By Duan Xiaolin and Lan Tian
Much of today’s debate about US–China rivalry assumes that Washington and Beijing are on a collision course. Commentators warn of a looming ‘Thucydides Trap’, where a rising power challenges an established one and war follows. This narrative is simple but misleading. Seeing the US–China contest as a life cycle rather than an inevitability offers a more nuanced way to think about the world’s most important relationship.
Power transition theory argues that as a rising power approaches parity with the incumbent, conflict becomes most likely. Applied to today’s geopolitics, this suggests that China’s ascent and the United States’ relative decline mean that war is simply a matter of time.
But history tells a different story. England challenged Dutch dominance before it was equally strong, the United States fought Spain when it was already superior and Japan attacked Pearl Harbor from a position of weakness. Some challengers falter before overtaking, others rise within the order created by the dominant power — and often the strongest states avoid war, aware of its catastrophic risks.
History also shows that incumbents sometimes contribute to their challengers’ rise — for example, Britain’s naval protection and trade concessions helped the United States ascend in the 19th century. China’s ascent similarly unfolded within the US-led order, with Washington encouraging China’s integration into global trade and finance and enabling flows of investment, knowledge and talent. US policymakers expected China to liberalise. But instead, Beijing became a formidable competitor while retaining an authoritarian system.
Many in Washington see past policy as naive, believing that since engagement empowered a rival, decoupling and deterrence must follow. But that the United States boosted China’s development is neither unique nor evidence of strategic failure.
The US–China power transition can be better understood as a course with multiple phases rather than a single match point. China has long been in the catching-up stage, but its current trajectory is far from linear. Slowing growth, demographic decline and structural weaknesses raise real doubts about whether Beijing will ever truly surpass Washington, especially as the United States retains advantages in technology, finance and global alliances. This is not a straightforward power swap.
And contrary to deterministic accounts, major powers often go to great lengths to avoid direct war. Rising states may delay confrontation to buy time, while incumbents may tolerate challengers to preserve stability. Both sides can accommodate, balance through allies or redirect pressure onto third parties.
Recent US–China interactions reflect these dynamics. Ahead of former speaker of the US House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi’s controversial 2022 visit to Taiwan, Chinese President Xi Jinping and then US president Joe Biden spoke directly to reduce the risk of escalation, even though Beijing’s military response to Pelosi’s visit was forceful. Despite tariff wars, China signed a ‘phase one’ trade deal with Washington in 2020. And when the Chinese balloon incident inflamed tensions in 2023, senior officials resumed diplomacy quickly to prevent a deeper crisis. These episodes show mutual restraint, stemming from both sides’ recognition that escalation could be disastrous.
But restraint is only part of the story. While the two governments want to avoid outright war, both sides have built strategies upon the uncertain assumption that China’s rise will inevitably see it overtaking the United States. Washington is reinforcing alliances, investing in competitiveness and hardening its stance on China, while Beijing is emphasising nationalist resilience and preparing for worst-case scenarios, particularly in the Taiwan Strait.
But these strategies risk fuelling confrontation and locking the two powers into unnecessary hostility. In recognising that the course of transition is uneven, leaders can recalibrate and create space for a rivalry that is competitive but more stable, not permanently crisis prone.
The likely outcome may be less a decisive great power conflict than a ‘new Cold War’, characterised by partial decoupling, diplomatic stand-offs, periodic crises and occasional low-intensity clashes. If leaders accept this as the prevailing reality, they can manage competition responsibly through confidence-building measures, sustained communication and acknowledgement of interdependence where it persists.
Strategic conflict avoidance is not simply a matter of crisis management but of recognising the long-term shape of coexistence. Both sides face a choice — to escalate rivalry under the assumption that time is running out, or to accept a complex reality in which power transitions rarely follow a straight line or end in decisive confrontation. The first course risks a self-fulfilling prophecy of war while the second allows for a precarious but stable coexistence.
The prevailing narrative casts China and the United States as destined enemies. But power transitions are complex, often incomplete and not always resolved by war. History shows that accommodation and restraint can prevent catastrophe.
The danger lies in exaggerating threats and treating pessimistic scenarios as inevitabilities. If policymakers in Washington and Beijing believe war is coming, they will act in ways that make it so. Strategic wisdom lies in recognising that the future is open. A sober view of the life cycle of power transition — with its phases, pauses and possibilities — can help both sides navigate the most consequential relationship of the 21st century.
Seeing power transition as a long, uneven process — not a sudden match point — should temper the impulse for rash moves or exaggerated threat perceptions. Neither Washington nor Beijing benefits from treating the other as an imminent danger demanding immediate (military) response. Enduring competition calls for patience, strategic restraint and, above all, investing in domestic prosperity and the welfare of one’s own people rather than draining resources in pursuit of so-called global dominance.
Most importantly, great power competition is not about ‘winning’ in the zero‑sum sense — it is about managing differences responsibly. If mismanagement leads to a hot war, there will be no victors — only profound losses on both sides.
Xiaolin Duan is Assistant Professor in the Global Studies Program at Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen.
Lan Tian is a postgraduate student in the Global Studies Program at Chinese University of Hong Kong, Shenzhen.
