Kevin Rudd on US-China relations with Fareed Zakaria GPS on CNN

Governments around the world are anxious about the free fall in US-China relations. It is why they want to see Beijing and Washington develop a framework of managed strategic competition to reduction crisis and conflict. Watch Kevin Rudd discuss this with Fareed Zakaria on CNN.

Transcript:

Fareed Zakaria
It was a one-two punch from China's President Xi and his new foreign minister aimed squarely at the United States. On Monday to accuse Western countries led by the United States of containing and suppressing China. He said those actions have severely challenged Beijing and he called on the country to unite as one to fight back because of China's top leaders calling out the United States directly. The next day to Xi's top diplomat warned conflict and confrontation will be the result if Washington doesn't change its tactics. It's safe to say we are in a very dangerous moment in US-China relations. Kevin Rudd is here to help us understand. He is a former Prime Minister of Australia who led the Asia Society for two years but is about to become Australia's ambassador to the US. He's the author of a terrific book the Avoidable War. Kevin, welcome.

Kevin Rudd
Good to be with you on the program.

Fareed Zakaria
So when you hear Xi Jinping say what he did, and his foreign minister say what he did, this is a big change for for the Chinese who have tended to not refer to the United States by name, specifically, accuse it in the way they did. What’s going on?

Kevin Rudd
I must admit as someone who has looked at this for the last 40 years, I was surprised. It's probably not since the 90s that I’ve seen a Chinese paramount leader attack the United States by name. They usually have an expression which says such and such a country…

 Fareed Zakaria
Certain nations…

Kevin Rudd
And that diplomacy was pushed to one side. And then of course, the foreign minister went one step further by saying that if the United States continues its current posture, in particular on Taiwan, inevitably this will result in conflict,  I've never heard that from a Chinese foreign minister before. So I think two things are at play here. I think both Xi Jinping and his team are under considerable domestic economic pressure at present from a very slow economy. And this has been an opportunity for Xi Jinping to say you know, we know you’re going through a hard time domestically, growth’s been down, unemployment’s been up, prices are a problem, in certain areas, but the United States and its allies have been making life impossible for us by the pressure they’ve brought to bear on us domestically, so I think that’s one of the rationales, but you know, when a Chinese president says something as definitive as this, it also has its own intrinsic foreign policy significance. And I do believe it further accelerates China's preparedness military for a future action over Taiwan if and when Xi Jinping so chooses.

Fareed Zakaria
So how did we get here? If Rip Van Winkle were to have gone to sleep when Obama was having that meeting in Sunnylands with Xi Jinping and they take their jackets off and walk together. It seems like yes, a complicated relationship, some of the stuff they were talking about was China's economic espionage, US support for Taiwan, but manageable. And from there, we're now at what seems like the beginning of a new Cold War. What happened?

Kevin Rudd
I think two or three things, Fareed. The first is the balance of power between these two countries has really changed again over the last 10 years. China was becoming more powerful, but the acceleration of the gap, or should I say the narrowing of the gap, between China and the US and military capabilities and also in aggregate economic size has caused China to conclude it has an ability now to project its own interests and values in a way in which it didn’t see as possible before. The second big change-driver, I think, is Xi Jinping himself, in the dynamic of Xi’s leadership is a change-driver in itself. Idealogically, he’s a Marxist-Leninist. He’s a much more dedicated advocate of an assertive foreign and security policy and you see him pushing the trajectory and accelerating the velocity of China's – shall we say – moment in the global sun. And then third, the United States has pushed back.

Fareed Zakaria
I wanted to ask you about that because the other big shift that took place since then was the election of Donald Trump and a much, much tougher foreign policy, first economically and then what do you think happened? Watching it from the outside as an Australian, what strikes you about why and how did America change?

Kevin Rudd
Well if you look at late-term Obama remember there were already some changes. Remember President Obama was responsible for the pivot to Asia. Remember Obama initiated the Trans Pacific Partnership which, if you like, was a way of bringing the free economies of Asia together under American leadership dealing with the emerging economic monolith which was China. But you're right, things did radically change under Donald Trump. The reasons for it driven essentially in the first instance by the view of the Trump administration on trade. That this was a net-loser for the United States, that jobs had been sacrificed, and they galvanised a series of reservations already alive in the American debate, which caused the launching of the trade war of 2018-19 and then of course, the turbo-charging influence of COVID and the Wuhan origins and where that took the relationship. So that then you had the formal proclamation of a new doctrine of strategic competition by the new National Security Adviser H. R. McMaster. So this was a rapid transition during Trump but the beginnings of it lay in late-Obama.

Fareed Zakaria
We are back here on GPS talking about relations between Beijing and Washington with Kevin Rudd, the former Prime Minister of Australia, soon to become Canberra’s ambassador to Washington. Kevin, help us understand China's calculation with regard to Ukraine. Does it help China to have Russia in this war. It feels like the war is not going particularly well for Russia, but how does China view this war?

Kevin Rudd
You know, often looking from the outside we think what’s in this for China. China's at risk of shredding its international reputation by being too close to Putin’s invasion of Ukraine, not sufficiently independent, etc. If you look at this relationship, however, through the Beijing lens or through Xi Jinping lense, it's really important to see this: from his strategic view, having Russia onside with China, for the long term, is of fundamental importance. For most of their 400 year history, as you know as a student of this, it's been a heavily armed border. No longer have to do that. There’s no longer 18 Soviet divisons on the other side of the border. China can focus all of its military activity and resources and planning to the maritime theatre, it’s principal future adversary the United States. I think the other thing in Xi Jinping’s calculus is the Russians from time to time will provide rolling strategic distractions, for the United States and other theatres. Syria, some time ago. Now of course in Ukraine, again, causing the United States to be focusing in multiple directions at once. China has one direction to focus on.

Fareed Zakaria
And wouldn't you add, it also gives China Russia as a kind of junior partner, some would say a vassal state, that is – we forget – one of the world's largest producers of energy, oil, coal, natural gas, and China needs that desperately.

Kevin Rudd
Absolutely. It provides secure access, reliable access, and discounted prices – free steak knives thrown in –  in order to have access to Russia’s oil, gas but also agricultural commodities where they are available and applicable. So you put that mix together, from Xi’s perspective, I don't want to do anything, he would say in his own mind, to jeopardise that. Furthermore the last thing he could ever see, from his own interest point of view, would be to sit back and see Putin fail fundamentally let along Putin collapse and Russia itself.

Fareed Zakaria
So will China supply arms to Russia?

Kevin Rudd
That’s the $6000 question. I’ve read carefully what the United States administration have said now through multiple officials, Secretary of State, Secretary of Treasury etc., and the Director of the CIA, about real intelligence on these matters. If you read carefully the text, decisions have not yet been taken. What’s my gut? In terms of where China is at present, unless they were concluding internally that there was a danger of Putin actually losing and actually coming under massive pressure in terms of his own position back home, I do not see that it in China’s interests now to cross that line. Either directly through providing military material directly to the Russians or cleverly through third parties as has often been suggested.

Fareed Zakaria
At the end of your book, which is really terrific, you talk about need for managed strategic competition between the United States and China. It seems we're far from that right now. We seem to be going into a world where just China going to quadruple its nuclear arsenal, where we will essentially be in a nuclear age, which could be quite unstable with very little by the way of arms-control talks and treaties. What would you advise Washington to do to bring things back on track?

Kevin Rudd
I think if we were to have Chancellor Scholz here or President Macron or if we were to have President Yoon in Korea or Prime Minister Kishida in Japan I think the general view would be to the superpowers, both these superpowers, finding a mechanism to restabilise the relationship, use strategic guardrails to reduce the risk of crisis, conflict and war by accident. If they're looking for treatment, you’re student has mentioned relations history, remember after the near death experience of the Cuban missile crisis? The Soviets and the United States for the subsequent 30 years never ever got close to the abyss again. They developed a series of common protocols, including the Helsinki accords in 1975. So I think there is a view across many countries, that taking this temperature down is in the world’s interests, it’s in allies’ interests,  and it’s also in the interests of China’s closest friends and partners as well.

Fareed Zakaria
Is it in order to try to help move things along those those lines that you've decided to take this new job. You are a former Prime Minister, you have a terrific job. You can travel the world. Is that why you are doing this?

Kevin Rudd
No,  it’s the climate in Washington, I just love the sunshine. No, my Prime Minister, who has been a friend and colleague for years in Australian politics asked me, as did the Foreign Minister. , But, I think, their interests, like mine, and their anxiety, like mine, is this is starting to become dangerous. And Australia is one of America's oldest treaty allies. We've been in the trenches with the United States, in I think all of America's major wars in the 20th century, into the 21st century, even some of the crazy ones. And so, working closely with the administration and under the guidance of the government in Canberra, it's about dealing with the granularity of deterrence, dealing with the granularity of mechanisms to reduce the risk of crisis, conflict and war by accident, as well as the roles and responsibility of allies. So, of course, as an Ambassador, I'm promoting the Australian national interest in business and security and defence and all that and I'll be doing that happily  as well. But I think we're living in dangerous times, my friend. Really dangerous times. And I think it's time for all hands on the pump.

Fareed Zakaria
Well I'm delighted to have you on Kevin I'm also delighted because my guess is this being your exit interview from now on you'll be speaking in diplomatic banalities and I will not get something this interesting out of you. Thank you.