Matthew Kroenig, deputy director of the Atlantic Council's Scowcroft Center for Strategy and Security, had an article published by Foreign Policy on Feb 18, calling for Washington to prepare for war with both Russia and China simultaneously. The outbreak of the war in Ukraine on Thursday, six days later, seems to give the Cold War monger a sense of prescience.

However, this argument, which represents the general overall view of major US think tanks, including the Council on Foreign Relations and the Center for New American Security, is a cliche divorced from reality and devoid of insights.

That they parallel the Ukraine crisis with the Taiwan question exposes a collective intention of the US security community to blur the line between two distinct matters so that they can more conveniently interpret both as threats to the interests of the US, if not its hegemony.

Fundamentally, the Ukraine crisis stems from Washington's long-term ignorance of Moscow's justified security concerns as well as Washington's desire to halt the Europe-Russia energy cooperation so that it can keep a tight grip on Europe in terms of security and economy and downgrade it from being an independent stakeholder to its vassal. Not to mention the huge tangible benefits the US military complexes are reaping from the war that the US is actually glad to see.

As for the Taiwan question, the rights and wrongs are more clear-cut. It is an internal affair of China, and upholding the one-China principle is a foundation of the Sino-US diplomatic relations. It is the US' open support of the secessionists on the island to serve its China containment strategy that has made the Taiwan question a flashpoint in Sino-US relations.

The prescription Kroenig offered Washington, that the US and its allies should develop the capabilities to deter and defeat Russia and China at the same time, lays bare how dangerous it will be if the sole superpower is guided by myopic zero-sum strategists.

These US strategists will never accept that only by guaranteeing world peace and development can the interests of all countries, including those of the US, be secured and better served.

What the US needs is by no means to prepare for war with both Russia and China simultaneously, but to find a way of coexistence with them by respecting their security concerns and core interests.

A root cause for the unrest in the world is that the US has never stopped classifying countries into rivals and allies in light of ideology so as to command a moral high ground while forcing the world to follow the law of the jungle.