China on the way to surpassing US in peaceful competition

I am writing with reference to : 'Gunboat diplomacy in offing', by Mohammed Amjad Hossain (Dec 19). In a recent hard -hitting articale, 'How China Can Defeat America', in the New York Times, Yan Xuetong , professor of political science at Beijing's Tsinghua University wrote: 'To shape friendly international environment for its rise, Beijing needs to develop more high -quality deplomatic and military relationships with every country in the world, thus core of competition between China and the United States will be to see who has more high quality friends. And in order to achieve that goal, China has to provide higher-quality moral leadership than the United States.' In fact, China may be winning the competition. While the United States has been losing friends abroad because of its flawed military missions, China is expanding its economic and diplomatic presence around the world. By the end of 2010, China has replaced the United States as Japan's biggest trading partner, it has also replaced the United States  . With the countries belonging to the European Union facing a seemingly insurmountable debt crisis, they are looking towards booming China for support. The United States, facing its own financial crunch, can provide little help. China seems to be well on the way to defeat America peacefully . With the United States facing a financial meltdown and political gridlock at home, it does not have the means and energy left to enter into a new era of gunboat diplomacy against China. With China bankrolling America's budget deficit , the United States is hardly in a position to bite the hand that feeds it.As professor Yan so corrently remarked, ' This will mean competing with the United States politically, economically and technologically. Such competition may cause diplomatic tensions, but there is little danger of military clashes.'