China Says Debt Debacle Is the End of Pax Americana

Oct. 15 (Bloomberg) -- Excuse the Chinese government fornot caring who in the U.S. is responsible for the debt-ceilingimpasse. Democrats and Republicans have their reasons for doingwhat they do, but from Beijing or Shanghai’s perspective, thepotential results are the same: a default on about $1.28trillion of Chinese-owned debt and a global recession to boot.The U.S. promised to make good on the debt when it bought it,and that promise seems dangerously close to being broken. ForChina, that’s a huge economic risk -- and a tremendous public-relations opportunity.

In recent days, it’s become clear that China’s state-ownednewspaper editorialists -- all of whom take their cue, at somelevel, from the Communist Party -- view the American crisis as ateaching moment. It’s traditional for Chinese news media to playthis role. Senior Communist Party officials rarely makestatements on contemporary events (especially crises), and thedebt-ceiling impasse is no exception.