BEIJING, Nov 1: China assailed what it called the "Bush doctrine" on the eve of the US election, saying the occupation of Iraq had ruined the global anti-terror coalition and blaming arrogance for problems dogging the United States worldwide.
A searing commentary by a senior policymaker was as close to a position on the US presidential election as China has come. The article on Monday made no mention of Democratic challenger John Kerry.
"The current US predicament in Iraq serves as another example that when a country's superiority psychology inflates beyond its real capability, a lot of trouble can be caused," wrote Qian Qichen, one of the main architects of China's foreign policy, in a commentary in the China Daily newspaper.
"But the troubles and disasters the United States has met do not stem from the threats by others, but from its own cocksureness and arrogance."
The United States was dreaming if it thought the 21st century was the American century, said Mr Qian, a former foreign minister who is credited with breaking China out of diplomatic isolation after the crackdown on the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests.
The invasion of Iraq "has made the United States even more unpopular in the international community than its war in Vietnam", he said in the unusual commentary.
"The Iraq war has also destroyed the hard-won global anti-terror coalition," Qian added, saying it had caused a rise in terrorist activity around the globe and widened a rift between the United States and Europe.
END OF EMPIRE: Mr Qian predicted the US strategy of pre-emptive strikes would bring insecurity and ultimately the demise of the "American empire".
Analysts say China has a slight preference for the incumbent in the US election, realising that US policy towards China has changed little from administration to administration.
But China, growing in economic and political clout, has expressed its aversion to Mr Bush's unilateralist tendencies and sided with France and Germany in opposition to the Iraq invasion.
An article in the state-run Liaowang magazine avoided endorsing either candidate, noting that both Mr Bush and Mr Kerry had avoided criticizing China over human rights because the US rights record was so bad.
The rift in the United States over Iraq was becoming so serious that "no matter who gets into the White House, they will have to face an America that is moving each day toward division", it said.
Mr Qian said the United States had not changed its Cold War mentality. "The 21st century is not the 'American century'. That does not mean that the United States does not want the dream. Rather it is incapable of realising the goal," he said.
After the Sept 11 attacks on the United States, the "Bush doctrine" created "axes of evil", Qian said, using the very phrase Bush coined once to describe North Korea, Iran and pre-war Iraq.
"It linked counter-terrorism and the prevention of proliferation of so-called rogue states and failed states ... It all testifies that Washington's anti-terror campaign has already gone beyond the scope of self-defence," Qian said. -Reuters
