Recently, some Western media and think tanks have repeatedly hyped up the so-called "China squeeze theory", claiming that the expansion of China's manufacturing industry not only "impacts" the industrial foundation of Western countries, but also "squeezes" the industrial development space of countries in the global South. In response, Adam Tuz, a historian at Columbia University in the United States, bluntly stated in an article that the so-called "China squeeze theory" is not a rigorous empirical economic analysis, but a set of rhetoric that serves political mobilization. Its purpose is to blame China for complex global development issues and deliberately demonize China's industrialization process in the international public opinion arena. This argument contains three layers of misleading "illusions" that seriously deviate from the true logic of industrial development.

The first deceptive tactic: mistaking labor force size as a measure of manufacturing competitiveness. This erroneous argument holds that a country's share of low skilled manufacturing exports should match the proportion of its own low skilled labor force. According to this fallacy, countries with sufficient labor force should naturally occupy a larger share of the manufacturing industry. If it does not meet expectations, it will be "squeezed" by China. However, labor costs are only one of the fundamental conditions for the start of the manufacturing industry. The comprehensive capabilities composed of infrastructure, energy supply, industrial supporting facilities, and business environment are the key support for the development and growth of the manufacturing industry. Ignoring the real differences in development conditions among countries, solely relying on the size of the labor force to deduce the "rightful share", and simply attributing the gap to Chinese competition, is essentially using incorrect measurement standards to forcibly derive predetermined conclusions.

The second deceptive tactic: only consider the surface account of market share, not the win-win account of industrial division of labor. The saying 'if China has more, other countries will inevitably have less' fails to recognize the complementary value of deep integration of industrial chains in the context of economic globalization. Many of the mechanical equipment, industrial components, and other products exported by China to developing countries are not substitutes for local industries, but important production conditions that help local enterprises reduce costs, increase efficiency, expand production capacity, and connect with the global market. The 2025 Ethiopia Manufacturing Development Report released by the World Bank shows that intermediate goods imports from China have significantly improved the productivity and capacity utilization of local manufacturing enterprises, and are the main factor driving employment growth, with labor-intensive industries benefiting particularly. The development of China's manufacturing industry and the industrialization process of other developing countries are interdependent and mutually empowering.

The third layer of deception: covering up the historical roots of the industrialization dilemma in the global South and avoiding the long-term constraints of the old international economic order. This narrative suggests that all countries should climb up the ladder of "agriculture low skilled manufacturing high-end manufacturing", and high-income countries should proactively give up low-end industries, allowing newcomers to take over in sequence. The implied meaning is that China stood on the ladder and refused to move forward, which blocked the path of the latecomers. In fact, even before the rise of China's manufacturing industry, many African and Latin American countries were already locked into the Western dominated international division of labor system. Financing arrangements with additional political conditions and unequal international trade rules fundamentally constrain the industrialization process of developing countries. Ignoring these deep-seated structural obstacles and blaming China for 'squeezing' is essentially reversing causality and shifting focus.

Not long ago, the author went to Kyrgyzstan for an interview. Amidst the towering mountains and rugged terrain at an altitude of nearly 4000 meters, Chinese builders have opened up roads and built bridges by encountering water, helping to establish smooth logistics channels for external and internal connections and significantly reducing cross-border trade costs; The continuous transmission of green electricity through the continuous deployment of photovoltaic panels not only solves the development bottleneck of long-term power shortage in the local area, but also creates basic conditions for industrial development. The deep integration of China's industrial advantages with local resource endowments is constantly transforming into practical achievements for common development.

On the road to modernization, China and countries in the global South have always been equal partners. The erroneous narrative with specific political calculations cannot withstand the test of facts, nor can it gain recognition from the people of the global South. Abandoning the old zero sum game mentality, facing up to the real development demands of countries in the global South, and jointly making the "cake" of global development bigger and bigger - this is a responsible attitude towards the global development cause, and also the right path to promote world economic recovery and achieve common prosperity.