Images: Gordon Johnson and here, Pixabay license, collage TLA

In promoting destructive “Western values,” hardline academic Samuel Huntington once said the following:

“The West must exploit differences and conflicts among Confucian and Islamic states to support in other civilizations groups sympathetic to Western values and interests — to strengthen international institutions that reflect and legitimate western interests and values (sic).”

Likeminded academic hardliner Bernard Lewis originated the clash of civilizations phrase in his 1990 essay titled “The Roots of Muslim Rage, saying:

“(W)e are facing a mood and movement in Islam far transcending the level of issues and policies and the governments that pursue them. This is no less than a clash of civilizations.”

Today the clash applies to all nations unwilling to bend to US interests. There’s no “clash” with the Saudis and other despotic Muslim/Arab states allied with the US war OF terror — nor with nations worldwide bending to its will.

In his scholarly works, Edward Said explained notions of colonizers and the colonized — the US-dominated West v. other parts of the world.

In The Heart of Darkness, Joseph Conrad said “the conquest of the Earth which mostly means the taking it away from those who have a different complexion, a slightly flatter noses than ourselves is not a pretty thing, when you look into it too much.”

Modern-day US manifest destiny is all about controlling planet earth, its resources and populations by whatever it takes to achieve its objectives — imperial rage and Pax Americana enforced dominance by another name.

Irreconcilable difference define Sino/US relations. The US prioritizes militarism and warmaking, along with pressuring, bullying, and threatening other nations to bend to its will.

China favors cooperative relations with other nations, along with economic, financial, and technological development to grow the nation into a preeminent power on the global stage.

Both countries are rivals, not partners, the US wanting Beijing’s goals undermined to further its own, toughness its favored strategy in dealing with all independent nations it doesn’t control.

Diplomacy and reason with Washington don’t work, considered a sign of weakness, not strength.

The Trump regime’s war on China by other means heads toward becoming more serious than already.

On Thursday, his State Department called Beijing a “thuggish regime” in response to personal information released about a Hong Kong-based US official.

The unacceptable remark followed a complaint by China’s Hong Kong-based Office of the Commissioner of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs over US official Julie Eadeh’s meeting with individuals involved in the city’s US-supported protests.

They’ve been ongoing for months, aiming to destabilize China, a common US tactic against nations it doesn’t control, including color revolution attempts to topple sitting governments.

China state media called demonstrations and related violence a “conspiracy with the West.”

China’s Global Times (GT) earlier said the city’s “future won’t be held hostage by (the) opposition and its Western supporters,” adding:

“(I)nternational forces have increasingly collaborated with the opposition in Hong Kong.” In May individuals involved visited the US to meet with House Speaker Pelosi and Pompeo, clearly discussing anti-Beijing strategy.

“Washington has been particularly active in meddling in Hong Kong affairs…to pressure China,” said GT.

The US is collaborating with opposition elements, its longstanding practice in sovereign independent countries it doesn’t control, a flagrant international law violation.

Beijing’s Hong Kong foreign ministry office demanded the US “immediately make a clean break from anti-China forces who stir up trouble in (the city), stop sending out wrong signals to violent offenders, refrain from meddling with Hong Kong affairs, and avoid going further down the wrong path.”

Days earlier, the State Department expressed strong support for Hong Kong protesters — unrelated to “freedom of expression and freedom of peaceful assembly.”

On Friday, the People’s Daily, China’s official broadsheet, said Beijing “made it clear that it will not allow this situation to continue,” adding:

“Basic Law of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region gives the central authorities ample methods and sufficient strength to promptly settle any possible turmoil should it occur.”

“It would be wise if both the radical protesters and the foreign forces colluding with lawbreakers in Hong Kong” understand this and cease their disruptive actions.

What’s going on is part of the Trump regime’s war on China by other means, including unacceptable tariffs, Pentagon South China Sea provocations near Beijing’s territorial waters, the same thing near its airspace, enlisting support from regional nations against Beijing, and advancing America’s military footprint in the Indo/Pacific.

Washington treats all parts of the world like its own, heightening global tensions, risking confrontation with nations able to defend their interests if belligerently challenged.

The US Info/Pacific agenda, strengthening military, economic, and political ties with Japan, South Korea, India, Australia, New Zealand, Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, Myanmar, Singapore and Vietnam is an unacceptable effort to form an Asia/Pacific-type Lima Group against China.

Hostile US policies against the country haven’t worked and won’t likely ahead.

Instead of fostering cooperative relations China, Washington is alienating its ruling authorities, biting off more than it can chew against a nation able to defend against whatever toughness the US employs.

Escalating war on China by other means is a losing strategy — what geopolitical know-nothing Trump and hardliners surrounding him don’t understand — harming the US and world economies by their unacceptable actions.

Author, Stephen Lendman