In a world where great-power competition is intensifying, a revealing test of foreign-policy acumen is a country’s ability to avoid costly conflicts or other endeavors that waste resources, divert attention, and ultimately leave them weaker rather than stronger. In other words: staying out of quagmires. Great powers are often happy to see their rivals stumble into strategic quicksand and may even try to encourage such developments, but wise leaders try to stay out of this kind of trouble.

In recent decades, China has done a far better job of avoiding quagmires than either the United States or Russia. Post-Cold War hubris led U.S. leaders to take on a vast array of global responsibilities, some that made sense but many that did not. The “forever wars” in Iraq and Afghanistan are the most obvious examples of the latter, of course, but the United States also gotten itself mired in lesser conflicts in Libya, Yemen, Syria, and various parts of Africa, largely as part of the “global war on terror.”

In a world where great-power competition is intensifying, a revealing test of foreign-policy acumen is a country’s ability to avoid costly conflicts or other endeavors that waste resources, divert attention, and ultimately leave them weaker rather than stronger. In other words: staying out of quagmires. Great powers are often happy to see their rivals stumble into strategic quicksand and may even try to encourage such developments, but wise leaders try to stay out of this kind of trouble.

In recent decades, China has done a far better job of avoiding quagmires than either the United States or Russia. Post-Cold War hubris led U.S. leaders to take on a vast array of global responsibilities, some that made sense but many that did not. The “forever wars” in Iraq and Afghanistan are the most obvious examples of the latter, of course, but the United States also gotten itself mired in lesser conflicts in Libya, Yemen, Syria, and various parts of Africa, largely as part of the “global war on terror.”

One might add the long, inept, and fruitless effort to broker an Israeli-Palestinian peace, which consumed vast amounts of presidential time and attention and ultimately failed, in good part because Washington acted not as a fair-minded mediator but as “Israel’s lawyer.” And now U.S. President Donald Trump has walked open-eyed into a quagmire of his own making with Iran, one with few if any benefits, increasingly obvious costs, and no obvious exit save a humiliating retreat.

Similarly, since 2000, Russia has engaged in a series of frozen conflicts with various neighbors, failed to prop up clients such as former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych or former Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad, and is now mired the running sore of war in Ukraine. Not only have these actions cost the Russian economy and the Russian people a great deal, but they have also poisoned relations with most of Europe and made Russia increasingly dependent on China.

Both Washington and Moscow had reasons for acting as they did, but it is hard to argue that these various adventures left either country in a stronger global position.

By contrast, China has stayed out of costly quagmires and focused on building power at home, constructing islands in the South China Sea, expanding its diplomatic presence and influence abroad, insulating itself from foreign pressure by building up stockpiles and reserves, and gaining leverage through its control of raw earths........

© Foreign Policy