Introduction – The Two Clocks
A barefoot monk in saffron robes stands amid a crowd of protesters at Sri Lanka’s Hambantota Port, watching as a Chinese flag is hoisted above his homeland’s soil. In 2017, unable to repay Chinese loans on the loss-making Hambantota harbor, Sri Lanka’s government handed Beijing a 99-year lease on the port and 15,000 acres of land. Ninety-nine years – nearly a century of control over a strategic Indian Ocean waypoint. The shock of that deal reverberated globally. After all, who leases a national asset for a century? The answer: a country playing the long game. Contrast this with the West’s short game: politicians perpetually fixated on the next election, CEOs on the next quarterly report. As one observer noted, Western democracies often “refuse to think strategically unless and until compelled” by immediate crisis. It’s a tale of two clocks ticking at different speeds – Beijing’s set to centuries, Washington and Brussels to soundbites and election cycles.
This divergence in time horizons is civilizational. In China’s narrative, history stretches back 5,000 years, and planning for 50 or 100 years ahead is not unusual. Deng Xiaoping once advised setting aside territorial disputes for future generations – a level of patience hard to imagine in frenetic democracies. In the West, by contrast, 250 years feels old, and four-year political mandates encourage immediate gratification over long-term strategy. It’s often said in geopolitical circles that “Americans have all the watches, but China has all the time.” That old aphorism, allegedly quipped by Taliban fighters about the U.S., captures a truth: liberal societies count minutes; autocratic ones cultivate decades. What happens when two civilizations measure time so differently?
Look again at Hambantota. China’s century-long lease there isn’t an isolated case of patience – it’s a signature move in a global strategy. From Africa to the Balkans, Beijing has been methodically securing footholds via loans, leases, and infrastructure deals that only mature decades hence. Sri Lanka’s 99-year port lease is almost anachronistic to modern ears, evoking the era of empire (the British famously leased Hong Kong for 99 years). Yet here in the 21st century, a new empire of influence is being built contract by contract. And it’s catching democracies flat-footed. While Western leaders seldom look beyond the next election, China’s Communist Party plans for 2049 – the centenary of the People’s Republic – and beyond. Beijing issues mega-loans with “pay later” terms, happy to wait 20, 50, even 100 years to reap the strategic rewards. Meanwhile, Western governments struggle to maintain consistent policies for 4 years at a stretch, yo-yoing with each electoral swing.
This asymmetry – one side buying the future while the other sells off the present – is reshaping global power. “Civilizations die from suicide, not by murder,” historian Arnold Toynbee warned, and the West’s short-sightedness is looking uncomfortably like slow self-harm. Each port handed over, each supply chain ceded, each long-term choice deferred for short-term comfort, represents a small surrender of the future. As we’ll explore, China has mastered turning these surrenders into strength. Through its Belt and Road initiative and beyond, Beijing is effectively “buying time” – locking in advantages that won’t fully materialize for years, but will last generations. And it is doing so while Western democracies, stuck in an immediacy trap, often can’t see past the next news cycle.
This is the century game: Beijing bets on tomorrow; the West consumes today. In the following sections, we’ll see how China wields long-term strategy as a weapon – from debt-driven deals in Asia and Africa, to silent footholds in Europe, to a patient encirclement of the world’s strategic nodes. We’ll also examine how Western short-termism leaves democracies vulnerable, echoing lessons from Rome’s decline to modern Europe’s strategic inertia. It’s a story of present vs. future – and why, unless the West learns to play the long game, it could lose far more than a port.
The Belt and Road Strategy: Loans, Leverage, and 99-Year Deals
On a sweltering day in Djibouti in 2017, Chinese troops ceremonially raised their flag at Beijing’s first-ever overseas military base. The tiny African nation had accrued so much debt to China – building railways, ports, and pipelines – that it had little choice but to grant a base lease as part of the bargain. In just two years, Djibouti’s debt ballooned from 50% to 85% of GDP, with Chinese loans for a water pipeline and railway alone equal to half of its annual GDP. Alarm bells rang at the IMF, which warned Djibouti was at risk of debt distress. But when pressed on these dangers, Djibouti’s president shrugged – if China was the only one offering to build vital infrastructure, what choice did we have? The base opened, cementing China’s strategic foothold at the mouth of the Red Sea.
This pattern – “We build it, you pay later (and maybe default)” – is at the heart of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). Through BRI, launched in 2013, Beijing bankrolls highways, ports, railroads, and power plants across Asia, Africa, and beyond, often on generous credit. The allure is obvious: countries get shiny new infrastructure without immediate payment. But many deals harbor a sting in the tail. When repayments come due, struggling borrowers can find themselves overextended and in Beijing’s debt trap. Sri Lanka learned this the hard way. Former President Mahinda Rajapaksa racked up $8 billion in Chinese loans after 2009 for a spree of prestige projects – highways, airports, and the now-infamous Hambantota Port. By 2017, Sri Lanka couldn’t service the loans, and Hambantota port – built and funded by China – had only ever attracted a few dozen ships a year. The result: Colombo signed away a controlling stake in the port to a Chinese state company on a 99-year lease. In effect, China turned debt into leverage, and leverage into land on a 99-year clock.
Sri Lanka and Djibouti are just two case studies in a broader strategy. Across the Indian Ocean and Eurasia, Beijing has been accused of “debt-trap diplomacy” – extending credit with the strategic aim of gaining control when debtors default. Pakistan, a major BRI partner, has taken on an estimated $62 billion in Chinese projects through the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, from roads and rails to ports. The promise was grand – Pakistan’s officials touted up to one million new jobs from CPEC. The reality? By 2018 Pakistan slid into a balance-of-payments crisis and had to seek an IMF bailout, with analysts bluntly noting that “part of the reason Pakistan found itself in this situation is Chinese debt.”. Even as Islamabad negotiated emergency IMF relief, it quietly sought additional Chinese loans to help stave off collapse. In other words, the cure for the Belt-and-Road hangover was…more Belt-and-Road liquor.
China’s defenders argue that debt traps aren’t a deliberate strategy but rather the byproduct of enthusiastic (if sometimes imprudent) development lending. They note that some failed projects, like Hambantota Port, were driven as much by local politics and hubris as by Chinese scheming. Whether or not every loan was designed as a trap, the outcomes rhyme: when projects underperform and debts mount, Beijing proves patient and pragmatic—trading restructurings for equity, leases, or political alignment. Perhaps, as one Chatham House analyst observed, no one in Beijing initially thought “this port will never make money, great, we’ll get a naval base for 99 years if they default.” It just turned out that way. But intentional or not, the pattern repeats often enough to raise eyebrows. Beijing has proven remarkably adept at converting loans into influence on the ground. When a country can’t pay, China is willing to restructure the debt in exchange for equity or strategic favors. For Sri Lanka, that meant handing over a port. For Djibouti, it meant a base lease at a mere $20 million per year – peanuts for a PLA Navy outpost guarding the Suez shipping lane. In other cases, it could mean mining rights, long-term port operating concessions, or diplomatic alignment with China’s positions.
The BRI’s leverage structure often works like this: China offers to build infrastructure today with Chinese financing and Chinese contractors, deferring repayment far into the future. The partner government, hopeful that the project will pay for itself, signs on. If the project succeeds economically, China earns interest and good favor; if it flops, China is positioned to demand compensation in other forms. It’s a win-win for Beijing, if not always for the borrower. Small countries with limited financial buffers – Laos, Montenegro, the Maldives, Tonga, and others – have seen debt to China mount to unsustainable levels. Eight nations identified in one study (including Pakistan, Djibouti, Montenegro and Laos) were at high risk of debt distress from BRI loans by 2018. Several have already teetered into default or needed bailouts.
What does Beijing ultimately gain? In many cases, infrastructure ownership or usage rights in strategic locations. By 2021, Chinese firms had secured ownership stakes or leases in around dozen ports from the South China Sea to the Mediterranean – a potential “String of Pearls” (more on that later). In Pakistan’s Gwadar, China Overseas Port Holding Company took a 40-year lease on the Arabian Sea port, which could one day host Chinese naval vessels. In Djibouti, beyond the military base, Chinese state companies run the new Doraleh port and Djibouti’s railroad to Ethiopia. Essentially, Beijing extends its logistical reach under the guise of commerce. Each port or rail line is ostensibly a commercial venture, but collectively they form a latticework of Chinese influence spanning continents.
To be fair, Chinese lending has built useful infrastructure that Western aid or private capital long neglected. From power plants in Africa to highways in Southeast Asia, BRI projects have filled genuine needs. Local leaders often praise the “win-win” rhetoric of Beijing’s development deals, contrasting it with what they see as Western lecturing or strings-attached aid. As one Djiboutian official put it bluntly when asked about debt warnings: the West offered us “nothing” as an alternative, so we chose development with Chinese help. This speaks to a failure of Western strategy: while Washington and Brussels dither, China writes checks and pours concrete. However, the debts remain – and when they come due, Beijing is unafraid to play hardball.
In Hambantota, when a local monk likened the Chinese port takeover to a “colonial invasion,” it underscored the backlash that debt-trap deals can spark. Protests erupted, and Sri Lanka’s populace learned a bitter lesson about sovereignty. Yet even that backlash can serve China’s aims: it sends a message to other nations in China’s orbit about the consequences of defaulting. Your ports, pipelines, and national jewels are on the table. Beijing’s long game with BRI loans is not just economic – it’s deeply strategic. Through patient accumulation of IOUs, China is buying influence that can translate into military access, diplomatic clout, and decades-long economic advantages. As one U.S. State Department spokesperson warned, countries must beware mortgaging their future to China. For Beijing, however, mortgaging the future is precisely the plan – because it intends to own that future.
China in Europe: Piraeus, 16+1, and Silent Footholds
Piraeus isn’t a hostile takeover; it’s a contract signed under duress of crisis—and that’s precisely the point. On the docks of Piraeus Port in Greece, enormous blue cranes bearing Chinese characters swing containers from ship to shore. Once a struggling, strike-plagued harbor, Piraeus is now majority-owned and operated by China’s COSCO Shipping. How did the flagship port of Western civilization end up in Beijing’s orbit? The story begins in the depths of the Eurozone crisis. In 2009, as Greece teetered on bankruptcy, COSCO entered a 35-year deal to run Piraeus’s container terminals. By 2016, amid EU-mandated privatizations, COSCO plowed ahead – buying 51% of the Piraeus Port Authority for €280.5 million and committing nearly €300 million more in investments. Athens sweetened the deal with a concession running until 2052. In 2021, after COSCO completed the promised investments, Greece handed it an additional 16% stake, bringing the Chinese company’s ownership to a commanding 67%. In a span of a decade, Piraeus had effectively become a Chinese-run port on European shores. COSCO upgraded facilities and throughput surged – Piraeus is now the busiest Mediterranean port – but Europe woke up late to the strategic implications. A Chinese state enterprise controlling a major entry point to the EU set off alarms about dependence and security. Yet the horse had bolted from the barn; the deal was inked in ink as red as the Chinese flag.
Piraeus is a prime example of China’s silent foothold strategy in Europe. Rather than conquer territory, Beijing writes checks and patiently integrates itself into Europe’s economic fabric. Across the continent, Chinese companies (often state-backed) have acquired stakes in ports (Spain’s Valencia and Bilbao, Belgium’s Zeebrugge), airports (Toulouse in France until recently), power grids, and high-tech firms. Perhaps most audacious was Italy’s flirtation with the Belt and Road. In March 2019, Italy broke ranks with its G7 peers to become the first (and only) major Western nation to sign up for China’s BRI. Rome’s populist government, hungry for investment, rolled out the red carpet for President Xi Jinping and inked a memorandum of understanding hoping for a surge of Chinese money and exports. Washington fumed; Brussels winced. Italy hoped to revive ports like Trieste and Genoa with Chinese partnerships. But the “trade bonanza” never arrived. By 2023, Italian exports to China had grown only modestly, while Chinese exports to Italy had nearly doubled – the trade balance tilting further in Beijing’s favor. Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, a China-skeptic elected in 2022, made the call to quietly withdraw from the BRI deal. In late 2023, Italy formally informed Beijing it would exit the initiative when the MoU expires in 2024. “The [BRI] tool did not produce the expected results,” Meloni remarked dryly. Italy sought to reassure that it still welcomes trade with China, but the symbolism was stark – a Western democracy reversing course to escape entanglement. For Xi’s signature project, Italy’s about-face was an embarrassing blow, but it also underscored how effectively China had exploited European disunity. While Italy joined then left, Germany and France never joined at all, yet continue robust trade with China – raising questions about what, if anything, the BRI “membership” really meant in Europe.
Where China has arguably been more successful is in Central and Eastern Europe. In 2012, Beijing launched the “16+1” format (now “14+1” after some dropouts) to court 16 countries in Eastern Europe and the Balkans. The plan: woo these cash-strapped nations with infrastructure deals and investments, sometimes outside the strict scrutiny applied in Western Europe. Leaders in Hungary, Serbia, Greece (which later joined making it 17+1), etc., welcomed Chinese rail and road projects as alternatives to slow EU funds. For instance, China pledged $15 billion for CEE infrastructure by 2017 and offered easy credit. The marquee project was a Budapest–Belgrade high-speed railway to link Hungary and Serbia (and ultimately funnel Chinese goods from Piraeus into Europe’s heartland). But that project became a fiasco: the EU Commission launched an investigation over Hungary awarding it to Chinese contractors without open tender, and years later it remains mired in cost overruns. Other 16+1 ventures yielded similarly mixed results. By late 2017, only one major Chinese-built highway (in North Macedonia) and one bridge in Serbia had been completed under the format. Even so, Beijing’s engagement reaped political dividends. Countries like Hungary, led by Viktor Orbán, touted China’s approach as respectful and mutually beneficial, a “new form of globalization…based on common respect” rather than Western lecturing. Orbán and others have at times openly sided with China within EU councils – for example, blocking EU statements criticizing Beijing over human rights or the South China Sea. In 2017, Greece (fresh off Chinese investments in Piraeus) vetoed an EU condemnation of China’s human rights record at the U.N., calling it “unconstructive”. Such incidents show how economic footholds translate to political influence. A relatively small investment in a port or railway can buy a friend in EU discussions – a friend who might tone down or veto anti-China measures.
Western Europe, for its part, has been divided and slow in response. On high-tech concerns like Huawei’s 5G networks, Europe sent mixed signals for years. The U.S. and Australia moved early to ban Huawei from critical telecom infrastructure, warning of espionage risks. But as of mid-2024, fewer than half of EU countries had barred or restricted Huawei/ZTE gear. Germany, Europe’s biggest economy, dragged its feet – reluctant to anger Beijing, given Germany’s heavy trade reliance on China (and memories of its ill-fated dependency on Russian gas). Not until 2023 did Berlin signal it might curtail Huawei in 5G, years after warnings. Even then, the approach is cautious. “Europe is unlikely to outright ban Huawei…even so, what is happening is a de facto phase-out,” noted one Carnegie report. The broader point is that Europe has struggled to present a united front. Where Washington sees a strategic rival, EU capitals see a top trade partner and source of investment. This dissonance allows China to “divide and conquer” – or more aptly, divide and co-opt. Beijing deftly uses carrots (investments, contracts, market access) and sticks (threats of commercial retaliation) to prevent a coherent EU strategy against it.
Consider the microcosm of German policy. In 2022, a political tussle broke out in Berlin over COSCO’s bid to buy a 35% stake in a Hamburg port terminal. Germany’s intelligence and security services strongly opposed the deal on national security grounds; Olaf Scholz’s chancellery initially supported a compromise allowing a smaller stake. After public outcry, Berlin imposed conditions and limited COSCO’s share to 24.9%, a face-saving partial approval. The episode revealed how even Europe’s most powerful country found it hard to say no, fearing to jeopardize relations with China. As late as 2024, five EU countries still had no formal investment screening for national security, meaning Chinese acquisitions can slip through unvetted. Even where mechanisms exist, member-states often make exceptions: witness Italy’s previous government letting Chinese firms buy stakes in energy and engineering companies, or Portugal selling its utility to China years back.
Meanwhile, Beijing’s footprint in Europe quietly grows. Chinese automakers are now exporting electric vehicles en masse to Europe, provoking alarm that Europe may become as dependent on China for EVs and batteries as it was on Russia for gas. A report by the EU Chamber of Commerce in China dryly noted that Europe’s vaunted “de-risking” strategy is so far modest – Europe remains deeply entangled. From 5G networks (where as of 2024 only 11 EU states have truly acted to bar high-risk vendors) to consumer goods supply chains, Europe is woven into China-centric systems. Beijing’s “silent” approach eschews confrontation; it works within Europe’s open markets and political hesitations. There are no Chinese troops on European soil, no open threats – just slow, patient encirclement by contract and capital.
All of this has earned China significant leverage in Europe without firing a shot. When the EU considered sanctioning China for human rights abuses in Xinjiang, Beijing swiftly counter-sanctioned European lawmakers and targeted European companies, chilling the effort. When Lithuania dared to deepen ties with Taiwan in 2021, China unleashed economic retaliation not just on Lithuania but on multinationals using Lithuanian components – a shot across Europe’s bow to stay in line. Europe’s response to such coercion has been halting. The European Commission in 2023 rolled out a new “economic security strategy” and anti-coercion instrument, signaling recognition of the problem. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen began speaking of “de-risking” from China – reducing dependencies on key materials, tech, and investment. But implementation remains slow, fragmented by differing national interests.
In sum, China’s long game in Europe is one of stealthy entanglement. It took a historic foothold in Piraeus under Europe’s nose, tested the waters with Italy’s short-lived BRI enthusiasm, and cultivated allies in the East. Europe is belatedly waking up, as illustrated by Italy’s exit from BRI and growing scrutiny of Chinese tech. But as with Russia’s gas, one wonders if Europe will only act decisively after dependency has already become dangerous. An EU think-tank report cautioned that Europe risked “making the same mistake of dependency on China as it did with Russian gas” if it doesn’t diversify supply of critical green tech and materials. The analogy is apt: Europe sleepwalked into over-reliance on cheap Russian energy and paid the price in 2022. Will it sleepwalk into a similar bind with Chinese technology, ports, and investments? If Beijing’s silent footholds continue to expand, by the time Europe’s political class sounds the alarm, the Chinese dragon may already be comfortably coiled around key parts of the European economy.
The West’s Immediacy Trap: Elections, Earnings, and 24/7 Feeds
In the late Roman Republic, politicians doled out bread and circuses to win the next vote while provinces fell into disrepair and legions atrophied. A similar malaise afflicts modern Western democracies: a bias toward the here and now that undermines long-range strategy. The symptoms are everywhere. In Washington, policy priorities flip every 2–4 years with new administrations or congressional majorities; long-term initiatives are starved for funding or killed by partisan whiplash. In European capitals, leaders seldom pursue projects whose payoff lies beyond their likely term of office. Corporate boardrooms, likewise, reward hitting the next quarter’s earnings target over investing in research that may take a decade. This short-termism is often cited as the Achilles’ heel of liberal democracies. As one strategic analysis bluntly put it, democracy’s pitfalls include “a tendency toward short-term return over longer-term interests, being reactive rather than proactive”. Urgent problems that require foresight – climate change, infrastructure renewal, technological competition – get kicked down the road until they morph into crises. Western politics, in short, is caught in an immediacy trap.
The trap has several reinforcing loops:
- Election Cycles: In democracies, leaders are perpetually in campaign mode. Every decision is filtered through the prism of “will this help or hurt in the next election?” Bold but tough reforms (think raising retirement ages, investing heavily in future tech, or implementing carbon taxes) often entail short-term pain for long-term gain – an equation that spells electoral suicide. As political scientist Patrick Deneen observes, liberal societies find it hard to demand that citizens “endure short-term pain as the price of long-term gain”. The result: can-kicking. Bridges and roads crumble, debt piles up, climate mitigation is delayed – because the benefits of addressing them are diffuse and delayed, while the pain (costs, opposition) is immediate. By contrast, an autocrat like China’s Xi Jinping doesn’t face voters at all; he can enact 5-year or 30-year plans without seeking permission from public opinion.
- Financial Quarterly Capitalism: Western capital markets exert another immediacy pressure. CEOs live and die by quarterly earnings reports. Activist investors agitate for stock buybacks now rather than R&D that pays off later. A Silicon Valley venture capitalist once quipped that in the U.S., “we no longer build cathedrals” – i.e. projects that might take generations – because Wall Street demands results this fiscal year. Meanwhile, China’s state-backed companies and sovereign wealth funds willingly take a decades-long outlook, often prioritizing strategic position over immediate profit. They’ll invest in securing rare earth supplies in Africa or ports in Brazil with an eye on 2040 and beyond. American and European companies, accountable to impatient shareholders, find it much harder to justify such moves unless there’s a clear near-term return.
- 24/7 News and Social Media: The Western public sphere now operates on a 24-hour news cycle (or more accurately, a 24-minute Twitter cycle). Political leaders chase viral moments and manage scandal flare-ups, leaving scant bandwidth for strategy. As a policy brief from the United States Studies Centre noted, “relentless day-to-day churn of modern politics and media traps government in a short-term, reactive hamster-wheel that prioritises sensation over substance.” In such an environment, who has time to think 10 years ahead? By the time a strategic report is written, it’s bumped off the headlines by the latest outrage or gaffe. Authoritarian regimes, by silencing discordant media, at least shield themselves from this kind of frenzy (albeit at the high cost of freedom). Democracies gain vibrancy from open media – but suffer a coordination problem, as urgent issues are drowned in a sea of ephemeral content.
- Internal Division and Policy Reversals: Democracies are inherently pluralistic and often divided – that is their strength, but also a weakness for long-term planning. One government signs a climate accord; the next one cancels it (the Paris Accord -> Trump withdrawal -> Biden re-entry being a prime example). In the U.S., defense and foreign policy priorities can swing wildly between administrations (consider the U.S.’s inconsistent engagement in Asia-Pacific trade deals, from joining the Trans-Pacific Partnership to quitting it). In Britain, the Brexit saga epitomized strategic self-harm driven by short-term political calculus. Continental Europe’s frequent coalition governments sometimes collapse before they can implement multi-year strategies. Strategic foresight requires continuity, which democracies find hard to sustain beyond the electoral calendar. A RAND Corporation study on foresight noted that the U.S. government often lacks mechanisms to ensure strategic initiatives survive turnover, leading to a piecemeal approach to long-term challenges.
History provides a cautionary tale. Rome, as a republic, saw its strategic horizon shorten in its waning days – legions more loyal to individual generals than the state, populares politicians riling the masses for immediate gain, strategic planning succumbing to constant civil strife. By the time of the Empire, Rome had more continuity but had lost the republican virtue and adaptability that once drove its long-term expansion. As Arnold Toynbee analyzed in A Study of History, great powers often falter not when enemies overrun them at height of strength, but when internal degeneration rots their capacity to respond. Toynbee famously argued that “civilizations die from suicide” – internal failures – “not by murder” from external foes. In modern terms, the West’s strategic suicide could be a death by thousand short-term cuts: neglecting to invest in next-generation industries, failing to educate for future skills, ignoring climate and energy transitions until crises hit, and so on. Each short-term fix mortgages a bit of the future, compounding over time. It is poignant that while China is often criticized for thinking in centuries (some say it’s a myth or exaggeration, but clearly Beijing does plan decades ahead), the West increasingly struggles to think even a few years ahead. British historian Halford Mackinder warned in 1919 that democracies don’t think strategically until forced by war or disaster. A century later, his words ring true. Western democracies largely ignored the looming Russian threat until tanks rolled into Ukraine; they dismissed pandemic planning until COVID-19 struck; they outsourced industrial production to China for efficiency, only to panic later about supply chain reliance. Always reactive, seldom proactive.
This immediacy trap is the key vulnerability that patient adversaries like China can exploit. Beijing can make a contentious move – say, building military runways on contested South China Sea reefs – and then play for time, weathering the short-lived outrage in Washington (which soon moves to the next issue). China bets that democracies have short attention spans, while it can pursue consistent aims quietly. An anecdote: When Hong Kong’s pro-democracy protests erupted in 2019, Chinese state media remarked that Beijing could wait them out – the protesters would tire, Western attention would move on. Indeed, by 2020-21, a sweeping crackdown ensued while global focus had shifted elsewhere. From Beijing’s perspective, dealing with the West is like playing chess against an opponent with ADHD; if you can handle the initial burst of resistance, you gain in the long run because the democracies’ gaze will inevitably flit away.
Critics might contend that short-term focus is an inherent price of freedom – that open societies shouldn’t operate like regimented autocracies. That’s true: pluralism and public pressure bring accountability and prevent grandiose follies. Not all long-term schemes are wise (Mao’s China had plenty of disastrous multi-year plans, for instance). Yet, if democracies cannot find a way to inject some long-horizon thinking into their policymaking, they risk steadily losing ground. A chorus of scholars and strategists in the West now call for reforms to combat short-termism: multi-year budgeting, independent foresight units in government, “sovereign wealth funds” to invest for future generations, cross-party compacts on critical infrastructure and R&D insulated from political cycles, etc. Essentially, the West needs to rediscover strategic patience without sacrificing its democratic soul.
There are glimmers of such effort. For example, the U.S. passed a rare bipartisan infrastructure bill in 2021 – a recognition that decaying ports and grids needed long-term fixes. NATO, prodded by Russia’s war, has drafted new long-term defense plans for Europe (after years of complacency). The EU is crafting 2030 and 2050 climate roadmaps. But often these plans still lack teeth or funding, or they falter when public attention wanes. Overcoming the immediacy trap will require a cultural shift. Political leaders must start telling voters hard truths: that sacrifice today is necessary for security tomorrow. That is a difficult message in a consumerist, instant-gratification society. Patrick Deneen, in Why Liberalism Failed, argues that liberal individualism untethered from a sense of shared past and future leads to “economic, social, and cultural short-term thinking” – people acting as if only the present matters, with little responsibility to posterity. Rebuilding a sense of intergenerational stewardship may be key to Western renewal.
One striking illustration comes from the world of climate policy. The science is unequivocal that cutting emissions now (short-term cost) is required to avoid catastrophe later. Yet democracies drag their feet because coalitions of voters resist higher prices or lifestyle changes today. As the USSC policy brief noted, “the gap between short-term interests of key constituencies and long-term needs of the wider community is only becoming larger” under electoral pressures. Democracies like the U.S. or Australia could have begun energy transitions earlier, but leaders feared voter backlash – now the adjustment will be costlier and more urgent. This same dynamic applies to strategic competition with China: investing in education, cutting-edge tech, and industrial capacity might pinch now but pay off in a decade. Yet until a “Sputnik”-like shock hits, mobilizing democratic publics for that effort is tough.
In ancient Athens, leaders like Pericles thought in generational terms – erecting grand infrastructure (the Parthenon) and pursuing strategies (like long walls for defense) that outlived them. Today’s Western politicians, by and large, lack that mindset, or feel the system won’t reward it. The danger is that a patient power, like China, or even a scrappier one like Putin’s Russia, can exploit our tactical obsession to achieve strategic victories. As the Taliban taunt goes, “You have the watches, we have the time.” The West has the world’s most advanced economies, powerful militaries, and vibrant societies (the watches). But if it cannot muster the will to look beyond next Tuesday, those advantages may slowly erode in the face of adversaries playing the long game.
Consequences: A “String of Pearls” World
What does the world look like when one great power thinks in decades/centuries and its rivals think in news cycles? We are starting to see the answer: Beijing is patiently constructing a new global order – or at least a parallel one – often while the West is busy navel-gazing. The outlines of “the world Beijing is building” can be seen in infrastructure maps and diplomatic alignments. It is a world where key trade routes, ports, and even emerging technologies increasingly bear a “Chinese imprint,” where many nations find their primary economic partner is China, and where international norms bend toward authoritarian-friendly interpretations.
Begin with the literal ports and bases forming China’s “String of Pearls.” Along the arc from East Asia to the Middle East and Africa, China has established or acquired a network of maritime footholds. Taken individually, each can be explained as a commercial venture; together, they form a strategic necklace encircling much of the Eurasian landmass. In the South China Sea, China built artificial island bases outfitted with runways and missile systems, asserting military reach over vital sea lanes. Moving west, China helped expand port facilities in Myanmar (Kyaukpyu), providing access to the Indian Ocean. Further west in the Maldives and Sri Lanka, Chinese-built ports (like Hambantota) sit at choke points. In Pakistan, Gwadar Port on the Arabian Sea, built and leased by China, gives direct access near the Persian Gulf. Up the African coast, the jewel is Djibouti – now hosting not just a commercial port but a Chinese naval base (complete with a pier long enough for aircraft carriers). According to analysis by the U.S. Department of Defense, China is also seeking additional military logistics sites – eyeing perhaps the coast of East Africa, the Persian Gulf, or even the Atlantic in West Africa. In late 2021, reports emerged that China was in talks with Equatorial Guinea for a potential Atlantic base – which, if realized, would mark China’s first such presence in the Western Hemisphere. The Port of Bata in Eq. Guinea, built and financed by China, was singled out as a likely candidate. U.S. officials sounded alarms; China denied any hostile intent. But the very fact that Chinese basing in the Atlantic is discussed shows how far Beijing’s global reach has extended. As one CSIS analysis put it, Beijing’s aim is to have a “global network of dual-use facilities that could be transformed into forward operating bases” if needed. Today they might be commercial ports; tomorrow, they could host PLA Navy warships.
Parallel to physical infrastructure, China has been busy reshaping trade and technology flows to its advantage. Trade: China is now the top trading partner of over 130 countries, eclipsing the U.S. in much of Asia, Africa, and Latin America. It is the central node of global manufacturing. Through agreements like the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) – a mega Asian trade pact that China joined while the U.S. sat it out – Beijing sets rules on commerce and integration in the world’s fastest-growing markets. If the 20th century had an “American order” of trade (the Bretton Woods institutions, dollar dominance, U.S.-led free trade), the 21st is seeing the rise of a “China-centric” trade sphere. Nations on China’s economic belt end up oriented primarily toward Beijing for imports, exports, financing, and technology. For instance, South America’s commodity exports (soy, copper, iron) increasingly go to feed China’s economy. In Southeast Asia, cross-border railways and pipelines now link neighbors to China as the hub. Even in Europe, China has tried to lock in long-term energy supply through pipelines from Central Asia and port deals for supply routes.
Technology and norms: Here, the contest is subtle but momentous. China has invested massively in 5G networks (Huawei), artificial intelligence, quantum computing, and other cutting-edge arenas, aiming not just to catch up to the West but lead. By exporting its tech (like smart city surveillance systems or telecom infrastructure) to other countries, Beijing also exports an authoritarian-friendly model of tech governance – one that emphasizes state control, censorship, and surveillance. At the United Nations and other bodies, China has pushed initiatives framing cyber sovereignty (the idea each state should tightly control its internet) as a norm, versus the Western ideal of a free and open internet. In standard-setting organizations (from telecom protocols to facial recognition standards), Chinese experts now play leading roles, ensuring new global standards aren’t hostile to China’s interests. Consider also the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) – a Chinese-founded multilateral development bank that some see as a rival to the World Bank. In less than a decade, AIIB has grown to include dozens of countries (including many European allies of the U.S.) and financed billions in projects with a more “East-friendly” bent. The “world Beijing is building” thus includes parallel financial structures that reduce reliance on Western-dominated systems. We see steps toward a yuan-based trading system, as China encourages partners to transact in its currency (for instance, recent energy deals with the Gulf states and Russia denominate in yuan). If successful, over time this could chip away at the U.S. dollar’s primacy, with profound geopolitical effects.
Another consequence is the erosion of Western dominance in global norms and institutions. At the U.N., China has gained leadership positions in agencies like the International Telecommunication Union and has used its clout to mute criticism of its policies (e.g., rallying countries to defend China’s actions in Xinjiang as “anti-terrorism” measures). A decade ago, Western officials assumed the international order’s rules – promoting human rights, transparency, liberal economics – were universally accepted. Now, with China and Russia leading a cohort of illiberal states, there is an open contest over norms: Should the internet be open or state-controlled? Should U.N. human rights investigators freely investigate abuses, or does “non-interference” prevail? Beijing consistently pushes the latter stance, often finding support among developing countries who chafe at Western lectures. The longer-term danger is a “two-tier world”: one where authoritarian powers set one set of standards and democratic powers another, with the authoritarian set expanding as China draws more states into its economic and political influence.
Importantly, many of these changes happen gradually, without dramatic moments that spur Western public outcry. Western dominance won’t end with a bang, but with a slow drift. A port here, a tech standard there, a loan agreement somewhere else. Individually, they barely make the news; cumulatively, they redraw the strategic map. To illustrate, consider Europe’s creeping dependence on China – termed by some analysts as Europe’s potential “strategic complacency.” For years, Europe benefited from inexpensive Chinese goods and ravenous Chinese demand for luxury exports, all while assuming politics and security were separate. But as China’s posture hardened, Europeans realized much of their critical supply chain – from pharmaceutical ingredients to rare earth minerals for electronics – comes from China. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Europeans were shocked to find themselves dependent on Chinese-made PPE and medical supplies; Beijing did not hesitate to leverage that for propaganda (and allegedly even for pressuring European states to thank China publicly). The war in Ukraine was another wake-up call: Europe’s painful lesson with Russian gas taught it that economic ties can be weaponized by autocratic suppliers. Immediately parallels were drawn to China: for example, Germany’s auto industry sells more cars in China than anywhere – what if Beijing one day uses that as economic leverage to influence German policy on, say, Taiwan? European officials like France’s Emmanuel Macron have since talked up “strategic autonomy,” implicitly recognizing that relying on a potentially adversarial China for key markets or materials is dangerous.
Indeed, Europe may be stumbling into a dependence on Chinese clean tech just as it exits dependence on Russian fossil fuels. Europe’s push for electric vehicles and renewable energy, while laudable for climate reasons, has a side effect: China dominates the production of battery components, solar panels, and rare earth magnets for wind turbines. In 2021, China made about 75% of the world’s lithium-ion batteries and processed the majority of rare earths. A Carnegie Europe piece warned that by focusing single-mindedly on green targets without securing diverse supply chains, Europe “risks making the same mistake of dependency on China as with Russian gas.”. If in a few years European electric cars run on Chinese batteries, and its power grid depends on Chinese-made solar panels, Beijing gains immense leverage – it could threaten cutoff or actually disrupt supplies in a crisis. The world Beijing is building, in that sense, is one where others are hooked on Chinese inputs and infrastructure. That gives China veto power: any country considering crossing Beijing politically must calculate the risk of its economy being throttled. We saw a dress rehearsal when China blocked imports from Lithuania and slapped tariffs on Australian goods in 2020–21 to punish those countries’ stances. Both were small or medium economies; imagine if China did the same to a larger European economy enmeshed with it.
Finally, consider the normative or ideological dimension: China as a model. While Western soft power still has global appeal (in culture, education, etc.), China is positioning itself as an alternative developmental model – authoritarian capitalism, sometimes dubbed the “Beijing Consensus.” The message to developing countries: you can achieve rapid growth without liberal democracy; in fact, a firm hand might get you there faster. This resonates with many leaders who see Western preaching about democracy as hypocrisy or inconvenience. Over time, if China’s influence grows and Western influence recedes, we could see a tilt in the global balance of ideas. Values like individual rights, press freedom, and multiparty democracy – which underpinned the post-1945 “liberal world order” – might give way to values of state sovereignty, collective stability, and economic rights over political rights championed by Beijing. Already, in forums from the U.N. Human Rights Council to internet governance bodies, Chinese positions have gained traction.
In sum, Beijing’s world is one where hard power is underpinned by ports and pipelines, soft power by trade and tech dominance, and normative power by a coalition of states comfortable with authoritarian governance. It is not a world where Western countries have no place – but they will find themselves increasingly on the back foot, needing to adapt to rules they didn’t write. Europe, in particular, may sleepwalk into dependency, only realizing too late that it has replicated its mistakes with Russia on a grander scale with China. The U.S., insulated by oceans and still a technological peer rival to China, faces its own reckoning: can it maintain enough of the innovative and economic edge to avoid falling into second place? If Western immediacy continues to undermine strategy, the likely consequence is a slow eclipse of the West’s global leadership. Beijing won’t “defeat” the West in a World War-style clash; rather, it will outmaneuver and outlast – buying pieces of the future while the West shortsells its inheritance.
Conclusion – The Century Game
In a famous Chinese fable, a foolish man burns his house down to kill a fly. The West in recent decades, one might say, has been busy burning through its inheritance – economic, political, strategic – in pursuit of short-term comforts, while China quietly amassed leverage for the long haul. The century game unfolding now pits an East that thinks in epochs against a West often stuck in election-to-election thinking. And unless the West radically adjusts, it will keep getting outplayed. As we’ve seen, while the West sells the present, Beijing is buying the future.
Western democracies now face a moment of reckoning. The warning signs are blinking red. Ports that once flew European flags now effectively answer to Beijing. Critical technologies powering Western societies may soon come pre-loaded with Chinese firmware – or simply be overtaken by Chinese innovations if R&D investments aren’t sustained in the West. Diplomatic clout is shifting: when a developing country needs a dam or highway, they often call Beijing before Washington or Brussels. None of these shifts happened overnight, but they are the compounded interest on Beijing’s patience and the West’s distractions. If liberal democracies cannot think beyond the next quarter or the next ballot box, they will always lose to civilizations that plan in quarters of centuries.
This is not to glorify authoritarianism or declare China infallible. Beijing faces its own long-term challenges – an aging population, a debt-ridden domestic economy, environmental strains, and potential pushback from nations wary of its rise. Some argue that China’s supposed long game is overstated, that it too reacts to short-term exigencies (after all, Chinese officials are incentivized to deliver growth now, and Xi’s aggressive moves sometimes seem tactically opportunistic). Yet, the overarching evidence is that China’s system, for all its flaws, has a strategic consistency and an ability to absorb short-term pain for long-term gain that democracies struggle to match. Xi Jinping can launch massive initiatives like the Belt and Road or “Made in China 2025” and stick to them (or quietly tweak them) over many years. In the U.S., by contrast, major policies can barely survive two election cycles without being gutted or reversed – producing an almost schizophrenic strategic posture abroad that allies and adversaries alike lament.
So what is the remedy? The West need not, and should not, emulate authoritarian methods. The great strength of democracies is their responsiveness to people and ability to self-correct. But self-correction requires recognizing the problem. That means citizens and leaders alike recognizing that short-termism is a strategic vulnerability. It means forging bipartisan or cross-party commitment on existential issues: investing in future industries and education, climate resiliency, infrastructure, and defense – even when the payoff isn’t immediate. It might mean electoral reforms or political norms that encourage thinking beyond the next vote (for instance, longer term limits, or independent long-term planning agencies that have influence). Culturally, it certainly means rekindling a sense that we owe something to future generations. The West can take inspiration from its own past: the post-WWII leaders who set up institutions (UN, NATO, Bretton Woods) that they knew would primarily benefit their children and grandchildren; or the Cold War strategists who maintained consistent containment policy over decades until the Soviet Union collapsed under its internal contradictions. That was a long game – and the West won it because it stayed united and patient (mostly). Today’s challenge with China is in some ways more complex, because it’s as much economic as military, and as much about resilience as dominance.
The alternative to adjustment is grim. If Western democracies remain in the immediacy trap, then the trends described in this article will accelerate. By 2035 or 2040, we could see a world where Beijing has de facto control or influence over a lattice of ports spanning from the South Pacific to the North Sea, where key emerging technologies have Chinese standards built-in from the ground floor, and where countries reliant on Chinese trade and investment reflexively align with Beijing’s diplomatic positions to avoid upsetting their economic lifeline. In such a scenario, Western leverage collapses. The U.S. might find its alliance network hollowed as partners hedge or drift away. The EU might find itself isolated, attempting to regulate a global digital sphere already dominated by Chinese tech ecosystems. The “rules-based order” that Western leaders invoke would effectively be replaced by a kind of sino-centric order – not a formal empire, but a constellation in which Beijing is the lodestar and Western capitals are just one group of planets circling at a distance.
One can already glimpse a test case in certain regions. Look at the Persian Gulf: long under American security protection, but now Gulf states openly court China (and Russia), calculating that U.S. influence is waning. China brokered a detente between Saudi Arabia and Iran in 2023 – a diplomatic coup unthinkable a decade prior, signaling that Beijing is stepping into roles the West used to play. In Southeast Asia, nations balance between the U.S. (security) and China (economics), but if forced to choose in the long term, some may lean toward China which they see as geographically and economically indispensable. The slow erosion of Western dominance won’t be a Hollywood-style surrender ceremony; it will be subtle, like sand slipping under the door until the foundation gives way.
And yet, as we conclude, there is nothing inevitable about Western decline – provided the West chooses to wake up. History is not a straight line. Democracies can surprise with their capacity for reinvention. But time is not on our side if we squander it. The alarm bells have been rung by strategists from Washington to Brussels – now it’s about whether leaders and citizens can break out of the comfort of presentism. In earlier parts of this series, we discussed how Western paralysis and shortsightedness (After the Collapse, Bureaucracy as a Weapon, Special Rapporteurs) have allowed adversaries to chip away at the post-Cold War order. China’s century game is perhaps the ultimate example of this dynamic. The West’s greatest adversary, however, may not be China’s cunning but our own complacency.
An ancient Chinese proverb advises: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now.” The West didn’t plant enough strategic seeds 20 years ago – we enjoyed a unipolar moment and assumed it would last forever. It didn’t. Now is the time to plant those seeds of long-term thinking, even if late. If we do not, the shade in the future will belong entirely to trees planted by Beijing. The Century Game is afoot, and every player will live with the outcome. As Western democracies, we must decide: do we continue burning through the present and betting the future will take care of itself? Or do we remember that having a watch is useless if you ignore the alarm? The alarm is ringing loud and clear. It’s time to wind our clocks to the long term – or risk that the 21st century belongs to those who already have.
- The peril of modern democracy: Short-term thinking in a long-term world | United States Studies Centre
- Destined for War by Graham Allison
http://ser.appsc.sab.ac.lk/assets/articles/2024-1-AJPS.pdf#page=88
- Frye, N. (1974). ” The Decline of the West” by Oswald Spengler. Daedalus, 1-13.
- China’s Base in Djibouti: Who’s Got the Power? – The China Story
- Greece completes transfer of 16% stake in Piraeus port to COSCO | Reuters
- Greek Court Blocks Expansion of Major Port Under Chinese Deal
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- China’s “16+1” Equals Much Ado About Nothing? – Reconnecting Asia
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- Is the EU Finally Headed Towards a Ban on Huawei?
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- Is China Building a New String of Pearls in the Atlantic Ocean?
- https://www.csis.org/analysis/chinas-military-base-djibouti
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