China must be checked

Hello again, Please free to respond but form your own arguments. Plagiarized arguments don’t count and can’t possibly be as rewarding as developing your own opinions. From what I can tell Pro wrote his intro/conclusion and edited together several unaccredited quotes so he does deserve some credit. The majority of Pro’s arguments are plagiarized; I just realized this after writing my response. The first half of Pro’s section on Assessing China’s ‘Grand Strategy’ is here on page 44. The second half is in the third paragraph on page 42: http://www.aerospaceindia.org... Interesting enough, the first Amazon reviewer Dr.Charles Dusenbury provided Pros opening four paragraphs for the China’s Aggrandizement section: http://www.amazon.fr... Pro’s next block of text is pasted from the beginning of chapter two in this book: http://books.google.com... Next Pro pastes two lengthy paragraphs taken from this website starting halfway through the third paragraph of the article: http://www.southchinasea.com... Pro’s Human rights arguments were cut and pasted from The Human rights world report on page 300: https://www.hrw.org... The majority of Pro’s environmental arguments are cut pastes from this article: http://www.economist.com... Pro still managed to form case that China is a potential threat I still have the same problems with your setup so I’ll address these first. I agree for the most part with your issues with China. They are clearly a rising potential threat and major violators of human rights with a poor environmental record. It does not follow that intervening to prevent growth is the obligatory or likely solution. My rebuttals are pretty quick since I don’t see that your arguments strongly support your resolution. China must be checked: you need to establish that this is possible, feasible and that a power is obligated to intervene or likely to do so. Must is a strong word and you have allowed for no other possible scenarios. In your resolution description you do not add a single qualifier. For example China must be checked if we want to prevent major civil rights violations etc. Nothing must be. China could very well implode financially or become a dominant superpower as you indicate. No other power must check them and there is the strong possibility that no one will. Who is obligated to intervene. Why open with a claim that doesn’t allow for another possibility? From Merriam Webster must is defined as: —used to say that something is required by a rule or law —used to say that someone should do something —used to say that something is very likely There are many other scenarios when your resolution allows only one It’s possible that no power will intervene leading to an extended cold war and arms race with other nations. China may gradually defer to international pressure and improve on their own without the need for intervention. The United States, Europe, Japan, India etc may carry out an aggressive reform serving as a natural check on China’s power and intimidate China into change. China may become the dominant superpower and even initiate another global war. Peaceful negotiations and ramping up international pressure to make changes to civil rights, foreign and environmental policies are certainly preferable to antagonizing China by limiting growth. As China matures and industrializes changes to these policies may come naturally. Abusing your own citizens, environment and neighbors is a terrible policy after all. It is also possible that the Chinese people will revolt redirecting or even eventually overturning their government as we have seen in the Middle East. How is this the top priority assuming we are all interventionists? North Korea recently threatened to destroy South Korea [2] and has made less credible threats against the United States. The volatile country has nuclear bombs and is allied with China. Iran recently threatened to launch a massive missile strike against Israel [3], has a nuclear program and is also allied with China. China is also getting close to another major human rights violator, Russia [5]. Antagonizing China by preventing growth is like punching a bees nest. You define checked as slowing or stopping China’s progress which sounds like an act that could very well inspire war. You concede that China has some very bold ambitions as a country, which is a good thing in and of itself. If another power forces a slowing or a full stop to their progress it’s not unreasonable to suggest that war is a likely outcome. China is allied with Iran opening up the Middle East, along with the nuclear powers [6] Pakistan [7], North Korea and Russia. Any war could easily lead to a global conflict. Who will stop/slow China’s progress? You have said that this does not matter but if this must occur it has to be possible and feasible. Who is obligated and able to intervene and is it likely they will? It has to be in a powers best interest or it is unlikely it will occur at all. I don’t see that an effective prevention of China’s growth would occur unless the U.S. was to back it and I don’t see that any major forceful action is likely in the near future. Rebuttals: Assessing China’s ‘Grand Strategy’ I don’t object that China would like to be a great power but I think there is a good case that the world should try to influence what type of power they will be. If I did object I do not see that the world should feel obligated or is in any position to stop them. If there is an argument here it is that the United States, Europe, India, Japan etc need to get serious about reform or be left in the dust without the power to face a possible new threat in China. China’s Aggrandizement I concede that China’s power and wealth are growing. You have pointed out that China’s wealth has benefitted the world through trade. Any forceful action by another power to prevent or stop growth would both hurt trade negotiations and limit the growth of trade to powers that remain neutral. China’s expansion makes them a possible threat and they are becoming more aggressive I concede, for now, that China’s growth does make them a potential threat and they have been increasingly aggressive with surrounding nations. There are still other options other than preventing growth or containing China. I’m not sure what containing China would even mean. My objections still stand. You need to demonstrate that there is an obligation on some power or powers to intervene preventing growth or that this is likely. Abuse of Human Rights I concede that China is a major human rights violator and that it is desirable for this to be improved. I do not see that slowing/stopping China’s growth or containing the country is a solution much less the obligatory or likely solution. There are many countries that abuse human rights and China is in no way a priority. Maplecroft is an organization that tracks human rights violations and ranks countries according to the risk and severity of violations. Although China is ranked highly as a rights violator it does not crack the top ten [4]. If you can establish that preventing growth would help curb human rights violations there are better countries to start with. Abuse of the Environment “Recently, the Chinese government unveiled a series of reforms to restrict air pollution… Many environmentalists, both in the country and outside, fear it is too little, too late.” You concede that China recognizes the risk of there environmental impact and have voluntarily enacted a series of reforms. If this is too little than they are still open to reform and negotiation. The environment is an international issue and we cannot prevent the industrialization of the rest of the world by force. The world is not on the verge of destruction and the global community needs to work out the environmental problem together. China contributes to global warming You are assuming that the major cause of global warming is anthropogenic which is still a topic open for debate and something you would have to demonstrate here. Assuming this is true you need to show that forcibly preventing growth is the likely/obligatory solution. “Its economy is not only large but also resource-hungry.” That China consumes a lot of resources does not obligate the international community to forcibly prevent growth. The industrialization of third world countries is inevitable and desirable. We will have to work out solutions as we go. The costs of environmental and natural-resource degradation, according to the World Bank, are the equivalent of 9% of GDP, an enormous amount which is dragging down the long-term growth rate. If this is true then China’s actions to deal with the environmental problems are likely genuine and they are motivated to change. - I do not see that you have met your burden of proof. You have essentially argued that China is a potential threat to surrounding nations and abuses its people and environment and I agree. You have not shown that outside intervention to curb growth is likely, possible, compulsory or even an effective solution. [1] http://www.merriam-webster.com... [2] http://www.rawstory.com... [3] http://www.wnd.com... [4] http://maplecroft.com... [5] http://thediplomat.com... [6] http://en.wikipedia.org... [7] http://frontpagemag.com...