China in our current timeline is also a true ideological and moral competitor to the west.
If our morals are competing, I take that as we are trying to win in the domain of morality, not that the domain of morality is a piece of the competition in the domain of global mind share
These models reflect moral as well as political beliefs. The models are also not compatible - meaning we can't be both and the more of one the less there is of the other. This is the sense in which we have conflicting views and are striving against one another to promote our ideology.
Haven't the 'best morals' always have been those with the most mindshare ?
Praise China!
If their morals were popular that wouldn't have to constantly lie about them.
For me it is not separable from their pasts because those nations would not have stability or the flexibility to make moral choices if they didnt successfully do immoral things to people they didnt like until they were either eradicated or everyone else finally got the memo to leave.
Although it is uncomfortable to be aware of and powerless, there just isn’t a history of intervention to think there will be one with China, or more accurately there isnt a history to suggest that this particular problem wont solve itself.
Secondly, I have to disagree that present day Europe benefits from past imperialism. Pre-imperialist UK and France were doing just fine. In fact, they were doing so well, they decided they could be doing even better by going out and taking over more of the world. It doesn't make sense to me to attribute their modern day successes to their imperialist past. Imperialism isn't on the table unless you're already doing great relative to the rest of the world. I think the US is a perfect example of that actually. We were arguably at our peak globally well before we began military interventions elsewhere in the world.
I think we have to judge a thing on its actions, or the arguments get rather circular.