LEE Kuan Yew, the retired Singapore leader who remains hugely influential in Asia, insists in a new book that the US will revive economically and strategically - and he expresses concern about China's rise.
The very name China, he says - Middle Kingdom - recalls a region in which it was dominant, "when other states related to them as supplicants to a superior".
"Will an industrialised and strong China be as benign to Southeast Asia as the US has been since 1945? Singapore is not sure. Neither is Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, The Philippines, Thailand or Vietnam."
He says "many small and medium countries in Asia are concerned. They are uneasy that China may want to resume the imperial status it had in earlier centuries, and have misgivings as being treated as vassal states". Full story
