Why do you present China as an alternative? I’d you’re a western country, the CCP is not a body you want anything to do with unless you’re desperate. They do not share western values. If you don’t ally with the US, you really, really want to be a separate center of power, because everyone who isn’t US wants to exploit you dry and admits it openly.
Why not?
China seems a lot more reliable than the US, and has seem more reliable for quite a while.
You speak as if the US does not exploit others dry. The US is a lot more malignant than you make it sound.
Most of the "protection" and for democracy stuff the US has been up to has been to protect their own corporate interests to extract resources from those countries, see all of South America and some of the middle east.
I don’t blame them for how the world works. I’m saying if I need to be under some ‘protection’, I’d rather it is US than China and especially Russia.