This chapter is about China’s role and behavior in Northeast Asian geo-politics. 1 What have been the main goals of China? How and why has China committed to geo-politics in Northeast Asia? Does China’s growing “power” matter? It will be argued here that China’s geo-politics in Northeast Asia has gone through four stages. This was an evolutionary process of policy changes. It was evolutionary not so much in the sense that those changes happened gradually over the genera- tions. Rather, critical changes happened in the political environment of North- east Asia frst, and next, China adapted to the changes in the environment. The sequence of events mattered. The initial choice narrowed the feld of succeeding policy options. In this sense, these stages were path dependent. 2 China survived turbulent years. The Chinese people had the will and capability to adapt to the changing environment. China was also lucky. It could learn from the experience of the other nations. Step by step, China succeeded in distancing itself from the nexus of Northeast Asian geo-politics. Getting out of this cage, China could fy freely over Asia and the world looking for new frontiers and mar- kets. A socialist regional China has become a capitalist global power. Chairman Mao tried to make China a dominant player in Northeast Asian geo- politics. Deng Xiaoping then changed the goal. Deng’s goal was to become a domi- nant regional power in Asia. In the 2000s, post-Deng leaders changed the goal again. Xi Jinping disclosed the new goal in 2012. In his inauguration speech as General Sec- retary of the Party, Xi declared that China’s goal was to become a global superpower. Has China’s roughly seven decades of experience in Northeast Asian geo- politics mattered? This chapter fnds that China’s commitment to Northeast Asian geo-politics did matter. China learned a precious lesson: how to leave socialism without much fuss and how to implement capitalism without much pain. The lesson remains valid today. Four Stages of China’s Economic Development The frst stage began in the early 1950s when China participated in Northeast Asian geo-politics as a regional socialist power. The Chinese Northeast (Dong- bei, former Manchukuo) became a testing ground of China’s construction of 2 The Transformation of China in Northeast Asia Since 1990 From Regional Power to Global Power Yoshifumi Nakai DOI: 10.4324/9781003288039-4