40 Percent of Americans See China As ‘Greatest Enemy’

(ConservativeSense.com) – A new poll about foreign relations found that 41% of Americans consider China to be the United States’ number one enemy.

The Gallup poll was published on Wednesday, March 20, and questioned Americans about which foreign nations they perceive as the greatest threat. Although China was still considered the primary enemy of the US at 41%, that number was 50% when a similar poll was conducted this time last year. That survey happened during the “Chinese spy balloon” affair.

With the ongoing Ukraine war, some might expect that Russia would’ve been perceived by Americans as the number one threat to the US, but Russia came in second at 26%, down 6% from the last time the poll was conducted. In third place was Iran with 9%, which is a 7% increase since the last poll. North Korea came in at 4%, down from 7% last year.

Perhaps the most surprising change since last year is that those who viewed the US as its own worst enemy reached 5%, exceeding 2% for the first time. Last year, only 1% of respondents said the US itself was its greatest threat.

The survey also looked at political affiliation in relation to the questions, finding that 67% of those who viewed China as the greatest threat were Republicans, 40% were independents, and only 18% were Democrats. The biggest threat to Democrat respondents was Russia, which 48% of Democrats selected. Only 10% of Republicans viewed Russia as the greatest threat, and 21% of independents.

Despite the fact that most perceived China as the biggest enemy, that country did not stop the list of which nation Americans viewed most unfavorably, which was North Korea at 87%. Close behind was Russia at 86% and then Afghanistan at 82%.

In contrast, the countries viewed most favorably by Americans were Japan and Canada, each coming in at 83%, followed by Great Britain at 82%, Germany at 79%, France at 78%, and Taiwan at 77%.

The Gallup poll was conducted by telephone interview between Feb. 1 and Feb. 20 and surveyed 1,016 adults randomly selected from every state.