U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Tuesday, April 10 the United States was not seeking conflict with a rising China but urged emerging powers to act more "constructively" in the world, AFP reported.

As academics in China and elsewhere increasingly speak of U.S. decline, Clinton offered a robust defense of the United States and said it still had the military power, innovative companies and core values to make it "exceptional."

But addressing aspiring military leaders at the U.S. Naval Academy, Clinton said bluntly that 2012 "is not 1912, when friction between a declining Britain and a rising Germany set the stage for global conflict."

"We are not seeking new enemies. Today's China is not the Soviet Union. We are not on the brink of a new Cold War in Asia," Clinton told the academy in Annapolis, Maryland.

"A thriving China is good for America, and a thriving America is good for China - so long as we both thrive in a way that contributes to the regional and global good," she said.

Clinton acknowledged concerns overseas about U.S. intentions but denied that the United States was bent on "denying rising powers their fair share" or on bringing them into "a rigged system" designed to preserve U.S. power.

The United States has frequently voiced concern that China, despite its rising wealth and ambitions, has not taken the role of a leading power on tough issues such as North Korea, Iran and climate change.

Clinton conceded that many Americans faced "difficult" economic times but said that there was "simply no substitute" for the United States in Asia and around the world.