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This chapter examines alliance dynamics in U.S.–China relations in Northeast Asia. It analyzes how each nation has used third-party coercive diplomacy to compel the other to restrain its allies' challenges to great power security. A major objective of U.S. policy toward North Korea and the corresponding tension of the Korean Peninsula has been to compel China to exercise greater control over North Korea's nuclear weapons program. A major objective of Chinese policy toward Japan and the corresponding tension in the East China Sea has been to compel the United States to restrain Japanese challenges to Chinese sovereignty claims in disputed waters in the East China Sea. For a brief period, third-party coercion contributed to greater U.S.–China cooperation as each country adjusted its policies toward its respective ally, easing regional tension and U.S.–China conflict.

Few countries get the public’s attention to the extent that China does. And few generate such diverging views concerning its economic, social, and political evolution. This chapter sets the context by noting China’s impressive economic achievements as well as current financial difficulties. Markets are questioning whether China can survive the threat of looming debt and property-market bubbles, while the general public is more concerned with the country’s political stability and security as Beijing becomes more aggressive in its claims over neighboring islands. How does one explain such extreme variation in views? Many factors are involved, which makes it difficult to be ideologically neutral regarding this emerging great power. If the diagnosis is wrong, then likely so are the policy prescriptions.