The Chinese have an old saying: When you ride a tiger, it is hard to dismount.
China is now riding the tiger of nationalism, and unless it soon realizes how damaging its actions are to its own interests, it may be too late to get off.Communism's appeal is gone - except among opportunists who have something to gain by manipulating the old system. So the Chinese people need a unifying force to counteract the regional decentralization caused by economic growth - and nationalist xenophobia is filling the vacuum.
There is a rallying cry for Chinese everywhere - from Shanghai to San Francisco - that after a century of humiliation and Mao's social and economic experiments China's time has come. Join the cause of Greater China, they say, and it will rise in the world to the place it deserves.
Of course, in inciting the patriotic fervor of the masses, China's leaders divert attention from the inequities caused by rapid growth to the old devil of foreign intervention.
Thus, best sellers such as "The China That Can Say No" and "Wrestling with the U.S." arise and, as with the Boxer Rebellion in 1900, the drums of nationalism are thumping. The Red Guards who deified Chairman Mao now have descendants who inject the adrenaline of resentment into China's body politic.
The United States fits the role of villain well: big, arrogant, sometimes insensitive and mean-spirited.
In the Chinese view, America blocked China's bid for the Olympics in 2000; NBC maligned China's beautiful athletes in Atlanta and Washington has bullied China on trade, human rights and nuclear proliferation, while encouraging separatists in Taiwan.
But why then is it hard to dismount the tiger? Because once unleashed, this nationalism has caused a serious backlash. Chinese military exercises in March, which may have fired a shot across the bow of Taiwanese independence, set off alarms all over East Asia, causing a series of moves that were against China's national interests.
The Japan-U.S. security relationship was strengthened. The American military withdrawal from Okinawa was shelved temporarily. Indonesia has drawn closer to Australia and is contesting China's claim to gas fields in the South China Sea. The Philippines is strengthening its military and has improved relations with Taiwan.
Last month angry young Chinese in Hong Kong and Taiwan demanded that China stand up to Japan on the disputed Diaoyu Islands - which the Japanese call the Senkaku Islands. But China, anticipating big loans from Japan, only quietly rebuked Japan for crimes during World War II.
As the old men in Beijing consider how to deal with angry demonstrators, they have plenty of lessons from history. The Boxers helped bring down not the foreigners but the Manchu Dynasty. The Red Guards destroyed much of China's leadership.
Yet China's leaders still have not decided to change course. Last month their representative in talks with Taiwan delivered a diatribe condemning Taiwan's "serious misbehavior" and America's violations of its long-standing pledge to limit arms sales to Taiwan and to honor a one-China policy. He insisted, of course, that China remained pure and unblemished.
Chinese everywhere have benefited enormously - economically and politically - from the unprecedented cooperation between China and Taiwan. Any violent move that disrupts trade and investment harms all Chinese and most of Asia. The saber-rattling has set back economic growth, especially in Taiwan, where China's military exercises in March caused the stock market to plummet.
Political squabbling and military adventurism will only provoke international reaction and harm regional stability. China is becoming the big man of Asia, and the region will welcome it as a friend. But strident nationalism will only set the nation back.
For the Chinese, cooperation - with neighbors, distant powers and their brothers on Taiwan - should be the wave of the future.
But first they must recognize the dangers of a Central Kingdom mentality.