When the NATO leaders collectively targeted China in their communique issued after their meeting on Monday, the question it raised is to what extent the tough line with US characteristics it presented reflects the position of the rest of the NATO members.

Alleging that "China's stated ambitions and assertive behavior represent systemic challenges to the rules-based international order and to areas relevant to alliance security", the communique pointed accusing fingers at China's military spending, nuclear arsenal and joint military drills with Russia, all of which the US has been banging the drum about.

Yet any undermining of the rules-based international order comes from the determination of the US and its allies to resist the natural evolution of the international system that has been manufactured to favor them. While in terms of military spending, that of NATO is more than half of the world's total, with the total number of nuclear warheads the NATO members possess nearly 20 times that of China. And while China has made a solemn pledge that it will never use nuclear weapons first, NATO and its members have refused to make a similar vow. All of which begs the question: what kind of rules are they claiming to defend as the foundation for the international order?

The rules and principles based on the United Nations Charter are the foundation for the international system. Not those some countries attempt to make and impose on the rest of the world. Both China and Russia, as two permanent members of the UN Security Council, are pillars of that UN-centered international order, despite the false light in which the US and its allies seek to portray them.

The other NATO members should be wary of the proposition that "America is back" as it is merely another means of putting "America first". They should observe China's development rationally. If, as NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said, the alliance does not want a new Cold War with China, the bloc should speak and act to that effect.

As the spokesperson of China's mission to the European Union told the media, the scaremongering of the communique slandered China's peaceful development, misjudged both the international situation and NATO's identity, and provided further proof of the fact that the group is still struggling with its Cold War sequela.

In fact the NATO communique is of little significance except to show that the US and the European members are keen to find some common ground to paper over the cracks that appeared as a result of it being "brain dead'' during the previous US administration's attempts to squeeze more money out of the European countries for the dubious benefits of being under the US' security umbrella. Given that it is the US' anxieties that are likely to be the origin of any miscalculation, the other NATO members might want to think twice about letting the US hold the reins.

A threat is something that presents the possibility of trouble, danger or ruin. What the world has seen at this summit is the practice of clique politics, power politics, and the creation of confrontation and division, which threatens global stability.