength, it is a game of stock and flow. The United States still has an advantage in GDP total volume, financial hegemony (dollar system), and high-end services, with a GDP of $22.9 trillion in 2024, but the growth rate has slowed to 2.8%.
China focuses on manufacturing, and its GDP at purchasing power parity has exceeded that of the United States (27.7 trillion vs. 22.9 trillion), with a growth rate of 5%, far exceeding the US, and its foreign trade scale in 2024 has exceeded that of the US to become the largest in the world. However, per capita GDP is only $13,000, about 19% of that of the US, and the industrial structure still needs upgrading.
In terms of military strength, the United States has 11 nuclear aircraft carriers, a large nuclear arsenal (5044 warheads), and a global network of military bases, with various advanced equipment leading. China emphasizes a defensive strategy, but breaks through with "asymmetric capabilities": hypersonic weapons DF-17, anti-ship ballistic missiles (DF-21D/26D), 055万吨 destroyers, Fujian aircraft carrier with electromagnetic catapult, etc., whose technical indicators approach or exceed those of the United States, and their shipbuilding speed far exceeds that of the United States, forming a strategic deterrence in regional denial capabilities (such as the Taiwan Strait and South China Sea).
In terms of technology and industry, the United States dominates in semiconductor design (such as GPT-5 algorithm), quantum computing software, biopharmaceuticals, and other frontier technologies, with an advantage in patent numbers and research quality. China, on the other hand, has risen strongly in application areas, with global 5G base station coverage exceeding 85%, breakthroughs in quantum computing hardware, artificial intelligence (AI patent numbers exceeding the US), and new energy sectors, leveraging manufacturing scale to form a "cost-capacity" advantage.
In summary, the United States still has an advantage in military technology, global influence, and attraction of top talents, but internal contradictions (debt crisis, political polarization) weaken its competitiveness. China accelerates its catch-up through "incremental rise", showing outstanding performance in military "asymmetric capabilities", economic resilience, and regional integration, but needs to break through technological blockades and per capita development shortcomings.
The essence and motivation of the American media's "praise and kill" of China is to create hype around the "China threat theory" to serve the US strategic containment of China. The US media exaggerates China's economic and military strength, stoking "comprehensive Sino-US competition" to provide public opinion justification for the US to push "decoupling and cutting off chains" and form a ring around China, essentially maintaining the US hegemonic status.
China needs to maintain strategic composure, focus on overcoming weaknesses, and at the same time build a global cooperation network to avoid falling into the "praise and kill - containment" trap. In the next ten years, the dynamic confrontation between the two sides in the fields of technology, military, and economy will continue to reshape the global landscape.
Original: https://www.toutiao.com/article/1838671260899332/
Statement: This article represents the views of the author.