Unlike the United States, China has to contend with strong regional rivals. Just think of Japan, Russia, and India. Even the smaller neighbors are no pushovers: Taiwan, South Korea, Indonesia, Pakistan and Vietnam; they will put a lot of weight on the Chinese military and economic resources just to defend the Chinese territorial integrity. At best China will be an economic superpower and it will take place as one of the world's leading trading powers. But the economic and military resources of Beijing will always be stretched thin. It has to devote enormous amount of military resources just to defend its territorial integrity from its internal fragilities and external rivals.