Understandable given the media climate whipped up by the military industrial complex.

>> True. But I fear China more.

> Extraordinary rendition, CIA, regime change, foreign invasions. Compare US to China, please

The PRC is explicitly opposed to a lot of basic values nearly all Westerners care a great deal about:

https://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/20/world/asia/chinas-new-lea...

For the most part, US foreign policy broadly attempts to promote and spread those values, though there are some notable areas where it disregarded them or failed (though to properly see those, you sometimes have to look at the big picture).

"For the most part, US foreign policy broadly pretends to promote and spread those values"

I think is more accurate. I'm not sure it matters if China is opposed to my basic values but doesn't do anything about it, and the US isn't opposed to my basic values, but kidnaps and tortures me for a few years because I've grown a beard and went on a pilgrimage to Pakistan.

> "For the most part, US foreign policy broadly pretends to promote and spread those values"

No, it's not "pretend." For instance the US just sunk something like 2 trillion dollars trying to build a democracy in Afghanistan, and you don't blow 2 trillion on anything you're only pretending to do (and if you think it's some conspiracy to line the pockets of defense contractors, there are far more efficient ways of doing that and it wouldn't have stopped).

> I'm not sure it matters if China is opposed to my basic values but doesn't do anything about it, and the US isn't opposed to my basic values, but kidnaps and tortures me for a few years because I've grown a beard and went on a pilgrimage to Pakistan.

You think China doesn't do that? I mean having "grown a beard and went on a pilgrimage to Pakistan" is a literally entry criteria to get sent to a camp in Xinjiang. Also:

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-48634136

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/06/04/world/europe/repression-u...

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/08/10/world/asia/china-canada-s...

You really don't need a conspiracy for the government to pay large sums to domestic industries. It's what governments do. That it's also used for global power projection is without question.

To believe in good intentions, you need to also believe in complete idiocy. "Hey, let's just remove the authoritarian leaders and watch countries descend into civil war, that'll surely bring about democracy, right?" is a weird idea.

> You think China doesn't do that?

No, I'm not aware that China buys German Muslims from Pakistan's military in order to illegally torture & imprison them.

See, the whole spiel would be so much easier to believe if the acts would at least roughly align with the stated intentions. But they generally don't. I don't believe that the US government is made up of idiots, so "they meant well but were misguided" isn't on the table.

This is a slash piece my a media outlet owned by an explicit political adversary. There are no doubt things in China some folks would find difficult to swallow, but a US news outlet is not the place to find them.