In other words, it’s far from fated that China’s rise will track forever upward. The United States and China may never reach the crossover point envisioned by exponents of the “Thucydides Trap”—the point beyond which Chinese power outstrips American, giving Beijing the upper hand in the Western Pacific. But Brands and Beckley argue rightly that an impending stall in China’s rise doesn’t mean the coming years will be free from U.S.-China conflict. In fact, the opposite could well be true. A China on the threshold of decline is a dangerous China—as Clausewitz might prophesy were he among the quick today.
