04-04 US vs China

Is there anyone as confused as I am trying to determine just what defense spending is all about? Is it more than what nations spend on military personnel and military hardware?
And do different nations have different concepts of war? Certainly no one really thought of war as cyber warfare back in the days of WW2, the Korean War or the Vietnam war. But stealing each other’s technology is more about modern warfare than sending soldiers over the hill.
Certainly China wants to control its own backyard in Asia, and it is building artificial islands as military outposts in the South China Sea. And there is a lot of public evidence of the build-up of the Chinese navy, mostly to intimidate its neighbours like Taiwan, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and Vietnam.
And the 2.3 million Chinese military personnel, and the further one million reservists, suggest China as a potential military threat to the US. It is all very confusing if you are not a professional analyst.
Here is what I mean. The US can have ten nuclear aircraft carriers to China’s single carrier, and yet modern anti-ship cruise missiles, where China excels, can minimize this kind of superiority. Today, military technology means military superiority. It is not a numbers game.
If I was to describe the cold war between China and the US, it would be economic and diplomatic rather than military. And China is winning.
In fact, in my opinion, the US is acting like a failed state, increasing its military spending while borrowing a trillion dollars from China. And promoting isolationism or America First, that allows China to fill the role of global leader. This is happening in Europe, Asia, Africa, Latin America and the Caribbean.
The Chinese diplomatic and economic offensive also has military implications. The more nations of the world that are pulled into China’s orbit the fewer nations that will be able to conduct trade with Taiwan. And Taiwan will become more isolated and more dependent on trade and investment with mainland China.
This, of course, is a better alternative to military conflict between the US and China over the control of Taiwan.
Smart people look at things that will impact the future. And it is China growing at 7-8 percent a year compared to the US growth of 2-3 percent that is a portent of the future. And it is 300 million Chinese learning to speak English.
Here is a scary look into the future. It is China buying $400 billion of energy per year from Russia. It looks like two cold war warriors, China and Russia, becoming adversaries of the US, Japan, South Korea and India.
And as more global trade and investment is done in the Chinese Yuan rather than the US dollar, it is not impossible that the Yuan will replace the dollar as the world’s major currency. Currency controlled by the Communist Party of China.