The US-China rivalry has led to an “over-securitization of almost everything” and echoes the tensions of the 1930s, a leading Chinese strategist has said.
Yu Tiejun, president of Peking University’s Institute of International and Strategic Studies, made the remarks at the Asia New Vision Forum in Singapore on Tuesday. He said the United States should be more confident in competing with China, particularly in technology.
“In technological innovation, the U.S. has many opportunities and should be more confident in competing [with China],” Mr Yu said.
His comments came after relations between Washington and Beijing warmed slightly following Chinese President Xi’s visit to Washington last week. The two countries agreed to extend their bilateral trade truce by two months.
That limited thaw has eased some of the strain between the world’s two largest economies, whose relationship has deteriorated steadily over the past decade amid increasingly hostile rhetoric and concerns that each is seeking to suppress the other.
“Nowadays, there’s an over-securitization of almost everything: it feels like the 1930s, with rising nationalism and populism between the different powers,” Mr Yu said.
He argued that Washington had little reason to be anxious because of the depth of America’s capital markets. The United States’ leading technology companies spent more than $400 billion on capital expenditure in 2025, compared with $63 billion for Chinese technology firms, according to figures cited from the Boston Consulting Group.
Valuations for Anthropic and OpenAI also significantly exceed those of Chinese artificial intelligence companies including DeepSeek and Moonshot AI, the forum heard.
Mr Yu said China wanted to act as a stabilising force in an increasingly divided international system, echoing President Xi’s vision of an equal and orderly multipolar world.
“China wants to be a stabilizing force, [especially as] the U.S. and Russia—two of the world’s biggest countries—are involved in regional conflicts,” he said.
Joseph Liow, dean of the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy and a fellow panellist, said the two powers should look for areas in which they could work together.
“There are areas in technology where the U.S. and China can cooperate for the betterment of humanity,” he said, identifying AI governance and biotechnology as possible areas of collaboration. “The problem is politics, basically.”
Southeast Asia seeks strategic autonomy
The rivalry is also putting pressure on smaller countries, particularly in Southeast Asia, which are increasingly being forced to choose between the United States and China.
Mr Liow said those countries should pursue strategic autonomy by managing their dependence on outside powers so that it did not become a vulnerability.
“Countries need to have the space to pursue their own interests in the way they see fit,” he said. “This isn’t about being independent from the rest of the world… but about managing their dependence on external powers such that those dependencies don’t become vulnerabilities.”
Southeast Asia’s economy is forecast to grow by 4.7% in 2026 and 4.9% in 2027, after the Asian Development Bank raised its projections on September 23. Growth remains uneven across the region, while differences in national priorities continue to make regional integration difficult.
Mr Liow described integration through the Association of Southeast Asian Nations as a “moving target”, saying the bloc appeared unable to reach a final endpoint. Singapore, which is due to chair ASEAN in 2027, has pledged to strengthen Southeast Asia’s centrality and unity.
Yasuto Watanabe, director of the ASEAN+3 Macroeconomic Research Office, said countries could also draw on wider regional groupings linking ASEAN members with China, Japan and South Korea.
“The ASEAN+3 region has been using a growth model which is based on openness and integration,” Mr Watanabe said. “This is a solid growth model that would not be threatened by a single shock.”
