I don't think that any country with a military advancing like China's, plenty of ready cash, and a vast surplus of people is at the mercy of smaller countries. Especially for the United States, which is also borrowing money from the Chinese to fund its fiscal deficit.
Actually 2/3 of the budgets have gone into kickbacks or individual pockets. And much of the weapons really bought are what the Chinese would call "Projects about face" i.e. flashy on the surface, but can't be used when the need comes - it is not what I say, but rather military analysts in Hong Kong like Ma Ting-shing (who's about as insider Chinese military strategy analyst this side of the language barrier as possible).
(Remember the days before the first Sino-Japanese war in 1894: Qing dynasty-era China reputedly had the world's 4th largest navy courtesy of the 1860s to 1880s modernization programme (Yanmu yundong) but it couldn't fight against the Japanese despite in larger numbers and roughly comparable technology).