China is no longer an isolated power, and India has recently emerged as a world economic force to be reckoned with. Some financial experts believe that China could overtake America economically in another 25 years and India will be number three, just behind the United States .

How will the West react? Noted Financial Times writer Philip Stephens recently gave this assessment: "The questions that will vex Mr. Blair's successors [in Britain] will be about if and how China, India and other rising powers can be peacefully accommodated in a new international order; or whether we will see the return in Asia and elsewhere of the balance of power politics once familiar in Europe" (emphasis added throughout).

Diplomatic relations with these Eastern nations will gradually move from the margins of Western foreign policy to the center. There will be no other viable choice.

Two rising economic giants

Certainly both China and India will be having increasingly greater impact on the global economic order. Consider this important fact that we cannot ignore: In excess of a third of the world's population resides in these two Asian countries. Both are growing at substantially faster rates than any nations in the Western world.

Surprisingly, this growth is not exactly new in nature. According to Martin Sorrell, cochairman of the India Economic Summit, "If we go back to 1825, we would find that India and China represented the same proportion of worldwide GDP that they are forecast to represent in 2025. And this is a 200 year economic cycle that we are seeing" (World Economic Forum).

This rapid growth is occurring in spite of enormous social problems in both countries, particularly the AIDS epidemic in India. Still, some observers expect economic growth rates to reach double-digit figures before long.

A Sino-Indian accord

We should not forget that these two countries share a 3,500-kilometer (more than 2,000-mile) border. In 1962 in the Sikkim province of northeast India, a two-month armed conflict broke out between China and India. Serious tensions continued long after the truce.

As Dan McDougall of Scotsman.com news reported: "For the past 43 years both nations have bitterly contested their territories on the roof of the world." That is, until late last summer when the two countries signed a joint declaration with so-called "cartographic diplomacy" becoming the order of the day.

Both China and India compromised on key points soothing long-standing border disputes. But this was not all. Among the wide-ranging agreements were bilateral trade, joint petroleum, gas and space exploration and, perhaps much more disturbing, additional accords of joint cooperation between China's 2.5-million-strong army and the 1.3-million-man Indian defense force.

What all this means is patently obvious. As long as there are serious tensions between China and India, the rest of the world might breathe a little easier. But united, these two Asian powers constitute a formidable force from the east. We also must not forget that both nations possess nuclear arms.

As the "World View" feature in Newsweek magazine recently stated: "Thirty years of lectures on nonproliferation and sanctions have done nothing to stop, slow down or make safer India's nuclear program."

Still, President Bush is currently trying to put a cap on the number of Indian nuclear weapons. According to Asian Age, "U.S. President George W. Bush has made it very clear that all 'partners' under his new $250-million 'Global Nuclear Energy Partnership' proposal will have to agree to use nuclear power only for civilian purposes and forego uranium enrichment and reprocessing activities that can be used to develop nuclear weapons."

Yet at the same time, France and India are currently strengthening nuclear ties and have recently forged a new bilateral defense agreement.

The "kings from the east"

Where are all these events taking us in the long run? Prophetically, the Bible speaks specifically of the "kings from the east." It tells us that near the time of the very end of this age of man, the great Euphrates River will be dried up "so that the way of the kings from the east might be prepared" (Revelation 16:12).

This passage is referring to the movements of massive armies that will attack the coming European-centered superpower not long before the second coming of Jesus Christ.

A giant Asian superpower is prophesied to emerge, perhaps comprised of several large nations supported by an array of small ones. This heavily populated power bloc will execute one of the key events that will bring this age of man to an abrupt end and ironically help pave the way for Christ's coming millennial reign.

Trade and economic expansion will precede the main military effort. The armies of the east are currently nowhere near as large as they are biblically prophesied to become. Meanwhile the People's Republic of China is gradually pulling those levers that will eventually put it in a position of undisputed leadership among the Asian nations (at the expense of the United States).

Where is this world headed?

It is enormously important for us to understand how these future events fit together in a coherent manner. Only the Bible gives us accurate information about the overall destiny of nations. No other reliable source is available to humankind.

The United Church of God has published several key booklets about Bible prophecy. They draw these future events together, showing us the ultimate outcome of present world trends.

For starters, please request You Can Understand Bible Prophecy, Are We Living in the Time of the End? and The Book of Revelation Unveiled. All three are free for the asking. WNP