This is clearly an extreme position, but how extreme do you think it will be in 5 years?
Dictators ride to and fro upon tigers from which they dare not dismount.
To begin with, even if US is to completely ban the entire trade with China, it will be just a prick to an elephant...
Surely, the rest of the world will eagerly buy iToys, and stuff like cheap clothing – China is safe in that scenario. Not so much for US, biggest US exports to China are unsellable anywhere else. Surely, soybeans can be sold as animal feed, but it will saturate the market few times over.
IMO they'll place their bets on regional hot spots and boundary-keeping, while continuing to turn their economic partners into colonial-style resources. A tight game but one with a lot of potential for easy wins for China that can close some important geopolitical gaps. I think 10-20 years is a possibility for open conflict around boundaries, but in 5 years, no way. It's a cliche but I really think they are much too wise for that. Maybe it comes from wallet-feels but it looks like wisdom. To be Chinese right now, and an advocate for war, also means advocating for your own restricted rights to be restricted even further. The smart money is on China looking for economic safety and potential rebounds.
In that time period the US must absolutely continue to 1) diversify in all areas from society and culture to technology theory, 2) rebuild important partnerships that have recently been sabotaged and 3) leverage its renewed cultural signage as political influence within China.
The US has the qualitative advantage in education and technology and we can easily keep that edge sharp enough to cause massive fears within our enemy before conflict ever breaks out.
The west also desperately needs open cultural dialogue-technology (basically: a new vocabulary) regarding nuclear exchange and its meaning and potential. I remember watching an "educated" person expressing nuclear war fears on a C-SPAN broadcast panel in October of 2008 and that prediction was censored by C-SPAN after the recording of the show was posted online. It was just gone. This is unacceptable, both the instant leap to "nuclear war" dialogue after a big financial event, and the censorship. Such black and white extremes clearly illustrate a lack of refinement and education on the topic, and this is nearly endemic in its small but significant way. Embrace the fear, wrap it in more educated terms that put problems and solutions in a more realistic perspective, and move past it.
Xi’s base of power is also not as stable as it seems. There’s grumbling within the party about him over reaching and the slowing economy is giving his opponents ammunition. If things continue on the current path, you may start to see open opposition to Xi’s policies, which will lead to questions about Xi’s leadership.
What makes it an "enemy" of the US?