Presently, yes. If China doesn't push too hard, though, they've got the right partnerships in place to start building out a global military presence under the same pretenses as the US within its partner nations' borders. Give it a decade (maybe less) of serious effort on their part and they could rival the US globally, not just regionally.
If they decide to start a hot war (say by invading Taiwan) today, then it'd be catastrophic for them. Most of those partnerships would dry up (by being a good excuse to end a bad deal for the partner nations or by force from the US and other nations).
Yeah, but if they do it 10 years from now, it could well be different. Thus the very interesting book, "2034: A Novel of the Next World War", 2022,
by Elliot Ackerman (Author), Admiral James Stavridis USN (Author).
The interesting thing was about how India had also advanced in those 10 years from now.
If they decide to start a hot war (say by invading Taiwan) today, then it'd be catastrophic for them. Most of those partnerships would dry up (by being a good excuse to end a bad deal for the partner nations or by force from the US and other nations).