I’m not anti-Chinese. I want better relations with China, free China that is. The way we kowtow to the butchers of Beijing over the Republic of China is despicable.
Well, I firmly believe that test will come. I believe Mainland China will become a democracy someday. But here is the kicker, its easier to feel good about a "free China", when that free China is only 20 million strong. But when that free China is a developed nation of 1.4 billion people, I feel, by that time, people like yourselves (and I don't mean that with any malice) will still not feel any better about a rising China.
By that time, it won't be an issue of whether China has one aircraft carrier, but whether China will go beyond 10 or not. I believe you when you say you are not anti-Chinese. But many Americans, knowing the history of Western civilization, and how the West has positioned herself for the last 4-500 years, will never feel comfortable with a non-Western nation that they do not have the potential to contain. Democracy or not. And this attitude, I feel, is wrong.
America's healthy relationship with other countries, in particular the non-Western countries, is based, in small part, to the overwhelming resources we have over countries like Japan and South Korea, Taiwan, etc. And to a lessor degree, even towards Britain, Canada, Germany, Australia, etc.
I for one, feel that the US can have a healthy diplomatic relationship with a nation in which we do not have overwhelming power over.