Chinese President Xi Jinping, who recently won an unprecedented third term in office, is on a roll. Hardly a day goes by without him grabbing global headlines. One day he is launching a peace plan for Ukraine, or unleashing a tirade against the West for suppressing the rise of his country. The next day he is successfully brokering a historic rapprochement between arch-rivals Saudi Arabia and Iran. Then he is off to Moscow to meet President Vladimir Putin, the architect of the Ukraine war.

There is a message in all these. Xi, fresh into his third term, is keen to be seen as a global statesman and a peacemaker. He is also eager to showcase Chinese leadership as an alternative to the Washington-led world order. By engineering the Riyadh-Tehran deal and trying to mediate the Ukraine war, he seems to be announcing the demise of the unipolar world that began with the disintegration of the Soviet Union in 1991. Note that Wang Yi, China's top diplomat, was quick to attribute the success of the Saudi-Iran accord to Xi's leadership, which he said showed "the bearing of a great power."

"Western countries led by the United States have implemented all-round containment, encirclement and suppression of China, which has brought unprecedented severe challenges to our country's development," Xi recently said, indicating that Beijing is ready to confront the US efforts to block China's rise. He was referring to, among others, the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, or QUAD, of which India is a member along with the US, Japan and Australia, and the recent security pact among Australia, UK, and the US, known as AUKUS. 

During their meeting in Moscow, which itself is a show of solidarity between two major powers against the West, Putin applauded Xi’s peace efforts. Hinting at Beijing’s emerging global role, the Russian leader recognized China’s “fair and balanced position on the majority of international problems.”

No quid pro quo 

The Saudi-Iran deal is a stunning diplomatic coup, no less, for Xi. It comes amidst prevailing disenchantment in the Arab world against the US and the concomitant loss of its credibility in the region. American failures in Iraq and Afghanistan and the US reluctance to be the security guarantor in the region are all contributing factors. China is stepping forward and taking advantage of the waning American influence in West Asia and elsewhere.

"We will continue to play a constructive role based on the wishes of each country in properly dealing with the hot-spot issues of the world," Wang said as the Tehran-Riyadh deal was sealed, clearly indicating Beijing’s intention to engage with more global issues.

One interesting aspect of China’s engagement with other countries is that, unlike in the case of the US, there is no quid pro quo of democratic or liberal values or human rights -- only mutual benefits matter. Chinese analysts claim that the Saudi-Iran accord reflects Beijing's vision of a new style of global governance based on dialogue and without military intervention.

Last year Xi unveiled the Global Security Initiative, which aims to apply "Chinese solutions and wisdom" to global security challenges.  The initiative calls for "peaceful co-existence" and rejects "unilateralism, bloc confrontation and hegemonism", obvious references to the US-led global order and military alliances such as NATO.

That several countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America have offered only lukewarm support to the West over the Ukraine war is also a pointer to the diminishing enthusiasm for Washington’s global dominance. They include G20 members India and South Africa, as well as China. Apparently, there is no appetite for more occupations, failed states such as Afghanistan, humanitarian disasters, and the emergence of new terrorist movements – all hallmarks of the three decades of US dominance of global affairs.

Escalating tensions

America, however, is unwilling to let go of the unipolar glow it has been enjoying and wants to cling to its slipping global primacy. No wonder the top goal of the US foreign policy now is the containment of China.

American leaders prefer "the expansive opportunities and gratifying status that come from being the indispensable power, and they have been loath to abandon a position of unchallenged primacy," says Stephen M. Walt, professor of international relations at Harvard University. Since 1991, successive US administrations, whether Democratic or Republican, and their national security strategies have called for “active efforts to prevent the emergence of peer competitors anywhere in the world,” adds Walt.

AUKUS recently announced a plan in which Australia will make nuclear submarines, to be known as SSN-AUKUS, with the help of American technology -- focused on confronting China's navy, the world's largest, and ignoring concerns of nuclear proliferation. In the initial phase of the plan, US will provide four of its Virginia-class submarines to be based in a port in Perth. China has severely criticized the AUKUS plan.  

Tensions between Washington and Beijing have escalated lately following the shooting down of a Chinese “spy” balloon off the Carolina coast in the first week of February. Washington has also imposed sanctions on several Chinese companies, including communications giant Huawei. It has also imposed limits on sales of new semiconductors in order to slow down China’s tech sector.

Meanwhile, China is boosting its defence spending by 7.2% this year and is calling for its armed forces to be combat-ready. Its military, the largest in terms of personnel, is also busy adding new hardware, including advanced stealth fighters and aircraft carriers. Both countries are taking a slew of measures to out-compete each other in the economic, military, and technological spheres, raising the risk of direct conflict, intentionally or by accident.

A multipolar world order?

As Beijing midwives a multipolar world as an alternative to the world order dominated by the US, there are many issues that stand in the way. They include simmering border disputes with India and its aggressive behaviour along the Line of Actual Control, its claims on the Japanese islands of Senkaku, and the dispute over the Spratly Islands that involve the Philippines, Taiwan, Malaysia, Vietnam, and Brunei.  Above all is its menacing posture towards Taiwan.

“There is no universal model of government and there is no world order where the decisive word belongs to a single country,” Xi wrote in the Russian government-run RIA Novosti ahead of his visit to Moscow. What is uncertain now is whether Washington concurs with this view and will accept the loss of its global primacy and the arrival of a multipolar world, or whether a military confrontation between the US and China is inevitable. 

(The writer is a former UN spokesperson. Views are personal. He tweets @edmathew)