China was never really a world power, even at its height. Look back at Western history: Alexander the Great, the Roman Empire, the British Empire, or the Mongol

China was never really a world power, even at its height. Look back at Western history: Alexander the Great, the Roman Empire, the British Empire, or the Mongols, or further back, the Xiongnu. Han China mostly stayed confined to its own self imposed borders, with the exception of the acquisition of Xinjiang and the Tibetan plateau, and some voyages by Zheng He. I guess what I'm saying is, if China becomes a hegemonic power, it won't be militarily, it'll be economically, sort of like monopolies/oligopolies today, and those kinds of powers can be resisted much more easily by soft power methods. The economic growth argument fails to impress it. Every nation that goes through an agrarian->industrial conversion experiences huge economic growth until they transition to a developed service sector economy. Much is made about Chinese infrastructure building, but did you ever look at what was done by FDR under the New Deal? 1 million kilometers of roads built. 10,000 bridges. 40,000 schools. etc. The Tennessee Valley Authority built tens of thousands of miles of electric grid. Or take progress in the Space Program of China. It looks impressive, but Von Braun founded the US rocket program in 1945, and NASA was founded in 1958. 11 years later, there were men standing on the moon. Things only look fast now, because developed Western economies have settled into long term 2-3% service oriented economy growth. With China's declining birth rate, rising cost of living and wages, it too will experience a slowdown.