First, of course, you're quite right that there's a lot of discussion on China. This year China's defence budget will equal the defence budgets of the top eight NATO allies, not counting the U.S. It gives you a little sense of proportion. Asia's defence spending will equal Europe's defence spending for the first time this year. It would make sense to look at it.
But NATO does not see China as a threat. We don't want to engage in rhetoric that makes conflict with China a self-fulfilling prophecy. I say this on a personal basis, not as a media line. If we constantly call them a threat, then they will feel threatened. As an alliance, we don't take that view. We need to engage with them as an international community, and as NATO, and help bring them into a system that has to accommodate them as much as it has to accommodate us in order to protect what you might call the global comity.
We have a shared interest in free seas, free space, free information, and free trade. So there is a lot on which we can base ourselves. Chinese ships and NATO ships are working together off the coast of Somalia right now. There's a lot of potential to do more. Even so, the Chinese are careful about NATO. They wish to develop relations step by step. That's the expression they use, and they are famously patient.