Sino-U.S relations have evolved from tense standoffs to complex mix of intensifying
diplomacy, growing international rivalry and increasing intertwined economies. The US and
China are usually neither allies nor enemies. The US government does not regard China as
an adversary but as a competitor in some areas and partner in others.
In recent times,
especially since the beginning of the decade the rapid rise of China's power have created
worries and concerns for US. China is viewed as increasingly assertive or even aggressive
in the way it defines its core interests and in its approaches to the East and South
China Seas disputes. As its power grows, it is becoming more outspoken about its interest
and more prepared to defend them forcefully. It became one of the prominent reason for US
to introduce pivot for Asia strategy.
While there are tensions in SIno-US relations, there are also many stabilizing
factors. The PRC and US are major trade partners(second largest in the world) and have
common interests in the prevention and suppression of terrorism and nuclear
proliferation.. The relationship has been described by top leaders and academics as
world's most important bilateral relationship of 21st century. Infact China is the
greatest beneficiary of the existing international system, which the US architected and
helped to create.
Even though differences or strategic trust deficits may persist but with intense
economic interaction and diplomatic efforts both of them tries to maintain positive
direction in the international relationship.
The relationship between the U.S. and
China is vitally important, touching on a wide range of areas including, among others,
economic policy, security, foreign relations, and human rights. U.S. interests with China
are bound together much more closely now than even a few years ago. These extensive
inter-linkages have made it increasingly difficult for either government to take
unilateral actions without inviting far-reaching, unintended consequences.
In recent years, both Beijing and Washington have been putting a lot of efforts to
better manage their relationship and steer it onto a more stable terrain. Yet, the
world's most important pair of nation-to- nation ties is unable to break the undesirable circle of ups and downs. Some of the
recent event have put strain in the relationship are disputes of East China and South
China Sea, the economic advantage China gains from not floating its currency, human
rights violation charges on China, US Asian pivot strategy, which China fears as a
strategy to encircle it, Air Defense zone declaration by China, Cyber warfare and Cyber
espionage by US, Environmental issue.
However, despite all these issues, the United States and China have become
symbiotically intertwined, China is the second-largest U.S. trading partner and is the
second largest holder of U.S. securities and the largest holder of U.S. Treasuries. Both
Nation have common interest in combating terrorism, piracy ,Afghanistan , Nuclear
proliferation. They should maintain cordial relation which not also beneficial for
well attempted.. u can add more recent examples like.. US's support to Japan and pact
with the Philippines and also China voting against US backed resolution against Sri
Lanka, Support to Russia over Ukraine Crisis etc.. well drafted and keep writing
A superpower and emerging power, US and China are on the forefront of any change
happening in world’s page. Recent happenings have made the competition more regressive
but at the same time cooperation has also find its way.
The instances like cyber warfare, US media active reporting about human rights abuse of Chinese by their government, its pivot to Asia as defence pact with the Philippines which will strengthen its Asian arrival and support to Japan on China’s Air Identification Zone had helped distrust to grow. At another side China’s governments favouring indigenous projects, and its regressive emergence in Asia including support to North Korea have threatened US capture of superiority.
While rivalry is on they have tried for reconciliation of which invitation to China as
guest in G8, China move to prohibit some chemicals and weapons export to N Korea ,China
attending Nuclear Secular Summit, and also chances of it joining TPP are some major moves
by both powers to have amicable relations. Positive steps were China-US Strategic and
Economic dialogue and both working on Iran’s’ nuclear program. Both share and
interdependent relation in trade China being second largest trade partner of US.
Both countries relation are full of distrust but they have compartmentalized their
interests in order to let the contentious issu grow in their own interest but not to harm
the economic interest.
The nature of China - US relations depends more on their strategies for influence in the
countries of Asia-pacific than the bilateral issues. The ties are looked stable on top,
but many underlying issues are taking ground.
Both the nations are competing for
increasing influence in ASEAN, which became vital in their long term strategies for
hegemony. China has softened its stance on South China Sea islands; offered MSR, maritime
Silk Road. US has diluted the sanctions on Mynamar; floated TPP, trans pacific
partnership. This competetion is yet to be evolved.
East China Sea dispute and the ADIZ by China hasn’t attracted a strong response from
US, representing US cautious apporach. US pivote to Asia strategy is went to backburner
after Kerry gets in. However, US is bound for Japan's defence by treaty. Both nations is
taking a cautious apporach and avoided extremes.
The evolution of US-japan-India access raised suspicion in Chinese and they perceived
as a containment strategy by US.
Other areas that generated minor differneces include, China's support ot Russia over
Ukrain crisis, nuclear programme of North Korea, safe passage of Snowden though hongkong,
spying by chinese telecom manufactures.
The rise of China has threatened the dominant position of US in world politics.US in
order to retain its position has looked to contain china’s rise by backing states with
which china’s relation are negative. This is the base to US pivot to Asia strategy. US in order to emphasize its seriousness about its Asia pivot strategy has undertaken a
whistle stop tour of Asia, visiting countries with whom china’s relation are hostile.
Japan was one of them, where US president in his visit assured Japan of support in case
of threat from china. If this statement made US intensions explicit, the deal signed with
Philippines, which allowed greater US military presence in the island, was implicit
assertion of its goal towards containing china. China on the other hand has taken the US head on by going against it in the global
platforms like voting against the US backed resolution in UNHRC against Sri Lanka and
also recently pledging support for Russia for over Ukraine crisis. But despite their political ambitions, both countries have huge stake in each other’s
economy .US is vital market for China’s exports and also China is a major investor in US
treasury bonds. Therefore both countries while being hostile towards each other has
maintained a neutral stand towards each other’s peaceful ambitions. words: 217 time : 17 mins approx Please review ..
A superpower and emerging power ,US and China are on the forefront of any change
happening in world’s page. Recent happenings have made the competition more regressive
but at the same time cooperation has also find its way.
The instances like surveillance by NSA in Chinese government emails, US media active reporting about human rights abuse of Chinese by their government, its pivot to Asia as defence pact with the Philippines which will strengthen its Asian arrival and support to Japan on China’s Air Identification Zone had helped distrust to grow. At another side China’s governments favouring indigenous projects, censorship, and its regressive emergence in Asia including support to North Korea have threatened US capture of superiority.
While rivalry is on they have tried for reconciliation of which invitation to China as
guest in G8, China move to prohibit some chemicals and weapons export to N Korea ,China
attending Nuclear Secular Summit, and also chances of it joining TPP are some major moves
by both powers to have amicable relations. Positive steps were China-US Strategic and
Economic dialogue and both working on Iran’s’ nuclear program. Both share and
interdependent relation in trade China being second largest trade partner of US.
Both countries relation are full of distrust but they have compartmentalized their
interests in order to let the contentious issue grow in their own interest but not to
harm the economic interest.
US and China are the world`s two largest economies and have considerable influence on the
world politics. China is the largest holder of the US public debt. China has emerged as
the second largest economy posing a threat to the US dominance.
The events in the east
and south east Asia have impacted the relations between the two powers. US had criticized
the setup of ADIZ by China without prior consultation with the countries in the
region.The call for international arbitration by US for the resolution of the south China
disputes has raised concerns in China. China has published a report on the human right
violations in US including the surveillance on the citizens, gun violence , mistreatment
of inmates and homelessness.
Chinas increased defense expenditure has not been received well by US. The
expansion in the defense capability has posed threat to the US bases in close proximity
to China. The augment of Chinas cyber capacity has created potential for cyber
warfare. China`s support for Sri Lanka in the US backed resolution has impacted the ties.
US has been critical of the low value of Yuan being used by China to boost its exports.
Realizing the growth of China , US aims to foster the ties and strengthen the
relations. US has maintained that it seeks the peaceful resolution of disputes , rather
than the containment of China.
The rise of China over the last few decades have changed the balance of the world
politics, and relation between China and USA have been redefined. There have been areas
where co-opreration has strengthened but at other issues serious conflicts have arisen.
China's rise to world as the second largest economy and continued high growth rate
threatens the unipolarity and balance of USA. Over the past few years. There have been
an increase in trade since open door policy, and totally many US companies have
production units in China. Simultaneously Chinese are the most populous group in USA. At
various fronts like role in Afghanistan, Global war on terrorism, trade, nuclear
disarmament and others the two countries are extremely cooperative.
Simultaneously there have cropped up many dispute areas as well. Cyber security,
declaration of Air Defece Zones, Syrai and Cremia issue etc. the two have taken
unfriendly stances. China's recent occupation of oil fields in Africa and Latin Ameria
have further agrravated the tensions. Counties have accused each other of patent
infringement and cyber space as well. Even on Global Warming conventions they have taken
opposite stances. Recently US refused to join the navy exercise organised by China.
USA and China are two country with two different ideologies and thus few ares of
conflict are bound to happen. World has changed and hence their relations will get
redefined according to time. But it's expected of the the largest two economies that
they wold play a constructive role in the creation of a safe sustainable future of the
world.
Recent trends in US Sino ties have been shaped and calibrated both by geostrategic and
economic considerations.China's rise and challenge to US hegemony,esp in East Asia, is
being viewed with alarm in The US.Its crucial role in US economy is also considered and
taken account of.The recent US foreign policy failures like inability to meet the red
line in SYria,its diminished influence during Arab Spring,afghanistan quagmire and the
recent snubs in Ukraine and paelstine have emboldened China to assert its global role.
China is US 2nd largest trading partner.It employs lakhs of americans,esp in its
manufacturing industry.In 2011.Us and China stressed on positive,comprehensive and
cooperative relationship.There has been increased instances of US China military and
official level contacts.Talks are on Bilateral investment treaty and cooperation on green
economy.Further,discussions have been held on cyber espionage,north Korea and free trade.
However,some roadblocks and power tussles ahve inevitably crept into their ties.The
unilateral ADIZ declaration by China,its support for North Korean regime,territorial
disputes with almost all of its neighbors and hostile relations with major US allies in
the region,taiwan and Japan, have exacerbated Sino US mistrust.The recent US president
visit to East Asia,essentially to reaffirm its committment to the Asia Pacific pivot
announced in 2011,as also to assure its partners of its staying ability and
willingness,alongwith its lead in trans pacific partnership (TPP) negotiations has
further infused mistrust and latent hostility in Sino-US ties.
The Sino-US relations have grown ever since Nixon-Kissinger secret
visit to China in the 1970s. Today, while the US is the largest economy, China is the
fastest growing nation and the fact that its growth is fueled by FDI flows from the US
and other European countries, make the Sino-US tie of great importance to a large number
of human beings on earth today.
Sino-US ties have certain variables that should be kept in mind: a) China's relationship with the two Koreas. Noth Korea's belligerance and threat of US
troops coming close to Chinese soil. b) China-Japan relations as US has signed a Friendship Treaty with Japan. c) China's expansionist attitude, especially in South China sea, as all the trade routes
from Middle east or South Asia, to the Western Coasts of the US passes through this
region. d) China's role at international fora, both global and regional, viz: WTO, IMF, G8, UN,
Asean, SCO to name a few.
In recent years, with the US promoting the Asia pivot doctrine and reiterating its
commitment to contain China and at the same time build a peaceful relationship with the
World's leader in economic growth, gives the idea of how complex the ties are.
On one hand, China is accused of devaluing its currency to fuel its exports on the
other hand the US is blamed of making the US dollar so very crucial for global trade. As
China has already started to talk about an alternate, parallel global trade and economic
architecture citing the undemocratic nature of post second world war institutions of
global co-operation and development, one may see a synthesis of new global order from the
thesis of a unipolar world post cold war to an anti-thesis of expanding China and present
day fears of the start of an second cold war.
<hr/>
PS: About the answer to this question, I think Sourabh had already given a good start.
Though US patent regime is of more importance I think. Specially in renewable energy
sector. Shale gas extraction too is an emerging sector and both US and China are going
to be key players in that market. Plus Chinese Diplomacy is the most intricate I think,
so not much can be said from what we get to read. I am not too much for including cyber
issues here as I have little input right now for that. May be you might have a point,
after all Chinese hackers are known for causing menace and copy rights are heavily
breached in China. Plus one thing should be noted, the US is more interested in
Southern China, where most of the economic activity takes place. As soon as you go a
little North, military bases start appearing. Now US-China economic ties and US-China
defense ties are two different things. I do not know where cyber things will fit into
as it has implications on business as well as security. But then that can be said about
everything else. Ummmm... really don't have much input so.. I feel tell others say.. I
really find China hard to understand :P
In the 21st century era, US and China relations have become complex and multidimensional
as well as with lot of interdependencies. They are neither allies nor enemies, rather are
competitors in some areas and partners in others.
Political ties: -- China views US' Asia Pivot with suspicion as an attempt by US to contain and encircle
China. It assumes the recently concluded defence pact between US and Philippines as a
step in this direction. --US backing China's neighbours in maritime territorial disputes in East and South China
sea has caused tensions between the two. --China's aggressiveness points towards its fear for increasing presence of US in its
vicinity, especially Asia-Pacific. -- To counter China, US repeatedly uses India as a swing state.
Global issues: -- both have difference of opinions on global issues like Syria, Iran, Ukraine. --US views China as more inclined towards Russia. --US blames China along with India for not cooperating on climate change, greenhouse
gases issues. However, US acknowledges the need of cooperation required on issues like North Korea,
Afganistan, proliferation of nuclear weapons, terrorism, etc.
Economic relations: -- in this multipolar world, the rise of China as one of the pole is increasingly making
them as competitors. --US blames China for intentionally keeping its currency devalued to increase its exports
competitiveness. -- proposed Trans-pacific Partnership cautiously excludes China also generates suspicion
between the two.
However, being the world's two largest economies and one of the largest trading
partners, both economies share complex interdependencies. In recent times, trade and
commerce relations have strengthened and both regard each other as important economic
partners.
Post Open Door Policy of US, US and China have emerged as the two largest powers in the
world, be it economic, technological or military. Both of the nations are largest trading
partners with trade crossing over $500 bn in 2013. US has increasingly becoming
accommodative of China and propose a cordial relationship with China in era of Chinese
rise.
However, there have been certain contentious issues between the two nations. * Currency Wars issue, where US increasing said that China is devaluing its currency to
get benefit from its huge exports to US. * Human Rights violations in China. * Cyber Security implications where China has criticized US for Spying and US has put the
same allegations on China. * Despite denial by US, it is also felt that US is keen to contain China's expansion
whereby Chinese claims to many territories would be settled by supporting the countries
who are opposite parties to such claims (Pivot to Asia policy).
Despite all these concerns both the nations can not live in isolation from each other
as both nations depends on each other in many areas like manufacturing, technology,
security, services and many more economic and strategic benefits involved.
Recent trip by United states President to Tokyo and Manila has brought the ties between
US and China to the fore .Though China is not in the itinerary , it is unavoidable in the
agenda. The development of US Sino ties in the recent past can be reflected from multiple
dimensions. Among them ,US attention given to military engagement with countries in the
South China sea and its reiteration on the respecting the status quo when it comes to
territorial disputes will be keenly watched by Chinese. Furthermore, China’s increasing
spending in the military ,cyber and space has exacerbated US concerns . From the economic angle, the rising power of China in global, in particularly Asian
market is undoubted. China s export led growth ,increasing economic integration with
neighboring countries ,especially India, accelerates the US rebalance towards Asia. Trans
Pacific Partnership involving ASEAN and US ,excluding China, stands testimony to it.
Though commitment to cooperation rhetoric hits the stand more often, suspicions building
up on both sides can never be ignored. Also ,the Cremian referendum brings a new dimension into picture. China can’t afford to
lose or offend or abandon its support to Russia for varying compelling reasons such as
internal and external security, leave alone US regarded as common threat. US should also
keep in mind that China s one child policy will change the social structure in China ,it
would be giving more focus to take care of the ageing population and its domestic
concerns. To add further,Countries in this South Asian region will wishfully expect both
the countries to avoid hostilities and build confidence so that win win situation is a
possible scenario. It can be unequivocally concluded that tensions and rivalry will
prevail between two super power and it is not by eliminating these forces but by
balancing these forces peace and prosperity would prevail in the entire world.
America and China are world’s 1st and 2nd largest economies respectively. Also, America
and China is world’s Second largest trading partner. They are having huge military power
and influence in world political affairs. Thus, their relationship is considered by many
strategists as highly critical in 21st century.
Their relations have been improving and
strengthening despite having several issues such as influence in Asia, disputes of East
China and South China Sea, Currency issues and human rights violation charges on China.
USA is concerned that China is keeping its currency deliberately lower in value to
benefit its exporters. Also, China is trying hard to replace Dollar with Yuan as currency
of global and regional trade. Global climate change is another issue, as both countries
are highest consumer of oil and highest Greenhouse Gas emitters. Cyber warfare and Cyber
espionage is another issue of contention.
But, China is also largest debt provider to US. Both countries have common interests
in combating nuclear proliferation and terrorism. Ex – Afghanistan and North Korea. A lot
of people are visiting from China to US and vice-versa for studying, business, working
and living thus strengthening ties. Media has created an important role in building
public perception. Both countries have a desire to maintain stable relations which is
beneficial for not only them but to the whole world.
Nice flow of answer rs5000..covered almost all issues. kindly review my answer also...
The relationship between the two heavyweights US and China has not been smooth and there
have been continuous ups and downs due to converging spheres of influence globally be it
indo pacific or middle east.
There have been some bilateral issues like US initially deployed pivot to asia to
contain china but later on recalibrated to rebalancing of asia,initially opposition of
chienese ADIZ over senkaku/diayou islands and later on criticizing japan on issue of
visit to war shrine. freedom of navigation in south china sea has been also a bone of
contention between these two. In Cyberspace also US initially asked china to promote
freedom of expression and reduce control on internet but found itself wanting after the
snowden snoopgate scandal.
At international fora also US and china found themselves on opposite sides during
climate change negotiations, syria and ukraine issue and recently on Resolution against
Sri lanka for human rights violation.
Though both sides are bounded closely on economic front , issues of counter terrorism
, piracy , Afghanistan , Nuclear proliferation but there is lot of scope of for
harmonization and diffusion of tension.
China and U.S relation can be seen in the lieu of redistribution of power in world
geopolitics. China is rising and U.S is a bit stagnant or rising slowly. The world is
moving towards balance of power. The trend in U.S-Sino relation has been a bit of
animosity. Some of the recent event have put strain in the relationship: 1. Air Defence zone declaration by China, has infuriated U.S and its allies in Pacific. 2. U.S apparent support against China with respect to disputed Island in South China Sea. 3. U.S Asian pivot strategy, which China fears as a strategy to encircle it. 4. Opposition of U.S in global forum, regarding issues like Sri Lanka, Syria etc. However despite of a sort of cold war, U.S China trade has been growing leaps and bounds.
Both of them are getting more and more interdependent each day. Thus, China-U.S relation
may have certain flip flops, but it is not a threat to world peace as was the case during
cold war.
very nice answer Sourabh. you have written about all important aspects. You can add the
dispute over patent rights, especially in solar energy sector. Also, I think the fact
that China is coming under increased terrorist threats, China-US relations should also
be seen in the light of recent defense deals. You could have added one more paragraph about China's economy undergoing changes that
might show new trends in future.
Trump is engaging in the declassification of documents, one of which is the 2018
US Strategic
Framework for the Indo-Pacific that's provided at the top of Pepe Escobar's essay,
"Trump's not-so-secret plan for containing China," that was published yesterday:
"These are the Top 5 items – with no euphemistic softening:
•Maintain as sacrosanct US 'primacy,' code for uncontested military power
•Promote the Quad (US, Japan, India, Australia)
•Fully support the (failed) Hong Kong color revolution
•Demonize everything connected to Belt & Road
•Invest in 'the rise of India'
"On the military front, things get way trickier: The imperative is to prevent Beijing, by
all means necessary, from 'dominating the first island chain' – that is, the island
ring from the Japanese archipelago to Taiwan all the way to the northern Philippines and
Borneo. Moreover, 'primacy' should also be maintained in the 'area beyond.'
"So once again this is all about naval containment."
That's followed by an excellent graphic showing the first and second Island Chains. Of
course, China isn't really worried:
"The 100th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party falls next July 23. The day before
the declassification of Indo-Pacific, President Xi Jinping outlined his – and the CCP's
– vision for the almost three decades culminating in 2049, the hundredth anniversary of
the People's Republic of China.
"Here are Xi's Top Three – in a nutshell:
•Keep calm and carry on, despite the ravaging effects of Covid-19, unrelenting
Western – especially American – hostility, and the trials and tribulations of the
crumbling US Empire
•Focus on domestic development, in all areas
•Focus on China's priorities; then, whatever happens, the world outside will not be able
to interfere.
•Solidify its own 'primacy' in the South China Sea while diversifying trade and
development strategic options all along Belt and Road"
I tried to locate where Xi made this statement Pepe cites, but was unsuccessful, and Pepe
provided no link. The essay closes with an economic forecast for China that Biden won't be
able to do much about. Indeed, this article details how much
damage Trump's Trade War did to the US economy and how it would benefit from Biden's ending
it:
"The multi-year trade war with China under the Trump administration resulted in a peak
loss of 245,000 US jobs, Reuters reported Friday, citing a study commissioned by the US-China
Business Council, a business group representing major US firms with operations in China.
"In an escalated scenario, meaning a significant China-US decoupling, the US GDP could
shrink by $1.6 trillion over the next five years, resulting in up to 732,000 job losses in
the US by 2022 and 320,000 fewer jobs by 2025, according to the study. A gradual scaling back
of tariffs, however, is likely to boost growth, resulting in an additional 145,000 jobs by
2025."
As I wrote when Trump announced his Trade War, the Outlaw US Empire would be much better
off if it joined with China rather than trying to fight it, and now the results are in. Too
bad this report will likely be suppressed. The article looks at Biden's position and
concludes with an infographic detailing trade flows between China and the Outlaw US
Empire.
@84:
As sometimes said: don't sweat the small stuff.
This "We are all Taiwanese now" stunt is Pompeo's act of petty spite for getting outfoxed in
the Hong Kong colour revolution play.
Empire's useful idiots were let loose to trash the hapless city, fired up by the Western
propaganda machinery.
Now Beijing is putting the stock on those pompous minions with the National Security Law, and
their foreign masters can't do nuffin' except squeal human rights and apply some nuisance
sanctions.
The West fails because it looks at China through ideological lenses and sees Communists, who
can fall back on 5000 years of statecraft to push back at interlopers.
Beijing's moves can be likened to two classic strategies.
1. Zhuge Liang fools the enemy to fire all their arrows at straw men, which become ammunition
against them.
2. The Empty City strategy. Invaders take over an ostensibly abandoned city, only to be
trapped inside.
Global Times is cantankerous and sometimes risible, but even a broken clock is right, twice a
day.
So when it says that crossing Beijing's red line on the Taiwan issue is not in the island's
best interests, the incoming BiMala administration should take note.
"... The Biden administration, staffed with Obama veterans , may be in effect a third Obama term. Biden may seek a détente with China on some issues. But Democratic foreign policy elites as well as Republicans view China more harshly than they did four years ago. The most likely scenario, then, is an attempt to restore Obama's trilateral strategy of building the biggest possible coalition of allies against China. ..."
"... Democratic foreign policy elites are much more Europhile and Russophobic than their Republican counterparts. ..."
Under Barack Obama, the containment of
China -- the "pivot to Asia" -- took the form of what might be called trilateralism, after
the old Trilateral Commission of the 1970s. According to this strategy, while balancing China
militarily, the United States would create trans-Pacific and trans-Atlantic trade blocs with
rules favorable to the United States that China would be forced to beg to join in the future.
The Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) was intended as an anti-Chinese, American-dominated Pacific
trade bloc, while the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP) sought to create a
NATO for trade from which China would be excluded.
Obama's grand strategy collapsed even before the election of 2016. TTIP died, chiefly
because of hostility from European economic interests. In the United States, the fact that the
TPP treaty was little more than a wish-list of giveaways to U.S. finance and pharma interests
and other special-interest lobbies made it so unpopular that both Hillary Clinton and
Trump
renounced it during the 2016 presidential election season.
Trump, like Obama,
sought to contain China , but by unilateral rather than trilateral measures. The Trump
administration emphasized reshoring strategic supply chains like that of steel in the United
States, unwilling to offshore critical supplies even to allies in Asia and Europe and North
America. This break with prior tradition would have been difficult to pull off even under a
popular president who was a good bureaucratic operator, unlike the
erratic and inconsistent Trump.
The Biden administration,
staffed with Obama veterans , may be in effect a third Obama term. Biden may seek a
détente with China on some issues. But Democratic foreign policy elites as well as
Republicans view China more harshly than they did four years ago. The most likely scenario,
then, is an attempt to restore Obama's trilateral strategy of building the biggest possible
coalition of allies against China.
An emphasis by the Biden administration on alliances may succeed in the case of the
U.S.-Japan-Australia-India "Quad" (Quadrilateral alliance). The UK may support America's East
Asian policy as well. But Germany and France, the dominant powers in Europe, view China as a
vast market, not a threat, so Biden will fail if he seeks to repeat Obama's grand strategy of
trilateral containment of China.
Democratic foreign policy elites are much more Europhile and Russophobic than their
Republican counterparts. In part this is a projection of domestic politics. In the
demonology of the Democratic Party, Putin stands for nationalism, social conservatism, and
everything that elite Democrats despise about the "deplorables" in the United States who live
outside of major metro areas and vote for Republicans. The irrational hostility of America's
Democratic establishment extends beyond Russia to socially-conservative democratic governments
in Poland and Hungary, two countries that Biden has denounced as "totalitarian."
In the Middle East, unlike Eastern Europe, a Biden administration is likely to sacrifice
left-liberal ideology to the project of
maximizing American power and consolidating the U.S. military presence, with the help of
autocracies like Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Any hint of retrenchment will be denounced by the
bipartisan foreign policy establishment that lined up behind Biden, so do not expect an end to
any of the forever wars under Biden. Quite the contrary.
Michael Lind is Professor of Practice at the Lyndon B. Johnson School of the University of
Texas at Austin and the author of The American Way of Strategy. His most recent book is The New
Class War: Saving Democracy from the Managerial Elite.
That's wishful thinking. While Chinese are making progress, the USA still is the only
technological superpower and can cut oxygen to China companies in one minute.
Increasingly America does not compete with China, but strongarms it because it cannot
compete. For example, in Five G China is ahead in technology, manufacturing capacity, and
turnkey systems. Unable to produce an equivalent product, Washington banned Huawei Five G in
the US and has twisted arms to keep countries that it controls from using Huawei. Seeing that
Huawei had very attractive smartphones that would have competed with Apple, it banned these
also. What America can't do, it seeks to keep anybody else from doing.
WSJ:
"US vs. China in Five G: The Battle Isn't Even Close
HONG KONG -- By most measures, China is no longer just leading the U.S. when it comes to
5G. It is running away with the game. China has more 5G subscribers than the U.S., not just
in total but per capita. It has more 5G smartphones for sale, and at lower prices, and it has
more-widespread 5G coverage. Connections in China are, on average, faster than in the U.S.,
too By year's end, China will have an estimated 690,000 5G base stations -- boxes that blast
5G signals to consumers -- up and running across the country ."
Techies can argue C band versus millimeter waves but I will bet that the Chinese, nothing if
not commercially agile, will have Five G up and running in factories and the IoT and everywhere
else while American pols rattle on about how China is an Existential Threat and the Pentagon
needs more money for Space Command and diversity is more important than schooling anyway.
The shifting balance may already be visible. For example, America used to make superb
aircraft such as the SR-71 and the F-16. Now it has the F-35, an engineering horror. The Boeing
737 MAX, its flagship product, has been grounded internationally because of poor engineering,
second-rate software, and corporate lying about both.
America invented the microcircuit, and once dominated its manufacture. Today, American
companies cannot make the seven nanometer chips now used in high-end telephones, and certainly
not the five nanometer chips now coming online. Neither can China. Both countries buy them from
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, TSMC, Interestingly, the Taiwanese are genetically
and culturally Chinese. Washington has strongarmed TSMC into ceasing to sell to Huawei -- the
US still can't make high end chips. Recently it strongarmed TSMC into agreeing to build a
semiconductor fab in Arizona. Because America can't.
Then there is TikTok, a hugely popular Chinese video app that threatened to break America's
lock on social media. Unable to compete, Washington decided simply to confiscate it on grounds
that it might be used to spy on Americans. (Chinese intelligence is deeply interested in your
daughter's video of her cat.)
Parenthetically, technology seems to be shifting toward East Asia, with America being less
ahead in things in which it is ahead and behind in others. Did I mention demographics?
You can't argue with the real engineering going on over there, especially the Civil
Engineering. When you don't have a thousand tax-payer-supported bureaucrats from a hundred
different agencies and even "Non-Governmental Organizations" blocking every thought you have,
it's hard to get things done. There's no doubt that the huge military spending on "democracy
for the world" and the squandering of the huge amount of goodwill and power accumulated at
the end of the Cold War is part of America's problem (thanks NotSoFast). Mr. Reed never
mentioned the increase in regulation and taxation by the Feral Beast that has turned America
into a Can't-Do country.
It's a great photo essay on the amazing engineering advances out of China, but, as usual,
Fred gets major things wrong.
I don't know what the deal is with Mr. Reed's repetitive harping on Americans' concern for
intellectual property rights. The Chinese will do fine without our help now, but it's the
theft of the IP of American engineering that has gotten them this far so fast. Why would you
not be concerned with your ideas being stolen? Not giving your stuff away for free is not the
same as trying to "cripple development. That's water under the bridge now but stupidity by
Mr. Reed nonetheless.
I guess it's mission accomplished. Trump can loosen his witch hunt of Huawei and end the
tech/trade war now. Or maybe he won't. Maybe the eventual goal is still the toppling of a
government that the Chosenites have no hand in electing through "democracy".
Meanwhile, I'm sure more corrupt CCP elites will take full advantage of the selling out of
their country, sleep(invest) with the enemy, get rich/richer, emigrate to the US, push their
kids into our elite high schools and colleges, and turn us more and more like the
dog-eat-dog, corrupt hellhole from whence they came.
So much for a government that looks out for its people. The CCP is as self-serving as the
US Congress critters or the EU. The only difference is they don't need the charade of
elections to install themselves in power.
" A US District judge has made an 11th hour intervention to block a federal government
order prohibiting downloads of TikTok from app stores by American users.
US District Judge Carl Nichols issued a preliminary injunction, which would allow the
popular app to still be on offer in Apple and Google stores, shortly before the ban was
supposed to come into force on Sunday midnight. Earlier in the day, Nichols allowed a
90-minute hearing, where a lawyer representing TikTok made the case for it remaining
available to users in the US.
Last week, a judge in California blocked a similar order ousting the WeChat app from
American stores hours before it was supposed to take effect."
What a bummer. Looks like your neocon handlers took a couple of hits, whitney. No doubt
those judges were agents of The B.L.M.
It was a week ago that Beijing made clear it won't be signing off on the messy and mired in
confusion proposed Oracle-TikTok deal, citing that it would harm its "national security
interests," which is exactly the same reason given by Trump for trying to shut TikTok down in
the first place.
China's state-run Global Times is out with a new editorial Saturday indicating that Beijing
will stick to protecting TikTok "at all costs" . The theme of "compromised" national security
is still being presented as the crux of the matter.
" China is prepared to prevent Chinese firm TikTok and its advanced technologies from
falling into US hands at all cost ," Global Times introduces.
This even if that should mean the hugely popular app "risks being shut
down in the US, because allowing the US to seize the firm and its technology will not only set
a dangerous precedent for other Chinese firms, but also pose a direct threat to China's
national security , Chinese experts said on Saturday, a day ahead of a court battle in the US
over a ban of the app."
Again, interestingly this seems to be the mirror image argument the Trump administration has
harped on for much of the past year, especially on Huawei. GT's argument continues:
More importantly, for Beijing, the case goes way beyond just a mafia-style robbery of a
lucrative Chinese business and cutting-edge technologies , but a threat to its national
security, because the US could find loopholes in those technologies to launch cyber and other
attacks on China and other countries to preserve its hegemony, the experts added.
Voicing the communist government's rationale further, GT cites an expert at the China
Electronics Standardization Institute Liu Chang, who says "What the US wants, we definitely
cannot give."
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"From the perspective of both the company and the Chinese government, this cannot be allowed
to happen ," he said. y_arrow 1 Pliskin , 18 hours ago
American Pirates looking for more stuff to steal..no surprises there!
Go and make your own stuff，piss-ant Yanks!
...And get the message into your thick skulls，the whole World hates you!
Srbutterfly , 13 hours ago
Except for Israel.
TheRapture , 19 hours ago
The USA has abandoned Ronald Reagan and free trade, and morphed into an incompetent rogue
state that behaves like the Mafia. Tik Tok, Huawei, etc. The U.S. can't compete fairly, so it
cheats, steals and launches "regime-change" wars.
R.I.P, America.
LEEPERMAX , 20 hours ago
The CCP is nothing but A CRIMINAL ORGANIZATION with that pompous clown Xi JinPig as their
despicable ringleader.
Criminals, all of them.
HoyeruNew , 18 hours ago
its called projection.
Srbutterfly , 13 hours ago
The ccp is an extension of the imperial system, they are no better off than when the
emperors were calling the shots.
kleptomistic , 19 hours ago
TikTok is "cutting edge technology"? Exactly what is this app capable of? It must really
be something since it's worth billions and everyone is fighting over it.
kleptomistic , 19 hours ago
Installing TikTok is literally like handing your phone to the CCP.
You give them total control of your phone...to listen/watch...to track you...to upload
your address book so they know everyone you know...you also allow them to upload stuff to
your phone.
HoyeruNew , 18 hours ago
prove it. BTW< I hear USA is STILL looking for Saddam's weapons of mass
distraction.
Suey Cidal , 18 hours ago
It is valuable as a distraction, keeping the sheep believing the lie that China and USA
are independent countries and that they are not both owned by the same rich fuktards.
Yen Cross , 18 hours ago
Lets look realistically at the situation. China is not cheap for manufacturing, has zero
interest honoring 'favored nation' trade status, and is definitely NOT a developing third
world country.
The Chinese love to gamble, yet call themselves, "long game" players?
Tic Tok is a fad. Just an information gathering scheme.
Ex-Kalifornian , 12 hours ago
Our society would be better off if we had no social media, so just ban it and make
everyone that more productive.....
halcyon , 15 hours ago
Good for them
**** Silicon Valley/NSA spy monopoly.
At least this way we'll have a spy duopoly, with one of them free of Israel's UNIT 8200
backdoor crap, and we can make them compete against each other.
Monopoly and no choice is the worst possible choice.
Tom Fowdy is a British writer and analyst of politics and international relations
with a primary focus on East Asia. The battle over TikTok is all because the US finds the idea
of a Chinese social media app gaining global acclaim as intolerable and a threat to its own
monopolies in Silicon Valley.
Did I miss the announcement that The Apprentice has got a new episode out? You know,
the one where Donald Trump shouts " You're fired! " to TikTok's owners in Beijing? Oh,
wait, that's not a reality TV show – it is reality. At least in his mind.
Were it not so serious, you would have to laugh at this week's flip-flopping antics of the
former TV show host turned president of the USA.
On Sunday, he stated he was giving his " blessing " to a deal between US giants
Oracle and Walmart and ByteDance, TikTok's Chinese owner. ' TikTok-Oracle Deal Wins Trump's
Approval ,' read
the headline on Bloomberg.
By Monday, he had made a U-turn, demanding that the Chinese firm cede control of its US
operations completely, or he would ban the popular platform. ' Trump Says ByteDance Can't
Keep Control of TikTok in Oracle Deal ,'
said Bloomberg.
Initially, the deal reported by the media involved the two US companies taking a 20 percent
stake in the creation of a new venture, TikTok Global, which would see its data managed by the
American stakeholders. But now the White House has seemingly reverted to its old position of
demanding that ByteDance, or as it puts it, " China ," cedes " complete control" of
the application in the US, including the handover of its technology and algorithm. Under the
headline 'Say 'No!' to US robbery of Tik Tok,' China's Global Times stated the country will
"not accept an unequal treaty that targets Chinese companies. "
Trump's actions concerning this app, irrespective of the eventual outcome, should be
understood not as legitimate " national security concerns, " but a clear attempt to
subjugate and humiliate China for his own political and electoral gain, as well as to maintain
American primacy over technology and global social media.
His approach has been infused with his classical ' Art of the Deal ' approach so
beloved of fans of The Apprentice . It essentially involves pushing a given target to
the brink in an attempt to extort an outcome on terms favorable to him. Beijing, however, sees
painful historical parallels in Trump's conduct, and is prepared to rise to the
challenge.
There is a period in China's history, roughly dating from 1830 to the 1950s, which is
popularly referred to as the " century of humiliation. " It describes an era when the
country was subjugated to political and economic exploitation by Western powers and forced to
accept agreements on unequal terms, particularly by Britain, France, Germany and Japan, amongst
others.
The era is commonly defined to have begun with the commencement of the opium wars, whereby
the British Empire waged war against the Qing Dynasty in order to open up its markets by force
to export opium, resulting in the Treaty of Nanking, which forced China to accept British
demands and the subsequent annexation of Hong Kong.
The legacy of the century of humiliation has a deep influence on how China perceives its
relations with the rest of the world today, particularly the West. To Beijing, the Trump
administration has sought to forcefully confront and contain China on multiple fronts,
especially in the field of technology and trade, in ways reminiscent of the bad old days.
The US evidently does not accept China on equal terms, and once having believed trade and
engagement would " reform " the country towards America's image and preferences, the
impetus has now shifted to Washington attempting to stifle the country's rise and force changes
to its political-economic system.
This is where TikTok comes into the picture. The claim that the popular video application is
a threat to US national security should not be taken seriously – it's a platform used by
young people to post videos, mostly of them doing silly dances.
Washington has a way of whipping up fear and hysteria in order to manufacture consent for
its aggressive foreign policies. There is no serious evidence TikTok has engaged in any
wrongdoing. Instead the impetus is geopolitical: the US finds the idea of a Chinese social
media application gaining global acclaim as intolerable and a threat to its own monopolies in
Silicon Valley. The Trump administration's response to any Chinese initiative which challenges
or outgrows US capabilities is simply to attempt to crush it by coercive force.
In this case, however, an outright ban on an application as popular as TikTok (it has around
80 million users in the US) would be politically damaging for Trump. Which is why he has sought
to utilize state force with the view to extorting the app into American ownership. The fact
that the proposed venture is called TikTok Global is an obvious indicator that the new "
US " version of the platform would quickly aim to compete with and make obsolete
ByteDance's market in the rest of the world.
Little wonder then that, in line with the rest of the administration's policies, China
perceives the attempt by Trump to extort TikTok as an attempt to start a new century of
humiliation. Their judgement is correct. Once again, a Western power believes that China ought
only to exist on terms which are tolerable to the West, and that the way to "handle" the
country involves attempting to subjugate it into accepting unequal agreements.
But this is 2020, not 1920. China will no longer be treated in this way or approve any deal
which extorts ByteDance's business. Beijing would rather see TikTok banned in America than have
it stolen from them through Trumpian coercion.
Like this story? Share it with a friend!
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author
and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
In what is perhaps the most compelling sign yet that Beijing has put the kibosh on the
Oracle-TikTok deal, the Global Times on Tuesday published a scathing editorial attacking
President Trump for attempting a "robbery" of TikTok and violate China's "dignity."
The paper's editorial writers echoed claims made in an editorial published more than six
weeks ago by
the People's Daily - that Beijing would never tolerate Trump transferring majority
ownership of TikTok to the US. Furthermore, as
Kyle Bass explained earlier, anything that would require the company to fork over its
content-recommendation algorithm is an instant deal breaker. Beijing has previously said it
would rather shut down TikTok US than hand the business to the Americans.
Writers explained that by turning over source code from TikTok to Oracle, Americans would
also gain insight into the operations of Douyin, TikTok's counterpart built for the Chinese
market (which, remember, runs on an entirely separate, cordoned-off internet).
Throwing Trump's words back in his face, the writers insisted Beijing didn't appreciate the
president's characterization that the new TikTok would have "nothing" to do with China.
Because even more than money, China must have the credit. Like
Bass explained, the CCP is fighting a narrative war against the US.
And in case the point wasn't clear, the Global Times editor, Hu Xijin, drives it home with a
tweet.
It was reported Sunday, Beijing time, that US President Donald Trump approved a deal in
principle between TikTok's parent company ByteDance, and Oracle and Walmart. The main content
of the deal was later disclosed. From the information provided by the US, the deal was unfair.
It caters to the unreasonable demands of Washington. It's hard for us to believe that Beijing
will approve such an agreement.
Although people can have various interpretations, some articles in the agreement show what
the problems are.
For instance, American citizens will take up four of the five board seats for TikTok Global
and only one can be Chinese. The board of TikTok Global would include a national security
director, who will have to be approved by the US.
Oracle will have the authority to check the source code of TikTok USA and updates. As the
TikTok and Douyin should have the same source code , this means the US can get to know the
operations of Douyin, t he Chinese version of TikTok.
TikTok Global will control the business of TikTok around the world except China. It will
block IP from the Chinese mainland to access it. This means the Americans can take control of
the global business of TikTok and reject Chinese to access it.
It is clear that these articles extensively show Washington's bullying style and hooligan
logic. They hurt China's national security, interests and dignity. ByteDance is an ordinary
company in China. The US suppresses it with all its national strength and forces it to sign a
deal under coercion. China, also a major country, will not yield to US intimidation and will
not accept an unequal treaty that targets Chinese companies.
When Trump said he had approved the new TikTok deal, he noted the new company would have
"nothing to do" with China and would be fully controlled by the US. On Monday, he said Oracle
and Walmart would have total control of the service; otherwise, "we're not going to approve the
deal."
It seems this is not his campaign language, but the Trump administration's real attitude
toward restructuring TikTok. Washington is way too confident and has underestimated China's
determination to defend its basic rights and dignity.
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The US is a big market. If the reorganization of TikTok under US manipulation becomes a
model, it means once any successful Chinese company expands its business to the US and becomes
competitive, it will be targeted by the US and turned into a US-controlled company via trickery
and coercion, which eventually serves only US interests.
If China surrenders, which country in the world can resist? The US encirclement of TikTok
and the global huntdown of Huawei are stifling the hopes of high-tech companies around the
world for having world-class technologies and independent development. Once Washington
succeeds, the US will enjoy global technological hegemony forever.
China will not accept this kind of bullying arrangement of the US. The US is taking
discriminatory action to squeeze TikTok. In an era when countries have concerns about network
data security, US internet giants set up branches around the world. But does any one of them
hand over its control to companies of the host country? Which company's board members must be
approved by the government of the host country?
Washington's huntdown on TikTok is creating problems for US internet companies worldwide.
With cyber security increasingly becoming a common issue, there must be countries that will
imitate the US to take action against American companies. The precedent set by the US will
eventually hurt its own companies.
Issues concerning global internet data security should be addressed in a fair, reasonable
and effective manner. China has put forward an eight-point proposal for this. The US seeks its
own interests in a hegemonic way, and attempts to maintain its technological hegemony under the
guise of cyber security. This cannot be accepted by international society, including China.
It's hoped the US returns to globalization from "America First," and retake the universal
commercial values that will not only benefit itself but also others.
Starting Sunday, downloads of the massively popular video app TikTok and the messaging app
WeChat will be banned in the United States, the U.S. Department of Commerce announced Friday
morning.
The department said in a statement that the move was necessary to "safeguard the national
security of the United States."
President Donald Trump issued twin executive orders in August, saying the apps would shut
down by Sept. 20 if they were not sold to U.S. owners. The admin claimed the Chinese Communist
Party was using data collected through these apps to "threaten the national security, foreign
policy and the economy of the U.S."
Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross said in an interview on Fox Business News Friday morning that
these new rules announced this morning were in connection with the executive orders issued in
August and are "separate" from the ongoing negotiations between TikTok and tentative U.S.
buyers including Oracle and Walmart.
Ross said that "for all practical purposes" WeChat will be shut down in the U.S. as of
midnight Monday with the new Commerce Department ruling.
MORE: For Chinese Americans, WeChat ban threatens to upend business and community "TikTok is
more complicated," Ross added, saying that essentially a deadline for a deal with a U.S. buyer
has been extended until Nov. 12. In the meantime, updates will be barred in the app.
"Basic TikTok will stay intact until November 12," he said. "If there is not a deal by
November 12 under the provisions of the old order then TikTok also will be, for all practical
purposes, shut down."
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo separately weighed in on the news while traveling in Guyana
on Friday.
A little over a week ago, we shared how President Trump's decision to expand the scope of
his crackdown on Chinese tech firms to include WeChat, Tencent's ubiquitous platform for
everything from payments, to messaging to e-commerce sent a wave of panic through American
multinationals like Apple who depend on the Chinese market for growth, and feared being
essentially shut out due to an oversight by the administration.
The backlash has been just as intense as could be expected. In
a quintuple-byline story published Friday afternoon, Bloomberg reported that an army of
corporate lobbyists are working with Team Trump to try and find a way to restrict WeChat's use
in the US without hamstringing every American company that depends on the app to connect with
Chinese consumers.
According to sources from within the West Wing, the administration is still "working through
the technicals" of how they're going to restrict WeChat in the US while allowing American
companies to liaise with it in foreign markets.
The Trump administration is signaling that U.S. companies can continue to use the WeChat
messaging app in China, according to several people familiar with the matter, two weeks after
President Donald Trump ordered a U.S. ban on the Chinese-owned service.
The administration is still working through the technical implications of how to enforce
such a partial ban on the app , which is owned by Tencent Holdings Ltd., one of China's
biggest companies. A key question is whether the White House would allow Apple Inc. and
Alphabet Inc.'s Google to carry the app in its global app stores outside of the U.S.,
according to the people, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Over the past week, lobbyists went into "overdrive" and started harassing White House and
Commerce Department staffers about Trump's order, and the "logistics and intention of the
WeChat executive order." Now they're pushing to "narrow" the scope of the looming ban.
"We are talking to everyone who will listen to us," said Craig Allen, president of the
US-China Business Council, whose group represents companies including Walmart Inc. and General
Motors Co. "WeChat is a little like electricity. You use it everywhere" in China, Allen
said.
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All Comments 18
YesWeKahn , 3 hours ago
Wechat is just junk, people used to do a lot more business in china without it, I think
these tech firms are bought by the ccp
aberfoyle_crumplehausen , 1 hour ago
America is turning Fascist under Trump right in front of our eyes. Fascism: merging of
State and Corporates. Full stop. You can't argue this, don't even try.
LetThemEatRand , 3 hours ago
Big tech depends on a communist country for growth. Let that sink in.
hoytmonger , 2 hours ago
A communist country is better at business than the US.
Let that sink in.
holyvanguard , 3 hours ago
Xi and Trump should stage a photograph to reinact a classic Winne the Pooh scene.
NIRP_BTFD , 3 hours ago
Riddle me this. How the hell does the USA want to ban apps? I can install every possible
apk on my device. If google takes apps out of their store i just install them with an
alternative app store or just download them somewhere else.
inhibi , 3 hours ago
That's you and me and the few tech minded folks out there.
99% of the users get what the store bought phone gives them. This is just trying to rattle
China's market.
Lets be honest: the real issue, as you have touched upon, is the complete monopoly of OS
and app stores by Google and Apple.
philipat , 2 hours ago
You expect Gubmin to understand that?
Or that these things work both ways and China will surely tit-for-tat with restrictions on
US Companies, probably starting with Apple?
Still, there's an election coming.............
HedgeJunkie , 3 hours ago
**** 'em all, ban it totally, let their vastly inflated values inflate more.
cr1stal , 3 hours ago
you have no idea how globalism works. they dont go oh i have 1000 billion so ill let a few
beady eyed devil worshippers who just dropped out of harvard cooking school accrue a few
hundred million. a disruptive autistic clown is about as welcome as he would be in the opium
fields of the golden triangle
BeePee , 3 hours ago
This is what I will miss about the exiting of the Trump administration. Standing up to CCP
China.
After Biden's inauguration, all this will roll back, money goes into Hunter Biden's
account. China will roll over us. Yes, there will be some agreements, none of which will be
honored by CCP China.
Kamala will be jocking one of the young male interns at the VP mansion. Apparently she is
very adept at penis stimulation.
I guess we'll get what we want, or at least deserve. Trans bathrooms everywhere. There are
no longer male or female identities. To heck with science, sexuality and gender is just a
perspective. Crime really doesn't go up if you don't consider it a crime.
DeathMerchant , 14 minutes ago
Who gives a rats about Chinese consumers ?? Lobbyists should not even be permitted to be
in or communicate with anyone in DC.
Experts familiar with law enforcement requests say that what TikTok collects and hands over
is not significantly more than what companies like Amazon, Facebook, or Google regularly
provide, but that's because U.S. tech companies collect and hand over a lot of information.
The documents also reveal that two representatives with bytedance.com email addresses
registered on the website of the Northern California Regional Intelligence Center, a fusion
center that covers the Silicon Valley area.
And they show that the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Department of Homeland
Security actively monitored TikTok for signs of unrest during the George Floyd
protests.
The number of requests for subscriber information that TikTok says it receives from law
enforcement is significantly lower than what U.S. tech giants reportedly field, likely
because police are more accustomed to using data from U.S. companies and apps in
investigations. TikTok enumerates its requests from law enforcement in a biannual
transparency report, the most recent of which says that for the last half of 2019, the
company received 100 requests covering 107 accounts. It handed over information in 82
percent of cases. Facebook, by contrast, says it received a whopping 51,121 requests over
the same period, and handed over at least some data in 88 percent of cases.
That last sentence... That's *why* Facebook exists. As does Google and Twitter and the
rest of the social media giants.
Home / Articles / Economy
/ All About The Chips: Taiwan Is Next Battleground For Trade Fight ECONOMY , WORLDAll
About The Chips: Taiwan Is Next Battleground For Trade Fight
The media likes to dabble in war-game fantasies between the 21st-century great powers China
and the U.S., but it's a distraction from the hybrid economic warfare that is underway -- from
Trump's tariff hikes to the shores of the advanced economy.
Here in a nutshell is the problem facing the United States. The country that used to be a
world leader in all forms of high tech, especially semiconductor chips, now spends its time
redesigning chocolate chips. By contrast, Taiwan, officially a "rogue province of China,"
but in reality operating as an independent nation of 23 million people, ranked 20th as a
world economy (right behind Switzerland), is now a leading global player in the production of
semiconductor chips. As such it has emerged as the key supply link to a multiplicity of
American and Chinese high-tech companies at a time when the Trump administration is working
hard to cut China's access to Taiwan's semiconductors.
For all of China's significant technological advancements, the country still lags in the
production of semiconductor chips.
Memory chips are principally made by Samsung, SK Hynix (South Korea), and Micron (USA).
Intel also makes some memory chips for its own use. Memory chips are a big issue for China.
Beijing has deployed considerable fiscal resources into producing them and last year set a goal
of producing 5 percent
of the world's total production by the end of 2020.
That's ambitious. It's one thing to produce memory chips, another to get a usable "yield,"
i.e., the percentage of output that actually works. It is a singularly challenging industry in
which to attain industrial self-sufficiency.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) is a "
fabless chip maker " that produces customized semiconductor chips for use in various types
of electronics, such as digital cameras, smartphones, and the new technologically sophisticated
"smart" cars. They also produce chips for the military, and for 5G base stations. China's
leading telecom equipment manufacturer, Huawei, was a large customer, but the Trump
administration has now
mandated that all semiconductor chip manufacturers using U.S. equipment, IP, or design
software will require a license before shipping to Huawei, which has forced TSMC to stop taking
fresh orders from Huawei, as it uses U.S. equipment in its own manufacturing processes,
such as LAM research and Applied Materials.
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The wisdom of so many companies relying on manufacturing facilities located in Taiwan is
debatable. Intel and Micron locate fabs around the world, in part to diversify risk
(earthquake, weather, politics) and to access skilled labor pools. Intel has long had
production facilities in Ireland, Israel, and China itself; it has also purchased Israeli
companies for their research and development. But it also has retained significant production
facilities still in the United States. Similarly, Micron has fabs in Boise Idaho, Utah, and
Manassas, Virginia (right near the CIA and Pentagon.)
TSMC is important because it is pretty much the only place to get processor chips
fabricated, unless you're Intel. In that regard, Intel's recent 2nd quarter
earnings announcement that its planned launch of the company's next generation of chips
will be delayed by six months is most concerning. News of the production delay (which now
pushes the production of the company's latest central processing unit (CPU) -- aka the "brains"
of the laptop -- out to early 2023) generated considerable market anxiety, as evidenced by the
17 percent fall in the share price in the wake of the disclosure. From a long-term perspective,
however, the more alarming aspect is Intel's decision to consider
outsourcing its manufacturing capacity, a sharp break from the company's historic practice.
Intel has been one of the few leading American high-tech companies that has hitherto largely
resisted the panacea of offshoring its production. Much of this is a product of the corporate
culture established by former CEO Andy Grove, who had warned that Silicon Valley risked
"squandering its competitive edge in innovation by failing to propel strong job growth in the
United States," according to a New York Times op-ed by Teresa Tritch written shortly after his
death. Tritch explains
that:
in [Grove's] view, those lower Asian costs masked the high price of offshoring as measured
by lost jobs and lost expertise
Mr. Grove contrasted the start-up phase of a business, when uses for new technologies are
identified, with the scale-up phase, when technology goes from prototype to mass production.
Both are important. But only scale-up is an engine for job growth -- and scale-up, in
general, no longer occurs in the United States. "Without scaling," he wrote, "we don't just
lose jobs -- we lose our hold on new technologies" and "ultimately damage our capacity to
innovate."
Intel's decision comes at a time when American policymakers are finally beginning to
appreciate the adverse economic and strategic consequences of such moves. Were Intel to
follow through on its outsourcing threat, it too would further exacerbate America's strategic
reliance on Taiwan for customized semiconductor manufacturing, as well as undermining the
impact of recent legislative attempts to
rebuild the country's semiconductor manufacturing capacity.
By contrast, economic competition that degenerates into out-and-out war would be a disaster
for all sides. As David Arase, resident professor of International Politics at the
Hopkins-Nanjing Center of the Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced International
Studies, recently contended in
the Asia Times, "Even an unsuccessful invasion of Taiwan would cause a supply chain
disruption." By the same token, actively upgrading
diplomatic relations with Taiwan to something akin to the old
mutual defense treaty that existed prior to Washington's recognition of Beijing in 1979 as
the one sovereign government representing China, would almost certainly provoke a more
aggressive response from Beijing.
U.S. goals should be far more modest: not to underwrite the freedom aspirations of another
country (even a vibrant multi-party democracy such as Taiwan) but, rather, to fix a key
vulnerability in the global supply chain that currently renders the U.S. so reliant on Taiwan.
Even TSMC has implicitly acknowledged its own geographical shortcomings, as it has recently
announced plans to build a new $12 billion chip manufacturing facility in Arizona. Consider
this a form of political risk insurance.
A full-scale defense of Taiwan would cost thousands of lives, and potentially entrench the
U.S. military in a long-term quagmire; it would also represent a logistical nightmare in terms
of supplying such a force over so many thousands of miles (versus an opposing Chinese army a
mere
100 miles away .) To say nothing of the risks posed to numerous substantial American
multinationals already operating in China.
A key conceptual problem that our policymakers and business leaders have today is an
addiction to 19th-century concepts that are anomalous in the context of a 21st-century economy.
David Ricardo's " comparative advantage " --
that "refers to an economy's ability to produce goods and services at a lower opportunity cost
than that of trade partners" -- has less relevance at a time when such advantage can be largely
created as a byproduct of state policy. Countries such as Taiwan, South Korea, and now China
itself, can dominate targeted industries by subsidizing them aggressively. Because of
increasing returns to scale, there is a winner-take-all pattern in which, at any given time,
one nation tends to dominate a huge global market share of the underlying product -- since the
1970s, Japan, South Korea and China in that order. It also creates huge employment
opportunities in high-quality jobs for the countries as they scale up production. This was also
a key insight of Andy Grove .
None of these countries had a natural "comparative advantage" in semiconductor production;
they just followed the
classic pattern of subsidizing their growth via substantial government support,
relentlessly driving down cost inputs to push other marginal manufacturers out of the
industry.
The incessant focus on market share usually comes at a cost of short-term profitability (a
no-no for Wall Street, which focuses on quarterly earnings as intently as an audience waiting
for the white smoke to emerge from a papal election). However, businesses usually recoup these
costs later once they've established dominant market share.
Semiconductors are a high value-added manufacturing platform industry that has a significant
multiplier effect on the domestic economy. It represents an area that should be prioritized by
the U.S., not de-emphasized (as Intel's proposed move threatens to do). The road back to
manufacturing relevance is a long one, but the perpetuation of the current policy risks
exacerbating longstanding pathologies in the U.S. economy, while simultaneously creating new
national security vulnerabilities.
Taiwan is a vibrant multiparty democracy that constitutes a model of economic development.
But those virtues could be threatened if we try, shortsightedly, to turn it into a U.S.
protectorate to address problems that should be resolved much closer to home.
Marshall Auerback is a market analyst and contributor to the Independent Media
Institute .
TSMC's Arizona fab is tiny compared to its 12 Taiwan ones, and more of a sop to the Trump
administration than a serious effort to diversify. The jugular vein of the semiconductor
industry is within easy reach of China's missile arsenal, and indeed the Chinese military can
be said to have been designed specifically for the task of retaking Taiwan.
China might not even need to invade. If they blockade Taiwan--air and sea--and threaten to
destroy ships and aircraft trying to enter or leave Taiwan, they can stop chip export.
It's similar to Iran saying, "Either everybody can export oil from the Gulf or no one
can." China would say, "Either everyone can import chips from Taiwan or no one can. And China
is in a much better position to enforce its will than Iran.
The reaction to Auberback's refutation of comparative advantage would be extreme depending
on who was reacting. The field of economics is like a cult, with a lot of groupthink and
academic homogeneity. In this way failed consensuses are continued and alternatives, even if
they have a good historical track record, are railed against as heterodox and fringe.
Its amazing how in just two or three decades we forgot about basically all of US economic
history and policy history up to that point.
I completely agree that a supply chains including those for memory chips in Taiwan must be
diversified but it is of paramount importance that Taiwan not be left weakened and vulnerable
to mainland China by these shifting supply chains because any weakness in Taiwan will be an
invitation for Beijing to exploit...and if Beijing exploits that invitation then they could
take that invitation all the way to an invasion which will be a detriment of all other
nations in the Pacific. Right now China is focused on Hong Kong, Taiwan and India....with
Hong Kong and Taiwan gone the China will push its aggressive hegemony to Indonesia, Malaysia,
Philippines, etc.
I also complete agree that we (the US, Japan and any other asian nation that will join)
need a treaty protecting Taiwan's independence from mainland China but the very first thing
the US should do prior to such a new treaty is to get other nations to start using the name
Taiwan again on their maps, plane flights, UN, etc because as you know Beijing has been doing
everything possible to not just get nations and businesses to stop recognizing Taiwan and to
even stop using its name in an attempt to erase both the existence of Taiwan and any
distinction that Taiwan is separate from mainland China. The recognition of Taiwan and the
use of its name must be reinforced everywhere in the world as part of the first step in
negotiating a security treaty for Taiwan.
The USA has a one China policy and recognises the Chinese Government as the Government of
China. It's true that it once recognised the Government of Taiwan as the Government of China.
It's a completely new policy you're proposing of splitting China into 2 (or more?) states.
That needs war, as it would if China was proposing to break up the USA, and the USA would
lose a non-nuclear war.
The USA could win a nuclear war but would lose a lot of its population. I don't know how
seriously we should take the US estimate of 90% within a year by starvation and disease with
just an EMP attack. Mexico, Canada and Cuba might accept many US refugees even though they
would also suffer damage. Not all of the area of those countries would suffer EMP damage.
Other countries might also provide some charity.
Mexico, Canada and Cuba could be rewarded for their charity by dividing the USA between
them. That would be a powerful incentive and remove a country fond of wars of aggression. A
USA that poses no threat to anybody could continue to exist and be called Hawaii.
[email protected]
TSMC's Arizona fab is tiny compared to its 12 Taiwan ones, and more of a sop to the Trump
administration than a serious effort to diversify. The jugular vein of the semiconductor
industry is within easy reach of China's missile arsenal, and indeed the Chinese military can
be said to have been designed specifically for the task of retaking Taiwan.
China might not even need to invade. If they blockade Taiwan--air and sea--and threaten to
destroy ships and aircraft trying to enter or leave Taiwan, they can stop chip export.
It's similar to Iran saying, "Either everybody can export oil from the Gulf or no one
can." China would say, "Either everyone can import chips from Taiwan or no one can. And China
is in a much better position to enforce its will than Iran.
The reaction to Auberback's refutation of comparative advantage would be extreme depending
on who was reacting. The field of economics is like a cult, with a lot of groupthink and
academic homogeneity. In this way failed consensuses are continued and alternatives, even if
they have a good historical track record, are railed against as heterodox and fringe.
Its amazing how in just two or three decades we forgot about basically all of US economic
history and policy history up to that point.
I completely agree that a supply chains including those for memory chips in Taiwan must be
diversified but it is of paramount importance that Taiwan not be left weakened and vulnerable
to mainland China by these shifting supply chains because any weakness in Taiwan will be an
invitation for Beijing to exploit...and if Beijing exploits that invitation then they could
take that invitation all the way to an invasion which will be a detriment of all other
nations in the Pacific. Right now China is focused on Hong Kong, Taiwan and India....with
Hong Kong and Taiwan gone the China will push its aggressive hegemony to Indonesia, Malaysia,
Philippines, etc.
I also complete agree that we (the US, Japan and any other asian nation that will join)
need a treaty protecting Taiwan's independence from mainland China but the very first thing
the US should do prior to such a new treaty is to get other nations to start using the name
Taiwan again on their maps, plane flights, UN, etc because as you know Beijing has been doing
everything possible to not just get nations and businesses to stop recognizing Taiwan and to
even stop using its name in an attempt to erase both the existence of Taiwan and any
distinction that Taiwan is separate from mainland China. The recognition of Taiwan and the
use of its name must be reinforced everywhere in the world as part of the first step in
negotiating a security treaty for Taiwan.
The USA has a one China policy and recognises the Chinese Government as the Government of
China. It's true that it once recognised the Government of Taiwan as the Government of China.
It's a completely new policy you're proposing of splitting China into 2 (or more?) states.
That needs war, as it would if China was proposing to break up the USA, and the USA would
lose a non-nuclear war.
The USA could win a nuclear war but would lose a lot of its population. I don't know how
seriously we should take the US estimate of 90% within a year by starvation and disease with
just an EMP attack. Mexico, Canada and Cuba might accept many US refugees even though they
would also suffer damage. Not all of the area of those countries would suffer EMP damage.
Other countries might also provide some charity.
Mexico, Canada and Cuba could be rewarded for their charity by dividing the USA between
them. That would be a powerful incentive and remove a country fond of wars of aggression. A
USA that poses no threat to anybody could continue to exist and be called Hawaii.
[email protected]
The Trump administration is
working to dispossess the Chinese company ByteDance by blackmailing it to sell its
valuable TikTok business to a U.S. company for a bargain price. This to the benefit of yet
unknown people.
False allegation over the security of TikTok user data were used to threaten the
prohibition of the video app in its U.S. market. In the U.S. alone the app is used by more
than 80 million people. It plays an important
part in the youth culture and music business. Faced with a potential close down of its
prime business in one of its most profitable markets ByteDance had no choice but to agree to
negotiate about a sale.
ByteDance declined an offer by two of its U.S. based minority investors to buy the
business for $50 billion as that price was far below its presumed value. The White House
stepped in to find a new buyer with enough change to pay for a deal. As the largest social
media companies - Facebook, Apple, Google and Twitter - are already
under congressional investigations for their monopoly positions in U.S. markets none of
them could be the potential buyer. Facebook has in fact just launched a rip-off of the TikTok
product under the name Reels. It is
trying to poach TikTok 'creators' for its own service. Facebook owner Mark Zuckerberg has
warned
of Chinese competition. He would be the biggest winner should TikTok be thrown out of the
U.S. market.
The White House finally came up with Microsoft as a potential buyer. But Microsoft has
historically been unsuccessful in the social media business. It also does other business with
China and is reluctant to get involved in a move that could damage that business.
Despite Microsoft's lack of interest President Trump personally pressed for a shotgun
marriage. The Democrats are supporting him
in this. But neither ByteDance nor Microsoft really want to make the deal.
TikTok could become totally independent from its Chinese owner ByteDance to continue
operating overseas, according to a source who has been briefed on the discussions.
But the source said that despite reports that the video-sharing platform would be taken
over by Microsoft, ByteDance founder Zhang Yiming and investors were reluctant to sell to
the US company.
...
[I]f it is able to continue operating in the US, the board of ByteDance will agree to a
complete spin-off for the overseas version of the app, which operates under the name Douyin
in China.
The new entity would keep the TikTok name, but will have different management and will
no longer answer to ByteDance.
"Except for Zhang Yiming, almost all those in the room favour such a spin-off," the
source said. "The mood is kind of: 'the founder will be out and the house will be
ours'.
"But even for Zhang himself, there's really no other option because the app will be
killed if you don't let it go."
The spin-off would cover all markets except China where a ByteDance owned app similar to
TikTok is run under the name Douyin. A sale to Microsoft would only include the markets in
the U.S., Canada, New Zealand and Australia. (Note that Britain is the only member of the
5-eyes club missing here.)
That Microsoft is not really wanting the deal can be gleaned for the convoluted statement
it issued yesterday. This is clearly unprecedented language in a public company's
communication:
Following a conversation between Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and President Donald J. Trump,
Microsoft is prepared to continue discussions to explore a purchase of TikTok in the United
States.
Microsoft fully appreciates the importance of addressing the President's concerns. It is
committed to acquiring TikTok subject to a complete security review and providing proper
economic benefits to the United States, including the United States Treasury .
Microsoft will move quickly to pursue discussions with TikTok's parent company,
ByteDance, in a matter of weeks, and in any event completing these discussions no later
than September 15, 2020. During this process, Microsoft looks forward to continuing
dialogue with the United States Government, including with the President.
The discussions with ByteDance will build upon a notification made by Microsoft and
ByteDance to the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS).
...
Microsoft may invite other American investors to participate on a minority basis in this
purchase.
...
Microsoft appreciates the U.S. Government's and President Trump's personal involvement as
it continues to develop strong security protections for the country.
This ass kissing of Trump is not what Microsoft is used to do. Satva Nadella was clearly
pressed into publishing this. Such a statement would usually include language about
increasing shareholder value or better user experience. This statement has none of that
standard sweet talk.
The stock market seems to believe that a takeover of TikTok would be profitable for
Microsoft :
I have my doubts that Microsoft can successfully run a social network business. This one
would be restricted to just four countries and it would likely lose access to the continuing
development of the app. Where is the potential growth for such a restricted application?
And how will China react if Microsoft takes part in the U.S. raid of ByteDance's business?
While China is only contributing some 2% to Microsoft's overall revenue the company's biggest
R&D center outside of the U.S. is in China . It
contributes to its global success:
"[There has been an] explosion of innovation in China," [Microsoft President Brad] Smith
said. "One of the things that we at Microsoft have long appreciated is the enormous
ingenuity of the engineering population of China."
Microsoft's X-Box game station as well as other hardware it sells is at least partially
developed and produced
in China . Some of Microsoft's Chinese engineers might have there own ideas on how China
should retaliate to the attack on a successful Chinese company. The Trump administration sees
that danger and it is pressing
Microsoft to get rid of all its relations with China:
White House trade adviser Peter Navarro suggested on Monday that Microsoft could divest its
holdings in China if it were to buy TikTok.
"So the question is, is Microsoft going to be compromised?" Navarro said in an interview
with CNN. "Maybe Microsoft could divest its Chinese holdings?"
Leaving China would surely damage Microsoft's long term business. For a global company
that country is a too big potential market to be left at the wayside.
But the real question about the mafia raid on ByteDance is who is destined to profit from
it.
Today Trump said (vid) that if Microsoft
closes the deal a substantial amount should be paid to the Treasury because his
administration 'enabled the deal'. He likely didn't consult a lawyer before making that
wrongheaded statement.
But who are the "other American investors" who are invited "to participate on a minority
basis in this purchase". Reuters had already reported
that 'minority investor' clause. Is the wider Trump family involved in this?
Why is that term so important for Trump that Microsoft has felt a need to repeat it in
what is essentially a public terms letter addressed to Trump?
Posted by b on August 3, 2020 at 17:47 UTC |
Permalink
I know B says this is about stealing, but maybe this is about sending China a message
about how it does business in general. As you should know by now, China disallows many
American apps in China. Is this a message to China about how America and maybe American
allies will do business with them from now on? First Huawei and now Tik Tok and next who
knows what? It looks to me like the message to China is: Follow the Golden Rule, which is not
"whoever has the most gold rules" but is instead "Do unto others as you would have them do
unto you."
Hey Kali, China DOES NOT need the US but what you are seeing is a violation of business
norms. You say China doesn't allow many apps from entering its market is not the same as the
US trying to blackmail a successful Chinese app that have already entered the US market.
Since you mentioned Huawei; they own almost the entire 5G technology so either you pay
directly or indirectly irregardless if the US bans them or not
Facebook at one time was operating in China. In 2008-2009 terrorists were using Facebook
to coordinate attacks in Xinjiang province. When the Chinese government demanded the
information Facebook declined to provide citing privacy issues. After that Facebook was
banned.
"For example Facebook, Youtube, Twitter, Google--maybe they want complete control over
what their populations hear or says online?"
If that's the case why is it not illegal in China to have a VPN? How many strawmen are in
that diatribe you just posted? I can only knock down one at a time.
Is the dispute over Tik-Tok really about protecting American citizens?
Non-US companies collect a lot of info about US citizens and citizens of other Western
countries via internet apps and other means. And much info is available for sale as well.
Seems more likely that the forced sale is really about protecting the Western
establishment and US power-elite. A massive social network is a threat to their control
because it could be used to spread anti-US govt messages. Mostly to younger people who are
already very cynical (as we can see from the protesting) and thus more willing to accept it
as true or reflecting a truth.
Although Sarah's comedy is not a threat to the US power-elite, one can easily imagine
messaging that would be:
USA threatens war against a country and suddenly everyone in USA gets messages that
depict Trump/USA as a bully and that create sympathy for the good people of the target
country.
Messaging that decries the harsh and unfair treatment of political prisoners
(Assange?);
Messaging that calls into question the legitimacy of a US Presidential election.
Messages that mock Trump's blaming China for the pandemic by describing the Trump
Administration's inept response to the pandemic.
<> <> <> <> <>
PS Where's the libertarian mob complaining about government control? Those astro-turfed
bullsh*ters are not really interested in issues that they are not paid to be interested
in.
"As TikTok's global market influence was skyrocketing, the company was suppressed by the
US government. Again, this shows how difficult it is for companies from China to go global.
ByteDance said in a statement that it is "committed to becoming a global company." But
Washington will not easily let the company off just because of its good wishes.
"The US' decoupling from China starts from killing China's most competitive companies. In
the process, Washington ignores rules and is unreasonable. Although suppressing Huawei and
TikTok also incurs losses to the US, the suppression can still be implemented in the US. This
is because such suppression echoes the sense of crisis instigated by some US elites when
facing China's rise.
"Huawei and ByteDance can only provide limited protection to themselves via legal means.
But we should not overestimate the US' sense of justice. The country has shown us too many
examples of politics overwhelming everything else....
"Huawei has advanced equipment, and ByteDance sells services to the world through unique
concepts and technologies. The two companies are pioneers worldwide. They have brought a
sense of crisis to US elites, which shows that China's top companies have the ability to move
to the forefront of the world in technology. It reflects the power of China as an emerging
market. As long as such power continues to expand, these top Chinese companies can eventually
break through US suppression.
"By banning Huawei, the US would lag behind in 5G technology. By banning TikTok, the US
would harm its own internet diversity and its belief in freedom and democracy. When similar
things happen time and again, the US will take steps closer to its decline. The US is a
pioneer in global internet and has created Google, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. But in
recent years, the US' internet structure has been rigid.
"Rising stars such as ByteDance continue to emerge in Chinese internet sector, showing
huge vitality. China knows its deficiencies, strives to become stronger, and adheres to
opening-up to the world. The US, however, is gradually being shrouded in arrogance, seclusion
and a negative attitude. Chinese people should not be discouraged by temporary setbacks, or
our weaker position in the China-US confrontation. What's important is that China's trend of
faster-pace progress has not changed....
"The COVID-19 pandemic is an important issue, clearly showing us that the US has fallen
into a type of systematic chaos. This will severely limit its ability to indefinitely upgrade
and exert pressure on China. Many of the US practices, including banning TikTok, show the
country's weakening competitiveness. Can't Facebook just come up with a more powerful app and
beat TikTok in the market? The problem is Facebook cannot do it. It can only resort to the
brute force of US politics."
As you read, China takes this very differently. It sees the inability of Outlaw US Empire
firms to compete and thus seek protection as suggested here :
"Western countries' social media platforms have long dominated, and only a handful of
Chinese firms that have entered the arena in recent years have won popularity. TikTok has
seen record-high downloads across the world. Per data from an industry analysis platform
Sensor Tower in April, TikTok had been downloaded more than 2 billion times globally
.
"The US' plan to ban TikTok follows the same logic as its crackdown on Chinese tech firm
Huawei. The US has been limiting the 5G frontrunner for years, essentially the result of
evolving relations between China and the US-led Western world.
" TikTok and Huawei are not isolated cases. Chinese high-tech firms that expand
overseas will encounter different levels of barriers as China develops into a new tech power,
giving rise to concerns from countries that feel threatened by Chinese technology .
"The US will not allow a social media platform that enjoys high popularity among younger
generations to be operated by a foreign company, especially when the countdown to its
presidential election ticks on. Banning TikTok now is, to some extent, also a move by Trump
to control public voices after groups of young American TikTok users reportedly upstaged his
first large-scale public rally amid the COVID-19 pandemic by registering for tickets and
failing to attend.
"With the election drawing near, a plunging second-quarter GDP at negative 32.9 percent,
and the world's largest number of coronavirus infections, it is likely the Trump
administration will continue rolling out new and even harsher measures to antagonize China
and attempt to block it economically." [My Emphasis]
How much revenge and the election play into the drama are unknown, but we know Trump is
soft-skinned and very vindictive; Tulsa was a huge embarrassment. Can't compete; erect a
tariff wall to protect your weak companies--the Outlaw US Empire demands China "open up"
while it closes up instead. As the headline of the first item screamed, "Banning TikTok
reflects Washington's cowardice."
Gotta love the stupid Western capitalists.
First, it was "Let's all invest in China, do a lot of business and move all our factories
there because we'll make a shit-ton of $$".
Then, it's "Oh, they're too big and powerful, we need to stop trading and making any kind of
business with them".
As some clever guy said about these short-sighted idiots more than a century ago, they're
selling the rope with which to hang them.
The mafia methods used are often packaged as monopoly powers such copyrights, patents,
transformation of public goods into for profit private enterprizes (privatization), takeovers and
bankruptcy, private ownership of the highest levels of nearly all governments, and just 6 own 92%
of all media.
Takeover of Tik Toc by Microsoft is just one demonstrating of a wider trend -- the tend
toward gangster capitalism. BTW Chinese proposes complete divestment. That spells big trouble for
US heavyweights such as Amazon, Google and Facebook.
"We lie to deceive ourselves, we lie to comfort others, we lie out of pity, we lie out of
shame, to encourage, to hide our misery, we lie out of honesty. We lie for freedom."
Trump blames China every chance he can and the Democrats either agree or offer mealy-mouthed
protest.
Notable quotes:
"... It comes to light that at least 125 US companies owned or invested in by Chinese entities, including Chinese SOE, received hundreds of millions in PPP loans backed by the US SBS. ..."
"... This level of capitalust interconnection between elite investors and governments belies all the heated talk of cold war by politicians on both sides as well as useful idiots the world over. ..."
"... "If this is also national security, then US national security is synonymous with hegemony." ..."
China has never banned US high-tech companies from doing business in the country. What the
Chinese government demands is that what they do in China should comply with Chinese law.
That's all . It was some US companies that refused to comply with Chinese laws.
Google used to have a position in the Chinese market. It itself pulled out of China a
decade ago, while other companies were accused in the US of kowtowing to China when they
tried to design their specific versions for the Chinese market. This leaves no US internet
giant currently operating in China.
TikTok operates in the US in full compliance with US laws and is completely cut off from
Douyin, its Chinese equivalent. Users in the Chinese mainland cannot register for TikTok
even if they bypass the so-called great firewall . TikTok does not violate any US
law but fully cooperates with the US administration.
The US claim that TikTok threatens its own national security is a purely hypothetical
and unwarranted charge - just like the groundless accusation that Huawei gathers
intelligence for the Chinese government. This is fundamentally different from China's
refusal to allow the original versions of Facebook and Twitter to enter China and require
them to operate in accordance with Chinese laws.
In just three paragraphs, the Global Times killed two myths: that a "great firewall"
exists and that China censorship things from the West (i.e. that the Chinese people is
"living in the darkness").
I had a teacher who traveled to China recently. He went to a local bar (100% Mainland
Chinese) as soon as he landed. He was having difficulty accessing Google (I think it was
either Gmail or Google Drive). He tried, tried, tried but couldn't do it. When the locals
there realized he was trying to access Google products, they promptly and calmly told him he
should use VPN because Google didn't operate in China. No drama, no fear of a local police
officer suddenly coming to the place to arrest them.
They know what Apple, Google and Facebook are. It's just that China has better local
options for the same product.
Not that globalization is a one way street by any means.
It comes to light that at least 125 US companies owned or invested in by Chinese entities,
including Chinese SOE, received hundreds of millions in PPP loans backed by the US SBS.
This level of capitalust interconnection between elite investors and governments belies
all the heated talk of cold war by politicians on both sides as well as useful idiots the
world over.
Why even favorite Chinese PR flack Pepe Escobar recently characterized the Stupidity Trap
aka Thucydides Trap as childish nonsense.
"If this is also national security, then US national security is synonymous with
hegemony."
That is precisely the problem. Unfortunately, the current US economy has become dependent on
advantages arising from unrivaled geopolitical power. Take it away too suddenly, and there
would be a painful economic transition to become a normal nation again.
While concern might be legitimate, Trump administration actions looks more and more like
extortion. They really open the door for king US financial companies and accounting firms from
China and Russia. The latter also represent "national security" threat.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Sunday that President Trump would soon take action
against Chinese software companies that the administration believes present a national security
risk for Americans.
"President Trump has said, 'enough,' and we're going to fix it," Pompeo said on Fox News's
"Sunday Morning Futures." "And so he will take action in the coming days with respect to a
broad array of national security risks that are presented by software connected to the Chinese
Communist Party."
The comments come on the heels of Trump's announcement on Friday that he was prepared to
sign an executive order to ban TikTok, a Chinese-owned short-form video app, from operating in
the U.S.
Pompeo on Sunday asserted that Chinese-owned software companies doing business in America
were "feeding data directly" to the government in Beijing and that the practices amounted to
"true national security issues." He specifically named TikTok and WeChat, a Chinese-owned
messaging and social media app.
"They are true privacy issues for the American people. And for a long time, a long time, the
United States just said, well, goodness, if we're having fun with it, or if a company can make
money off of it, we're going to permit that to happen," Pompeo added, noting that officials
have been deliberating on a decision for months now.
TikTok, which has become especially popular among teens in recent years, has gained
relentless scrutiny from the Trump administration and members of Congress overs its
relationship with ByteDance, a Chinese firm. Lawmakers have voiced concerns that Americans'
information is not secure in the hands of TikTok, considering Chinese laws that require
disclosures of sensitive data upon request by the government.
TikTok has strongly pushed back against allegations about its handling of user data in
recent days, with the company's CEO releasing a statement rebuking "rumors and misinformation."
The company also sent a letter to leaders on the House Judiciary Committee last Wednesday
rebutting allegations about its data practices.
"TikTok is not available in China," the letter said. "We store Americans' user data in the
US, with back-up in Singapore, with strict access controls for employees. We have never
provided any US user data to the Chinese government, nor would we do so if asked. Any
allegations to the contrary are unfounded."
TikTok has not directly commented on Trump's stated plans to bar the app's use in the U.S.
Though TikTok's U.S. general manager, Vanessa Pappas, said in a video on Saturday that the
company is "here for the long run." The company has also highlighted the 1,000 people in the
U.S. it has hired, noting that it plans on adding another 10,000 employees in the country in
the future.
After Trump's comments on Friday, reports surfaced that Microsoft was in talks to purchase
the short-form video app, which boasts roughly 100 million American users.
Asked about that possibility and whether it would end any opportunity for Chinese
surveillance, Pompeo said on Fox News that the administration "will make sure that everything
we have done drives us as close to zero risk for the American people."
Multiple GOP Senators have voiced support of the prospect of a U.S. company purchasing
TikTok to avoid an outright ban. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) said in a tweet Sunday that a
"trusted" U.S. company buying the app would be a "positive and acceptable outcome."
"... Join the Singapore Property Festival - a virtual exhibition organised by the South China Morning Post on August 1 to explore a wide range of affordable luxury residential and commercial real estate assets in Singapore, perfect as relocation and investment options. Get property project highlights and market insights from Info Session webinars and LIVE 1-on-1 chats with property taxation, immigration and investment experts. Register for your FREE PASS now. ..."
Curtis also stuck close to the main theme of US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's
high-profile
China policy speech last week by arguing that the India border clash and sovereign debt
financing used for Belt and Road Initiative projects
"fits with a larger pattern of PRC aggression in other parts of the world". Pompeo called for
"a new grouping of like-minded nations" to counter China.
Accusing Beijing of "selling cheap armaments and building a base for the 1970s-era
submarines that it sold to the Bangladesh Navy in 2016", Curtis also committed to stronger
relations with Dhaka.
"We're committed to Bangladesh's long-term success because US interests in the Indo-Pacific
depends on a Bangladesh that is peaceful, secure, prosperous healthy and democratic," Curtis
said. "We continue to encourage the Bangladeshi government to renew its commitment to
democratic values as it prepares to celebrate its 50th anniversary of independence, next year."
Big Tech tangles with US lawmakers in antitrust showdown 30 Jul 2020
While the India-China border clash, pressing of maritime claims in the South China Sea, and
increasing military and economic pressure on Taiwan may have helped to push countries in the
region to cooperate more, Washington will not necessarily benefit, said Ali Wyne, a
non-resident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council and a non-resident fellow at the Modern War
Institute.
"China's actions in recent months have compelled many of its neighbours to try and bolster
their military capabilities on an accelerated timeline and to intensify their security
cooperation with one another," Wyne said.
"For at least two reasons, though, it is unclear that those neighbours would be full
participants in a US-led effort to counterbalance China.
"First, geographical proximity and economic dependence constrain the extent to which they
can push back against Beijing's assertiveness without undercutting their own national
interests," he said. "Second, many of them are reluctant to make common cause with the United
States in view of the transactional diplomacy that it has pursued in recent years."
China's foreign minister calls on other nations to resist US and stop a new cold war 29 Jul
2020
China's embassy in Washington did not respond to a request for comment.
However, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi on Tuesday called Washington's increasingly hard
line against the Chinese government "naked power politics". In a phone
call with his French counterpart Jean-Yves Le Drian on Tuesday, Wang said the Trump
administration's strategy was to "constantly provoke China's core interests, attack the social
system chosen by the Chinese people and slander the ruling party that is closely connected with
the Chinese people," according to state news agency Xinhua.
"These actions have lost the most basic etiquette for state-to-state exchanges and have
broken through the most basic bottom line of international norms," he said, warning that "the
world will fall into a crisis of division, and the future and destiny of mankind will also be
in danger".
https://www.youtube.com/embed/c3uzkXgW4yY?rel=0&mute=1&playsinline=1&frameborder=0&autoplay=0&embed_config=%7B%22relatedChannels%22%3A%5B%22UC4SUWizzKc1tptprBkWjX2Q%22%5D%2C%22adsConfig%22%3A%7B%22adTagParameters%22%3A%7B%22iu%22%3A%22%2F8134%2Fscmp%2Fweb%2Fchina_policiespolitics%2Farticle%2Finstream1%22%2C%22cust_params%22%3A%7B%22paid%22%3A1%2C%22scnid%22%3A%223095250%22%2C%22sctid%22%3A%22326745%22%2C%22scsid%22%3A%5B%2291%22%2C%224%22%2C%22318198%22%5D%2C%22articletype%22%3A%22DEFAULT%22%7D%7D%2C%22nonPersonalizedAd%22%3Atrue%7D%7D&enablejsapi=1&origin=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.scmp.com&widgetid=2
US House of Representatives sends Uygur Human Rights Policy Act to Trump's desk for
approval
US House of Representatives sends Uygur Human Rights Policy Act to Trump's desk for
approval
Curtis was less sanguine about how much Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and other Central Asian
republics were resisting China's influence, citing an emphasis by governments in the region on
the economic consequences of strained ties with Beijing by protesting the treatment of Muslim
minorities in China's far northwest.
China's internment of Muslim Uygurs in the Xinjiang region has drawn international
condemnation. The UN has estimated that more than a million Muslims have been detained in camps
there for political re-education, but Beijing claims they are vocational training centres aimed
at countering religious extremism.
"With regard to the Central Asian countries, I think they're concerned about China's
economic influence in their countries, and therefore they very much hedge their comments about
the repression of Muslims in Xinjiang province," Curtis said, but added that she expected
public condemnation of China in Pakistan and Bangladesh to mount over the issue.
"There has been reticence, which has been disheartening, but I think as these countries see
China trying to trying to increase disinformation campaigns you'll start to see pushback from
the South Central Asian countries and more speaking out about the treatment of Muslims in
Xinjiang," she said. Join the Singapore
Property Festival - a virtual exhibition organised by the South China Morning Post on
August 1 to explore a wide range of affordable luxury residential and commercial real estate
assets in Singapore, perfect as relocation and investment options. Get property project
highlights and market insights from Info Session webinars and LIVE 1-on-1 chats with property
taxation, immigration and investment experts. Register for
your FREE PASS now.
"... The problem for the US is that China is the world's biggest semiconductor market and biggest chip importer on the world ..."
"... these bans are lose lose situation for both the US and China ..."
"... I do not think that Pompeo is smelling blood and moving for the jugular, its not such a situation as China is not that vulnerable, it is more likely to be US elite anger due to the US weakening and China gains during the Covid-19 crisis. ..."
"... Trump strategy of bullying works many times. Supposedly there should be costs for the US in soft power and world opinion, but we are not seeing them. ..."
"... I guess most of the world is too cowardly and prefers to go with the flow. They will abandon the US only after the US lost anyway. Well, it is not an easy situation. Still, the US reactions are very strong and hateful precisely because things are still not good for it and its decline is continuing, regardless of some tactical victories, where in some cases it is a lose lose situation anyway. ..."
A Significant Decline Is Coming For The U.S.james , Jul 27 2020 18:10 utc |
1
by Passer by
In response to several comments in the last
open thread (slightly edited).
Actually there is even some real, and not only relative, decline for the US, for example
US life expectancy is dropping. This is a pretty bad sign for a developed country. Same for
the UK by the way.
On the issue of China gaining during the Covid crisis, they gained in raw power, for
example gained in GDP relatively to the US. And they gained in debt levels too, relatively,
as US debt levels exploded due to the crisis. Now you have V-shaped recovery in China and
poor, W-shaped double dip recovery in the US. With far more debt added.
Of course there is the issue of public relations and soft power. On the one hand the US
blamed China for the pandemic, but on the other hand it embarrassed itself due to its poor
performance in containing the pandemic, compared to other countries. And the US lost points
around the world due to rejecting WHO right in the middle of the pandemic. Europe and
developing countries did not like that at all. Don't forget that Covid also weakened the US
military, they have problems with it, including on ships and overseas bases, and even broke
the biggest US exercise planned in Europe for the last 30 years. And the pandemic in the US
is still raging, its not fixed at all and death rates are increasing again.
Here for example, the futurologists from Pardee Canter that that China gained during the
crisis, in raw capabilities. Future research and relative power between countries is
their specialty :
Research Associate Collin Meisel and Pardee Center Director Jonathan Moyer use IFs
(International Futures) to explore the long-term impact of COVID-19 in China in this Duck
Of Minerva blog post" "Where broad measures of material capabilities are concerned, the
picture is clear: COVID-19 is closing the gap in relative capabilities for the U.S. and
China and accelerating the U.S.-China transition. Through multiple long-term forecast
scenarios using the International Futures tool,
Research Associate Collin Meisel and Pardee Center Director Jonathan Moyer explain on the
Duck of Minerva blog that China is likely to gain approximately one percent of global
power relative to the U.S. by 2030 due to the economic and mortality impacts of COVID-19.
This share of global power is similar to the relative capabilities of Turkey today.
On the issue of the USD, Stephen Roach
also says that there will be a significant decline in the medium term. And the argument
is pretty logical - if the US share in the global economy is declining (and it will be
declining at least up to year 2060), and if the level of US debts is reaching all time high
levels, then the USD will decline. I agree with that argument. It is fully logical.
On the chip/semiconductor issue. David Goldman is skeptical that the US will be able
to stop
China on this :
The chip ban gives the world an enormous incentive to circumvent the US
Basically Huawei still has advanced suppliers, from South Korea and Japan. And
some of them are refusing to yield. The problem for the US is that China is the world's
biggest semiconductor market and biggest chip importer on the world , which gives
enormous initiative for private businesses to circumvent US made equipment in order to export
to China. Then also China is stashing large quantities of chips. By 2025, it should be able
to replace foreign production with homegrown. So these bans are lose lose situation for
both the US and China - yes, this will cause come costs to China up to 2025. But it will
also lead to US companies, such as Qualcomm, to lose the Chinese chip market, which is the
largest in the world, and there is nothing to replace it.
These are hundreds of billions of losses for the US due to gradually losing the most
lucrative market. Thus, in relative terms, China does not lose from these games, as the US
will pay a large price just as China. It is lose-lose situation, but in relative terms the
same. US loses just as China loses. And do not forget that China warned that a full US attack
on Huawei will lead to Boeing being kicked from the country, which is becoming the biggest
aviation market in the world, and will lead to hundreds of billions of losses for that
company too, and will probably burry it under Airbus. China needs lots of planes up to 2028,
when they will replace them with their own, worth hundreds of billions of dollars. Elevating
Airbus over Boeing, which already has big troubles, will be a significant hit for the US
aerospace industry.
So China has cards to play too. On the issue of the US getting some countries to ban
Huawei, it is again lose - lose situation - that is both the US and some of its allies will
lose due to using more expensive 5G equipment and will lose more time to build their
networks. So China loses, and US and some allies lose, but in relative terms things remain
the same between them power-wise, as they both lose. Do not forget that Germany said that
it will continue to use Huawei equipment, and this is the biggest economy in Europe:
Germany's three major telecommunications operators Deutsche Telekom, Vodafone and
Telefonica have been actively promoting 5G in recent years. They implement the "supplier
diversification" strategy and use Huawei equipment in their networks among other vendors.
Peter Altmaier, German minister of economy, told the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung on July
11 that Germany would not exclude Huawei from the country's 5G network rollout. "There can
only be an exclusion if national security is demonstrably at risk. However, we will
strengthen our security measures, regardless of which country the products come from," said
Altmaier. "There is no change in Germany's position," a spokesperson of the country's
Interior Ministry told local broadcaster ARD on July 16.
So we can say that probably half of Europe will be using Huawei. Still, as you said, a
large part of the world will exclude it. Maybe half of world's GDP. Unfortunately things are
not perfect. One bright spot in that is that Huawei is betting on emerging markets, and
emerging markets have higher growth rates than western markets - that is, they will matter
more in the future.
I would agree that the US is harming China, but the damage is not large IMO, as these are
mostly lose lose situations where relative power stays the same. And with time, there will be
significant damages for the US too, such as losing the biggest chip and aviation markets and
the empowerment of Boeing competitors such as Airbus.
So its not too bad in China. Thus, after mentioning all of this, I do not think that
Pompeo is smelling blood and moving for the jugular, its not such a situation as China is not
that vulnerable, it is more likely to be US elite anger due to the US weakening and China
gains during the Covid-19 crisis.
On Hong Kong China had no options. It was a lose-lose situation. If they allowed
everything to stay as it is there would be constant color revolution there and they will be
constantly in the media. Maybe it is better to stop this once and for all. They hoped that
the Covid crisis will give them cover to do this. It did not work very well.
Unfortunately it is right that the Trump strategy of bullying works many times.
Supposedly there should be costs for the US in soft power and world opinion, but we are not
seeing them.
I guess most of the world is too cowardly and prefers to go with the flow. They will
abandon the US only after the US lost anyway. Well, it is not an easy situation. Still, the
US reactions are very strong and hateful precisely because things are still not good for it
and its decline is continuing, regardless of some tactical victories, where in some cases it
is a lose lose situation anyway.
The data shows a
significant decline incoming for the US.
2019 China 1,27 times bigger in GDP/PPP
2030 China 1,8 times bigger in GDP/PPP
US debt to GDP 2019 80%
US debt to GDP 2030 125%
US debt to GDP 2050 230 %
The Highway Trust Fund (HTF) will be depleted by 2021, the Medicare Hospital Insurance (HI)
trust fund by the beginning of 2024, the Social Security Disability Insurance (SSDI) trust
fund in the 2020s, the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation (PBGC) Multi-Employer fund at
some point in the mid-2020s, and the Social Security Old-Age and Survivors Insurance (OASI)
trust fund by 2031. We estimate the theoretically combined Social Security OASDI Trust fund
will run out of reserves by 2031.
Military budget (before Covid estimates, Trump budget) 2019 3,2 % of GDP - 2030 2,5 %
of GDP (Could drop to 2,3 % of GDP due to Covid)
Civilian discretionary spending (before Covid estimates) 2019 3,2 % of GDP - 2030 1.8 %
of GDP (drop to all time low) (Could drop further due to Covid)
That is not to mention the big divide in US society, and the ongoing Covid crisis, which
is still not fixed in the US. But is largely fixed in China. Do you see the decline now? They
have a big, big reason to be worried. A significant decline is coming for the US.
Posted by b on July 27, 2020 at 17:53 UTC | Permalink
thanks for highlighting 'passer by's post b... i agree with them for the most part... it
reminds me of a game of chess where pieces are being removed from the board.. it is a lose-
lose, but ultimately, it is a bigger loss for the usa down the road... for whatever reason
the usa can't see that the financial sanctions, bullying and etc, only go so far and others
work around this as we see with russia, iran, venezuala and china in particular...
the one comment i would view differently then passer by is this one - "Unfortunately it is
right that the Trump strategy of bullying works many times. Supposedly there should be costs
for the US in soft power and world opinion, but we are not seeing them." i think the usa is
losing it's position in terms of soft power and world opinion but you won't be reading about
it in the western msm.. that is going to come out later after the emergence of a new reality
is very clear for all to see... the trump strategy is really more of the same and it is like
a medicine that loses it's power over time and becomes ineffective - sort of like
antibiotics...
In other words the western oligarchs will lose out to the eastern oligarchs in the Great
Trade War under the cover of a fake pandemic.
Or perhaps the global oligarchs in general just want the world to follow more in the
Chinese model where the population is more agreeable to total surveillance, social credit
scores and even more out right fascistic government/corp model under the cover of a fake
pandemic.
With respect to "bullying works", in international diplomacy it usually does since weaker
powers have more to lose in a direct diplomatic crisis with a larger power. This is not to
say that they won't push back, but they will be far more strategic in where they do. In
essence, weaker powers have fewer "red lines" but they will still enforce those, while
greater powers have more "red lines", because they have more power to squander on
fundamentally insignificant issues. However, weaker states will still remember being abused
and oppressed, so when the worms turns while they won't be the first to jump ship, they will
be more than eager to pile on and extract some juicy retribution once it is clear they will
not be singled out. I suspect the Germany will be the bellwether, when (if) Germany breaks
from the US on a key aspect on the transatlantic relationship that will be the signal for
others to start jumping ship. If Nordstream 2 go through, then there will be a break within 5
years; if Nordstream is killed, then the break might be delayed for 5 years or more but there
will still be a break when the US pushes Germany to support the next major US regime change
war in the Middle East.
The engineered collapse is being called the "Great Reset" by many outlets already. The
covid nonsense is just a cover for it. Instead of Saudi Arabian terrorist it is a basically a
harmless coronavirus. Just in the days immediately following 911 the "terrorist'' threat was
so overhyped that security theater was employed everywhere. Now sanitation theater is the new
act in town.
Where does anyone get these numbers about military spend as a % of gdp? Have you listened
to Katherine Austin Fitts on Corbett Report?
Posted by: oglalla | Jul 27 2020 18:27 utc | 4
Good to see your comment. Lots of anecdotal evidence nationwide about store closures and
many vacancies in business centers, particularly within economic engines of NYC and elsewhere
along the East Coast. IMO, lots of self-censorship by business media while the reality
reported by Shadowstats goes ignored. As for losing the status of #1 economy, that was always
going to occur once China or India became a moderately developed economy. It just happened
that China is far more efficient politically which allowed it to become #1. And until India
improves politically, it will continue to lag behind numerous smaller nations. Too bad there
isn't a place where one can bet on the great likelihood that the Outlaw US Empire will
outperform all nations in the production of Bullshit and Lies.
I also disagree with the comparison between USA and China gdp and other statistics.
China is not simply competing against USA but against the Empire: 5 eyes, NATO, Euro
poodles, Israel and the Gulf States and others like Mexico, Columbia, Brazil, India.
Anyone that is minimizing the conflict and the advantages of one side vs another is doing
a disservice.
CitizenX @ 26
Agree with your tone and content.
Particularly the third from last paragraph. I think people are missing by choice the growing
ground-swell of public opinion US wide as this blog shows, a multi-faceted detereation of US
political morals and legality.
Combined with a world wide growing awareness of how deranged American leaders now are.
Haterd consumes itself as dose greed.
My ear to the ground tells me, the protests at present are growing some in full sight some
not.
This is not buseness as usual. Then return to normal. The mood now is -- -- - let's settle
this thing once and for all, let's get the job done.
So my personal opinion ? we will see a US regime chainge faster than a lot here predict. Much
faster.
Passer by is correct, no doubt, thanks to incompetent leadership in the US, but this
economic horse race doesn't matter.
What matters above all is that nations should hold it together, "it" being sustainable,
survivable support systems capable of providing for mass populations.We have failed that test
here in our encounter with this pandemic. We have failed to develop a sustainable financial
system. We have failed to meet any sort of environmental goals. We don't even have
environmental goals! Our electoral system doesn't work, either, proof being the election of
this idiot atavistic rich boy. If anyone thinks the election of Trump reflects the will of
the majority of Americans, they are part of the problem.
China is in deep trouble. The CCP's greatest challenge is simply to hold "it" together.
The Party has to perform economic miracles or the country will collapse. Those groups not
satisfied with life in the PRC have no outlet for their voices to be heard. They cannot
protest. They are under the strict control of an increasingly sophisticated but tiny elitist
clique that is only 6.5% of the total population. This clique will not relinquish power and
permit more democratic expression. On the contrary, more and more suppression of dissidence
of any sort will happen. The social scoring system is an especially insidious program of
social control. China's collectivism has turned the country into an ant hill. It is extremely
productive, but people are not ants.
Passer by is looking at the world through a keyhole.
Nightmare' conditions at Chinese factories where Hasbro and Disney toys are made
Investigators found there were serious violations at the factories which were endangering
workers.
In peak production season, employees were working up to 175 overtime hours per month.
Chinese labour law restricts monthly overtime to 36 hours per month, but the report alleged
factories would often ask local governments to implement a "comprehensive working hour
scheme" to override existing legislation.
One wonders if China will run into the same problems of the US in the not too distant
future?
"The End of Sweatshops? Robotisation and the Making of New Skilled Workers in China"
Over the past four decades China has undergone a process of massive industrialisation that
has allowed the country to achieve remarkable economic growth. Because of its large
manufacturing capacity based on a seemingly unlimited supply of cheap migrant labour in light
industries, China has come to be known as the 'workshop of the world'. However, since the
early 2000s the country's labour market has experienced a remarkable transition from labour
surplus to a shortage of labour, which has led to sustained increases in the wages of
ordinary workers. In such a context, since 2015 robotisation has become a driving policy for
industrial upgrading for manufacturing in China, with the slogan 'replacing human workers
with industrial robots' (机器换人) frequently appearing in media
reports and official policy documents.
The early date of "full spectrum dominance" (1996 not 2010) suggests to me that the
doctrine was related the "end of history" thinking of that time. USA Deep State believed its
own propaganda.
It also strengthens my case for the proximate cause for the current conflict originating
in 2014 when the US Deep State suddenly realized the threat that Russia and China Alliance
posed to their plans for global domination.
Not only had they believed their own propaganda but they had overreached with their
attempt to force Russia to capitulate and had been distracted by Israel interests that wanted
to use USA for the greater Israel project.
When I wrote my economic analysis paper on China in 1999, it was quite clear that the 21st
Century was going to become the Asian Century as the Outlaw US Empire would be eclipsed by
Asia's economic dynamism. 20+ years later, my prediction holds true, and it's even stronger
now than then with Russia's resurgence. Both outcomes clearly go against the 500+ years of
Western Global Hegemony and goads numerous people. For students of history like myself,
what's occurring isn't a surprise thanks to the West's adoption of--or should I write forced
indoctrination into--the Neoliberal political-economic philosophy, which is akin to that of
Feudalism since it benefits the same class as that of the Feudal Era. China too was once
Feudal and suffered a massive Civil War that destroyed much of its structure, a conflict
known to the West as The Taiping Rebellion that lasted
almost 14 years, from 1850-1864. One might say that was the first half of China's overall
effort to overthrow Feudalism and Western Imperialism, as the second half began in 1927 and
finally concluded in 1949. That amounts to a large % of years for a newbie nation like the
USA; but for a nation like China inhabited by humans for over 1.3 million years and with
4,500 years of recorded history, it's really just another Dynastic Rollover--something
inconceivable to non-Asians.
In reality, China's a conservative nation, culture and society with a several thousand
year ethos of Collectivism, although that allowed a significant divergence in social
stratification due to the ruling Feudal ways. Those who have read The Good Earth have
an excellent grasp on the nature of Chinese Feudalism, which was embodied by the Kuomintang
or KMT--as with Feudal lords, KMT leaders were deemed "Gangsters" by US Generals and
diplomats during and after WW2. General Marshall wrote in 1947 it was clear to him that the
KMT would lose to the CPC, that there was no good reason to throw good money after bad, and
it would be best for the USA and the West to accept the fact of a Communist China (all noted
by Kolko in his Politics of War ). Contemporary China when compared to China as
depicted in 1931 by Pearl Buck is one of the most amazing human achievements of all time, and
the conservative Chinese government intends to keep it that way through a series of well
thought-out plans. That's the reality. It can be accepted and worked with as numerous nations
realize, or it be somehow seen as unacceptable and fought against in what will prove to be a
losing effort since all China need do is parry the blows and reflect them back upon its
opponent using skills it developed over several thousand years. It would be much easier to
join China than fight.
It's misleading to assess the National Military Capability of various countries in $US terms.
The West's M-IC is privately owned and puts shareholder profit before all else. And the
owners of the Western M-IC also own the politicians who facilitate and approve the rip-offs.
China and Russia's M-IC are owned and controlled by The People via the government and can
therefore get $2+ of value for every $1 invested. For example, one can buy some very nifty
twin-engine bizjets for less than half the price USG pays for a flying Batmobile (F-35) - a
glorified hot-rod with guns.
There is definitely a decline in the USA. Deaths of despair and from the coronavirus are
too great to ignore anymore. 150,000 dead and counting are not nothing. The Western Empire
has fallen. The U.S. federal government failed. The Imperialists are quarantined at home.
The question is if the 19th century North American Empire from Hawaii to Puerto Rico
survives. The Elite have bet it all on a vaccine or patentable treatment to give the
Pharmaceutical Industry billions of dollars. However, quick cheap paper monoclonal antigen
tests would make testing at home before going to work or school practical.
This would end viral transmission and the pandemic. No drug jackpot for the 10%. Instead
public health is ignored as Americans die. The silence is deafening. The protests in the
Pacific Northwest are not about slavery. They are about the 90% of Americans being treated as
disposable trash.
150,000 dead and counting are not nothing. The Western Empire has fallen.
No offense VV but I can't help thinking that you (and maybe some others) are talking past the
issue.
To be clear, the issue is this: Will the West's decline play a role in the US/Empire's
ability and willingness to confront Russia-China? Or is the oft-heard refrain that US/Empire
can not 'win' against China (implying that they shouldn't/won't bother trying!)
because of its decline (usually attributed to 'late-state capitalism') just wishful
thinking?
Virtually everyone here has agreed that the West - especially USA - hasn't fought the
virus correctly and with vigor. And virtually everyone agrees that there has been a relative
decline in USA/West and in some areas an absolute decline.
IMO what is ignored is that:
from the perspective of the US 'Deep State' or Western power-elite the failure to fight
the virus is a net positive if the repercussions are blamed on China (in addition to
other 'positives' from their perspective: saving on cost of care to elderly, boosting Big
Pharma profits, etc.) -
In fact, deliberate mistakes and mounting only a token effort (as we've seen)
is exactly what we should expect from a craven power-elite that want to further their
interests;
the overall decline, while troublesome - especially to the ordinary blokes who get the
short end of that decline - is not yet significant enough to prevent USA/Empire from
countering the Russia-China 'upstarts' aggressively.
I likened the hopefulness of the anti-Empire crowd about Western decline to their hopefulness
they previously expressed regarding Turkey. "Erdogan is turning east!" proved to be wrong.
Posted by: Andrei Martyanov | Jul 27 2020 19:01 utc | 14 Within last 10 years China built
surface fleet which in terms of hulls (and "freshness") rivals that of the US. US economy
would have it bottom falling off if it tried to accomplish a similar task.
Nice to see you here again. Yes, I mentioned the relative navy building in the previous
open thread. China's navy will exceed US capability by 2050 and be on parity by 2030-2040
according to reports I've read. That's just ten years to twenty years from now.
Result: US gets kicked out of the South China Sea and has to share the Pacific, Indian
Ocean (as will India with gnashing of teeth) and even the Med with China. China will
undoubtedly project naval power all the way to the Med in support of BRI in the Middle
East.
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Jul 27 2020 20:43 utc | 27 There is decline, and while it has been
mostly relative it is also accelerating - but that hasn't significantly constrained
USA/Empire's response to the upstarts.
I agree. US military power isn't going away in ten years or twenty. China may achieve
parity at some point (and can do serious damage now). But that doesn't obviate the fact that,
short of nuclear war, the US is still in a position to throw its weight around and will
continue to do so until forced back by a (hopefully conventional) military defeat of serious
proportions, i.e., not just "give up and go home". And economic woes won't change that as
long as the taxpayer can be fleeced - and they will be, for at least a few more decades.
@ 62 A.L. "Would it be a surprise to you than there are many many protests in China at the
grass root level everyday?"
There are indeed protests all the time, which is the fire under the local Party leaders
that keeps them dancing. Usually the protests are against local corruption or mismanagement
and are not serious. People can get what they want this way. Each year at the general Party
gathering, however, special note is taken of "mass incidents", that is, protests on a larger
scale, and overtly political events such as those in the Uighur province of Xinjiang and in
Hong Kong. Any protest that challenges the control of the Party is not permitted. The current
protests in the US could not happen in China because they challenge political orthodoxy. The
Chinese don't just roll over on command for the CCP to scratch their bellies and the Party
knows just how volatile the political situation could be if mishandled. China is developing
into the ultimate surveillance state. There are lots of Chinese like that little guy that
stood down the tank at Tienanmen in 1989. Eventually that guy is going to say: "There is some
shit I will not eat!" The Party knows this.
Several years ago (close to 10) I noted that the US would be bringing back US companies
from China, that it would actually subsidize their relocation. It's only logical. I saw China
as becoming hostile to US corporations: in light of how things are going today it's the US
govt becoming hostile toward US companies in China. Make huge profits and then get free money
to return back to the US: and be welcomed as victorious troops arriving back from some
glorious war.
It's Musical Chairs. As the music plays more and more chairs are being removed. Capitalism
has been the most efficient economic system in which to trigger an economic collapse. WTF did
people think would happen with basing economic systems on the impossible, basing on perpetual
growth on a finite planet. All of this was readily foreseeable using SIMPLE MATH.
China is in deep trouble. The CCP's greatest challenge is simply to hold "it" together.
The Party has to perform economic miracles or the country will collapse.
How do you square your dire prediction of China's collapse with the
Edelman trust barometer of 2019 (warning: PDF file), where China scores 88 on the trust
index and the US scores 60?
The COVID-19 pandemic revealed that all the "leading" western countries are unable
to handle even a relatively moderate public health crisis. The neoliberal economic model
considers any aspect of society that isn't generating a profit as ideologically unsound and
targets these areas for "reform" (i.e. privatization).
Sometimes this is done outright, as when a public utility or service is sold to a private,
for-profit operator (e.g. British Rail in the UK). But when the government thinks the public
will resist and push back it is done by stealth, usually by starving the targeted
service/organization of funds and then farming out parts of it to for-profit companies in the
name of "efficiency", "innovation", "resilience" or some other neoliberal doublespeak concept
(they all mean only one thing of course: PROFIT). This is currently happening to the US
Postal Service.
Every public healthcare system in the so-called "advanced" nations encompassed by the
EU/NATO and Five Spies has been underfunded and subjected to stealth privatization for
decades. Furthermore, people in neoliberal societies exist to serve as fodder and raw
material for "the economy" (i.e. the plutocrat or oligarch class) and there is no mechanism
to deal with emergencies that can't be milked for a profit. Hence, the half arsed,
incompetent, making-it up-as-they-go-along response to COVID-19 that simply writes off older
and sick people as expendable.
Neoliberalism began as a US/UK project, that's why poverty, crime, inadequate health care
and social services etc. and governmental and societal dysfunction generally is more advanced
there than in, say, Canada and Germany.
So, yes, the US is in decline, maybe even collapsing, but that doesn't mean the imperial
lackey countries are immune to the forces tearing apart the United States. They are just
proceeding down that road at a slower pace. If the US falls, the west falls...globalization
takes no prisoners.
I live in Canada where sometimes people get a bit smug about how great everything is here
compared to the US. In British Columbia, for example, opiate overdose deaths are at a record
high and have killed many many more people than COVID-19 since the pandemic began. Housing in
cities like Vancouver is increasingly unaffordable, there aren't enough jobs that pay a
living wage, permanent homeless camps exist in city parks, there are entire blocks where
people who live in their vehicles park etc.etc.
The reality is that it's the west that is in decline, not only the United States.
China is developing into the ultimate surveillance state.
Posted by: jadan | Jul 28 2020 1:30 utc | 95
But don't you see, dear jadan, it is for the good of the people, if only the rest of the
world could see the benevolence of Big Brother we would all be much happier at least that is
what the thought police has told me to think. One government, one heart, one mind. Long Live
the PRC revolution./s
Amidst all of the nonsense in the discussion section of the following link, I believe
there are some germane comments from individuals that work in the semiconductor space that
touch on some of the challenges China's chip industry faces. link
I hope their hiring of 3,000 experienced chip engineers accelerates their learning curve.
Developing a chip industry on a moment's notice, let alone competing with Samsung and TSMC,
is no small chore.
One item not mentioned in the above article is whether China could build many consumer
components based on domestic 14nm (or larger) technology. Given China used to spend more
importing chips than oil, I assume that even less advanced chips used for TVs, etc. as
opposed to cellphones, would be very helpful for China's consumer electronics
manufacturing.
They are also making some strides in the flash memory and CPU space, but production
quantities are still very low.
Health, education, infrastructure, research and development. The backbone of prosperity.
These will all continue no matter trade war or cold war but barring hot war. There must be a
doubling time for this - something like an R0. Cold war and sanctions will only serve to
increase R&D
US mistakes, hubris ect move in the opposite direction, mistakes multiplying
mistakes.
@Schmoe 105
thanks, interesting. Here is a complementary tho less detailed article on some of the same
topics I ran across recently: China Speeds Up
Advanced Chip Development [semiconductorengineering.com]
One important point, clearly visible in the tables in the seekingalpha article linked by
Schmoe, is that the ultra-small 14nm/7nm stuff is for specialized (but strategically
important) applications. Most consumer electronics, industry, and everything else is 40-60nm
and up, although of course smaller has benefits to older applications in improve power (i.e.
mobile applications and servers) and cost (higher density/wafer)
US as an one excuse for its current hostilities against China is 'intellectual property'
theft. Makes me think of ninja Chinese sneaking around removing peoples brains.
But back to semiconductors. One of China's biggest imports is chips, mostly made by machines
using US tech. Many industries are highly specialized and it often makes sense from small
community level to national and global level to by a product from those that specialist in
that product.
China has been content to buy chips, but that will now change due to necessity. Yankistan can
now expect to get its brains hacked, but I am also reminded of the Scientists in the
Manhattan Project being the ones to pass on much information to the Soviet Union.
Yankistan will be leaking like a sieve. I guess that's why both oz and the poms are beefing
up their secret police laws. Wont be long before we are getting shot trying to run through
checkpoint charlie to the free east.
It is clear that the US is in decline. It is clear the US military is bloated and
overpriced but it can still turn most countries into rubble (even without using nuclear
weapons) and has done a few recently. Mostly the US uses its reserve currency status and
control of financial networks to punish countries that do not go along with its program. Can
you say sanctions. but as Hemingway said about bankruptcy - it happens slowly and then all at
once - is probably how it will continue to go. It is even losing its technological advantage.
Boeing used to be the leader and made reliable planes. Now they sometimes fall out of the
air. Things like high speed railways used to be the kind of thing the US did well. Now
California can't get one built. China has built thousands of miles of them. Russia built a 19
kilometer bridge to Crimea in 2 years after 2 years of planning. It appears to be competently
built on time and on budget. Do you really think this could happen in the USA now? In the 70s
the US was the leader in environmental actions. I wonder if the present day Congress could
even pass bills comparable to the Clean Air ACT or the Clean water bill. US national politics
are a mean joke. Our choice this year for President - two 70+ old white men with mental
issues. Our health system is overpriced. Medical bills are one of the main reasons for
personal bankruptcies. As others mentioned the US life expectancy is falling. As Dmitri Orlov
who watched the Soviet Empire fail said - Empire hollowed out the Soviet Union till it
failed, I see it doing the same thing in the US.
The current 'adjustment' in the USD & living standards is just what the doctor ordered
to allow elites to roll out "tech wave 2" - there is precious little gain to be had from
further staffing & wages cuts to the average shit-kicker, so now the bourgeoisie,
medicos, architects, academics, writers plus all the rest of the tertiary educated types who
blew hundreds of thousands on an education guaranteed to keep them employed, are about to be
tossed on the scrap heap.
We already know from previous stunts such as 911 & the 2008 'global financial
meltdown' that those most disadvantaged by this entirely predictable destruction of lives
will be easily diverted into time-wasting and pointless arguments about the real cause
of the mess.
This will allow the elites to use that diversion to funnel all federal funds into
subsidising the capital costs of the retooling, as both parties have begun to with the
despicable CARES Act, supported by the mad christian right in the senate, as well as the
so-called socialists in the Congress squad.
All the Cares Act does is inject capital into big corporations, boosting their stock price
& leaving citizens to lose most of their unemployment benefit. Citizens get evicted from
their homes. This time it will be tenants as well as home owners.
Both of those factions of elite enablers are going to create a great deal of noise and
crass finger pointing. The squad will jump up and down about this being a deliberate attack
on citizens by the elite while senate fundies will claim that this 'retooling' is the result
of unreasonable pay & working conditions demands by the communist unions.
What should be a universal expression of disgust will be reduced to just another culture
war.
Neither will ever admit that it is far too late to be worrying about cause, it is time to
concern themselves with effect, because to do so would create focus back on where the money
was going at time when it is important to be saying "everyone is hurting, including the
elites". Fools.
Eventually when the deed has been done assorted scummy senators & creepy congress
people will announce "It is time to move on" That will be a signal that treasury tanks are
dry, the elites have gotten everything which wasn't nailed down so now the citizens can roll
clawing & scratching in the mud.
I have no doubt that will be the direction of discussion here as well, it is much easier
to sit at a keyboard digging out obscure 'facts' that 'prove' one point of view or another,
than it is to leave the keyboard behind and put work into resisting the elites and in doing
so forcing a change that is more citizen friendly.
With the return of Russia to the geo-political arena, US can no longer destroy counties at
will through conventional weapons nor color revolutions and AQ freedom fighters.
Trump decided to go nuclear, so Russia placed its nuclear umbrella over it allies.
US can no longer destroy countries at will. It can attack a country and risk ensuring its own
destruction.
So back to hybrid war and proxie war ... but now the field is narrowed down to five-eyes and
in the case of China - India.
So to keep Russia out, yankistan has to rely on conventional war and hybrid war, though we
are looking at a country where the lunatics are in charge of the asylum so anything could
happen.
The MNCs producing it, the MSS, NSA and GCHQ, the IoT idiots and all authoritarians on the
globe. Consumers are happy with 3G: many don't even have 4G reception - give that to
them.
With IoT more unemployment, more electricity and Internet dependency, more chance of hacks
or natural disruptions (solar flares), more 1984.
The Chinese Communist Party wants a tributary international system where smaller countries
are deferential to larger powers, instead of a rules-based international order where
small countries enjoy equal rights.
The US/UK declining won't bother most billionaires with those passports: they just buy any
other. Stuck are the millions of others.
Equally "China" ascending brings joy for all billionaires around the globe holding stock
depending on Chinese near monopolies, including Anglo-es.
Some middle class Chinese are beginning to see that dying "rich" is is very limited goal,
as zero can be taken to the Here After and the price for this Now is too high. Money is not
everything. Welcome to this select club, Chinese brothers and sisters. Sure, a bit is good to
live but amassing is a waste of precious time and attention.
The US lacks the capacity to erect an "economic wall" that can stop China's
development. Trump's "trade war" was an attempt to do just that, and America got
steamrolled.
To be sure, the US can attempt even more irrational and desperate acts such as trying to
seize assets owned by Chinese people and organizations in the US, but that would be America
shooting itself in the head rather than just the foot.
The US simply does not posses the ability to "take the wind out of China's sails" .
That is not something that is within America's power to accomplish without going kinetic by,
for instance, trying to enforce a naval blockade of China's maritime transport routes. At
this point there are no economic measures America can take that will not do vastly more
damage to America than to China. Both trade war and bio attack were the best options America
had, and America has suffered grievously from those efforts with relatively minimal impact on
China. China's economy remains fundamentally strong while America's economy is
devastated.
As for disrupting China's international development efforts, America has been trying its
hardest for years now with the only impact being minor delays in China's plans. The only way
to truly disrupt China's international development efforts would be to offer a better deal,
but America no longer has anything to offer that is better. The only option left to America
to delay the BRI for longer would be a kinetic one, and the door is closing on that.
from the perspective of the US 'Deep State' or Western power-elite the failure to fight the
virus is a net positive if the repercussions are blamed on China (in addition to other
'positives' from their perspective: saving on cost of care to elderly, boosting Big Pharma
profits, etc.) -
It will not be possible to blame China, simply because no one believes the US press any
longer, and there is no convincing the woman or man on the street that US handling of the
virus has been in any way competent. We may not understand its virulence, and we perhaps
don't understand yet how to cope with it, but the example of China has been clear from the
earliest moments, and that speaks louder than any false rhetoric can claim.
We know what we have been experiencing in comparison with others who acted with celerity,
and that basically was what was needed. The US chose to go it alone, at its peril. It stuck
by a set of rules it had made for itself in these last years - rules which have not benefited
the people at large. It all comes down to that.
I would not quote a Zionist dominated source like Wikipedia on anything politically
sensitive and the article you refer to is in any case 10 years out of date. However if you
read it it refers to two foreign-owned firms, and it mentions that there are (In 2010)plans
to double wages in the next ten years which has happened. The article also states"
Strikes are not new in China. Chinese authorities have long tolerated limited, local
protests by workers unhappy over wages or other issues.[40] The Pearl River Delta alone has
up to 10,000 labor disputes each year. In the spring of 2008, a local union official
described strikes as "as natural as arguments between a husband and wife".[41] The Chinese
government sought balance on the issue; while it has recently repeated calls for increased
domestic consumption through wage increases and regulations, it is also aware that labour
unrest could cause political instability.[42][43]
In response to the string of employee suicides at Foxconn, Guangdong CPC chief Wang Yang
called on companies to improve their treatment of workers. Wang said that "economic growth
should be people-oriented".[44] As the strikes intensified, Wang went further by calling
for more effective negotiations mechanisms, particularly the reform of existing trade
unions. At the same time, authorities began shutting down some websites reporting on the
labour incidents, and have restricted reporting, particularly on strikes occurring at
domestic-owned factories.[46][47] Guangdong province also announced plans to
"professionalize union staff" by taking union representatives off of company payroll to
ensure their independence from management influence.
Which indicates to me that the suicides alerted the government to the fact that
these firms were making the lives of their workers miserable and took steps to improve the
control of them. They obviously realized that the Union officials had been bought by the
management. I wonder how the British government or the USG would have reacted? What I am
certain about is that the MSM would have been much less enthusiastic about reporting it.
IMO, taking a good look at Brazil's situation provides close to a mirror image for those
within the Outlaw US Empire having trouble seeing clearly. Too often we forget to look
South at the great sewer and its misery US Imperialism's created. It may be getting
defeated in Eurasia, but it's winning in Latin America.
That sewer of misery was running full flush during Susan Rice's rise through the
ranks.
National Security Adviser to Obummer 2013 - 2017,
US Ambassador to the UN 2009 - 2013
Do read the rest:
And well beyond South America.
Now she is close to seizing the prize of VP to Biden. She is a iron war horse of
formidable capacity and mendacity given her past roles. She has few redeeming features. She
will conform exactly to the dictats of the permanent state and she will easily step right
over Joe Biden as he either falls or is taken down at the most opportune time.
What drole sense of humour thought of this - the hapless Trump squeezed between two black
American presidents. Seems like something the Clintons dreamed up.
"It was asked upthread if the US citizenry would trade its no-longer existing Superpower
status for decent living standards.... There're only two forces keeping the American people
from attaining freedom from the above fundamental fear and having lifelong security: The
Duopoly and its Donor Class, the Rentier Class of Feudalistic Parasites that are the enemy of
virtually all humanity."
The US citizenry will choose decent living standards in a heartbeat, but the present
arrangement for eating off the labour of deplorables is just too profitable for the Duopoly
& Donor Class to be permitted to change for a couple decades more.
Perhaps they will move on when there is no more meat on the American corpse, or when they
have built up a sufficiently large group of useful idiots in China to begin eating off the
backs of deplorables with Chinese characteristics.
Anything is possible, with the right amount of moolah, even overcoming Confucian morals.
Joshua Wong comes to mind, who not only does idiotic, but actually looks idiotic.
"... Attempting to neutralise a global competitor is the main goal of Americans. Neutralising China's rapid, dynamic development is the essence of the American strategy ..."
Recap from today's Global Times where the argument is to continue to stay the
course and counterpunch in the typical martial arts fashion, as this op/ed from today's Global
Times says :
"Chinese analysts said Sunday the key for China to handle the US offensive is to focus on
its own development and insist on continued reform and opening-up to meet the increasing
needs of Chinese people for better lives. In the upcoming three months, before the November
US presidential election, the China-US relationship is in extreme danger as the Trump
administration is likely to launch more aggressions to force China to retaliate, they
said."
Stay the course; Trump's shit is just an election ploy. However,
"The US' posturing is serving to distract from domestic pressure over President Trump's
failure in handling the pandemic when Trump is seeking reelection this year, Chinese
observers said. However, the Trump administration's China stance still reflects bipartisan
consensus among US elites, so China should not expect significant change in US policy toward
China even if there is a power transition in November, which means China should prepare
itself for a long fight."
Don't stray from the Long Game. An international conference was held that I'll try to get
a link for. Here's GT's summation:
"According to the Xinhua News Agency on Saturday, international scholars said at a virtual
meeting on the international campaign against a new cold war on China on Saturday that
'aggressive statements and actions by the US government toward China poses a threat to world
peace and a potential new cold war on China goes against the interests of humanity.'
"The meeting gathered experts from a number of countries including the US, China, Britain,
India, Russia and Canada.
"Experts attending the meeting issued a statement calling upon the US to step back from
this threat of a cold war and also from other dangerous threats to world peace it is engaged
in.
"The reason why international scholars are criticizing the US rather than China is that
they can see how restrained China remains and the sincerity of China to settle the tension by
dialogue, even though the US is getting unreasonably aggressive, said Chinese experts.
"Washington has made a huge mistake as it has chosen the wrong target - China - to be 'the
common enemy or common fear' to reshape its declining leadership among the West. Right now,
the common enemy of humanity is COVID-19, and this is why its new cold war declaration
received almost no positive responses from other major powers and even raised concern, said
Lü Xiang, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences in Beijing, on
Sunday."
Today's Global Timeslead editorial asked most of the
questions everyone else's asking:
"People are asking: How far will the current China-US confrontation keep going? Will a new
cold war take shape? Will there be military conflicts and will the possible clashes evolve
into large-scale military confrontation between the two?
"Perhaps everyone believes that China does not want a new cold war, let alone a hot war.
But the above-mentioned questions have become disturbing suspense because no one knows how
wild the ambitions the US ruling team has now, and whether American and international
societies are capable of restraining their ambitions."
IMO, the editor's conclusions are quite correct:
"The world must start to act and do whatever it can to stop Washington's hysteria in its
relations with China.
"Right now, it is no longer a matter of whether China-US ties are in freefall, but whether
the line of defense on world peace is being broken through by Washington. The world must
not be hijacked by a group of political madmen. The tragedies in 1910s and 1930s must not be
repeated again ."
Trump is elevated to the same plane as Hitler and Mussolini, and the Outlaw US Empire is
now the equivalent of Nazi Germany and the Fascist drive to rule the world--a well
illustrated trend that's been ongoing since 1991 that only those blinded by propaganda aren't
capable of seeing. I think it absolutely correct for China to focus its rhetoric on the
Outlaw US Empire's utter failure to control COVID, which prompts some probing questions made
from the first article:
"Shen Yi, a professor at the School of International Relations and Public Affairs of Fudan
University, told the Global Times on Sunday that there is wide consensus among the
international community that the COVID-19 pandemic is the most urgent challenge that the
world should deal with. Whether on domestic epidemic control or international cooperation,
the US has done almost nothing right compared to China's efforts to assist others and its
successful control measures for domestic outbreaks .
"In response to US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's 'new Iron Curtain speech' at the
Richard Nixon Presidential Library on Thursday declaring a new cold war against China, Shen
said, ' We can also ask 'is Pompeo an ally of coronavirus?' Because he wants to confuse
the world to target the wrong enemy amid the tough fight against the pandemic, so that the
virus can kill more people, especially US people, since his country is in the worst
situation .'
Shen said, 'In 2018, US Vice President Mike Pence already made a speech which the media
saw as a new 'Iron Curtain speech,' and in 2020, Pompeo made a similar speech again, which
means their cold war idea is not popular and brings no positive responses from its allies, so
they need to try time and again. Of course, they will fail again.'" [My Emphasis]
Wow! The suggestion that Trump, Pompeo, Pence, and company want to "kill more people,
especially US people" seems to be proven via their behavior which some of us barflies
recognize and have discussed. Now that notion is out in the public, internationally. You
don't need Concentration Camps and ovens when the work can be done via the dysfunctional
structure of your economy and doing nothing about the situation.
Shen provides the clincher, what Gruff, myself, and others have said here:
"'So if we want to win this competition that was forced by the US, we must focus on our
own development and not get distracted. The US is not afraid of a cold war with us, it is
afraid of our development .'" [My Emphasis]
My synopsis of both articles omitted some additional info, so do please click the links to
read them fully.
Sputnik offers
this analysis of the China/Outlaw US Empire issue , where I found this bit quite apt from
"Alexey Biryukov, senior adviser at the Centre for International Information Security,
Science and Technology Policy (CIIS) MGIMO-University":
"'The US is fighting with a country that is developing very rapidly, gaining power,
increasing its competitiveness in areas where previously there was undeniably US leadership.
Attempting to neutralise a global competitor is the main goal of Americans. Neutralising
China's rapid, dynamic development is the essence of the American strategy .
Meanwhile, China is interested in developing friendly relations with all countries.
Recently, it presented the idea of building a community of common destiny for humanity.
That's what Sino-American relations should be built around . It would seem that the
pandemic should have brought people together around the idea of building a prosperous world
for all, not just someone. But the Americans didn't understand that: they started looking for
the guilty ones. This is the favourite strategy of Anglo-Saxons, Americans including, to
look for the guilty . As a result, they found their main competitor – China'". [My
Emphasis]
That is the "guilty ones" that aren't within the Outlaw US Empire. Many more opinions are
provided in the article, but they all revolve around the one theme of Trump's actions being
motivated by the election and his morbidly poor attempts to corral COVID.
French authorities have told telecoms operators planning to buy Huawei 5G equipment that
they won't be able to renew licences for the gear once they expire, effectively phasing the
Chinese firm out of mobile networks, three sources close to the matter said.
####
Quelle surprise that they fall in to line too. No doubt €µ will say something
different to Beijing that France values 'friendly ties' with China, but the die is cast. It
must be tempting for Beijing to kill two birds with one stone by pulling the plug on UK NPPs
as France's EDF is also the project lead. The anti-China crowd want it out of any European
NPPs likewise. We'll see
What a triumph for the global bully. Well, as I have said before – marry in haste,
repent at leisure. European countries which commit to an inferior network just for the
privilege of having Uncle Sam spy on their every move instead of the Chinese will have many
years to ponder their gutlessness. The USA knows now that is in a fight to the finish, and
will want to consolidate as much of the globe as possible under its solid control. But those
who are in thrall will regularly be reminded who is the boss, with forced concessions to
American objectives, so let's have no more of this 'sovereignty' pap. If you're in, you're
ALL in.
It will mess up Huawei's plans and give the iPhone a new lease on life, but it will also
sharpen the division between East and West in terms of networks and smartphones. iPhones will
be bigger in the west as Huawei fades from competition, but iPhones should all but vanish
from the shelves in Asia, which was the growth market, especially China. Loyal American ally
Japan might become a bit of an outlier in its own region. Washington will have a much harder
time spying on China as the demand for American electronics dries up. What goes around comes
around, and the search will be on for neutral companies from whom you can buy a cheap
smartphone to use while you're going from one side to the other, which can draw on the
networks of both. America has been successful to a significant degree in excluding a
competitor who makes a superior product – which, by the bye, goes completely against
the blabber America spouts about a level playing field and trade based on merit – but I
am confident it will not go unanswered by China and American products in China will suffer as
a consequence.
Closing consulates is far from the best foreign policy and fat Pompeo known it. It just
starts the unnecessary and counter productive spiral of retaliation and Chinese have more
leverage over the USA as more the USA diplomatic personnel woks in China than the china
diplomatic personnel in the USA. They were always burned in Russia and now they stepped on the
same rake again.
Maybe fat Pompeo knows he's on his way out and desperate to make a lasting mark on the
geopolitical stage on behalf of the West Point mafia and his brothers-in-arm at the Jweish
mafia.
QABubba , 8 hours ago
Quit stealing Russian consulates, Chinese consulates, etc.
It serves no purpose.
Haboob , 7 hours ago
Closing diplomacy with nations as USA shrinks on the world stage shows America's juvenile
behavior.
Salisarsims , 7 hours ago
We are a young twenty something nation what do you expect but drama.
Haboob , 7 hours ago
It is funny how the young and arrogant always think they are right and have manifest
destiny over the old and wise. The young never listen to the old and as the story goes they
are defeated everytime. China is older than America, older than the west, they understand
this world we are living in far more than we do.
me or you , 9 hours ago
He is right!
The world has witnessed the US is not more than a banana Republic with a banana healthcare
system
To Hell In A Handbasket , 9 hours ago
I love seeing how gullible the USSA dunces are susceptible to hating an imaginary enemy.
Go on dunces wave the star spangled banner, and place the hand over the heart, you
non-critical thinking imbeciles. I told you fools years ago we are going to invoke the Yellow
Peril 2.0, and now we are living it. China bad, is just as stupid as Russia bad, while the
state stenographers at the MSM netowrks do all in their power to hide our rotten
behaviour.
Who falls for this ****? The poorly educated, and the inherently stupid.
To Hell In A Handbasket , 8 hours ago
No, it's called nationalism or self preservation.
What are the citizens of the US suppose to do,
You are wrong on so many levels, but ultimately the Chinese have beaten us at our own
rigged game. When I was riling against unfettered free-markets, and the movement of capital,
that allowed the west for centuries to move into undeveloped foreign markets and gain a
stranglehold, I was called a communist, and a protectionist.
While the USSA money printing b@stards was roaming around the planet like imperialists,
and their companies was not only raping the planet, but gouging foreign markets, the average
USSA dunce was brainwashed into believing USSA companies were the best.
Now these same market and economic rules we the west have set for the last several hundred
years no longer work for us, we want to change the rules. Again, my point is "where was you
on this position 5-10-20-30 years ago?" I've always seen this outcome, because logic said so.
To reject our own status quo, and return to mercantilism, makes us look like the biggest
hypocrites ever.
"Much of the focus of the Trump administration's trade dispute with China has centered on
the size of the U.S. bilateral trade deficit. Most economists agree that this focus is
misdirected, and that the existence or size of bilateral trade deficits should not generally
be a matter of concern or a target of public policy. Instead, there is bipartisan agreement
regarding a different problem at the core of trade issues with China: China's persistent
misappropriation of foreign technology. Forced technology transfer occurs when foreign
multinational companies have to provide strategically significant technology to an indigenous
entity they do not control in order to gain access to the massive Chinese market." https://econofact.org/what-is-the-problem-of-forced-technology-transfer-in-china
The western oligarchs want the Chinese oligarchs to be more fair, in particular Huawei to
transfer their tech the other way in order to play in western markets.
"The global business community would generally prefer that business with Huawei could just go
on as usual. Huawei and its affiliates are the acclaimed leaders in 5G technology, and the
rest of the commercial world wants to have access to that technology, and also to be able to
interoperate with it. In other words, to the extent that western companies agree with the US
administration the risks, they have decided that the rewards outweigh those risks and are
willing to accept them -- as most recently evidenced by the news yesterday relating to how
many US components are finding their way into Chinese handsets." https://www.zdnet.com/article/huawei-changes-its-patent-story/
Furthermore, Houston is one the main cities where total 5g tech is being implemented first
along with L.A and Chicago.
Forced Tech Transfers Are on the Rise in China, European Firms Say
The practice has become more widespread despite official assurances from Beijing it would be
stopped
Is the US right to cry foul about forced technology transfer to do business in China
– and what is Beijing's position?
Foreign companies' concerns about having to share their tech secrets are among the matters
being discussed in ongoing US-China trade talks
Beijing's draft foreign investment law could legislate against the practice, but businesses
are sceptical about enforcement
That's the question DB's new tech strategist Apjit Walia asks in a new research report, in
which he looks at the interplay between the Post Covid Tech Rally and the Tech Cold War, which
have emerged as two of the most salient aspects of the current market dynamic. And with
tensions between US and China continuing to rise and spread to other parts of the world, the
strategist conducts a top-down analysis of the impact on the Global Information &
Communications Technology sector from a full-blown cold war.
The report finds that the ensuing demand disruption, supply chain upheaval and resultant
"Tech Wall" that would delineate the world into rivaling tech standards could cost the sector
more than $3.5 Trillion over the next five years .
But before getting into the details, we update on the current state of the DB Tech Cold War
Index. As Walia writes, a nuanced observation of the tariff and geopolitical issues between the
US and China over the past few year suggest they are primarily a smaller strategy that is part
of a larger Global Tech Cold War. To reduce the noise from the subjective geopolitical
commentaries, DB created a systematic measure using machine learning to quantify the intensity
of the cold war at any given point of time. It quantitatively analyzes and tracks the sentiment
of the Tech Cold War globally. Not surprisingly, the DB Tech Cold War Index has been trending
higher since 2016 with peaks coinciding with tit-for-tat measures by US and China on technology
IP protection and counter measures. It made an all-time high in April 2020 with the Covid
crisis fueling tensions and has spiraled higher since then. The political headlines are
matching the sentiment among the populace. Recurrent surveys from April to June show that post
Covid tempers remain at elevated levels with 41%+ of Americans and 35%+ of Chinese stating they
will not buy each other's products. An election year in the US further complicates this
geopolitical dynamic.
US and China have been engaging in an increasing capacity since the 1970s and the level of
integration between the two global tech regimes is unprecedented. The integration is a complex
demand and labyrinthine supply chain network that has taken 40 years to develop. DB uses a top
down approach to ascertain the level of revenues and supply chain links across the global ICT
industries to China. To analyze and quantify this complex co-dependent Tech relationship
between the two countries is a challenging task, the bank surveyed Tech managements, CTOs,
Industry associations and supply chain experts globally. The estimate on the total impact is by
no means a solid target but a reference point that should provide context if the cold war
escalates significantly and decoupling picks up momentum. The bank's strategist quantifies the
downside impact on the sector from a material escalation of the tech cold war, categorized
under the following three broad categories:
Loss of domestic Chinese demand
Costs of shifting global supply chain currently located in China
Higher operating costs due to emergence of two divergent tech standards (the "Tech
Wall")
DB looks at a range of downside scenarios including one of a full-fledged tech cold war and
estimate the total impact on the ICT sector from the three factors over a 5-year period to be
around $3.5 trillion. And while the bank thinks that 5-8 years is an appropriate time period
some supply chain experts believe the time to relocate the cluster of supply chain networks
could take as long as 10 years.
Globally, China has about 13% of revenues of the ICT sector amounting to around $730 Billion
per annum. However, a significant part of this is demand from the Chinese tech sector that is
re-exported after some value-add, assembly and packaging ("re-export demand") - this
constitutes supply chain risk . To analyze domestic end demand from China that could be at risk
if tensions escalate leading to IP restrictions, product bans and export-restrictions, DB looks
at the underlying ICT industry groups and their varied re-export mixes from China. The range
varies widely with Telecom services sectors that have minimal revenue exposure all the way to
software services that have pure domestic Chinese consumption (low or no re-export). For
majority of the ICT sector, the range falls between 25%-75% in re-export mix (semiconductors,
electronic components, computer hardware, computer peripherals, electronic equipment sectors).
The weighted average of the re-export demand mix for the whole ICT sector comes to 45%.
Stripping that out of the total ICT revenues, one gets 55% in current organic Chinese
end-demand or $400 Billion in revenues. In the worst case scenario of a full-fledged tech cold
war, the ICT sector would stand to lose these revenues.
Supply Chain Risk
A transition out of Mainland China could take 5-8 years to achieve successfully. Lack of
infrastructure, clustered networks and skilled labor in other countries versus China are major
obstacles. Vietnam, India, Malaysia, Indonesia and Philippines are the primary targets for this
transition but most of them would need significant infrastructure upgrades to catch up with the
Chinese supply chain cluster strength.
In most categories, exports outstrip imports, except for electronic components, where
imports are 3x of exports. Electronic components, such as semiconductors are imported and used
as inputs in consumer goods and communication equipment and exported out of China. While
Electronic component manufacturers have the risk of end demand from China declining –
e.g. semis used in communication equipment, majority of the supply chain costs would fall on
the final goods manufacturers who use China as a manufacturing base. When they shift the supply
chain outside, component manufacturers would simply shift the destination of where they ship
components.
The supply chain risk of the ICT sector is estimated to be the built-up book value that is
exposed to China that would require relocation in the event of disengagement. Although book
value provides a decent lower bound measure for the capital
deployed in hard assets, it does not fully account for the economic value of the supply chain
network, which may be quite costly to rebuild. To arrive at an estimate of the book value that
is exposed to supply chain facilities in China, DB analyzed the revenues and Export/Import
ratio of various categories of Tech goods. The book value of the ICT sector tied to China comes
to approximately $500 billion.
The average cost of rebuilding the supply chain will be approximately 1.5 to 2x of the book
value based on feedback from Tech managements and supply chain experts. Using a sustainable
capex rate, it would take 5-8 years to relocate the supply chains. The cost of a transition
over a five year period would come to around $1 Trillion.
Tech Wall Risk
On top of the demand disruption and supply chain upheaval, it would be unavoidable for Tech
companies to operate efficiently in a large part of the "Non Aligned" world without complying
with the two rivaling global standards that would come up as the cold war heats up. The Tech
Wall would entail rival internet platforms, satellite communication networks, telecom
infrastructure regimes, CPU architectures, operating systems, IOT networks and payment systems
with very little inter-operability or interaction. It would mean having to deploy two different
communication and networking standards across several geographies to ensure inter-operability.
In this new world order, these non-aligned countries would require companies to have dual
standard compliance to operate there.
A divergence in standards could increase costs in multiple ways. Increased R&D, design,
product development and related costs for manufacturers. Increased costs of compliance to
different IP, networking, data privacy/localization regimes for corporates. Loss of
interoperability of devices across geographies for consumer. For example, a high-end smartphone
networking gear makes up ~10%-15% of the bill of materials. If phones had to support dual
standards that cost could increase by ~30-70% and can add close to $100 for the end consumer.
For lower end handsets costs would be high enough that manufacturers would probably choose to
cater to a single standard based on geography. Corporations' compliance to different data
localization, privacy rules as well as supporting multiple networking standards would increase
costs by 2-3%.
The Tech Wall's impact on ICT sector could range between 2-3% in incremental costs (capex,
labor) or $100-$150 Billion per year. After some time, these costs would get absorbed as
economies of scale kick in, but that would take about 5 years to average out.
Second and third order effects:
There are also going to be cross effects and second order effects.
One Belt One Road - Loss of market share for ICT would not only be limited to China but
can extend to China allied OBOR markets. However there is a cross effect here - in markets
adopting US standards, western ICT firms would gain share lost by Chinese firms. The net
effect may be relatively small but would be marginally incremental.
Economic downturn - These potential second order effects with substantial uncertainty and
the actual impact would depend to a large extent on policy response - direct government
spending, sector specific policy incentives and tax policy. While we estimate the potential
impact of a full blown tech cold war at $3.5 Trillion over a five year period, the actual
outcome will obviously be path dependent on how both countries approach the economic and
geopolitical trade-offs.
Second and third order effects : There are also going to be cross effects and second
order effects. One Belt One Road - Loss of market share for ICT would not only be limited to
China but can extend to China allied OBOR markets. However there is a cross effect here - in
markets adopting US standards, western ICT firms would gain share lost by Chinese firms. The
net effect may be relatively small but would be marginally incremental. Economic downturn -
These potential second order effects with substantial uncertainty and the actual impact would
depend to a large extent on policy response - direct government spending, sector specific
policy incentives and tax policy.
In summary, while DB estimates the potential impact of a full blown tech cold war at $3.5
Trillion over a five year period, the actual outcome will obviously be path dependent on how
both countries approach the economic and geopolitical trade-offs.
ICT Sector Correlations to Tech Cold War
The following chart shows ICT industry group's revenues to China, this includes sales of
goods that are re-exported out of China after assembly for end consumption
elsewhere.
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DB measured sensitivities of these industry groups to escalations between US and China.
Using the DB Tech Cold War Index, the bank identified 15 major periods of sustained escalation
in news intensity. These are periods where the geopolitical tech dispute news flow picks up
from low initial levels and continues to grow in intensity until it reaches a peak, often
coinciding with major news events or steps on either side. DB then computed the correlations of
these global ICT industry stock returns with the DB Tech Cold War index over these
episodes.
As the chart shows, the market is quite efficient. Industries in the right bottom quadrant
are the ones with the higher revenue exposure to China and have the most sensitivity or
negative stock price correlation to rising tensions. The hardware industries which
predominantly have both revenue and supply chain dependence on China respond sharply to
escalations. Industries with lower revenue exposure to China display defensive characteristics
during rising tensions, and fall in the top left quadrant. Software and service display
defensive characteristics as they have very limited revenue exposure to China. Telecom service
providers have limited revenue exposure and their returns appear to be uncorrelated to
escalation events.
The one surprising exception to this trend is the Semiconductor sector, standing out in the
top right hand quadrant. Contrary to consensus opinion, the analysis shows that semiconductor
stocks are reacting positively to rising cold war tensions despite the sector being the biggest
point of contention in the conflict and high sales exposure to the Chinese market.
This could be driven by several factors. One of the explanations is inventory build that
occurs when tensions rise and companies over order as they are concerned about supply chains
clogging up . These orders could be viewed by the market as incremental demand.
Another factor could be the market considering the sector as defensive given its long term
secular potential and the structural growth becoming less sensitive to business cycles. With
digitization ramping up globally in the post Covid tech ramp, this structural dynamic of the
sector starts to become self-reinforcing.
Anticipated policy support from governments given the centrality of the sector to nation
states in geopolitical tech relevance is also touted as a driving factor in multiples. Clearly,
Semis are key to retaining tech supremacy and form the backbone of any AI or Software
enhancements to institutions and countries.
However, there remains one tail case scenario and that is in the event of disengagement and
escalation of the cold war, Semiconductors will see significant market share and supply chain
disruption that will be too big to be offset by government policy support and central bank
liquidity. This scenario does not seem to have been factored in the current market.
"... The ruling effectively ends the privileged access companies in the United States had to personal data from Europe and puts the country on a similar footing to other nations outside the bloc, meaning data transfers are likely to face closer scrutiny. ..."
"... The so-called Privacy Shield was set up in 2016 by Washington and Brussels to protect personal data when it is sent to the United States for commercial use after a previous agreement known as Safe Harbour was ruled invalid in 2015. ..."
U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said on Friday the United States was "deeply disappointed" in a ruling
on Thursday by Europe's highest court that a trans-Atlantic data transfer deal is invalid because of concerns about U.S. surveillance.
Pompeo said in a statement that the United States would review the consequences and implications of the decision by the Court
of Justice of the European Union that could disrupt thousands of companies that rely on the agreement.
"We are deeply disappointed that the Court of Justice of the European Union ... has invalidated the EU-U.S. Privacy Shield framework,"
Pompeo said.
"The United States will continue to work closely with the EU to find a mechanism to enable the essential unimpeded commercial
transfer of data from the EU to the United States," he added.
The ruling effectively ends the privileged access companies in the United States had to personal data from Europe and puts the
country on a similar footing to other nations outside the bloc, meaning data transfers are likely to face closer scrutiny.
The so-called Privacy Shield was set up in 2016 by Washington and Brussels to protect personal data when it is sent to the United
States for commercial use after a previous agreement known as Safe Harbour was ruled invalid in 2015.
More than 5,000 companies have signed up to it but the Privacy Shield was challenged in a long-running dispute between Facebook
and Austrian privacy activist Max Schrems, who has campaigned about the risk of U.S. intelligence agencies accessing data on Europeans.
(Reporting by Daphne Psaledakis; editing by Jonathan Oatis)
That is correct. Backdoors were baked into every piece of equipment and random number
generator the US and friends are able to influence. Hardware and software.
Read up on how cisco networking equipments were/are intercepted enroute for 'extra'
attention by US Intel depending on where they're going to. With full assistance from cisco.
Other manufacturer also play the same game.
This was the genesis of Huawei, to cut reliance on US network gear and it is also why
China is doing its own silicon. Huawei with the Kirin which is an ARM based processor and
also x86 via the AMD JV and VIA/Cyrix.
Fabs aside the Kirin can cut it with the best and the x86 are about 2-6 years behind but
rapidly improving depending on who you ask.
Their achilles heel is the Fabs where China is about 2-3 generations behind. Today Huawei
is relying on Taiwanese Fabs to produce its cutting edge chips to Huawei's design.
However, these are just a function of investment in research and time, China is well past
the tipping point for self reliance and they'll get to parity and beyond soon enough. So the
west's game is already lost.
Reading between the lines, when China is cut out of the west's networks who then could the
5 peeping Tom's look at? Yup, the serfs, and that's the game plan all along.
Again, probably not an urgent problem unless some existing Chinese aircraft in service are
on their last legs and urgently must be replaced. In which case they could go with Airbus if
the situation could not wait. China has options. Boeing does not.
The west loves to portray the Chinese as totally without ethics, and if you have a product
they can't make for themselves, they will buy it from you only until they have figured out
how to make it themselves, and then fuck you, Jack. I don't see any reason to believe the
Chinese value alliances less than the west does, or are any more incapable of grasping the
value of a give-and-take trade policy. The west – especially the United States –
favours establishing a monopoly on markets and then using your inability to get the product
anywhere else as leverage to force concessions you don't want to make; is that ethical? China
must surely see the advantages of a mutually-respectful relationship with Russia, considering
that country not only safeguards a significant length of its border from western probing, but
supplies most of its energy. There remain many unexplored avenues for technical, engineering
and technological cooperation. At the same time, Russia is not in a subordinate position
where it has to endure being taken advantage of.
Trade is hard work, and any partner will maneuver for advantage, because everyone in
commerce likes market share and money. But Washington has essentially forgotten how to
negotiate on mutually-respectful terms, and favours maneuvering its 'partners' into
relationships in which the USA has an overwhelmingly dominant position, and then announcing
it is 'leveling the playing field'. Which means putting its thumb on the scale.
Must. Pass. Foreign. Relations. Policy. Past. USDoS. First. Well that is
unforgiveable for the Masters of the Universe(TM). No-one knows exactly what's in it except
that it is substantial. Still, the USDoS is having a public aneurism tells us that they care
a lot.
Every time you "impose costs" on another country, you make more enemies and inspire more
end-around plays which take you as an economic player out of that loop. And by and by what
you do is of no great consequence, and your ability – your LEGAL ability, I should
interject – to 'impose costs' is gone.
Sooner or later America's allies are going to
refuse to recognize its extraterritorial sanctions, which it has no legal right to impose; it
gets away with it by threatening costs in trade with the USA, which is a huge economy and is
something under its control.
But that practice causes other countries to gradually insulate
themselves against exposure, and one day the cost of obeying will be greater than the
cost of saying "Go fuck yourself".
"... The US is too indulged in using geopolitical means to cope with challenges and pursuing its own interests. Following the disintegration of the former Soviet Union, Russia hoped to integrate into the Western world, but the US pulled geopolitical levers and imposed the most intense strategic pressure on Russia. As NATO expanded eastward, it not only incorporated all countries of the Warsaw Pact and the Baltic states, but also extended its hand to the Commonwealth of Independent States, such as Georgia and Ukraine, eventually prompting Russia to have no other options but to take countermeasures. ..."
"... The world has to pay for Washington's ambition to strengthen its hegemony. What the US advocates is not simply decoupling from China, but urging the Western world and more countries to side with the US amid its clashes with China, and to contain China. China is the largest trading partner of more than 100 countries, and has a market almost as big as that of the US. The US not only stabbed China, but the current global cooperative system as well. ..."
"... Unfortunately, those geopolitical maniacs in the US are ending the "good old days" since the end of the Cold War. We are likely to enter a new era with more hatred and the menace of war. Major countries would become more nervous, and the prosperity of small countries would become fragile. The US political elite behind such changes are bound to be shamed by history. ..."
Washington has almost destroyed the cooperation-centered major-power relations and is
pushing the world back to confrontation between major powers.
The global geopolitical struggle has apparently become an irreversible trend. This will have
a profound influence on the nature of international relations, fundamentally disturb
globalization, and lead to undesirable consequences.
The US is too indulged in using geopolitical means to cope with challenges and pursuing its
own interests. Following the disintegration of the former Soviet Union, Russia hoped to
integrate into the Western world, but the US pulled geopolitical levers and imposed the most
intense strategic pressure on Russia. As NATO expanded eastward, it not only incorporated all
countries of the Warsaw Pact and the Baltic states, but also extended its hand to the
Commonwealth of Independent States, such as Georgia and Ukraine, eventually prompting Russia to
have no other options but to take countermeasures.
Now, the US is using its extreme geopolitical tools on China. It is making the ideological
conflict with China more extreme, because it is the cheapest means to mobilize its allies
against China. It supports all countries that have territorial disputes with China, incites
them to adopt a hard-line approach toward China, and smears China's foreign cooperation to
overthrow the world order. It aims to worsen China's external environment, and make people in
other countries less willing to cooperate with China.
The world has to pay for Washington's ambition to strengthen its hegemony. What the US
advocates is not simply decoupling from China, but urging the Western world and more countries
to side with the US amid its clashes with China, and to contain China. China is the largest
trading partner of more than 100 countries, and has a market almost as big as that of the US.
The US not only stabbed China, but the current global cooperative system as well.
The world will suffer long-lasting costs. The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is just the first
wave. In the face of the raging pandemic, the US has blocked international cooperation. It has
only two perspectives on the anti-virus fight - one from the upcoming presidential elections,
and the other from international geopolitics. Its lack of a scientific perspective has become
the biggest obstacle to international cooperation.
It is not hard to imagine that if China and the US, together with all major powers, join
hands and coordinate strategies, the COVID-19 pandemic could have been much less severe than it
is now, and the global economy could resume in a more orderly manner.
The US policy that favors major-power confrontation will surely drag down global economic
growth, which will force countries to consume their own resources. Coupled with the destructive
impact of the pandemic, global economic prosperity after the Cold War is, perhaps, coming to an
end. The world will lose huge employment. The global economy will become politicized, and the
concept of national security would play a leading role in irrelevant sectors such as the
economy.
An arms race and intimidation will return to international relations. Age-old contradictions
will be reinforced in the loss of a world order. Favorable opinions toward each other's society
will be reduced. The passion for studying and traveling abroad will cool down. The lives of
many people will change.
Unfortunately, those geopolitical maniacs in the US are ending the "good old days" since the
end of the Cold War. We are likely to enter a new era with more hatred and the menace of war.
Major countries would become more nervous, and the prosperity of small countries would become
fragile. The US political elite behind such changes are bound to be shamed by history.
"... I agree that globalism is/will be heading into the dumpers, but I see no chance that US-based manufacturing is going to make any significant come-back. ..."
"... What market will there be for US-manufactured goods? US "consumers" are heavily in debt and facing continued downward pressures on income. ..."
"... There will certainly be, especially given the eye-opener of COVID-19, a big push to have medical (which includes associated tech) production capacities reinvigorated in the US. ..."
"... More "disposable" income goes toward medical expenditures. Less money goes toward creating export items; wealth creation only occurs through a positive increase in balance of trade. And on the opposite end of the spectrum, death, the US will likely continue, for the mid-term, to export weaponry; but, don't expect enough growth here to mean much (margins will drop as competition increases, so figure downward pressure on net export $$). ..."
"... the planet cannot comply with our economic model's dependency on perpetual growth: there can NOT be perpetual growth on a finite planet. US manufacturing requires, as it always has, export markets; requires ever-increasing exports: this is really true for all others. Higher standards of living in the US (and add in increasing medical costs which factor into cost of goods sold) means that the price of US-manufactured goods will be less affordable to peoples outside of the US. ..."
"... I'll also note that the notion of there being a cycle, a parabolic curve, in civilizations is well noted/documented in Sir John Glubb's The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival (you can find electronic bootlegged copies on the Internet)- HIGHLY recommended reading! ..."
"... All of this is pretty much reflected in Wall Street companies ramp-ups in stock-buy-backs. That's money that's NOT put in R&D or expansion. I'm pretty sure that the brains in all of this KNOW what the situation is: growth is never coming back. ..."
"... Make no mistake, what we're facing is NOT another recession or depression, it's not part of what we think as a downturn in the "business cycle," as though we'll "pull out of it," it's basically an end to the super-cycle ..."
"... We are at the peak (slightly past peak, but not far enough to realize it yet) and there is no returning. Per-capita income and energy consumption have peaked. There's not enough resources and not enough new demand (younger people, people that have wealth) to keep the perpetual growth machine going. ..."
I agree that globalism is/will be heading into the dumpers, but I see no chance that US-based manufacturing is going to
make any significant come-back.
The world's economy is in contraction. Although capital, what actual capital exists, will have to try and do something "productive,"
it is confronted by this fact, that everything is facing contraction. During times of contraction it's a game of acquisition rather
than expanding capacity: the sum total is STILL contraction; and the contraction WILL be a reduction in excess, excess manufacturing
and labor.
What market will there be for US-manufactured goods? US "consumers" are heavily in debt and facing continued downward pressures
on income. China is self-sufficient (enough) other than energy (which can be acquired outside of US markets). Most every other
country is in a position of declining wealth (per capita income levels peaked and in decline). And manufacturing continues to
increase its automation (less workers means less consumers).
There will certainly be, especially given the eye-opener of COVID-19, a big push to have medical (which includes associated
tech) production capacities reinvigorated in the US. One has to look at this in The Big Picture of what it means, and that's that
the US population is aging (and in poor health).
More "disposable" income goes toward medical expenditures. Less money goes toward
creating export items; wealth creation only occurs through a positive increase in balance of trade. And on the opposite end of
the spectrum, death, the US will likely continue, for the mid-term, to export weaponry; but, don't expect enough growth here to
mean much (margins will drop as competition increases, so figure downward pressure on net export $$).
Lastly, and it's the reason why global trade is being knocked down, is that the planet cannot comply with our economic model's
dependency on perpetual growth: there can NOT be perpetual growth on a finite planet. US manufacturing requires, as it always
has, export markets; requires ever-increasing exports: this is really true for all others. Higher standards of living in the US
(and add in increasing medical costs which factor into cost of goods sold) means that the price of US-manufactured goods will
be less affordable to peoples outside of the US.
And here too is the fact that other countries' populations are also aging. Years
ago I dove into the demographics angle/assessment to find out that ALL countries ramp and age and that you can see countries'
energy consumption rise and their their net trade balance swing negative- there's a direct correlation: go to the CIA's Factbook
and look at demographics and energy and the graphs tell the story.
I'll also note that the notion of there being a cycle, a parabolic
curve, in civilizations is well noted/documented in Sir John Glubb's The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival (you can find
electronic bootlegged copies on the Internet)- HIGHLY recommended reading!
All of this is pretty much reflected in Wall Street companies ramp-ups in stock-buy-backs. That's money that's NOT put in R&D
or expansion. I'm pretty sure that the brains in all of this KNOW what the situation is: growth is never coming back.
MANY years ago I stated that we will one day face "economies of scale in reverse." We NEVER considered that growth couldn't
continue forever. There was never a though about what would happen with the reverse "of economies of scale."
Make no mistake,
what we're facing is NOT another recession or depression, it's not part of what we think as a downturn in the "business cycle,"
as though we'll "pull out of it," it's basically an end to the super-cycle.
We will never be able to replicate the state of things
as they are. We are at the peak (slightly past peak, but not far enough to realize it yet) and there is no returning. Per-capita
income and energy consumption have peaked. There's not enough resources and not enough new demand (younger people, people that
have wealth) to keep the perpetual growth machine going.
China's economic shutdown at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic disrupted many global supply
chains, prompting a number of countries and corporations to accelerate their strategy of
reducing their dependency on China for components.
...the trade war between Washington and Beijing had contributed to the
U.S. fashion industry and tech firms
like Apple rethinking their own supply chains. Japan, heavily dependent on Chinese trade,
is
using $2 billion in economic stimulus funds to subsidize the move of Japanese firms out of
China.
The Trump administration is thus swimming with the current in its effort to isolate China.
It has imposed sanctions because of China's violations of Uyghur human rights. It has levied
penalties against China for its cooperation with Iranian firms. And it has threatened to add
another set of tariffs on top of the existing ones for China's handling of the coronavirus.
Its latest initiative has been to tighten the screws on the Chinese technology firm, Huawei.
Last week, the administration announced sanctions against any firms using U.S.-made equipment
that supply the Chinese tech giant. The chief victim of these new restrictions will be the
Taiwanese firm TSMC, which supplies 90 percent of Huawei's smartphone chips.
In other words, the Trump administration is committed not only to severing U.S. economic
connections with China. It wants to put as much pressure on other countries as well to
disentangle themselves from Chinese manufacturing. Taiwan, of course, has no particular love
for Mainland China. It battles Beijing on a daily basis to get international recognition --
from other countries and from global organizations like the World Health Organization.
But the Taiwanese economy is also heavily dependent on its cross-strait neighbor. As Eleanor
Albert points
out :
China is Taiwan's largest trading partner, accounting for nearly 30 percent of the
island's total trade, and trade between the two reached $150.5 billion in 2018 (up from $35
billion in 1999). China and Taiwan have also agreed to allow banks, insurers, and other
financial service providers to work in both markets.
And it probably won't be Huawei but Taiwan that suffers from the U.S. move. As Michael
Reilly notes
, "Huawei's size in the global market means its Taiwanese suppliers cannot easily find an
alternative customer of comparable standing to replace it." China, meanwhile, will either find
another source of chips outside the U.S. sphere, or it will do what the United States has been
threatening to do: bring production of critical components back closer to home.
Another key player in the containment of China is India. Trump's friendship with Indian
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a right-wing Hindu nationalist, is more than simply an
ideological affection. Trump sealed
a $3 billion in military sales deal with India in February, with a trade deal still on the
horizon.
Modi, in turn, is hoping to be the biggest beneficiary of the falling out between Washington
and Beijing. "The government in April reached out to more than 1,000 companies in the U.S. and
through overseas missions to offer incentives for manufacturers seeking to move out of China,"
reports Bloomberg . "India is prioritizing medical equipment suppliers, food processing
units, textiles, leather, and auto part makers among more than 550 products covered in the
discussions."
Vietnam is another regional competitor that the United States is supporting in its
containment strategy. With only a couple hundred reported coronavirus cases and zero deaths,
Vietnam is
poised to emerge from the current crisis virtually unscathed. With low labor costs and an
authoritarian government that can enforce deals, it is already a favored alternative for
corporations looking for alternatives to China. But wildcat strikes have been happening in
greater numbers in the country, and the Vietnamese government recently
approved the country's first independent trade union.
Yet with a more technologically sophisticated infrastructure, China will continue to look
more attractive to investors than India or Vietnam.
... ... ...
Trump administration is, frankly, at a huge disadvantage when it tries to
pressure companies to relocate their operations. Writes
Manisha Mirchandani:
The global technology and consumer electronics sectors are especially reliant on China's
infrastructure and specialized labor pool, neither of which will be easy to replicate. The
Chinese government is already mobilizing resources to convince producers of China's unique
merits as a manufacturing location. Zhengzhou, within Henan Province, has appointed officials
to support Apple's partner Foxconn in mitigating the disruptions caused by the coronavirus,
while the Ministry of Finance is increasing credit support to the manufacturing sector.
Further, the Chinese government is likely to channel stimulus efforts to develop the
country's high-tech manufacturing infrastructure, moving away from its low-value
manufacturing base and accelerating its vision for a technology-driven services economy.
The Trump administration is playing the short game, trying to use tariffs and anti-Chinese
sentiment to hobble a rising power. China, on the other hand, is playing the long game,
translating its trade surpluses into structural advantages in a fast-evolving global
economy.
Will the Conflict Turn Hot?
Despite the economic ravages of the pandemic, the Pentagon continues to demand the lion's
share of the U.S. budget. It wants another $705 billion for 2021, after increasing its budget
by 20 percent between 2016 and 2020.
This appalling waste of government resources has already caused long-term damage to the
economic competitiveness of the United States. But it's all the money the Pentagon is spending
on "deterring China" that might prove more devastating in the short term.
John Feffer is the director of Foreign
Policy In Focus , where this article originally appeared.
The administration also took off the gloves with China over U.S. listings by mainland
companies that fail to follow U.S. securities laws. This came after the Commerce Department
finally moved to limit access by Huawei Technologies to high-end silicon chips made with U.S.
lithography machines. The trade war with China is heating up, but a conflict was inevitable and
particularly when it comes to technology.
At the bleeding edge of 7 and 5 nanometer feature size, American tech still rules the world
of semiconductors. In 2018, Qualcomm confirmed its next-generation Snapdragon SoC would be
built at 7 nm. Huawei has already officially announced its first 7nm chip -- the Kirin 980. But
now Huawei is effectively shut out of the best in class of custom-made chips, giving Samsung
and Apple a built-in advantage in handsets and network equipment.
It was no secret that Washington allowed Huawei to use loopholes in last year's blacklist
rules to continue to buy U.S. sourced chips. Now the door is closed, however, as the major
Taiwan foundries led by TSMC will be forced to stop custom production for Huawei, which is
basically out of business in about 90 days when its inventory of chips runs out. But even as
Huawei spirals down, the White House is declaring financial war on dozens of other listed
Chinese firms.
President Donald Trump said
in an interview with Fox Business News that forcing Chinese companies to follow U.S.
accounting norms would likely push them to list in non-U.S. exchanges. Chinese companies that
list their shares in the U.S. have long refused to allow American regulators to inspect their
accounting audits, citing direction from their government -- a practice that market authorities
here have been unwilling or unable to stop.
The attack by the Trump Administration on shoddy financial disclosure at Chinese firms is
long overdue, but comes at a time when the political evolution in China is turning decidedly
authoritarian in nature and against any pretense of market-oriented development. The rising
power of state companies in China parallels the accumulation of power in the hands of Xi
Jinping, who is increasingly seen as a threat to western-oriented business leaders. The trade
tensions with Washington provide a perfect foil to crack down on popular unrest in Hong Kong
and discipline wayward oligarchs.
The latest moves by Beijing to take full control in Hong Kong are part of the more general
retrenchment visible in China. "[P]rivate entrepreneurs are increasingly nervous about their
future," writes Henny Sender in the Financial Times . "In many cases, these
entrepreneurs have U.S. passports or green cards and both children and property in America. To
be paid in U.S. dollars outside China for their companies must look more tempting by the day."
A torrent of western oriented Chinese business leaders is exiting before the door is shut
completely.
The fact is that China's position in U.S. trade has retreated as nations like Mexico and
Vietnam have gained. Mexico is now America's largest trading partner and Vietnam has risen to
11th, reports Qian Wang of Bloomberg News . Meanwhile, China has dropped from 21 percent
of U.S. trade in 2018 to just 18 percent last year. A big part of the shift is due to the
U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade pact, which is expected to accelerate a return of production to North
America. Sourcing for everything from autos to semiconductors is expected to rotate away from
China in coming years.
China abandoned its decades-old practice of
setting a target for annual economic growth , claiming that it was prioritizing goals such
as stabilizing employment, alleviating poverty and preventing risks in 2020. Many observers
accept the official communist party line that the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic made it
almost impossible to fix an expansion rate this year, but in fact the lasting effects of the
2008 financial crisis and the aggressive policies of President Trump have rocked China back on
its heels.
As China becomes increasingly focused inward and with an eye on public security, the
economic situation is likely to deteriorate further. While many observers viewed China's "Belt
& Road" initiative as a sign of confidence and strength, in fact it was Beijing's attempt
to deal with an economic realignment that followed the 2008 crisis. The arrival of President
Trump on the scene further weakened China's already unstable mercantilist economic model, where
non-existent internal demand was supposed to make up for falling global trade flows. Or at
least this was the plan until COVID-19.
"Before the Covid-19 outbreak, many economists were expecting China to set a GDP growth
target of 6% to 6.5% to reflect the gradual slowdown in the pace of expansion over the past few
years," reports Caixin Global . "Growth slid to 6.1% in 2019 from 6.7% in 2018. But the
devastation caused by the coronavirus epidemic -- which saw the economy contract 6.8%
year-on-year in the first quarter -- has thrown those forecasts out of the window."
Out of the window indeed. Instead of presiding over a glorious expansion of the Chinese
sphere of influence in Asia, Xi Jinping is instead left to fight a defensive action
economically and financially. The prospective end of the special status of Hong Kong is
unlikely to have any economic benefits and may actually cause China's problems with massive
internal debt and economic malaise to intensify. Beijing's proposed security law would reduce
Hong Kong's separate legal status and likely bring an end to the separate currency and business
environment.
I honestly don't know if this article is or is not correct... But I wonder...
AmConMag publishes a major anti-China article on most days now. What is happening? What is
the mechanics of this... "phenomenon"?
A place where where Americans opposed to U.S. hegemony because it's harm on everyone
without being overwhelmed by the Neocon acolytes where can we go, anyone ever try to get a
word in on foxnews ?
If you try to reach out to twitter on Tom Cotton or Mike Waltz dismisses you as a
'Chinese govt / Iranian / Russian bot'
You know what, God will judge us and we will all be equal in he eyes of Him
Why should I be afraid. Why should I be silent. And thank you TAC for the opportunity to
post.
I too came here for interesting commentary, - and even better comments... five years ago or
so?
I found the original articles mostly okay, often too verbose, meandering for my taste but
the different point of view made them worthwhile. The readers' comments, now that is
priceless. That brings the real value. That's where we learn. That's where I learn, anyway.
:)
It never occurred to me to message to any politician, I think my voice would be lost in the
cacophony.
The target of my curiosity is that when all these articles start to point in one direction
(like belligerence toward China) how does it happen? Is there a chain of command? It seems
coordinated.
It's possible to be anti-neocon, for their being too ideological, and not pacifist. That is
basically my position.
I agree with most here on Russia and Iran. They are not threats, and in specific cases
should be partners instead. Agree on American imperialism being foolish and often evil. I
believe in a multipolar world as a practical matter. I don't take a soft view of China
however. I believe they do intend to replace nefarious American hegemony with their own
relevant, but equally nefarious, flavor of hegemony. There are few countries in the world
with such a pathological distrust of their own people. I truly believe that country is a
threat that needs to be checked at least for a couple of decades by the rest of the
world.
As to the editorial direction, I think it is merely capitalism. China's perception in
the world is extremely bad lately. I would fully expect the always somewhat Russophile
environment here to seize the moment to say 'see! Russia is not a true threat! It's China!'
RT itself soon after Trump's election I recall posted an article complaining about total
disregard for Chinese election meddling.
You can see when the people holding the leash give a tug on the collar. And it's clear that
the GOP is feeling the need for a warlike political environment.
The most blatant presstitution example, of course, was the National Review, going from
'Never Trump' to full time servicing.
Of all the options in the Western arsenal against China, arresting Huawei's heir apparent
on blatantly forged charges is easily one of the worst.
Chinese or not Chinese, fact is Meng is a member of the bourgeoisie. She is one of them.
It doesn't matter if Huawei only became big and prosperous thanks to the CCP: bourgeoisie is
bourgeoisie, and having a strong one within communist China's belly is essential for the long
term success of capitalism in its war against communism.
By arresting Meng, the capitalists (i.e. Americans) are just driving a hedge between
inside the "Capitalist International". The Chinese capitalist class - who was certainly very
interested in ganging up with their western counterparts to, in the long term, topple the CCP
- is now completely at the mercy of the CCP, as the CCP is now the only guarantor of their
own class status.
The correct strategy would be for the Western bourgeoisie to woo the Chinese bourgeoisie
with as many tax breaks, green cards and other kinds of flattery, so that, withing the course
of some generations, the Chinese bourgeoisie become fully liberal (westernized). It would
then make the infamous "middle class insurgence" theory feasible.
But (and there's always a "but" in the real world), it seems that capitalism itself is in
crisis. It seems that, all of a sudden, the pot became too small to make every alpha male
happy. The international bourgeoisie is now devouring its children (the petite-bourgeoisie,
the "small business owners") and is beginning to devour itself.
Meng is a high profile scalp but won't change anything. it'll just up the ante in this
game of chicken.
in regards to HK's special trading rights, it's horseshit really. HK hasn't made anything
anyone needed for decades. the biggest use of this special relationship (cough cough) is to
move mainland product through Hong Kong to skirt quota and tariff restrictions. as an
inhabitant I won't be sorry to see it go. it hasn't and doesn't benefit the people here
anyway.
as to it's status as a financial hub, do you really think the bankers will leave if there
are money to be made? c'mon who are we kidding here. actually, if it means driving away a few
expat bankers who does nothing except creating glass ceilings and hanging out in various golf
and aristocratic clubs in hk, I'm all for it too.
as to visa free travel, again it's a non issue as well. I remember before the 1997
handover having to get visas to go pretty much anywhere with my HK British passport it was an
utterly useless 3nd class citizen passport. so nothing changes. ironically all of the visa
free agreement came after the handover with no thanks to the Brits.
if USA start freezing assets of individuals and businesses it'll be a sloppily slope for
Trumpville. For one freezing individuals assets won't hurt China on the whole one iota,
second, China can play that game too. US businesses and assets can all be nationalised.
I'm still waiting for China to cancel all Boeing and GE orders because they're defense
suppliers of USA, just as USA is claiming huawei to be as the reason for sanctions.
"The Chinese capitalist class - who was certainly very interested in ganging up with their
western counterparts to, in the long term, topple the CCP - is now completely at the mercy of
the CCP, as the CCP is now the only guarantor of their own class status."
I think you nailed it on the head there. it's not just capitalists, a lot of party
officials shipped their families to the 5 eye countries thinking it's their plan B (often
with obscene, questionable wealth and under fake identities as dual citizenship is not
allowed in China). now it's becoming clear to them they're now in the pocket of uncle Sam,
their loved ones to be sacrificed and used against them in any moment.
I agree, stripping HK of its' special trading agreement isn't going to hurt China in any
meaningful way and I don't think the financial elite of HK are going to flee from China over
this. However, the way in which the US is doing this is an insult to the Chinese (not just
the government, but the Chinese people themselves). The US claiming to have the right to
adjudicate over the domestic policies of other countries is not just an insult but also an
implied threat. In international politics claiming that you have a right of approval over
another nation's internal policies is in effect a claim of superior authority over that
country than that country's own government and it logically brings up all sorts of questions
about what happens if they refuse to accept your claim, do you impose sanctions or go to war
over it?
The bigger threats are coming over Taiwan and Tibet, the US suggesting that it might pass
legislation recognizing them as independent countries means that the US feels it has the
right to unilaterally impose new boarders on countries - that only happens if you win a war,
so the US feels it is at war with China and that it has already won or is so certain to win
that it can announce what it wants the new boarders to look like. That is crazy. What's next,
will the US do what they did with Venezuela and declare some random oligarch the new Chinese
President then sign agreements with him and insist that they are real legal documents (that
might very well be the plan for the leader of the HK protests Joshua Wong).
The US was stupid or crazy or both to try this path with Venezuela to try this with China
means war.
@ 25 kadath... isn't this what the usa is doing with the huawei case in canada? they are
essentially saying - our rules 'trump' all of yours... this is how exceptional nations work
ya know... either that or the bullying tactics are wearing thin with me...
Since the subject of Meng Wanzhou's court case came up, I thought I'd post more detail.
"Meng's lawyers argued that the fact Canada does not have economic sanctions against Iran
meant her alleged actions would not have been considered a crime in Canada because no bank
would have suffered a loss in an identical set of circumstances.
But the judge said Meng's lawyers were trying to make the scope of her analysis too
narrow.
"Canada's law of fraud looks beyond international boundaries to encompass all the relevant
details that make up the factual matrix, including foreign laws that may give meaning to some
of the facts," Holmes said.
____
OK, so that's settled but there is a lot more to come:
"The judge still has to hold hearings to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to
warrant extradition, and Meng has also claimed that her rights were violated at the time of
her arrest.
Holmes pointed out that Canada's minister of justice will also have a chance to weigh in
on whether a decision to commit Meng for extradition would be contrary to Canadian
values.
The ministry confirmed in a statement that extradition proceedings will go ahead "as
expeditiously as possible."
The extraterritoriality the US is claiming over everything related to international
finance and sanctions (not just Iran, but also Cuba, Russia, roughly 1/3 of the world is
under some form of US sanctions) is a constant crime which kills thousands of people per
year. But what the US has been doing over the past few years, changing boarders unilaterally
without evening going to war is a step towards pure insanity. The US "declares" that the
"Golan heights" belong to Israel, the US hates the current President of Venezuela so they
declare some random guy the new President and bully other countries into pretending his is as
well. Ultimately, this is a sign of growing weakness, when the US wanted to change the
government of Iraq they invaded (and failed), when they wanted to breakup Syria they
bankrolled a bunch of mercenaries (and failed again). Now the US isn't even confident enough
to invade Venezuela and impose a new government, so instead they play make-believe with
Guaido. Despite this, Venezula isn't strong enough to punish the US for its' delusions but if
the US insists on playing make-believe with China they will learn some very painful lessons
because China is strong enough to push back.
The Meng case has always been part of the Trump campaign to put pressure on China. The
Judge's ruling today is quite ludicrous but wholly consistent with Canada's historic
tradition of carrying out instructions from the Imperial capital, whether that be in London
or Washington.
It is sad to see a national ruling class prostituting itself and sadder still when it does so
out of fear rather than for profit.
It is all about China, which is in an invulnerable position thanks to Washington having spent
the last twenty years forcing Russia and Iran into Beijing's arms. Having given up diplomacy
in order to concentrate on gangster bullying tactics the US has ended up, the way all
declining empires do, with no friends except those countries so weak that they still crave
the Emperor's favour.
An important ruling in the Canada-US extradition case of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou will be
announced shortly. A Canadian court will rule if the case has suitable "double-criminality"
- i.e. an act illegal in both countries - and Men will either be free or one step closer to
being delivered to the Americans. While it is claimed the arrest was political in nature
due to an off-the-cuff comment by Trump, the politicized nature of the charge and
extradition request goes back ten years as revealed in the New York Times in December 2018
(How A National Security Investigation of Huawei Set Off an International Incident Dec 14,
2018):
"The details of the criminal charges against Ms. Meng, filed under seal, remain murky. But
court filings in Canada and interviews with people familiar with the Huawei investigation
show that the events leading to her arrest were set in motion years ago.
How a National Security Investigation of Huawei Set Off an International Incident - The
New York Times 2018-12-15, 4*50 PM
They grew out of an Obama administration national security investigation into Chinese
companies -- including Huawei -- that act as extensions of the country's government,
according to the people familiar with the investigation. The focus only recently shifted to
whether Huawei, and specifically Ms. Meng, deceived HSBC and other banks to get them to
keep facilitating business in Iran. Former federal prosecutors said pursuing Ms. Meng, 46,
for alleged bank fraud proved to be a better line of attack than trying to build a case on
national security grounds...
Counterintelligence agents and federal prosecutors began exploring possible cases
against Huawei's leadership in 2010, according to a former federal law enforcement
official. The effort was led by United States attorney's offices in places where Huawei has
facilities, including Massachusetts, Alabama, California, New York and Texas."
In other words, the Americans had decided to use its courts against Huawei many years
before any charges directed at Meng came to pass. They were literally in search of a
crime.
Some of the uglier features of the Canadian political establishment and media have been
pounding the drums for expanded hostilities directed at China, in concert with other Five
Eyes partners.
Well now that it's 95% sure that Meng will be extradited to the US by the Canadian poodle
courts, we should now consider how China will respond as the full court press against China
has really heated up in the past month. If Meng is extradited to the US, she'll almost
certainly be kept in a high security prison, as I can't imagine the US allowing her to
remain free on bail during the trial and then given a 10-15yr prison sentence which will be
used as a bargaining chip in the US-China trade war. US intelligence agencies will
constantly interrogate/torture/bribe her in efforts to get her to flip against the Chinese
government or provide them some intelligence. Given her high status I think China may want
to consider the following options
1. Arrest some more Canadian "diplomats" (i.e. spies) and perhaps even up the ante by
arresting a US spy.
2. Pull an Assange and have Meng flee to the Chinese Consulate in Vancouver, I've seen the
Consulate and it is much roomier than the Ecuadorian embassy that Julian was stuck in. This
would ensure her protection and bypass the corrupt Courts, making it purely a question of
diplomacy between states (not that Canada has good diplomacy skills, but if China was also
holding a bunch of Canadian spies it would make sense to make this problem go away).
6 months ago, I think the Chinese would have allowed her to be extradited to the US and
then fought it out in backdown diplomacy with the US. But will all of the crazy things the
US has done in the past 2 months I think China has had enough and will start pushing back.
Heck, in the past 48 hours a congressman put forth a motion to declare Tibet an independent
country illegally occupied by China and the Whitehouse is threatening to strip Hong Kong of
special trading rights.
Of all the options in the Western arsenal against China, arresting Huawei's heir
apparent on blatantly forged charges is easily one of the worst.
Chinese or not Chinese, fact is Meng is a member of the bourgeoisie. She is one of them.
It doesn't matter if Huawei only became big and prosperous thanks to the CCP: bourgeoisie
is bourgeoisie, and having a strong one within communist China's belly is essential for the
long term success of capitalism in its war against communism.
By arresting Meng, the capitalists (i.e. Americans) are just driving a hedge between
inside the "Capitalist International". The Chinese capitalist class - who was certainly
very interested in ganging up with their western counterparts to, in the long term, topple
the CCP - is now completely at the mercy of the CCP, as the CCP is now the only guarantor
of their own class status.
The correct strategy would be for the Western bourgeoisie to woo the Chinese bourgeoisie
with as many tax breaks, green cards and other kinds of flattery, so that, withing the
course of some generations, the Chinese bourgeoisie become fully liberal (westernized). It
would then make the infamous "middle class insurgence" theory feasible.
But (and there's always a "but" in the real world), it seems that capitalism itself is
in crisis. It seems that, all of a sudden, the pot became too small to make every alpha
male happy. The international bourgeoisie is now devouring its children (the
petite-bourgeoisie, the "small business owners") and is beginning to devour itself.
"... Guo was far less vocal than colleague Richard Yu, who runs the consumer division responsible for smartphones. The outspoken executive said the restrictions that ostensibly aim to allay U.S. cybersecurity concerns are really designed to safeguard American dominance of global tech. ..."
"... "The so-called cybersecurity reasons are merely an excuse," Yu, head of the Chinese tech giant's consumer electronics unit, wrote in a post to his account on messaging app WeChat earlier on Monday. "The key is the threat to the technology hegemony of the U.S." posed by Huawei, he added. ..."
Trump's economic war on China comes in the shadow of an even deadlier military escalation.
And it may not stop after November, no matter who wins the election.
Economists like to
think of the wreckage caused by stock market downturns, widespread bankruptcies, and corporate
downsizing as "creative destruction." As it destroys the old and the dysfunctional, the
capitalist system continually spurs innovation, much as a forest fire prepares the ground for
new growth.
Or so the representatives of the dismal science argue.
Donald Trump, who is neither economist nor scientist, has his own version of creative
destruction. He is determined to destroy the Affordable Care Act and replace it with his own
health insurance alternative. He has torn up the Iran nuclear deal in favor of negotiating
something brand new with Tehran. He has withdrawn from the Paris climate accord and argues that the United
States is reducing carbon emissions in its own superior manner.
The problem, of course, is that Trump is very good at destruction but, despite his previous
job as a real estate mogul, exceedingly bad at construction. Indeed, there's abundant evidence
that he never intended to replace what he is destroying with anything at all. Trump has never
offered any viable alternative to Obamacare or any new negotiating framework with Iran. And
prior to the recent economic downturn, U.S. carbon emissions were increasing after several
years of decline.
Perhaps the most dangerous example of Trump's uncreative destruction is his approach to
China.
Previously, Trump said that he simply wanted to level the playing field by placing trade
with China on a fairer and more reciprocal basis, strengthening the regime of intellectual
property rights, and stopping Beijing from manipulating its currency.
He was willing to go to great lengths to accomplish this goal. The tariffs that Trump
imposed on Chinese products precipitated a trade war that jeopardized the livelihoods of
millions of American farmers and workers. The initial trade deal that the United States and
China signed in January, even though many of the U.S. tariffs remain in place, was supposed to
be the grand alternative to the old and dysfunctional trade relationship.
But here again, Trump is not telling the truth. He and his team have a very different set of
objectives. As with so many other elements of his domestic and foreign policy, Trump wants to
tear apart the current system -- in this case, the network of economic ties between the United
States and China -- and replace it with absolutely nothing at all.
Oh sure, Trump believes that U.S. manufacturers can step up to take the place of Chinese
suppliers. More recently, as the administration "turbocharges" its efforts to isolate China in
response to its purported pandemic mistakes , it has
talked of creating
an Economic Prosperity Network of trusted allies like South Korea, Australia, India, and
Vietnam. But this is all whistling in the dark, because the administration doesn't really
understand the consequences -- for the world economy, for the U.S. economy -- of tearing apart
the global supply chain in this way.
Just how poorly Trump understands all this is reflected in
his statement last week that "we could cut off the whole relationship" with China and "save
$500 billion." This from the president who erroneously believes that China
is paying the United States "billions and billions of dollars of tariffs a month." What else do
you expect from a man who received a BS in economics from Wharton?
Unlike many of the administration's other policies, however, its hardline approach to China
has some bipartisan support. Engagement with China has virtually
disappeared as a policy option in the Democratic Party. Joe Biden, the Democrats'
presumptive presidential candidate, has attempted to present himself as the tougher alternative
when it comes to China, a misguided
effort to fend off charges of his bedding down with Beijing.
Finger to the wind, Biden is crafting policies in response not just to Trump but to public
opinion. In 2017, 44 percent of Americans had a favorable view of China, compared to 47 percent
who held an unfavorable opinion of the country, according to Pew. In
this year's survey , only 26 percent looked at China positively versus 66 percent who
viewed it negatively. The latter category includes 62 percent of Democrats.
Writing for the Atlantic Council, Michael Greenwald
sums up the new conventional wisdom of the centrists:
The United States can no longer remain content with the notion of a Chinese economic
threat arising in the distant future. The advent of COVID-19 has made it more apparent than
any other time including the US-China trade war that now is the moment for the United States,
European Union, and other like-minded countries to diversify supply chains away from
China.
That's what makes Trump's uncreative destruction vis a vis China so dangerous. It may not
stop after November, no matter who wins the election.
The Great Disentanglement
China's economic shutdown at the onset of the coronavirus pandemic disrupted many global supply
chains, prompting a number of countries and corporations to accelerate their strategy of
reducing their dependency on China for components.
Rising labor costs in China, concerns over human rights abuses there, but especially the
trade war between Washington and Beijing had contributed to the
U.S. fashion industry and tech firms
like Apple rethinking their own supply chains. Japan, heavily dependent on Chinese trade,
is
using $2 billion in economic stimulus funds to subsidize the move of Japanese firms out of
China.
The Trump administration is thus swimming with the current in its effort to isolate China.
It has imposed sanctions because of China's violations of Uyghur human rights. It has levied
penalties against China for its cooperation with Iranian firms. And it has threatened to add
another set of tariffs on top of the existing ones for China's handling of the coronavirus.
Its latest initiative has been to tighten the screws on the Chinese technology firm, Huawei.
Last week, the administration announced sanctions against any firms using U.S.-made equipment
that supply the Chinese tech giant. The chief victim of these new restrictions will be the
Taiwanese firm TSMC, which supplies 90 percent of Huawei's smartphone chips.
In other words, the Trump administration is committed not only to severing U.S. economic
connections with China. It wants to put as much pressure on other countries as well to
disentangle themselves from Chinese manufacturing. Taiwan, of course, has no particular love
for Mainland China. It battles Beijing on a daily basis to get international recognition --
from other countries and from global organizations like the World Health Organization.
But the Taiwanese economy is also heavily dependent on its cross-strait neighbor. As Eleanor
Albert points
out :
China is Taiwan's largest trading partner, accounting for nearly 30 percent of
the island's total trade, and trade between the two reached $150.5 billion in 2018 (up from
$35 billion in 1999). China and Taiwan have also agreed to allow banks, insurers, and other
financial service providers to work in both markets.
And it probably won't be Huawei but Taiwan that suffers from the U.S. move. As Michael
Reilly notes
, "Huawei's size in the global market means its Taiwanese suppliers cannot easily find an
alternative customer of comparable standing to replace it." China, meanwhile, will either find
another source of chips outside the U.S. sphere, or it will do what the United States has been
threatening to do: bring production of critical components back closer to home.
Another key player in the containment of China is India. Trump's friendship with Indian
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, a right-wing Hindu nationalist, is more than simply an
ideological affection. Trump sealed
a $3 billion in military sales deal with India in February, with a trade deal still on the
horizon.
Modi, in turn, is hoping to be the biggest beneficiary of the falling out between Washington
and Beijing. "The government in April reached out to more than 1,000 companies in the U.S. and
through overseas missions to offer incentives for manufacturers seeking to move out of China,"
reports Bloomberg . "India is prioritizing medical equipment suppliers, food processing
units, textiles, leather, and auto part makers among more than 550 products covered in the
discussions."
Vietnam is another regional competitor that the United States is supporting in its
containment strategy. With only a couple hundred reported coronavirus cases and zero deaths,
Vietnam is
poised to emerge from the current crisis virtually unscathed. With low labor costs and an
authoritarian government that can enforce deals, it is already a favored alternative for
corporations looking for alternatives to China. But wildcat strikes have been happening in
greater numbers in the country, and the Vietnamese government recently
approved the country's first independent trade union.
Yet with a more technologically sophisticated infrastructure, China will continue to look
more attractive to investors than India or Vietnam.
Don't Count Out China
If your image of the Chinese economy is stuck in the 1980s -- cheap toys and mass-produced
baubles -- then you probably think that severing economic ties with the country is no big deal.
America can produce its own plastic junk, right?
But China is no longer hurrying to catch up to the West. In some ways, the West is already
in China's rearview mirror.
Huawei is well-known for the part it's playing in the rollout of 5G networks worldwide.
China is not only ahead of the curve in upgrading to 5G domestically, it is busy manufacturing
all the new tech that will run on these high-speed networks, like virtual reality and
augmented reality and AI-driven devices.
Perhaps more to the point, China is not simply part of the global supply chain. It is using
these new technologies to revolutionize the global supply chain.
For instance, it's using 3-D modeling to shorten product development. It has long integrated
drones into its distribution networks. "Chinese supply chain companies are incorporating
groundbreaking technologies like cloud-based systems, data analytics, and artificial
intelligence (AI) and using them to redesign supply chain operations," writes Adina-Laura
Achim.
And don't discount the role of a well-financed, centralized, authoritarian government. The
Trump administration is, frankly, at a huge disadvantage when it tries to pressure companies to
relocate their operations. Writes
Manisha Mirchandani:
The global technology and consumer electronics sectors are especially reliant on
China's infrastructure and specialized labor pool, neither of which will be easy to
replicate. The Chinese government is already mobilizing resources to convince producers of
China's unique merits as a manufacturing location. Zhengzhou, within Henan Province, has
appointed officials to support Apple's partner Foxconn in mitigating the disruptions caused
by the coronavirus, while the Ministry of Finance is increasing credit support to the
manufacturing sector. Further, the Chinese government is likely to channel stimulus efforts
to develop the country's high-tech manufacturing infrastructure, moving away from its
low-value manufacturing base and accelerating its vision for a technology-driven services
economy.
The Trump administration is playing the short game, trying to use tariffs and anti-Chinese
sentiment to hobble a rising power. China, on the other hand, is playing the long game,
translating its trade surpluses into structural advantages in a fast-evolving global
economy.
Will the Conflict Turn Hot?
Despite the economic ravages of the pandemic, the Pentagon continues to demand the lion's
share of the U.S. budget. It wants another $705 billion for 2021, after increasing its budget
by 20 percent between 2016 and 2020.
This appalling waste of government resources has already caused long-term damage to the
economic competitiveness of the United States. But it's all the money the Pentagon is spending
on "deterring China" that might prove more devastating in the short term.
The U.S. Navy announced
this month that it was sending its entire forward-deployed sub fleet on "contingency
response operations" as a warning to China. Last month, the U.S. Navy Expeditionary Strike
Group
sailed into the South China Sea to support Malaysia's oil exploration in an area that China
claims. Aside from the reality that oil exploration makes no economic sense at a time of record
low oil prices, the United States should be helping the countries bordering the South China Sea
come to a fair resolution of their disputes, not throwing more armaments at the problem.
There's also heightened risk of confrontation in the Taiwan Strait, the East China Sea, and
even in outer space . A huge portion of the Pentagon's budget goes toward preparing for war
with China -- and, frankly, provoking war as well.
What does this all have to do with the Great Disentanglement?
The close economic ties between the United States and China have always represented a
significant constraint on military confrontation. Surely the two countries would not risk
grievous economic harm by coming to blows. Economic cooperation also provides multiple channels
for resolving conflicts and communicating discontent. The United States and Soviet Union never
had that kind of buffer.
If the Great Disentanglement goes forward, however, then the two countries have less to lose
economically in a military confrontation. Trading partners, of course, sometimes go to war with
one another. But as the data
demonstrates , more trade generally
translates into less war.
There are lots and lots of problems in the U.S.-China economic relationship. But they pale
in comparison to World War III. Share this:
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So, yes, the West still has a realistic chance of destroying China and inaugurating a new
cycle of capitalist prosperity.
What happens with the "decoupling"/"Pivot to Asia" is that, in the West, there's
a scatological theory [go to 10th paragraph] - of Keynesian origin - that socialism can
only play "catch up" with capitalism, but never surpass it when a "toyotist phase" of
technological innovation comes (this is obviously based on the USSR's case). This theory
states that, if there's innovation in socialism, it is residual and by accident, and that
only in capitalism is significant technological advancement possible. From this, they posit
that, if China is blocked out of Western IP, it will soon "go back to its place" - which is
probably to Brazil or India level.
If China will be able to get out of the "Toyotist Trap" that destroyed the USSR, only time
will tell. Regardless, decoupling is clearly not working, and China is not showing any signs
so far of slowing down. Hence Trump is now embracing a more direct approach.
As for the USA, I've put my big picture opinion about it some days ago, so I won't repeat
myself. Here, it suffices to say that, yes, I believe the USA can continue to survive as an
empire - even if, worst case scenario, in a "byzantine" form. To its favor, it has: 1) the
third largest world population 2) huge territory, with excellent proportion of high-quality
arable land (35%), that basically guarantees food security indefinitely (for comparison, the
USSR only had 10% of arable land, and of worse quality) 3) two coasts, to the two main Oceans
(Pacific and Atlantic), plus a direct exit to the Arctic (Alaska and, de facto, Greenland and
Canada) 4) excellent, very defensive territory, protected by both oceans (sea-to-sea),
bordered only by two very feeble neighbors (Mexico and Canada) that can be easily absorbed if
the situation asks to 4) still the financial superpower 5) still a robust "real" economy -
specially if compared to the micro-nations of Western Europe and East-Asia 6) a big fucking
Navy, which gives it thalassocratic power.
I don't see the USA losing its territorial integrity anytime soon. There are separatist
movements in places like Texas and, more recently, the Western Coast. Most of them exist only
for fiscal reasons and are not taken seriously by anyone else. The Star-and-Stripes is still
a very strong ideal to the average American, and nobody takes the idea of territory loss for
real. If that happens, though, it would change my equation on the survival of the American
Empire completely.
As for Hong Kong. I watched a video by the chief of the PLA last year (unfortunately, I
watched it on Twitter and don't have the link with me anymore). He was very clear: Hong Kong
does not present an existential threat to China. The greatest existential threat to China
are, by far, Xinjiang and Tibet, followed by Taiwan and the South China Sea. Hong Kong is a
distant fourth place.
One problem with your scenario is that the US navy may be over-extended in parts of the
world where all the enemy has to do is to cut off supply lines to battleship groups and then
those ships would be completely helpless. US warships in the Persian Gulf with the Strait of
Hormuz sealed off by Iran come to mind.
Incidents involving US naval ship collisions with slow-moving oil tankers in SE Asian
waters and some other parts of of the the world, resulting in the loss of sailors, hardly
instill the notion that the US is a mighty thalassocratic force.
It's my understanding also that Russia, China and maybe some other countries have invested
hugely in long-range missiles capable of hitting US coastal cities and areas where the bulk
of the US population lives.
And if long-range missiles don't put paid to the notion that projecting power through
sending naval warships all over the planet works, maybe the fact that many of these ships are
sitting ducks for COVID-19 infection clusters might, where the US public is concerned.
I agree the new anti-ship missile technology may have changed the rules of naval
warfare.
However, it's important to highlight that, contrary to the US Army, the USN has a stellar
record. It fought wonderfully against the Japanese Empire in 1941-1945, and successfully
converted both the Pacific and the Atlantic into "American lakes" for the next 75 years. All
the Americans have nowadays it owes its Navy.
But you may be right. Maybe the USN is also susceptible to degeneration.
Of the existing 30 or so high-tech productive chains, China only enjoys superiority at 2
or 3 (see 6:48). It is still greatly dependent on the West to development and still is a
developing country.
Based on what I've read, China is on a fast track to develop technology on their own. In
addition, technology development is world-wide these days. What China can not develop itself
- quickly enough, time is the only real problem - it can buy with its economic power.
"if China is blocked out of Western IP, it will soon "go back to its place" - which is
probably to Brazil or India level."
Ah, but that's where hackers come in. China can *not* be blocked out of Western IP. First,
as I said, China can *buy* it. Unless there is a general prohibition across the entire
Western world, and by extension sanctions against any other nation from selling to China -
which is an unenforceable policy, as Iran has shown - China can buy what it doesn't have and
then reverse-engineer it. Russia will sell it if no one else will.
Second, China can continue to simply acquire technology through industrial espionage.
Every country and every industry engages in this sort of thing. Ever watch the movie
"Duplicity"? That shit actually happens. I read about industrial espionage years ago and it's
only gotten fancier since the old days of paper files. I would be happy to breach any US or
EU industrial sector and sell what I find to the Chinese, the Malaysians or anyone else
interested. It's called "leveling the playing field" and that is advantageous for everyone.
If the US industrial sector employees can't keep up, that's their problem. No one is
guaranteed a job for life - and shouldn't be.
"1) the third largest world population"
Which is mostly engaged in unproductive activities like finance, law, etc. I've read that
if you visit the main US universities teaching science and technology, who are the students?
Chinese. Indians. Not Americans. Americans only want to "make money" in law and finance, not
"make things."
"2) huge territory, with excellent proportion of high-quality arable land (35%), that
basically guarantees food security indefinitely"
In military terms, given current military technology, territory doesn't matter. China has
enough nuclear missiles to destroy the 50 Major Metropolitan Areas in this country. Losing
100-200 millions citizens kinda puts a damper on US productivity. Losing the same number in
China merely means more for the rest.
"3) two coasts, to the two main Oceans (Pacific and Atlantic)"
Which submarines can make irrelevant. Good for economic matters - *if* your economy can
continue competing. China has one coast - but its Belt and Road Initiative gives it economic
clout on the back-end and the front-end. I don't see the US successfully countering that
Initiative.
"4) excellent, very defensive territory, protected by both oceans (sea-to-sea)"
Which only means the US can't be "invaded". That's WWI and WWII thinking the US is mired
in. Today, you destroy an opponent's military and, if necessary, his civilian population, or
at least its ability to "project" force against you. You don't "invade" unless it's some weak
Third World country. And if the US can't "project" its power via its navy or air force,
having a lot of territory doesn't mean much. This is where Russia is right now. Very
defensible but limited in force projection (but getting better fast.) The problem for the US
is China and Russia are developing military technology that can prevent US force projection
around *their* borders.
"bordered only by two very feeble neighbors (Mexico and Canada) that can be easily
absorbed if the situation asks"
LOL I can just see the US "absorbing" Mexico. Canada, maybe - they're allies anyway.
Mexico, not so much. You want a "quagmire", send the US troops to take on the Mexican drug
gangs. They aren't Pancho Villa.
"4) still the financial superpower"
Uhm, what part of "Depression" did you miss? And even if that doesn't happen now,
continued financial success is unlikely. Like pandemics, shit happens in economics and
monetary policy.
"a big fucking Navy, which gives it thalassocratic power."
That can be sunk in a heartbeat and is virtually a colossal money pit with limited
strategic value given current military technology which both China and Russia are as advanced
as the US is, if not more so. Plus China is developing its own navy quickly. I read somewhere
a description of one Chinese naval shipyard. There were several advanced destroyers being
developed. Then the article noted that China has several more large shipyards. That Chinese
long coast comes in handy for that sort of thing.
China Now Has More Warships Than the U.S.
But sometimes quantity doesn't trump quality. [My note: But sometimes it does.] https://tinyurl.com/y7numhef
That's just the first article I found, from a crappy source. There are better analyses, of
course.
"I don't see the USA losing its territorial integrity anytime soon. There are separatist
movements in places like Texas and, more recently, the Western Coast. Most of them exist only
for fiscal reasons and are not taken seriously by anyone else."
I'd agree with that. I hear this "California secession" crap periodically and never
believe it. However, for state politicians, the notion of being "President" of your own
country versus a "Governor" probably is tempting to these morons. State populations are
frequently idiots as well, as the current lockdown response is demonstrating. All in all,
though, if there are perceived external military threats, that is likely to make the states
prefer to remain under US central control.
"Britain had to agree to the pact because it had lost the capability to defend the
colony.".."
That was the excuse. I believe HK was offered to China in return for Deng to open up and
turn China capitalist. Deng was not the one who
demanded HK return. Britain initiated the discussions. Deng gladly accepted although he
insisted on maintaining their authoritarian form of undemocratic government and left HK's
fate ambiguous so Britain could get support from their people and the HK elite. The party
elites were happy to be able to join the Western Elites in accumulating an unequal share of
the wealth. The Soviet elites led by the US Globalist puppet Gorbachev chose the same path
although they chose Fake Democracy and rule of the oligarchs as in the US rather than party
control of China
HK is protected against US tarrifs imposed on China goods. China exports a good chunk of
goods through HK. If Trump were really serious he would remove HK's protected status.
The timing doesn't add up. China opened up in 1972 (the famous Nixon-Mao handshake), while
the UK's agreement to give HK back was from 1984 - well into the Thatcher Era.
The most likely reason for the UK to decide to obey the lease deal was of military nature:
the valuable land necessary to defend HK was the flatland adjacent to the city proper, where
potable water comes from. It already part of the Mainland, thus rendering the defense of HK
virtually impossible without an outright invasion of the Mainland itself.
Margaret Thatcher probably didn't want to obey the treaty (99-year lease), as a good
neoliberal she was, but her military advisors probably warned her of the practical
difficulties, and, since it was a 99-year lease anyway, she must've agreed to simply allow
the treaty to be followed.
It is important to highlight that, in 1984, there were a lot of reasons the capitalist
world should be optimist about China becoming capitalist. After all, it really got off the
Soviet sphere after 1972, and Deng's reforms were - from the point of view of a vulgar
(bourgeois) economist - indeed a clear path to a capitalist restoration. It didn't cross
Thatcher's mind that China could stand its ground and remain socialist - at least not in
1984. If you read the sources of the time, you will easily see the Western elites treated
China's return to capitalism as a given.
It is still greatly dependent on the West to development and still is a developing
country.
So, yes, the West still has a realistic chance of destroying China and inaugurating a new
cycle of capitalist prosperity.
What happens with the "decoupling"/"Pivot to Asia" is that, in the West, there's
a scatological theory [go to 10th paragraph] - of Keynesian origin - that socialism can
only play "catch up" with capitalism, but never surpass it when a "toyotist phase" of
technological innovation comes (this is obviously based on the USSR's case). This theory
states that, if there's innovation in socialism, it is residual and by accident, and that
only in capitalism is significant technological advancement possible. From this, they posit
that, if China is blocked out of Western IP, it will soon "go back to its place" - which is
probably to Brazil or India level.
If China will be able to get out of the "Toyotist Trap" that destroyed the USSR, only time
will tell. Regardless, decoupling is clearly not working, and China is not showing any signs
so far of slowing down. Hence Trump is now embracing a more direct approach.
As for the USA, I've put my big picture opinion about it some days ago, so I won't repeat
myself. Here, it suffices to say that, yes, I believe the USA can continue to survive as an
empire - even if, worst case scenario, in a "byzantine" form. To its favor, it has: 1) the
third largest world population 2) huge territory, with excellent proportion of high-quality
arable land (35%), that basically guarantees food security indefinitely (for comparison, the
USSR only had 10% of arable land, and of worse quality) 3) two coasts, to the two main Oceans
(Pacific and Atlantic), plus a direct exit to the Arctic (Alaska and, de facto, Greenland and
Canada) 4) excellent, very defensive territory, protected by both oceans (sea-to-sea),
bordered only by two very feeble neighbors (Mexico and Canada) that can be easily absorbed if
the situation asks to 4) still the financial superpower 5) still a robust "real" economy -
specially if compared to the micro-nations of Western Europe and East-Asia 6) a big fucking
Navy, which gives it thalassocratic power.
I don't see the USA losing its territorial integrity anytime soon. There are separatist
movements in places like Texas and, more recently, the Western Coast. Most of them exist only
for fiscal reasons and are not taken seriously by anyone else. The Star-and-Stripes is still
a very strong ideal to the average American, and nobody takes the idea of territory loss for
real. If that happens, though, it would change my equation on the survival of the American
Empire completely.
As for Hong Kong. I watched a video by the chief of the PLA last year (unfortunately, I
watched it on Twitter and don't have the link with me anymore). He was very clear: Hong Kong
does not present an existential threat to China. The greatest existential threat to China
are, by far, Xinjiang and Tibet, followed by Taiwan and the South China Sea. Hong Kong is a
distant fourth place.
"They Saw This Day Coming" - Huawei Forges Alliances With Rival Chipmakers As
Washington's Crackdown Intensifies by Tyler Durden Fri, 05/22/2020 - 18:05 The US
Commerce Department's latest move to block companies from selling products to Huawei that were
created with American technology, equipment or software has undoubtedly hurt the Chinese
telecoms giant. But it won't be nearly enough to take it down.
Since Washington launched its campaign against Huawei two years ago (when the trade tensions
between the US and China started to heat up, as President Trump started slapping more tariffs
on foreign goods) the company has been strengthening ties with contract chipmakers in Taiwan
and elsewhere, while ramping up its own microchip-technology arm, known as HiSilicon
Technologies.
On Friday,
Nikkei reported that Huawei had initiated conversations with other mobile chipmakers to try
and figure out where it might source certain essential components for its handsets (remember,
Huawei is the second-largest cellphone maker by sales volume) and other products.
Of course, the crackdown cuts both ways, as several American companies relied heavily on
Huawei's business (they can still apply for licenses to continue selling to Huawei...so long as
Commerce approves).
As
we reported earlier this week , it's not just American chipmakers that are distancing
themselves from Huawei: some Taiwan-based chipmakers are also dropping the telecoms giant for
fear of being targeted by Treasury sanctions, including TSMC, the world's largest contract
chipmaker.
Now, Huawei is reportedly in talks with MediaTek, the world's second-largest contract chip
producer.
Huawei Technologies is seeking help from rival mobile-chip makers to withstand a U.S.
clampdown aimed at crippling the Chinese company, sources familiar with the matter told the
Nikkei Asian Review.
Huawei is in talks with MediaTek, the world's second-largest mobile chip developer after
Qualcomm of the U.S., and UNISOC, China's second-largest mobile chip designer after Huawei's
HiSilicon Technologies unit, to buy more chips as alternatives to keep its consumer
electronics business afloat, the sources said.
To work with a contract chipmaker, Huawei would still need to design its own chips. Over the
past two years, Huawei has expanded its team of engineers working on chip design to more than
10,000, Nikkei said.
To be sure, MediaTek already makes low- and medium-end chips for Huawei, evidence that the
company, which was founded by a veteran of China's PLA, and purportedly maintains strong links
to the Chinese military, has been bracing for the other shoe to drop. MediaTek, meanwhile, is
still trying to figure out if it can meet Huawei's latest bid.
"Huawei has foreseen this day coming. It started to allocate more mid- to low-end mobile
chip projects to MediaTek last year amid its de-Americanization efforts," one of the sources
said. "Huawei has also become one of the key clients for the Taiwanese mobile chip
developer's mid-end 5G mobile chip for this year."
MediaTek is evaluating whether it has sufficient human resources to fully support Huawei's
aggressive bid, as the Chinese company is asking for volume 300% above its usual procurement in
the past few years, another source familiar with the talks said.
The situation has also created an opportunity for small Chinese chipmakers (working, we
imagine, mostly with technology stolen from American and Taiwanese companies) to expand.
Huawei also seeks to deepen its collaboration with UNISOC, a Beijing-backed mobile chip
developer that relies mostly on smaller device makers as customers and mainly supports
entry-level products and devices for emerging markets. Previously, Huawei used only very few
UNISOC chips for its low-end smartphone and tablet offerings, sources said.
"The new procurement deals would be a great boost to help UNISOC further upgrade its chip
design capability," said a chip industry executive. "In the past, UNISOC was struggling quite
a bit, because it could not really secure big contracts with global leading smartphone makers
as these top smartphone makers could find better offerings elsewhere. This time could be an
opportunity that it could really seek to match the international standard."
UNISOC last year accelerated its 5G chip development to catch up with Qualcomm and
MediaTek, Nikkei has reported. More recently, the company received 4.5 billion yuan ($630
million) from China's national integrated circuit fund, the so-called Big Fund.
UNISOC is preparing to list on the Shanghai STAR tech board, the Chinese version of
Nasdaq, later this year. Qualcomm has needed a license from the U.S. Department of Commerce
to supply Huawei since mid-May of 2019.
Huawei has already expanded production of in-house mobile processors for its smartphone
business to 75%, up from 69% in 2018 and 45% in 2016, according to to data from GF Securities
cited by Nikkei. Huawei shipped 240 million smartphones in 2019. And with China now throwing
caution to the wind and cracking down on Hong Kong, we wouldn't be surprised to see more Huawei
drama in the headlines next week, with serious market repercussions for the US semiconductor
industry.
That will be an interesting chess party. The USA moved way to many plants to Chine to get out
of this conflict without major losses
Notable quotes:
"... Secretary of State Mike Pompeo slammed China as “hostile to free nations,” portraying Beijing as fundamentally opposed to the United States, on Wednesday. ..."
"... But the Secretary of State pointed to deeper issues in the relationship, claiming that “the nature of the regime is not new.” “For several decades, we thought the regime would become more like us through trade, scientific exchanges, diplomatic outreach, letting them in the [World Trade Organization] as a developing nation,” he said. “That didn’t happen.” ..."
'The regime is ideologically and politically hostile to free nations.'
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo slammed China as “hostile to free nations,”
portraying Beijing as fundamentally opposed to the United States, on Wednesday.
Tensions between the United States and China have reached a fever pitch during the
coronavirus pandemic. Pompeo’s speech at a Wednesday morning press conference laid out a
vision of a global clash between two fundamentally different societies.
“China’s been ruled by a brutal, authoritarian regime, a communist regime since
1949,” he said. “We greatly underestimated the degree to which Beijing is
ideologically and politically hostile to free nations. The whole world is waking up to that
fact.”
He added that a focus on the coronavirus pandemic “risks missing the bigger picture of
the challenge that’s presented by the Chinese Communist Party.”
The pandemic has accelerated U.S.-China tensions.
Last week, a Chinese Communist Party news threatened sanctions against U.S. lawmakers for
attempting to sue the Chinese government for the pandemic, and U.S. law enforcement accused
Chinese hackers of cyberattacks against U.S. researchers.
But the Secretary of State pointed to deeper issues in the relationship, claiming that
“the nature of the regime is not new.” “For several decades, we thought the
regime would become more like us through trade, scientific exchanges, diplomatic outreach,
letting them in the [World Trade Organization] as a developing nation,” he said.
“That didn’t happen.”
Pompeo accused the World Health Organization’s director-general Dr. Tedros Adhanom
Ghebreyesus of “unusually close ties to Beijing” that “started long before
this current pandemic.”
The Trump administration has accused China of covering up information about the novel
coronavirus—even implying that the virus emerged from a lab accident in Wuhan,
China—and pointed the finger at the World Health Organization for aiding China’s
coverup.
The Secretary of State slammed the public health group for excluding Taiwan in his Wednesday
speech, touching on a sensitive topic for Beijing.
Taiwan, an island that was once ruled by China, has ruled itself since the end of the
Chinese Civil War in 1950. Beijing considers the island a breakaway Chinese province that must
be reunited with the mainland, while Taiwan’s ruling Pan-Green Alliance leans towards
independence.
“The democratic process in Taiwan has matured into a model for the world,”
Pompeo said, congratulating President Tsai Ing-wen on her re-election. “Despite great
pressure from the outside, Taiwan has demonstrated the wisdom of giving people a voice and a
choice.”
But he shied away from changing U..S. policy towards Taiwan..
Pompeo said that work that “comports with the history of the agreements between the
United States and China is the right solution to maximize the stability there in the
straits.”
The United States acknowledged the Chinese position that “there is but one China and
Taiwan is part of China” as part of a 1979 joint communique with Beijing, and does not
officially recognize Taiwan as a state, but maintains close informal ties with the Taiwanese
government and opposes attempts to change the island’s government by force.
“The President talked about how we’re going to respond [to China], how
he’s beginning to think about responding to the calamity that has befallen the world as a
result of the actions of the Chinese Communist Party,” Pompeo said. “I don’t
want to get ahead of him in terms of talking about how the administration will respond to that,
but you can already begin to see the outlines of it.”
Matthew Petti is a national security reporter at the National Interest. Follow him on
Twitter: @matthew_petti. This article initially stated that the United States “recognized
that ‘there is but one China and Taiwan is a part of China’ in a 1979 joint
communique.” The communique actually states that the United States
“acknowledges” this as the Chinese position. The article has been updated to more
correctly reflect the communique. Image: Reuters.
"... The Chinese will not start a shooting war and the US has no guts for one. Its industry has been hollowed out not just by outsourcing but by corruption as well. The campaign of demonization against China is very obvious, how far it is working I have no way of telling. Among the 5-eyes probably quite well, in the rest of the World rather less well, I would imagine. Notably, the British economy has been hollowed out in exactly the same manner as the US's. Canada's, Australia's, NewZealand's? Could they, would they support a war? ..."
"... Right now, China is leading the vaccine race and has developed an antibody treatment for Covid-19 that should be ready this year. ..."
"... Interesting article by Escobar. If one cares to notice, this anti-China cold war is a neocon based aggression. The primary movers of it are mostly neocons or the sorts who follow the neocon lead. ..."
"... "Again! Trump is talking nonsense." Trump seems to be losing his mind right now. Even he has such crazy ideas of cutting ties with China, US politicians, businessmen and Americans would not allow him to do so, Xin Qiang, deputy director of the Center for US Studies at Fudan University, told the Global Times. ..."
"... Jin Canrong, the associate dean of Renmin University of China's School of International Studies in Beijing, told the Global Times on Thursday that Trump made very irresponsible and emotional remarks in the interview. ..."
"... "For Trump, fantasy is power; bluffing is power, so he might use the future of his country to gamble with China. Although China always believes cooperation is the only right choice for the two countries to solve the problems together, if the US unilaterally and irrationally chooses all-out confrontation, China also needs to be prepared." ..."
Washington wants to prevent Russia and China supplanting US interests. Moscow and Beijing
pursue what they see as their own legitimate interests. What we face is not a "hybrid" war or
"New Cold War" but a world war. https://www.ghostsofhistory.wordpress.com/
What we face is not a "hybrid" war or "New Cold War" but a world war.
Honestly, I don't see it. My reasoning is simple, maybe too simple. The Chinese will
not start a shooting war and the US has no guts for one. Its industry has been hollowed out
not just by outsourcing but by corruption as well. The campaign of demonization against China
is very obvious, how far it is working I have no way of telling. Among the 5-eyes probably
quite well, in the rest of the World rather less well, I would imagine. Notably, the British
economy has been hollowed out in exactly the same manner as the US's. Canada's, Australia's,
NewZealand's? Could they, would they support a war?
The other reason I think a shooting war is less likely than might appear, is that the the
MIC is doing so well with the current cold war; that it would seem stupid to allow the
massive disruption and uncertainty that a shooting war would cause to interrupt the torrent
of cash being shoveled its way at the moment.
[Hide MORE]
1990. China's economy has come to a halt. The Economist
1996. China's economy will face a hard landing. The Economist
1998. China's economy's dangerous period of sluggish growth. The Economist
1999. Likelihood of a hard landing for the Chinese economy. Bank of Canada
2000. China currency move nails hard landing risk coffin. Chicago Tribune
2001. A hard landing in China. Wilbanks, Smith & Thomas
2002. China Seeks a Soft Economic Landing. Westchester University
2003. Banking crisis imperils China. New York Times
2004. The great fall of China? The Economist
2005. The Risk of a Hard Landing in China. Nouriel Roubini
2006. Can China Achieve a Soft Landing? International Economy
2007. Can China avoid a hard landing? TIME
2008. Hard Landing In China? Forbes
2009. China's hard landing. China must find a way to recover. Fortune
2010: Hard landing coming in China. Nouriel Roubini
2011: Chinese Hard Landing Closer Than You Think. Business Insider
2012: Economic News from China: Hard Landing. American Interest
2013: A Hard Landing In China. Zero Hedge
2014. A hard landing in China. CNBC
2015. Congratulations, You Got Yourself A Chinese Hard Landing. Forbes
2016. Hard landing looms for China. The Economist
2017. Is China's Economy Going To Crash? National Interest
2018. China's Coming Financial Meltdown. The Daily Reckoning.
2019 China's Economic Slowdown: How worried should we be? BBC
2020. Coronavirus Could End China's Decades-Long Economic Growth Streak. NY Times
Forbes – May 15 2012 – Meghan Casserly The American Dream Is Alive And Well In New Jersey
American Express – November 6 2012 – Rieva Lesonsky The American Dream is Alive and Well -- and Transformed
The Telegraph – August 4 2014 – Jeremy Warner The American Dream is alive and well, if you are trained for the jobs of the future
Forbes – September 30 2015 – John Tamny – FreedomWorks Ignore The Left And Right, The American Dream Is Alive And Well
FOX Business – August 22 2016 – Steve Tobak The American Dream Is Alive and Well
Forbes India – November 1 2016 – Monte Burke The American dream is alive and well
Washington Times – June 19 2017 – Ed Feulner – Heritage Foundation The American Dream, alive and well
KEDM – July 4 2018 – Byron Moore, Argent Advisors, Inc. The American Dream is Alive and Well
New York Times – February 2 2019 – Samuel J. Abrams – American
Enterprise Institute The American Dream Is Alive and Well
Daily Caller – February 6 2019 – Steve Sanetti – NSSF Firearm Industry
Trade Association The American Dream Is Alive And Well
FOX Business – September 30 2019 – Julia Limitone Eric Trump: The American Dream is alive and well
Mail Online – October 2019 – Lauren Fruen The American Dream is still alive! Children of poor immigrants still beat US-born kids up the
ladder – just as they did 100 years ago – but now Chinese and Indian migrants
have replaced Italian and Irish as the most successful
CNBC – November 14 2019 Billionaire Bob Parsons: The American Dream is alive and well
FOX News – November 26 2019 – Carol Ross Carol Roth: The American Dream is alive and well -- Let's be thankful for it
Clarion Ledger – December 10 2019 – Lynn Evans The American Dream is alive and well, but redefined
Wall Street Journal – January 31, 2020 – Michael R. Strain, American
Enterprise Institute The American Dream Is Alive and Well
Newsweek – February 27 2020 – Lee Habeeb The American Dream Is Alive and Well. Just Ask District Taco's Osiris Hoil
The Independent Voice – May 7 2020 – Barbara Ball The American Dream is alive and well
eKenyan – May 8 2020 Opinion | The American Dream Is Alive and Well
New York Times – May 18 2020 – Michael R. Strain – American Enterprise
Institute The American Dream Is Alive and Well
Chinese strategists like Liu He publicly acknowledge that epidemics can catalyze geopolitical
changes.
Right now, China is leading the vaccine race and has developed an antibody treatment
for Covid-19 that should be ready this year.
If development is successful and if it donates the cure to the world as Xi promised
and if WHO's investigation shows China is not the source of the virus, and if
China's economy is firing on all cylinders in November, it's game over: 3-0 China.
Interesting article by Escobar. If one cares to notice, this anti-China cold war is a
neocon based aggression. The primary movers of it are mostly neocons or the sorts who follow
the neocon lead. China is one country the zionazi-gays have not been able to dominate.
Coupled with China's economic rise and appeal to developing countries, these zionazi
oligarchs are going apeshit trying to bring China down. In addition to other articles
referenced in the article, see also this Global Time report:
[MORE] "Again! Trump is talking nonsense." Trump seems to be losing his mind right now. Even he
has such crazy ideas of cutting ties with China, US politicians, businessmen and Americans
would not allow him to do so, Xin Qiang, deputy director of the Center for US Studies at
Fudan University, told the Global Times.
He noted that Trump is bluffing and acting tough toward China to win more support. Fox
News, which has been regarded as Trump's defender and is notorious for a lack of
professionalism, is also making eye-catching news to draw attention.
Jin Canrong, the associate dean of Renmin University of China's School of
International Studies in Beijing, told the Global Times on Thursday that Trump made very
irresponsible and emotional remarks in the interview.
"The China-US relationship is the most important bilateral relationship in the world and
involves huge interests of the two countries, as well as the rest of the world. Therefore, it
is not something he can cut off emotionally," Jin said.
"If the US unilaterally cuts off ties, the American people will pay a heavier price than
us, because China's domestic market is huge and 75-80 percent of Chinese manufacturers are
supplying China's market, and the 2 to 5 percent that supply the US can also be absorbed by
the domestic market," he noted.
China has nothing to be afraid of as "in the past, we didn't solve the Taiwan question
because we wanted to maintain the China-US relationship, and if the US unilaterally cuts it
off, we can just reunify Taiwan immediately since the Chinese mainland has an overwhelming
advantage to solve this long-standing problem."
"Trump is like a giant baby on the brink of a meltdown as he faces tremendous pressure due
to massive failures that caused such a high death toll," Shen Yi, an expert from Fudan
University, told the Global Times. "It's like someone who wants to show his guts when he
passes by a cemetery in midnight. He needs to shout to give himself the courage," he
said.
Shen also noted that the American companies and industries would suffer the most severe
consequences, because the supply chain has been integrated with China.
"The Chinese public would only take such bluffing as a joke," Shen said, adding that there
has been no US president in the history who has made such a ridiculous statement against
China, not even during the Cold War.
Yuan Zheng, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS), said he
could not even remember any US leader who took a similar action. "His flip-flop rhetoric is
unprecedented, but we need to take a look at whether Trump will take real action," he said,
noting that there is no need to pay attention to claims that are unrealistic and
meaningless.
"For Trump, fantasy is power; bluffing is power, so he might use the future of his country
to gamble with China. Although China always believes cooperation is the only right choice for
the two countries to solve the problems together, if the US unilaterally and irrationally
chooses all-out confrontation, China also needs to be prepared."
@Godfree
Roberts China's economy won't be firing on all cylinders by November, but the important
parts of it will be. The manufacturers I talk to have weathered the worst of it, and their
order books for Q4 are more or less back to what they were in January (or at least healthy
enough to prevent soft skill losses). Many are upbeat about the future. (Not all of them will
survive, and the ones that die probably should have done so years ago.)
Compare this to the rest of Asia (Bangladesh, Pakistan, India, Cambodia, Myanmar, and
others): they are a mess. Bangladesh put all its eggs in the huge volume low quality basket
and will now pay a fatal price. Pakistan was dead before corona, and is now in a
manufacturing death spiral. India has the capacity to succeed, but is hamstrung by a
caste-based barbarism that has jettisoned all pretense of decency by throwing migrant workers
in the informal economy to their deaths. This will not be forgotten and I predict years of
trouble. The others only have a manufacturing sector because the Chinese moved their
factories there. Vietnam has some chance, and should be a big winner as China moves out of
low- to middle-end manufacturing.
Countries in South America have lost their opportunity. China passed them by years ago.
It's a tragedy, but they really have themselves to blame for it. And Africa, the last
frontier, is already dominated by China (15 years ago I'd bump into Chinese businessmen who'd
ship a 40-foot container of – 'insert any product you can think of' – to some
back of beyond place in Africa and refuse to come home until everything was sold). They've
moved up the ladder since then. Ethiopia, the fastest-growing economy on the continent, is
essentially an industrial zone for Chinese manufacturing.
Australia has become a mine/farm for China. New Zealand and Canada likewise, and a nice
place to send your teenagers to get educated and perhaps for retirement.
The EU, led by Germany, will be back on track soon. The winners here should be the former
USSR countries, with low labor costs and strong soft skills. With EU companies wanting to
bring the supply chain closer to home, this is their moment. If they screw it up, they will
spend another 30 years wondering what went wrong. I hope they won't, but if you spend any
time working with these people you know they often fail at the final hurdle (as though on
purpose – the psychology of self-destruction is their Achilles heel).
It's China's game to lose. And quite frankly, at this point, I don't see how. This has
been in the making since the late 70s. Perhaps earlier. I admire them for their intelligence,
their work ethic, their organizational capacity, their can-do spirit, and – yes –
their creativity (if you think China is Japan in the 60s, you need to spend some serious time
with younger Chinese in China).
The Chinese problem is, of course, its culture of responsibility avoidance. But even with
this issue, they are on track for a knockout victory. Most people in the West have no idea
what going on, which is exactly how You Know Who likes it.
I have no intention of letting my tribe be overrun by Chinese. But I have enough
experience to know they're smarter than my tribe, and it would be a wise thing to start
thinking more strategically and tactically about how to carve out a space in a new world most
people are unable to imagine (which is less than 10 years away).
The center of gravity of global economic power keeps moving, inexorably, toward
Asia.
it's game over
While the U.S. spent recent decades policing the world in pointless wars, China was about
the business of building an infrastructure in which all roads lead to Beijing, railroad cars
and boatloads of wealth. Just keep it coming, folks. Those roads and railroads and shipping
are linking nothing less than Eurasia, Sir Halford's World Island. It took this coronavirus
to show the imperial subjects that the Empire is naked and that China had already surpassed
it economically several years ago. It seems like it really is game over. I'm sad in a way,
but I would rather have a normal country than a hegemon; that is, if normalcy is still a
possibility.
What about the biggest hybrid war going on since centuries ago: jews (including crypto-jews,
hybrids and minions) versus everybody else?
The chinese had the full cooperation of diaspora jews (and their sayanim network) and
israelis. Specially the Chabad Lubavich.
From the referenced Global Times article, the US attack on Huawei (with its 5G leadership +
NSA proof encryption ) is at the heart of the story:
Based on Global Times sources, if the US further pinches Chinese telecommunication giant
Huawei by blocking companies such as TSMC from providing chips to the company, China will
carry out countermeasures, such as including certain US companies into its list of
"unreliable entities," imposing restrictions on or investigating US companies such as
Qualcomm, Cisco and Apple, and suspending purchases of Boeing aircraft.
The US would lose this fight. Apple for example manufactures in China with only a small
percentage of the sales price staying in China. If Apple manufacturing is shut down then
Apple is the big loser. They're already trying to move manufacturing to India but that's not
going to work.
We must be clear that coping with US suppression will be the key focus of China's
national strategy. We should enhance cooperation with most countries. The US is expected to
contain China's international frontlines, and we must knock out this US plot and make
China-US rivalry a process of US self-isolation.
China has plenty of alternative markets. US corporations mostly only sell to the US using
(now very sophisticated) Chinese manufacturing. Take this away, and Apple for example, have
no alternative supplier for the volumes, quality, sub-contractor network and export
infrastructure required.
General Qiao dismisses the possibility that Vietnam, the Philippines, Bangladesh, India
and other Asian nations may replace China's cheap workforce: "Think about which of these
countries has more skilled workers than China. What quantity of medium and high level human
resources was produced in China in these past 30 years? Which country is educating over 100
million students at secondary and university levels? The energy of all these people is
still far from being liberated for China's economic development."
True.
This will imply a concerted offensive, trying to enforce embargoes and trying to block
regional markets to Chinese companies. Lawfare will be the norm. Even freezing Chinese
assets in the US is not a far-fetched proposition anymore.
If the US steals the $ trillions China has invested in US treasuries, then the US dollar
also forfeits its claim to be the world reserve currency (safe place to hold international
trade balances).
Still, scores of nations are being asked, bluntly, by the hegemon to position themselves
once again in a "you're with us or against us" global war on terror imperative.
9/11 was fakery pumped up by the MSM to target Iraq/Iran and Covid-19 is more of the same
– this time targeting China. European states are getting tired of this game. For
example they were all dragged into supporting the Venezuela CIA coup that fizzled, and are
now trying to disentangle from it.
General Qiao counsels, "Don't think that only territorial sovereignty is linked to the
fundamental interests of a nation. Other kinds of sovereignty – economic, financial,
defense, food, resources, biological and cultural sovereignty – are all linked to the
interests and survival of nations and are components of national sovereignty."
If the US public look carefully at General Qiao's list they will realize that they have
already lost more than 50% of these sovereignties.
" General Qiao dismisses the possibility .. India and other Asian nations may replace China's
c: "Think about which of these countries has more skilled "
Everyday US. news are amplifying the bipartisan chorus against China . India is begging
for favors from USA while serenading USA with reinforcing American position.
India is stealing land from Nepal and Indian media thinks that ultranationalist of Nepal
are to blame for questioning Indian stance .
China is under a real threat of concerted attacks by the US 's opportunistic vassals.
There will be a seismic change affecting the alliances and the future .
Can China persuade Nepal Bangladesh Pakistan Sri Lanka Afghanistan Iran and Myanmar to work
together and persuade them move out of India's hegemony ?.
It's always astounding to read a geopolitical analysis by a journalist who completely ignores
the climate pollution crisis with it's impending effects overhanging every strategy any state
may envision to dominate the planet. It's as if the writer lives in an imaginary world devoid
of nature, along with his supposed expert sources and well placed powerful state movers and
shakers. This is delusional. China's cheap forced labor, making more crap for the planet's
shrinking population of affluent consumers, competing with other countries with equally
desperate workers. Countries competing to build the most dangerous bio-weapons in their
unsafe, leaky level 4 labs. All the while the atmosphere is being polluted to the point of
melting all the ice on the planet, the air is being degraded to the point of being disgusting
to see and carcinogenic to breath, the fresh water supply is being depleted and polluted, the
oceans degraded into radioactive chemical cesspools (soon to be a brown sludge inhabited by
only bacteria, viruses and fungus), the land ceded with thousands of chemicals that have no
purpose other than to kill. The existential threshold is within a few years. The geopolitical
strategy of the US and China can be summarized as a strategy to kill all sentient life on the
planet in order to have a some sort of imaginary strategic dominance. It is mass psychosis.
@foolisholdman
Old man, don't be foolish, they all hate us human scum, and will gladly go to war, are at
war. Remember how, in Catch 22, the opposing sides eventually saved a crap load of money by
geting Milo de Milo to bomb their own airfields using his supply planes? Its already
happening, us plebs are just in the way. In the end, the Protocols calls for one government
ruling what's left of mankind "with an iron staff." I cannot tell you (yet) what Zion's hold
on Beijing is, but be assured, "bring on the war" is the swill of Zion being lapped up by
little globalist piggies trying to get to the trough.
People think 'hybrid warfare" is some kind of technological term. Zion chooses its words very
carefully, and your first defence is your dictionary. The USAGE of words change with time,
the MEANING is constant. Now let's go find them hybrids, before Bill Gates can create enough
microcephalics to man his man/machine interfaced battle 'droids armed with depleted uranium
bullets and virally-delivered vaccines.
@carlusjr
Pollution sure is an important issue, one of the most important of our time, yes. The subject
matter at hand though, is mostly military, with economics as a condiment to explain the sour
taste. China might be the one manufacturing plastic turds, but it is the so-called western
media that is teaching your children the dire need to own the latest version of plastic poop.
China would not bother with plastic poop, but you voted for people who decided China makes
the best poo at the lowest cost and highest profit. Don't blame China for taking advantage of
YOUR leadership's desire to disown YOU and hand your habitat over to those who "know how to
make a profit" from your suffering, while dangling a piece of plastic poop in front of you,
calling it ambition, and deplatforming you if you refuse their offer of improved
turdiness.
But yah, now we know you hate pollution. Soon we will close down all the factories, and ban
all cars, and only those on "official business" will be alowed on aeroplanes, and then you
can breathe freely, as you stand in line, so the Special Agents can see if you have the Bill
Gates vaccine licence to visit the plastic poop and soylent green depository that we used to
call a supermarket.
A toxic racism-meets-anti-communism matrix is responsible for the predominant
anti-Chinese sentiment across the US, encompassing at least 66% of the whole
population.
No it isn't.
A hint of what is responsible is this from the same article:
"They have state of the art technology, but not the methods and production capacity. So
they have to rely on Chinese production."
Our jobs, our industry, our hard-earned intellectual property, and our money have all gone
to China. Our own leaders of industry and government are to blame for our predicament, but
our anger at China is the result.
Funny this from the Chinese General Qiao:
"as a producing country, we still cannot satisfy our manufacturing industry with our own
resources and rely on our own markets to consume our products."
No kidding, General. Your country built itself up by selling to us! We made you into our
own rival. Thanks are in order, but instead you plot to weaken us.
@Godfree
Roberts Sounds like a man who has no understanding of the science regarding the matter,
but so doesn't most of the world. Vaccine? Anti-body treatment? Does anybody know what they
are and how they work (or doesn't) or mean? From those tests to those invasive ventilators,
it shows me how people can easily be herded towards slaughter, for their safety, ofc, because
"science." And just over a mild cold no less.
So much for China's brilliance; they are as dumb or brainwashed by 'accepted science' as the
next moronic authority figure.
But exploiting the situation, that's something else that should be appreciated.
This will be China's contribution to ensuring vaccine accessibility and affordability in
developing countries." The Global South is paying attention.
Do the underdeveloped (hate the PC term "developing") countries even want a vaccine? They
have too many people anyway, any moderate dying will be an advantage to their societies. And
another point is that the anti-vaxxer movement there might be on the rise, just as it is in
America – remember how the Philippines government was watching a conspiracy video about
evil Bill Gates? I have talked to anti-vaxxer people in my Ukrainian university!
"Containment" will go into overdrive. A neat example is Admiral Philip Davidson –
head of the Indo-Pacific Command – asking for $20 billion for a "robust military
cordon" from California to Japan and down the Pacific Rim, complete with "highly
survivable, precision-strike networks" along the Pacific Rim and "forward-based, rotational
joint forces" to counteract the "renewed threat we face from great power competition."
My prediction is the US goes into a civil war > the liberals start losing > the
liberals invite the Chinese into California > the Chinese exterminate all Americans and
get a large Lebensraum in the East.
a Korea War pictorial. Nice.
It's long long ago since China made the last movie about Korea War. Too long ago that they
are in black and white.
Recently someone is preparing for a new movie: The Chosin Lake.
I really hope it will be well made. I love war movies, especially the ones on historical big
wars.
@Buzz
Mohawk I think the Western globalists though that China would be subservient to them and
not get any funny ideas, this virus is just a cover for antipathy that was building up for
years, similar to how the poor Jews being persecuted in Germany was used by propagandists to
whip up Germany sentiment, because of German economic prowess.
Western thinking is dominated by this balance of power mentality, the same mentality such
caused it to enter into two fratricidal wars not too long ago.
One can only hope this is good news for us, but I fear the globalists will just use this
time to move manufacturing to other Third World countries instead of bringing it back
home.
I agree that it was a huge mistake transferring our IP to China, they would simply have
not got to this point if we hadn't. This is also why the Chinese are not taking any chances
in their BRI, and are using Chinese labour instead of doing the more sustainable thing and
training up local workers, that would mean a destruction of their market! Sadly this will
continue, on top of the terrible policy of mass Third World immigration, we let Chinese into
out top companies and research facilities, some of whom no doubt pass this information back
home.
So the Global South is going to be "grateful" to China for coming up with vaccination after
innudating it with the Chinese virus in the first place Pepe, lay of the Mezcal because is
clouding your opaque thinking!
Let me make this clear. America is self-destructing. A malignant narcissist in charge and a
man who cannot construct a sentence is an alternative. A stock market devoid of reality and a
1 percent devoid of conscience. Any remote consideration of the other 99 percent is soley
based on profit. Any civilization that cannot reverse itself is doomed. China maybe a
shortterm factor yet not a factor in the longer considerations.
{ .. and the US has no guts for one. Its industry has been hollowed out not just by
outsourcing but by corruption as well.}
Even in the 50s when US industry was not hollowed out ( ran supreme) and China had no
nukes, US was unable to defeat China in a ground war in Korea. Of course there was talk in US
of using nukes against China (Gen. MacArthur), but cooler heads prevailed, arguing that, that
would trigger USSR to use nukes too, resulting in world wide nuclear conflagration.
Now China has nukes, and delivery systems, and US cannot possible defeat China
conventionally, so US will huff-and-puff, try to damage China financially, or steal its
holdings in US*, but nothing will come out of it.
Sad that US screwed itself over the years so badly that it is in this predicament now.
_____________________________
* There has been semi-serious talk in US of just taking $ hundreds of billions of Chinese
holdings in US as payment for ' damages' China has supposedly caused US by
Covid-19.
All this big nation state fluff stinks today as it did when the first two Western ones,
England and France had a 100 Years War and it has stunk throughout history.
We humans are born naked, helpless, and totally ignorant. We also have an evil streak in
us; vide Adam and Eve. And as Shakespeare stated we must consign ourselves to a willing death
each eve or we die. We are so haughty yet the first thing we must do upon wakening from our
nightly death is evacuate waste.
We have never respected Nature. Now we spray aluminum and plastic microns in the upper
atmosphere which we all breathe as they fall and have virtually destroyed the ozone layer and
the biosphere. We live in 1984 right now!
True libertarianism which is no aggression against person or property and backed up by
cheap, Natural Law arbitration courts works. It is that or sayonara humans.
My reasoning is simple, maybe too simple. The Chinese will not start a shooting war and
the US has no guts for one.
You may be right about the Chinese (their government looks after 1,3 billion people) and
that the US has no guts. But what is the "US"? If you mean the (mostly Jewish) ruling cabal
and their goyim political clowns and puppets, you have no reason to be so sanguine about the
"no guts". It's not their guts that will be on the line, for they will be quite happy so
sacrifice millions of the plebes for the greater good of Israel and rebooting the "economy".
War devastations (and pandemics) are the greatest source for immiserating and culling the
masses and channeling wealth to the banksters.
Facing the demise of the Jewish-led hegemony through its PNAC's "full-spectrum dominance"
– and what that could do to the SHITIS (shit-state of Israel) – it is reasonable
(in their twisted minds) to step to the brink and beyond. Besides, the most recent great wars
(the greatest carnages in the world's history) were not intended to end the way the warhawks
wanted (neither Hitler not Chamberlain wished the destruction of country or empire) but the
power dynamics unleashed by geopolitical gamesmanship suppresses reason.
@paranoid
goy Non-CO2 pollution is a non-issue. It was far worse in the USA and China 50 years ago
(air and water), and in Europe/East coast USA over 200 years ago. Wildlife populations are
also rebounding. Every time I hear some retard complaining about pollution on the internet, I
want to reach through the monitor and pepper spray them.
The zionists are in control of China and the ZUS and Russia and Europe and India and
everywhere in central and South America, and the fact is the zionist control was proven by
every country that forced their people into the forced lockdown, using this scam of a
coronavirus as an excuse.
These wars are a deversion, as the zionist install their global prison.
General Qiao dismisses the possibility that Vietnam, the Philippines, Bangladesh, India
and other Asian nations may replace China's cheap workforce: "Think about which of these
countries has more skilled workers than China. What quantity of medium and high level human
resources was produced in China in these past 30 years? Which country is educating over 100
million students at secondary and university levels? The energy of all these people is
still far from being liberated for China's economic development."
Once again, I must caveat this with the proclamation I was not and I am not an advocate
for Obama's TPP. The reason I'm not an advocate is for environmental purposes. I believe
growth is killing the living planet and soon enough will extinct humans as well as many, most
even, other species on the planet. The TPP did nothing to address growth and instead enabled
it further by enhancing global trade versus diminishing it.
That being said, the TPP was a strategy to contain China's growing influence. It was
intended to put global trade eggs in many baskets and not just in the basket labeled China.
What does Trump do? He puts all the trade eggs in China's basket under the aegis/rubric of
repatriating manufacturing to America. He put a knife in TPP and killed it but he never
brought manufacturing back to America. Now America is truly good and fucked. Over a barrel.
No options. Can you believe this moron and the cabal that's using him as a foil? Like I said
before, if Trump didn't exist, the CCP would have to invent him because more than any other
power player, be it Russia or Saudi Arabia or Israel, Trump has been extremely beneficial to
China. Under Trump's watch, China is now the most powerful country in the world. Because of
Trump, China is now the leader of the world. America, finally, has been knocked from its
perch just as England was over 100 years prior. Once knocked from the perch, there is no
regaining the status you once enjoyed. I suspect that within five years the dollar will no
longer be the world's currency. When that happens, it's lights out for America FOR REAL. All
this banter is whistling past the graveyard. What's done is done.
House Democrats who've been interfering with President Barack Obama's ability to
negotiate the Trans-Pacific Partnership are missing something very important: The trade
deal isn't primarily significant because of the economy. It matters because it's part of
the broader American geostrategic goal of containing China -- which pointedly hasn't been
invited to join the TPP.
In the new cool war, China's rising economic influence is giving it greater geopolitical
power in Asia. The TPP is, above all, an effort to push back on China's powerful trade
relationships to reduce its political clout. By weakening Obama's ability to pursue it,
congressional Democrats had been unintentionally weakening the U.S. side in the cool
war.
In all this, China is using its close economic relationship with its neighbors as
leverage to build its geopolitical position. Its ultimate goal is to displace the U.S. as
the regional hegemon. President Xi Jinping's slogan of the "Chinese dream" requires nothing
less.
The TPP aims to reduce some of China's geopolitical resurgence by damping down the
extent of China's regional trade dominance. China itself has a proposed regional trade
alliance, the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership, that would include 16 members
and exclude the U.S. Australia, Japan and South Korea are all involved in negotiations to
become members. The TPP is a direct, competitive counterpart to the RCEP.
Fyi, the following cartoon is per China Daily , a publication owned and run by the
CCP. It's favorable to Trump. It's clear by virtue of Trump's cozy relationship with Putin
and Xi that Trump is a communist in capitalist clothing. He is a communist trojan horse in
the oval office. But he's even more than that. He has many hats. He's a tool, a
self-promoting front man, for any tyrant or tyranny that expands his brand masquerading as a
man of the people. As if. He's a man, albeit an insane moron, of the extractive elite and the
extractive elite are transnational and transcultural. The extractive elite are a nation and
culture unto themselves and the rest of us are their slaves on this global plantation.
@Weston
Waroda Once reserved currency status of dollar is over n done with, there would be zero
need for the huge military budget. That is the silver lining of this whole thing. The wars
might finally stop. But living standards will take a hit from the devaluation of the dollar.
But but, Jobs would return through that weakened dollar as off shoring jobs would no longer
make sense. And just maybe, our political class might finally focus on domestic issues and
improve the country after 4 decades of stagnation.
@Miro23
Apple follows every single law in China. Apple makes a lot of money in China, but also pays
alot of taxes. I highly doubt it would be a target of retaliation. But other companies are
fair game. Just something I noticed.
@carlusjr
Spot on. Humans are drowning in their own filth. There's an adage, "don't shit where you
eat." Humans invented the saying but apparently don't abide by it and in fact zealously defy
it. Here we are. It will be one pandemic after another from now until human is no more. Rapid
pace, like automatic weapon fire. The center cannot hold and is not holding. Civilization is
going down. Will the Samson Option be utilized? Man's last act? Destroy the planet
entirely if he can't have it entirely? My bet is this is how it will go down. All you have to
do is extrapolate the curve.
@bigduke6
It is quite obvious why they are doing, they are using Europeans' own liberal ideology
against them. In today's Western world, nothing is worse than being a "racist" (except maybe,
just maybe a paedophile necrophiliac, but even that is a close one) as such they will use
these terms to beat down Europeans. Erdogan recently likened Greece to "Nazis", due to their
brave defiance to Third World invaders.
As if they genuinely give a shit about Nazis, a particularly European obsession due to
decades of brainwashing by the Jewish media elite. Even if one believes the textbooks in
relation to Nazi atrocities, the fact is that such things are normal for history. No other
people's beat themselves down over bad stuff they've done, hell, the Mongolians have erected
a big statue of Genghis Khan, one of the greatest mass murderers in history!
Extremely misleading headline. Since the Asia Times story is actually about economic
and political sovereignity – always a big issue for China ever since the Eight Powers
carved up the nation in the past: Germany, Japan, Russia, Britain, France, Italy,
Austria-Hungary, and the U.S.
It doesn't speak about warfare against the U.S. It speaks about meeting a threat from the
U.S. It does speak of taking Taiwan, though by avoiding outright warfare. This is not
something we should desire, but it is not war against the U.S., as the misleading headline is
intended to make people believe.
As usual most of the rubes will only read the headline and look at the pictures, maybe
skim through the text a bit, before typing out an angry post based on whether they like or
dislike whatever nation is mentioned. Much like cruzbots and Bush lovers use Breitbart
comments to screech against Iran and praise Israel. No facts needed.
"... An example, referring to Covid-19, is the capacity to produce ventilators: "Out of over 1,400 pieces necessary for a ventilator, over 1,100 must be produced in China, including final assembly. That's the US problem today. They have state of the art technology, but not the methods and production capacity. So they have to rely on Chinese production." ..."
"... The gold standard expression has come in a no-holds barred Global Times editorial : "We must be clear that coping with US suppression will be the key focus of China's national strategy. We should enhance cooperation with most countries. The US is expected to contain China's international front lines, and we must knock out this US plot and make China-US rivalry a process of US self-isolation." ..."
"... An inevitable corollary is that the all-out offensive to cripple Huawei will be counterpunched in kind, targeting Apple, Qualcom, Cisco and Boeing, even including "investigations or suspensions of their right to do business in China." ..."
"... So, for all practical purposes, Beijing has now publicly unveiled its strategy to counteract U.S. President Donald Trump's "We could cut off the whole relationship" kind of assertions. ..."
"... The politicians controlling US foreign policy are leading us straight into the 19th century, with their updated gunboat diplomacy ..."
The bulk of his argument concentrates on the shortcomings of U.S. manufacturing: "How can
the US today want to wage war against the biggest manufacturing power in the world while its
own industry is hollowed out?"
An example, referring to Covid-19, is the capacity to produce ventilators: "Out of over
1,400 pieces necessary for a ventilator, over 1,100 must be produced in China, including final
assembly. That's the US problem today. They have state of the art technology, but not the
methods and production capacity. So they have to rely on Chinese production."
... ... ...
Gloves Are Off
Now compare General Qiao's analysis with the by-now-obvious geopolitical and geo-economic
fact that Beijing will respond tit for tat to any hybrid war tactics deployed by the United
States government. The gloves are definitely off.
The gold standard expression has come in a no-holds barred Global Times editorial : "We must be
clear that coping with US suppression will be the key focus of China's national strategy. We
should enhance cooperation with most countries. The US is expected to contain China's
international front lines, and we must knock out this US plot and make China-US rivalry a
process of US self-isolation."
An inevitable corollary is that the all-out offensive
to cripple Huawei will be counterpunched in kind, targeting Apple,
Qualcom, Cisco and Boeing, even including "investigations or suspensions of their right to do
business in China."
So, for all practical purposes, Beijing has now publicly unveiled its strategy to counteract
U.S. President Donald Trump's "We could cut off the whole relationship" kind of assertions.
A toxic racism-meets-anti-communism matrix is responsible for the predominant anti-Chinese
sentiment across the U.S., encompassing at least 66 percent of the whole population. Trump
instinctively seized it – and repackaged it as his re-election campaign theme, fully
approved by Steve Bannon.
The strategic objective is to go after China across the full spectrum. The tactical
objective is to forge an anti-China front across the West: another instance of encirclement,
hybrid war-style, focused on economic war.
This will imply a concerted offensive, trying to enforce embargoes and trying to block
regional markets to Chinese companies. Lawfare will be the norm. Even freezing Chinese assets
in the U.S. is not a far-fetched proposition anymore.
Every possible Silk Road branch-out – on the energy front, ports, the Health Silk
Road, digital interconnection – will be strategically targeted. Those who were dreaming
that Covid-19 could be the ideal pretext for a new Yalta – uniting Trump, Xi and Putin
– may rest in peace.
"Containment" will go into overdrive. A neat example is Admiral Philip Davidson – head
of the Indo-Pacific Command – asking for $20 billion for a
"robust military cordon" from California to Japan and down the Pacific Rim, complete with
"highly survivable, precision-strike networks" along the Pacific Rim and "forward-based,
rotational joint forces" to counteract the "renewed threat we face from great power
competition."
Davidson argues that, "without a valid and convincing conventional deterrent, China and
Russia will be emboldened to take action in the region to supplant U.S. interests."
... ... ...
From the point of view of large swathes of the Global South, the current, extremely
dangerous incandescence, or New Cold War, is mostly interpreted as the progressive ending of
the Western coalition's hegemony over the whole planet.
Still, scores of nations are being asked, bluntly, by the hegemon to position themselves
once again in a "you're with us or against us" global war on terror imperative.
... ... ...
For the first time in 35 years, Beijing will be forced to relinquish its economic growth
targets. This also means that the objective of doubling GDP and per capita income by 2020
compared with 2010 will also be postponed.
What we should expect is absolute emphasis on domestic spending – and social stability
– over a struggle to become a global leader, even if that's not totally overlooked.
... ... ...
Internally, Beijing will boost support for state-owned enterprises that are strong in
innovation and risk-taking. China always defies predictions by Western "experts." For instance,
exports rose 3.5 percent in April, when the experts were forecasting a decline of 15.7 percent.
The trade surplus was $45.3 billion, when experts were forecasting only $6.3 billion.
Beijing seems to identify clearly the extending gap between a West, especially the U.S.,
that's plunging into de facto New Great Depression territory with a China that's about to
rekindle economic growth
Zhu , May 20, 2020 at 00:34
"A toxic mixture of racism and anti-communism" sounds about right. The Chinese government
is not submissive and the "Chinks" are getting too prosperous. That's bound to infuriate both
elite and grass-roots Americans.
Drew Hunkins , May 20, 2020 at 00:34
"For the first time in 35 years, Beijing will be forced to relinquish its economic growth
targets. This also means that the objective of doubling GDP and per capita income by 2020
compared with 2010 will also be postponed. "
Good, good, just wonderful. This will really endear the United States to the Chinese
people.
All that the Chinese govt did for its people over the last 30 years is totally eliminate
poverty, that's all. Gotta love how our Western mass media won't shut their mouths about this
small achievement.
Drew Hunkins , May 20, 2020 at 00:15
"Those who were dreaming that Covid-19 could be the ideal pretext for a new Yalta –
uniting Trump, Xi and Putin – may rest in peace."
Rest in peace, no doubt. Washington is all about unilateralism, period. This is the crux
of the issue, the rapacious capitalist-imperialists who infest Wall St, the military
contractors and corporate mass media want nothing to do with a multi-polar world. This could
lead to putting the far east on a dangerous path with U.S. warships provocatively traversing
the area.
gcw , May 19, 2020 at 21:08
The politicians controlling US foreign policy are leading us straight into the 19th
century, with their updated gunboat diplomacy . Never a thought to the impending
disaster of climate change and unparalleled social and environmental chaos, they dream
instead of yet another Cold War (Yellow-Peril 2.0), all the time sustaining a gargantuan
military establishment which is draining the life-blood from American society. The Covid-19
virus is just a warning to us: we have about 5% of the world's population, yet lead the pack
in deaths from the virus. If this monumental display of incompetence doesn't wake us up, what
will?
@utu ... He produces evidence, evidence in response to highly-coordinated anti-China
propaganda, the mountains of belligerent lies that are all that remain today of the failed
state the USA. Those lies plus its military killing millions all over the world, incessantly
destroying or attempting to destroy states simply for being independent.
The best argument I have read from the anti China camp has been that if China succeeds, US
dollar will be kaput, living standard in the USA will tanked to shit levels compare to right
now.
Why would China succeeding reduce our living standard?
@Realist If China succeeds, that means dollar as reserve currency is kaput. Without the
reserved currency status, dollar will devalue by 50% or more. Living standard auto lowers by
50% or more.
Just a thought: what if people like Gordon Guthrie Chang, Jennifer Zeng, Peter Navarro or
even Maria Bartiromo suggest to the two dude Trump and Pompeo sending FBI, CIA agents
or even national guard to American's rural areas, small isolate farming communities in
Pennsylvania, Oregon ripping off every Huawei and ZTE hardwares 2G, 3G, 4G and maybe 5G if
any, cell towers and replaced it with Ericsson and Nokia. Would it make America great again
?
Almost every freaking day Trump and Pompeo bashing China including Huawei.. Not a day of
peace without china bashing.
Days earlier ZeroHedge, SCMP and other media reported freaking Trump and Pompeo... no
companies inside or outside USA can sell American software or technology items or chips made
with USA properties or machines to Huawei.
Meaning TSMC a Taiwan chip's foundry not permitted to sell any chips to Huawei, TSMC has
been the world's dedicated semiconductor foundry. "curtailing its chip supply, an
escalation of its campaign against the Chinese company that may also hurt Taiwan
Semiconductor Manufacturing Co."
"China has the most fab projects in the world.... 30 facilities planned, including
10/7nm processes, but trade war and economic factors could slow progress...... SMIC 's
move would put it on par with some of its foreign rivals. In addition, SMIC has
obtained $10 billion in funding to develop 10nm and 7nm. Semiconductor Manufacturing
International Corporation (SMIC) is a publicly held semiconductor foundry company, and the
largest in China.
"Wuhan Hongxin Semiconductor Manufacturing (HSMC), a logic IC foundry founded in late
2017, is gearing up for 14nm and 7nm process manufacturing eyeing to be China's most advanced
contract chipmaker.....Shang-yi Chiang, the former executive VP and co-chief operating
officer overseeing R&D for Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC), will join a
Wuhan-headquartered foundry in China. "<
Gone are the "good 'ole days" of BRICS bonhomie when the Alt-Media Community used to sing the
praises of this nascent trade bloc and portray it as a game-changing development in
International Relations. Although promising on paper, BRICS was always destined
to be disappointing due to the irreparable differences between India and China that were
either downplayed or outright ignored by this organization's loudest advocates. The author has
been consistently warning for over the past four years that " India Is Now An American Ally " after it
clinched the Logistics Exchange Memorandum Of Agreement (LEMOA) with the US to allow the latter
to use its military infrastructure on a case-by-case "logistical" bases. Since then, India has
fully submitted to the Pentagon's "Indo-Pacific"
strategy of empowering the South Asian state as a "counterweight" China, with even Russian
Foreign Minister Lavrov loudly warning his
country's strategic partner of
the pitfalls of this scenario as recently as early January of this year while speaking at a
conference in their country.
Modi's Military Madness
Alas, whether due to long-lasting ignorance of the situation, unchecked professional
incompetence, and/or shadowy motives that can only be speculated upon, the majority of the
Alt-Media Community still refuses to recognize these facts, though the latest developments
pertaining to Indian-Chinese relations might finally cause them to reconsider their
inexplicable stance of always "covering up" for New Delhi. India has recently clashed with
China
along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in
Indian-Occupied Kashmir 's Ladakh region and close to the Donglang Plateau (described as
"Doklam" by India and thus widely reported upon with this name in the Western Mainstream Media
and among the members of the Alt-Media Community sympathetic to New Delhi) near Sikkim where
they had their infamous three-month-long standoff
in summer 2017 (which threatened
to repeat itself in 2018). So tense has the situation become in Ladakh that China
reportedly flew several helicopters near the scene while India flew a few fighter jets,
significantly upping the ante.
India's Attempt To "Poach" Chinese-Based Companies
The backdrop against which these clashes are transpiring is India's aggressive attempt to
"poach" foreign companies from the People's Republic, which the author analyzed last month in
his piece about how " India's Selective Embrace
Of Economic Nationalism Has Anti-Chinese Motivations ". Of relevance, India has also set
aside land
twice the size of Luxembourg for such companies to exploit in the event that they decide to
re-offshore from the East Asian state to the South Asian one.
This perfectly dovetails with Trump's " trade
war " plans to encourage foreign companies to leave his country's rival and either return
home or set up shop in a friendly pro-American country instead. Of note, India is also
vehemently opposed to China's Belt & Road Initiative ( BRI ) behind the US on
the basis that its flagship project of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor ( CPEC
) traverses through territory that New Delhi claims as its own per its maximalist approach to
the Kashmir Conflict .
Obviously, the US couldn't have found a better ally than India to thwart China's economic
plans.
The US Might Rule The WHO Via Its Indian Proxy
On the soft power front, India is
slated to assume leadership of the World Health Assembly (WHA, the governing body of the
World Health Organization, WHO) from Japan later this month, and it's already being widely
speculated in Indian media that the country might be
seriously considering taking the US' side in respect to investigating the WHO for its
alleged pro-Chinese
bias . Not only that, but India might even be receptive towards Taiwan's request to
participate in the organization's meetings, the scenario of which has already concerned China
so much that its embassy in New Delhi
felt compelled to remind the Indian leadership that doing so would violate the One China
principle. From the American perspective, this is an unprecedented opportunity for Washington
to exercise proxy leadership of the WHO through its "junior partner" of India, which could add
a speciously convincing degree of credibility to its anti-Chinese claims in an attempt to win
back the many hearts and minds that it's lost to its rival throughout the course of World War
C .
The Indo-American Hybrid War On China
Taken together, India is indisputably intensifying its American-backed Hybrid
War against China as a sign of fealty to its new ally, especially considering that it's
only officially been the US' " comprehensive global
strategic partner " since Trump's landmark visit to the country a few months back in
February and thus feels like it has something to prove. Both countries share the grand
strategic goal of "containing" China, to which end they're working hand-in-glove with one
another to carry out this concerted campaign against the People's Republic.
Building off of the idiom, the American hand is unquestionably controlling the Indian
glove after Trump cracked the whip on
Modi by forcing him to export hydroxychloroquine to
the US last month, which asserted his country's dominance as India's neo-imperial master.
Whether across the military, economic, or soft power domains, the US-Indian alliance is
doing its utmost to create serious difficulties for China. With India now suspecting China of
building an island off of its coast, ties will likely continue to worsen to the US'
benefit.
An anonymous reader shares a report: China is ready to take a series of countermeasures against
a US plan to
block shipments of semiconductors to Chinese telecom firm Huawei , including putting US
companies on an "unreliable entity list," launching investigations and imposing restrictions on
US companies such as Apple and suspending the purchase of Boeing airplanes, a source close to
the Chinese government told the Global Times. The Trump administration on Friday moved to block
shipments of semiconductors to Huawei from global chipmakers. The US Commerce Department said
it was amending an export rule and the Entity List to "strategically target Huawei's
acquisition of semiconductors that are the direct product of certain US software and
technology," according to a statement on its website. "China will take forceful countermeasures
to protect its own legitimate rights," if the US moves forward with the plan to bar essential
suppliers of chips, including Taiwan-based TSMC, from selling chips to the Chinese tech giant,
the source told the Global Times in an exclusive interview.
China will also put a lot of money into making things that it has, up to now, obtained
from the USA. It might take a few years, but China's government set up (ie one party always
in power) means that it does not have to do things to an electoral cycle.
"... Sad but true. We are all given our illusions. In US its the illusion of democracy which is a fake democracy cloaking our totalitarian reality. In China they give the people the illusion of moving towards socialism, a fake socialism to be sure, never mind all the billionaire party members (and they don't have universal health care either, its insurance based) .The people have long accepted the reality of totalitarianism so they are one step ahead. ..."
Sad but true. We are all given our illusions. In US its the illusion of democracy which
is a fake democracy cloaking our totalitarian reality. In China they give the people the
illusion of moving towards socialism, a fake socialism to be sure, never mind all the
billionaire party members (and they don't have universal health care either, its insurance
based) .The people have long accepted the reality of totalitarianism so they are one step
ahead.
Since China doesn't have another party to blame they must blame external enemies like the
US and we happily play along with tarrifs paid for by us dumb sheep who cry out in
satisfaction "take that". Lol
A fake Cold War works for us too. Trump says we are in a race for 5G and AI/Robotics with
China. We must win or all is lost to China. Social credit scores, digital ID and digital
currency along with Total Information Awareness and Full Spectrum Dominance over the
herd.
Health effects of 5G will be blamed on CoVID. Fake Science is a great tool. Scientists
never lie, they can be trusted, just like Priests . They are the Priests of the New
Technocratic World Order. Global Warming and COVID- We must believe. They say Vaccines and 5G
are good for you, just like DDT and Tobacco were said to be Good by Scientists of another
time. We must believe. Have Faith and you will earn social credit bonus points.
Reality is Fake Wrestling. Kayfabe all the way baby. Who is the face and who is the heel?
We are free to choose. So who says we don't have freedom?
But it was natural target of offshoring manufacturing during neoliberal globalization frenzy.
Now the USA needs to pay the price for the betryal of its elite.
Notable quotes:
"... China is not a natural ally of the US. It was helped for decades as a counterweight to the USSR and that policy continued after the Cold War ended because the Western elite reaped vast profits from the entry of a billion Chinese into the world labour markets. We have created a monster of arrogance and economic dynamism that refuses to take measures against novel coronaviruses springing out of their peculiar eating and aphrodisiac medicine habits. ..."
The USA is under no obligation whatsoever to be friendly to Russia, and especially not to
China which rather owes America for everything and has repaid it in death. Capital and
technology has flowed to China from America for decades. In return they sent profit to Wall
St, Wuhan made Fentanyl the death of choice for whites desperate as a result of the policies
that made China did so well out of, and now they send us a deadly epidemic.
China is not a natural ally of the US. It was helped for decades as a counterweight to
the USSR and that policy continued after the Cold War ended because the Western elite reaped
vast profits from the entry of a billion Chinese into the world labour markets. We have
created a monster of arrogance and economic dynamism that refuses to take measures against
novel coronaviruses springing out of their peculiar eating and aphrodisiac medicine
habits.
It was coffee made from beans taken from civet faeces that led to the SARS-CoV bat/ civet
recombination virus and the 2002 Sars outbreak, during which China lied about what was
happening as they subsequently admitted. The SARS-CoV 2 receptor-binding domain from
pangolins ( world's most trafficked animal, is in demand by Chinese as a male enhancer) and
it recombined with a bat virus was hundreds of times more effective a pathogen in humans than
the one from bat–civet recombination of eighteen years ago.
But that is not what the Chinese said. Researchers in Wuhan on December 31st told the
world about the Wuhan disease having been identifies as a coronavirus but said, 'It's not
highly transmissible'. As late as the the 24th of January, Doctor Fauci w gave a briefing for
senators in which he said there was very little danger to the US from the Wuhan disease.
Later that day he repeated that opinion at a press conference.
So China said it was not infectious between people and there was nothing much to worry
about. When Trump began to restrict travel into the US from China on the 31st January there
was uproar about this supposed further evidence of his xenophobia,.
President Trump has used his executive power to take a hatchet to 40 years of America's
China policy. His administration has called for a
"whole-of-government" approach to counter Beijing's unfair economic practices, initiated a
damaging trade war, banned Chinese telecommunication equipment from domestic networks, and
implemented stringent regulations to vet Chinese investments in sensitive industries.
In a novel development, the administration has begun coaxing individual states to aid the
federal government in its anti-China fervor. Speaking to the National Governors Association in
early February, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo warned that "competition with
China is not just a federal issue It's happening in your states with consequences for our
foreign policy, for the citizens that reside in your states, and indeed, for each of you."
The administration's enlisting of states in the broader U.S.-China competition has
significant economic implications for subnational actors. Increasingly hawkish incumbents, as
well as congressional candidates, could provoke economic pushback from Beijing. Many of these
officials have bought into the Republican Party's strategy of carrying out an " anti-China
assault " on the campaign trail, scapegoating Beijing for the coronavirus outbreak in the
United States instead of acknowledging the Trump administration's central role in the country's
failure to prepare itself properly.
While Washington is correct to scrutinize Chinese investments in sensitive technologies
and pursue reciprocal trade and economic relations, politically motivated, opportunistic
anti-China rhetoric could threaten individual states' cooperation with China, one of the few
remaining productive aspects of the bilateral relationship. Indeed, as Hu Xijin, editor of
Chinese tabloid Global Times, tweeted , "Beijing is already
preparing to take necessary punishment measures against some members of the US Congress, the
state of Missouri, and relevant individuals and entities."
China-skeptic sentiment in the U.S. government and on the campaign trail is not a new
phenomenon , but the
coronavirus pandemic and resultant economic crisis have afforded many politicians the cover to
push hawkish policies. Some of their proposals would benefit the United States, including
reducing
U.S. reliance on Chinese-made pharmaceutical products , a motion broadly backed by both
Republicans and Democrats. But many of their arguments are politically motivated and risk
further inflaming U.S.-China tensions and painting Beijing as an enemy, à la the Soviet
Union during the Cold War, rather than a competitor.
Senator Tom Cotton made waves last month by arguing that U.S. universities should not
accept Chinese STEM students given the chance they might return home and use their training
to drive China's scientific advances. Senators Josh Hawley and Marco Rubio have also joined the
fray, advocating that the United States reduce its reliance on China and punish the country for
failing to contain the COVID-19 outbreak. The attorneys general of Missouri and
Mississippi have filed lawsuits seeking damages from Beijing for the coronavirus.
Incumbents, however, are not the only ones wagering their political futures on China. Senate
candidates in Tennessee , Arizona , and
Alabama , among other states,
have adopted overtly hawkish stances toward Beijing, blaming China for the pandemic, painting
their opponents as soft on the country, and using the China threat to push anti-immigration
policies .
Amid Washington's anti-China turn, preserving cooperation at the state level will be
critical to maintaining any semblance of productive bilateral ties going forward. As Los
Angeles Deputy Mayor of International Affairs Nina Hachigian said at a Brookings panel
last year, "cities and states can take advantage of the trade, investment, students, climate
change cooperation, culture, and tourism China offers without really having to balance the
broader national security, geopolitical, and human rights questions."
It is no coincidence that three of the past four U.S. Ambassadors to Beijing previously
served as governors of states with deep links to China: Terry Branstad (Iowa), Gary Locke
(Washington), and John Huntsman (Utah).
The aforementioned politicians may be fighting to relocate supply chains outside of mainland
China and decouple vast sections of the two countries' economies, but their rhetoric may also
lead Beijing to move Chinese-owned businesses out of the United States or cut imports from the
country. Despite bilateral tensions, there is clear evidence that Chinese investments in the
United States can be beneficial. In the midst of the trade war, a Chinese takeover of a failing
paper mill in Maine helped revitalize a local community. In Tennessee, Chinese investments in
automotive
parts ,
mattresses , and porcelain manufacturing have benefited the state's economy. There is a
real risk that Chinese companies, seeing both politicians' and the American public's growing
distaste for China, could simply up and leave.
A more likely outcome of the growing antagonism, however, is for Beijing to engage in
economic coercion , which it uses to try to force nations, companies, and officials into
doing its bidding and punish those who do not. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) has developed
a wide-ranging and flexible toolkit of coercive measures that it has used strategically
throughout the world.
When South Korea agreed to host the United States' Terminal High Altitude Area Defense
(THAAD) missile defense system, Beijing did not impose tariffs on Seoul despite its
displeasure. China instead
restricted flights to South Korea, drummed up nationalist sentiment among the Chinese public to
boycott South Korean goods, and even shut down China-based outlets of Lotte Group, the Korean
company on whose land THAAD was installed.
China took a similar approach with the
Philippines following a 2012 dispute over claims in the South China Sea. In order to cause
significant economic pain, Beijing tightened quality controls on agriculture exports from
Manila while stemming the flow of Chinese tourists to the Philippines. And most recently,
Beijing
threatened and then
followed through on a boycott of Australian beef after Canberra called for an independent
investigation into the origins of the coronavirus.
Beijing coerces not only countries but also private companies for perceived transgressions.
Marriott, Delta Airlines, and Zara all faced the prospect of losing business in China after
listing Taiwan, Hong Kong, or Tibet as sovereign nations. Last fall, Beijing suspended
broadcasts of NBA games after Houston Rockets general manager Daryl Morey tweeted his support for pro-democracy
protestors in Hong Kong.
If public sentiment across the United States continues to turn against China, Beijing may
begin adapting its methods of economic coercion to retaliate against states and politicians it
perceives as hostile to its interests.
Indeed, China is clearly paying attention to U.S. domestic politics and state officials'
views of China. A think tank in Beijing recently ranked
all 50 governors on their attitudes toward China, information the CCP values as it attempts to
mold the views of officials outside of Washington. As Dan Blumenthal has noted ,
Beijing "split[s] Americans into 'friends of China' who might lobby on their behalf and others
who refuse to do so [and] will not be granted access to China's massive market."
In recent years, Beijing has provided glimpses of what economic coercion in the United
States might look like. During the initial stages of the trade war, China's retaliatory tariffs
disproportionally targeted Red
states critical to Trump's 2016 election victory. Furthermore, China
identified key officials able to influence U.S. policy, such as then-Wisconsin
Representative Paul Ryan and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, and levied tariffs that
threatened jobs in and exports from their states in a bid to pressure the politicians to split
with Trump.
These actions are possible harbingers of economic pressures to come. Beijing may be tempted
to pressure local officials to influence policy from the bottom up. As the aforementioned think
tank report explicitly notes
, Beijing believes that "State-level officials 'enjoy a certain degree of diplomatic
independence,'" and that "Governors can ignore orders from the White House."
Recent downturns in public opinion in both countries, the result of several years of
increasing competition, and an emerging view that the other views the pandemic as a strategic
opportunity, could even see Beijing move beyond tariffs and drum up anti-U.S. sentiment. It
could even encourage citizens to boycott American products, the political and economic effects
of which could be devastating.
While the United States imports more from China than it exports, China-bound exports
supported around
one million U.S. jobs in 2018. According to the U.S.-China Business Council, 42 states counted
China among their top five export destinations in 2019. Chinese FDI, which peaked
at $46.5 billion in 2016, dropped to just over $3 billion in 2019 -- a decline of over 90
percent. Industries ranging from energy, agriculture, and manufacturing could be negatively
affected by an exodus of Chinese investment, a freeze on new Chinese FDI into the United
States, or increased tariffs on or bans of imports.
Given the astronomically high
unemployment rate and ballooning federal and state debt levels, U.S. states are in no
position to lose more investments or export-supporting jobs. Senator McConnell's recent call
for states to file
bankruptcy highlights their increasingly gloomy economic prospects, and already over 25
percent of state revenues have
disappeared due to the coronavirus.
The United States certainly needs to diversify its supply chains so as not to depend so much
on China. Washington has already rolled out several measures to better screen Chinese
investments in the country and limit sensitive technology exports. The increasingly prevalent
and politically expedient one-size-fits-all anti-China position espoused by many state-level
politicians, however, could endanger China-state ties, the locus of the two countries' economic
relationship, and threaten China-owned U.S.-based companies that pose no national security
threats and provide hundreds of thousands of jobs.
I recently came across a Facebook comment
from a Hongkonger, arguing that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is nothing communist
given China's prosperous private sector after 1979's reform . He then linked
a video to mock
the western electoral democracy that put Trump and Hitler into the office, leading to the
conclusion that the West has no credential to criticize the one-party system of China for
the lack of democracy. His comment represents the contemporary Chinese sentiment and is
quite understandable given the ongoing color revolution in Hong Kong
2019 , which is still lukewarm to this day, and the unrelenting
blame of COVID19 on China . Although the hybrid war waged on
China is unjust, the current Chinese mindset does not help to diffuse but only fuels
the conflict even further.
The Facebook comment was right about CPP not being Communist that seeks total control
of the economy by the state. Yet, China is state capitalism, an oligarchy, or crony
capitalism. China is a plutocracy by the marriage between the party leadership (the state),
and the monopolizing mega-corporations (the money) like Huawei, Ali, the four state-owned commercial
banks , and Sinopec Group .
It is far from a free-market where the only way to win a competition is to provide
excellent products, where the state has no role in deciding the winner and no ability to
finance itself by forcing the circulation of central-banknotes. China does have a private
sector – the semi-free-market, the good part of our bad plutocracy. Still, even that
part is
weathering after supreme leader Xi took power, and most Chinese do no realize that we
are marching back into a more planned, more communism, more Mao Zedong like system, slowly
but surely. In China, life is artificially expensive under the tightening state control
that imposes layers upon layers of covert taxation, to the point of causing hesitation
to have more children .
However, the west, in general, is fundamentally the same, albeit having a
façade electoral democracy where no crucial issues (i.e., war and peace, monetary
policy, and downsizing the government) are allowed into a debate.
The real private sector (not the likes of Google and Lockheed Martin) is also dying. The
states interfere with the market relentlessly, in the name of safety, welfare, and
stimulating the economy, which achieved the opposite (i.e., the 1929 great depression, 2000
dot com bubble, and 2008 housing bubble). The Federal Reserve finances the government
spending via debt, encourages malinvestment by
atrocious QE packages , which all translate into taxing away people's purchasing power
by creating tons of money out of thin air.
We see the same unholy marriage between the state and the money like big techs, big
pharma, and, most disgustingly, the Military-Industrial Complex. People are either covertly
forced, or duped into funding the nonsense by paying tax, no matter which party they
elect.
Therefore, the Chinese are right about the West not in the position of a critic, but
for the wrong reason. We either fail to realize or willfully deny that we are living
under a harsh plutocracy. Instead, we are distracted by the never losing fake debate about which system
elects the better government, since the "one-party system" is most attacked by western
pro-democracy voices.
Strangely though, both systems have seemingly good intentions, either emphasizing a
person's moral conduct and experience in low-tier office (the Chinese internal nomination),
or the people's direct control of the government (the West electoral democracy). Strangely,
both unanimously favor the use of "government power" the "right way."
Yet, power always corrupts its user by attracting the money, no matter how
well-disciplined, how experienced he/she was. A system that operates on coercive power
always finds its way to circumvent any laws and regulations meant to promote meritocracy.
Both have tried to fight cronyism rigorously with new agencies and new legislation, but in
the end, cronyism always prevails, for both. For the most part of history, the essence
of the Chinese system is not much different from the West, since they are all plutocracies
that conned the people into helplessly relying on more power to solve problems caused by
power until it collapses.
In
a 1979 Chinese opera broadcasted nationwide, the protagonist, a low tier official,
finds himself risking his political career to enforce the law on the aristocrats who made
the law; intoxicated, he yelled in desperation
"谁做管官的官," which literally is " Quis
custodiet ipsos custodes " in Chinese; in the end, he left his career behind
– adding no more to the bloated, self-conflicting bureaucracy, to preserve his
integrity. Maybe this was a coincidence, 1979 was the year the Chinese leadership decided
to let the
government govern less – kudos to them.
The year 1979, and the economic boom that followed, is
one of the most common counter-arguments from a Chinese when you criticize the draconian
practices of CCP. Admittedly, there are times the state power is not insane. In 1979 Deng
Xiaoping at least gave up
some government mandate to allow the private sector to grow , resulting in the
exploitative system we see today, nonetheless a society much more productive than Mao
Zedong's total state dominance. Some state heads refrained from moving the government
"muscle" too much, such as Jimmy Carter's
resistance to wars and money supply that reduced overspending and inflation since the
Vietnam War. In these "less bad, more sensible" eras, it is easier for people's
entrepreneurial spirit and creativity to overcome the innate
irresponsibility of centralized capital management. As a result, we saw significant
progress like the Chinese miracle, and the upswing during the Reagan presidency (even if he
turned up wars, debt, and the Fed's money machine again). Sadly, the leaderships are eager
to claim credits, creating the impression that it is the right administration resulting in
progress and recovery when it is the lack of governing that allows the people to make
sensible decisions on their own, achieving faster growth.
If we Chinese and the American attack each other's electoral system, it is like the two
worst kids in the class picking on each other over their looks rather than their poor study
and bullying of other kids, which only makes them both worse. In the real world, we leave
the unhinged growth of government power – the real enemy of all people, Chinese and
American alike, unattended.
Like that Hongkonger, most Chinese learned to mock Trump's personal, and naively
conclude that the democracy that put him (and Hilter) in the office is a joke. Some more
informed Chinese mock the media's clownish, unfair treatment of Trump, and naively conclude
that the freedom of the press is a joke. However, a bombastic president, the democracy, and
the media are not the problems; neither are the aggressive
sino-phobic policies of which Trump pretends to be in charge. The actual problem is the
monstrous government, married with big money, capable of waging costly war, funding
wasteful programs that drain the middle class to enrich a selected few, no matter who is in
the office. It can either be the well-spoken Obama loved by the media, who started
seven
wars and won the Nobel peace prize, or the bombastic, scandalous New Yorker hated by
the press, who nonetheless continued these wars. People coerced into funding this abusive
machine themselves are part of, with their hard-earned tax dollars, is the problem. Yet,
you do not see the Chinese majority mocking this miserable setup and come to realize that
we are under the same situation!
For us, the Chinese, the real issue is not the superficial corruption that the supreme
leader XI fiercely fought, nor the insanity, the incompetence, and the betrayal of the oath
of some party members. It is our innate reliance on authorities and the love of collective
glory, a part of our culture passing down through generations over more than 2400 years,
being the problem. We can never break the dynastic cycle if we do not see the path
to the self-destruction of unhinged state power, such as Mao's era . If we are still yearning
for a "just leader" to solve issues like retirement, education, and medication, still
admiring exhaustive achievements such as the Belt and Road, the South China Sea, and
Taiwan, we then have learned nothing from the downfall of thirteen dynasties and countless
hegemonies throughout the history of China. The collective conscious of the Chinese have so
far failed to realize the force driving the rise and fall of a dynasty is not the moral and
intellect of the leaders, but the people's economic freedom relatively untouched or
infringed at times, by a mixture of chance, sanity, and imperialism vainglory. The blind
reliance on leaders and the love of collective grandiosity is only compounded when the
Americans fail to take back their power from the government, who is warring with China and
covertly overtaxing them. The collective enlightenment of the Chinese population is nearly
impossible, since the tyrants in Beijing have no shortage of strawman to throw at the
people and say "that is the problem, blame the belligerent Trump and the jealous
Americans", and the Communist Dynasty will always enjoy the " mandate of heaven ".
Even with a sheep's mindset, the Chinese economy will overtake the US, despite the slow
death of its most productive private sector. The sheer momentum of the slight right turn to
liberty 40 years ago is good enough for China, since the Americans do not restore their
free-market and liberty that had made them an exceptionally productive civilization for a
long time. But then what? We Chinese are just molecules burnt to fuel the blinding flash of
a new empire not far from its fourteenth dynastic downfall, just like the Achaemenids, the
Romans, the Umayyads, the Ottomans, Napoleon's France, the British, and the Americans
before us.
Xiaoran Tong has a Ph.D. in
Epidemiology from the Michigan State University (MSU). He is originally from Kunming,
Yunan, China and arrived in the US in 2014 to pursue his Ph.D. at MSU. He is Interested in
the history of America and its similarities with ancient and contemporary
China.
Amid the ongoing diplomatic spat between Washington DC and Beijing,
which now also includes the deployment of B-1B
bombers and warships in the South China Sea , late on Monday (local time) China's Global Times
reported , citing sources close to the Chinese government, that some "hawkish" officials in
China are calling for a renegotiation the the "phase one" trade deal with Washington as well as
a "tit-for-tat approach on spiraling trade issues after US' malicious attacks on China ignited
a tsunami of anger among Chinese trade insiders."
The calls to renegotiate the current version of the deal - which has yet to be actively
implemented - emerge amid dissatisfaction because "China has made compromise for the deal to
press ahead."
While in the past, these same trade negotiators "believed that it would be worthwhile to
make certain compromise to reach a partial truce in the 22-month trade war and ease escalating
tensions", given what the Global Times called "President Donald Trump's hyping an anti-China
conspiracy that aims to cover up his mishandling of the COVID-19 pandemic", advisors close to
the trade talks have suggested Chinese officials rekindling the possibility of invalidating the
trade pact and negotiating a new one to tilt the scales more to the Chinese side, sources close
the matter told the Global Times.
A former Chinese trade official told the Global Times on condition of anonymity on Monday
that China could complete such procedures based on force majeure provisions in the pact.
"It's in fact in China's interests to terminate the current phase one deal. It is beneficial
to us. The US now cannot afford to restart the trade war with China if everything goes back to
the starting point," another trade advisor to the Chinese government told the Global Times,
pointing to the staggering US economy and the coming of the US presidential election this
year.
"After signing the phase one deal, the US intensifies crackdown in other areas such as
technology, politics and the military against China. So if we don't retreat on trade issues,
the US could be trapped," the former official noted.
Some could disagree, and counter that Trump can certainly restart the trade war especially
since it suits his pre-election agenda - after all, now that the fate of the market is entirely
in the hands of the Fed which has gone full MMT, Trump is no longer afraid by the market's
response to a renewed trade war. In fact, with over 60% of the US population seeking to
distance US from China, it would appear that Trump's best bet to winning independent votes is
precisely to keep hammering China.
Confirming this, Trump said on Friday that he was "very torn" about whether to end the
China-US phase one deal, Fox News reported, with some observers interpreting his words as
equating to a threat from the US to re-launch a trade war against China.
Then again, over the weekend, the SCMP reported that US source familiar with recent
discussions stated US officials acknowledged China was largely delivering its pledges on
structural issues such as opening market access and improving IP protection but they have yet
to agree in some details including IP action plan and easing equity caps for foreign investors.
Furthermore, the source stated fallout from the virus meant agreement on purchasing US goods
has become much more important and that many believe China needs to increase pace on
purchases.
Meanwhile, Gao Lingyun, an expert at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences who advises the
government on trade issues, told the Global Times on Monday that China has "well documented"
Washington's usual threats after previous rounds of confrontation. That means if the trade war
restarts, "China knows how to respond, and it is able to retaliate quickly and inflict serious
harm on the US economy," Gao said.
Still, as the Global Times concludes, analysts noted that terminating the phase one trade
deal would be China's "last option" and one that China would only resort to under extremely
hostile conditions.
"... What does a developing country like China, still mired in socio-economic inequality, technological dependence, political corruption and environmental degradation do? Concentrate on its own hinterland while bidding its time? Confront the hegemon head-on which would lead to military conflict? Or control its responses while cultivating partnerships with ALL peace-loving countries, whether rich or poor, First World or Third World, Western or non-Western? ..."
Unlike Escobar, Roberts, et al, I am much more sanguine about the prospects of China's rise
which has threatened the indispensable nation of Yankistan because China was not supposed to
rise above its assigned role as the cheap cog of the globalist economy serving the Capitalist
Oligarchy of the NWO. By dint of hard work, sly cunning and shrew tactics, China outgrew its
role by becoming the hub of the international economy via its New Silk Road and the BRI.
What does a developing country like China, still mired in socio-economic inequality,
technological dependence, political corruption and environmental degradation do? Concentrate on
its own hinterland while bidding its time? Confront the hegemon head-on which would lead to
military conflict? Or control its responses while cultivating partnerships with ALL
peace-loving countries, whether rich or poor, First World or Third World, Western or
non-Western?
The rapid decoupling of China's economy away from the USA started with the GFC 2008 but has
since accelerated with Obama's "Pivot to Asia" and Trump's trade war with China. Exports to the
USA account for less than 3% of China's GDP today with 60% of those exports being either US or
foreign goods manufactured in China. So the real figure is 1% of China's GDP consists of
Chinese goods exported to the US market, consisting mostly of industrial commodities or
consumer products.
As China has already charted its own independent path of building trading/investment
partnerships with Europe, Asia, Africa and Latin America, the USA has become threatened by
China's successful decoupling from its export dependence on the US market as proven by its
hostile reaction to Xi's BRI and China's New Silk Road. In addition, the US was caught
off-guard by the sudden rise of Chinese tech firms such as Huawei which is the world's number
one vendor of telecommunications equipment with undisputed world leadership in 5G
technology.
Shocked to find its manhood as no longer exceptional, Uncle Sam feels the need to show off
to the world: "Me Gringo! Big Dick!"
China has become, over the past two decades, the planet’s second-most powerful nation after the United States. Booming
economic growth has lifted millions of its citizens out of poverty and catapulted it to the world’s second-largest economy,
while increased military spending has made it the second-largest military power (though its military spending, and nuclear
stockpile, are still a small fraction of the U.S.’s).
That growth — in both economic and military power — has led U.S. officials to conclude that they must do more to counteract
what they regard as China’s growing influence. President Obama, early in his administration, memorably vowed an “Asia pivot,”
whereby the U.S. would devote fewer resources and less attention to the Middle East and more toward China’s growing power in its
own region.
That led to some moderate escalation in adversarial relations between the two countries — including the Trans Pacific
Partnership trade agreement (TPP) and other regional skirmishes — but nothing approaching direct military confrontation.
President Trump, since taking office, has largely heaped praise on the Chinese government and its leader President Xi Jinping,
siding with Xi over democracy protests in Hong Kong and even Beijing’s handling of the coronavirus outbreak.
But this pandemic has seriously escalated tensions between the two countries given the increasingly hostile rhetoric
emanating from various sectors of the west, making it more urgent than ever to grapple with the complex relations between the
two countries and how China ought to be perceived.
The question is far more complex than the usual efforts to create a new U.S. Enemy because numerous power centres in the U.S.
and the west generally — particularly its oligarchs, Wall Street, and international capital — are not remotely hostile to
Beijing but, quite the contrary, are both fond of it and dependent upon it. That’s why — unlike with other U.S. enemies such as
Saddam Hussein, Fidel Castro, the Iranian government or Nicolas Maduro — one finds very powerful actors, from Bill Gates to
Michael Bloomberg to the consulting giant McKinsey to Trump himself, defending Chinese officials and urging better relations
with them.
That, in turn, reflects a critical reality about U.S./China relations that defies standard foreign policy frameworks: while
hawkish, pro-war political elements in both parties speak of China as an adversary that must be confronted or even punished, the
interests of powerful western financial actors — the Davos crowd — are inextricably linked with China, using Chinese markets and
abusive Chinese labor practices to maximize their profit margins and, in the process, stripping away labor protections, liveable
wages and jobs from industrial towns in the U.S. and throughout the west.
That is why standard left-wing anti-imperialism or right-wing isolationism is an insufficient and overly simplified response
to thinking about China: policy choices regarding Beijing have immense impact on workers and the economic well-being of citizens
throughout the west.
Today’s new episode of SYSTEM UPDATE is devoted to sorting through the complexities of this relationship and how to think
about China. I’m joined by two guests with radically different views on these questions: the long-time Singeporean diplomat who
served as President of the U.N. Security Council, Kishore Mahbubani, whose just-released compelling book “Has China Won?” argues
that the U.S. should view China as a friendly competitor and not as a threat to its interests; and Matt Stoller, who has worked
on issues of economic authoritarianism and the U.S. working class in multiple positions in Congress and in various think tanks,
culminating in his 2019 book “Goliath,” and who argues that China is a threat to the economic well-being of the U.S. working
class and to civil liberties in the west.
The show, which I believe provides excellent insight into how to think about these questions, debuts this afternoon at 2:oo
pm ET on the Intercept’s YouTube channel or can be viewed on the player below at 2:30 p.m. As always, a transcript of the
program will be added shortly thereafter.
Update: May 7, 1:54 p.m. EDT
The debut time for this episode has been moved by 30 minutes; it will not debut on the Intercept’s YouTube channel at 2:30 pm
ET.
I have been watching China's gradual rise in the world's GDP– as well as GDP-per-capita– charts and a concomitant fall in the United
States' position in these charts, for nearly 20 years now. The United States' decline is still relative rather than absolute. In
absolute terms, its GDP is still "Number 1!" But the decline was accelerated from 2003 on, when successive US presidents decided
to pour massive amounts of government revenues into large-scale and always disastrous military adventures all around the world. As
of last November, Brown University's "Costs of War" project
tallied the U.S. budgetary costs of these wars, FY2001-2020, to be $6.4 trillion. These were funds that could have been invested,
instead, in repair and upgrading of vital infrastructure here at home– including vital health infrastructure. But no. Instead, the
money was shoveled into the pockets of the large military contractors who then used a portion of it on expensive lobbying operations
designed to ensure that the sow of military spending continued feeding her offspring (them.)
When Donald Trump became president, in 2017, one of his early instincts was to pull back from the foreign wars. (This was about
his only sound instinct.) The military-industrial complex then proved able to slow-walk a lot of the military-retraction moves
he wanted to make One of the other abiding themes of Trump's presidency has been his desire to "decouple" the U.S. economy from the
tight integration it had developed at many levels with the economy of China, as part of broader push to halt or slow the rise of
China's power in the global system. At the economic level, we have seen the "tariff wars" and the campaign against Huawei. At the
military level, we have seen a slight escalation in the kinds of "demonstration operations" the U.S. Navy has been mounting in the
South China Sea. Mobilizing against "Chinese influence" also seems to come naturally to a president who shows no hesitation in denigrating
anyone– even US citizens and politicians– who happens not to be of pale-complected European-style hue.
With the eruption of Covid-19 in U.S. communities nationwide, Pres. Trump's pre-existing proclivity to demonize and denigrate
anything Chinese has escalated considerably– spurred on, it seems, by his evident desire to find an external scapegoat to blame for
the terrible situation Covid-19 has inflicted on Americans and to detract voters' attention from the grave responsibility he and
his administration bear for their plight.
He and his economic advisors clearly realize that, with the supply chains of major US industries still inextricably
tied
up with companies located in China and with China still
holding $1.1 trillion-worth of U.S. government debt, he
can't just cut the cord and decouple from China overnight. Yesterday, his Treasury Secretary and the US Trade Representative held
a
phone call with China's Vice Premier Liu He, the intent of which was to reassure both sides that a trade deal concluded four
months ago would still be adhered to.
But today, less than 12 hours after the reassuring joint statement released after the phone call, Trump
told Fox News that he was
"very torn" about the trade deal, and had "not decided" whether to maintain it. This, as he launches frequent verbal tirades against
China for having "caused" the coronavirus crisis. US GDP is highly inflated by counting financial moves on Wall Street (extracting
money from suckers and moving money from one hand to another) as productive activity. China's purchasing power parity already exceeds
the US and I suspect its actual GDP does as well. Only US financialization is able to mask the lack of actual productivity in the
US economy.
I am somewhat skeptical about China chances in this race. That will be much tougher environment for China from now on. And
other major technological powers such as Germany, Korea and Japan are still allied with the USA.
The major problem for China is two social systems in one box: state capitalism part controlled by completely corrupt Communist
Party (which completely abandoned the communist doctrine and became essentially a religious cult ) + no less corrupt neoliberalism
part created with the help of the West.
The level of corruption inherent in the current setup (first adopted in Soviet NEP -- New Economic Policy) is tremendous, as
the party has absolute political power and controls the major economic and financial areas while the entrepreneurs try to bribe
state officials to get the leverage and/or enrich themselves at the state expense or bypass the bureaucratic limitations/inefficiencies
imposed by the state, or offload some costs. So mafia style relationship between party officials and entrepreneurs is not an aberration,
it is a norm. And periodic "purges" of corrupt Party officials do not solve the problem. Ecological problems in China are just
one side effect of this.
Add to this the certain pre-existing tendencies within Chinese society to put greed above everything else, the tendency clearly
visible in some emigrants and to which Yen devoted one post recently. Riots in some Asians countries against Chinese diaspora
are often at least partially caused by this diaspora behavior, not only by xenophobia. Note that several African countries with
Chinese investments now intent to sue China for damages from COVID-19. This is not accidental.
Technologically the USA and its G7 satellites are still in the lead although outsourcing manufacturing to China helped Chinese
tremendously to narrow the gap. For example, Intel CPUs still dominate both desktops and servers. All major operating systems
(with the exception of some flavors of Linux) are all USA developed.
You rise important points, but I respectfully disagree with all of them.
1) I don't think China is a "State capitalism" country. The term "State capitalism" was first coined by Lenin for a very specific
situation the USSR was in. Yes, the similarities are striking - and Deng Xiaoping's reforms were clearly inspired by Lenin's NEP
- but it is important to state that the CCP actively avoided the term and built upon the concept both theoretically and in practice.
Besides, we don't need to read Lenin's works critically, an not take him as the second coming of Jesus: when he used the term
"State capitalism", he used it in a clearly desperate moment of the USSR, almost by improvisation. Lenin's last years were definitely
desperate times.
Besides, the NEP didn't culminate with the capitalist restoration of the USSR. On the contrary: it collapsed in 1926 (after
another bad harvest) and gave way to the rise of Stalin and the radical faction of the CPSU. The Five-year plans were born (1928),
and agriculture would be fully collectivized by the end of the 1930s (a process which catapulted Molotov to the second most powerful
man in the USSR during the period). By the end of WWII, the USSR had a fully collectivized economy.
2) The corruption hypothesis is an attractive one - specially for the liberal middle classes of the post-war and for the Trotskyists
- but it doesn't stand the empirical test. The USA was an extremely corrupt nation from its foundation to pre-war, and it never
stopped it from growing and reaching prosperity. The Roman Empire and Republic were so corrupt that it was considered normal.
There's no evidence the PRC is historically exceptionally corrupt. However, I can see why the CCP is worried about corruption,
as it is a flank through which the West can sabotage it from within.
3) The COCOM tactic will be much harder to apply against China than against the USSR. For starters, the USSR lost circa 35%
of its GDP in WWII. This gave it a delay from which it never recovered. Second, the USSR fought against capitalism when capitalism
was at its apex. Third, the USSR collectivized and closed its economy too early, not taking into account that it still lived in
a capitalist world.
China doesn't have that now. It is fighting against capitalism in a phase where it is weakened. It is open and intimately integrated
economically with its capitalist enemies. It closed or is about to close the technological gap in many strategic sectors during
a stage where the capitalists have low retaliation capacity. It found time to close at least the GDP gap. It found time to recover
fully from its civil war and the Japanese Invasion of the Northeast.
Germany, South Korea and Japan are not technologically more advanced than the USA. This is a myth. Plus, they are too small.
They may serve as very useful - even essential - pawns for the USA-side, but I don't see any of the three ever achieving Pax
.
HiSilicon , Huawei
Technologies ' in-house semiconductor and integrated circuit design company, has surpassed
US chip giant Qualcomm in
terms of smartphone processor shipments in China for the first time amid coronavirus-linked
disruptions that have hit most major players, according to a report.
In the first quarter of 2020, HiSilicon shipped 22.21 million smartphone processors,
according to Chinese research firm CINNO's latest monthly report on China's semiconductor
industry. Although HiSilicon's shipments only increased slightly from the 22.17 million units
it shipped in the first quarter of last year, it was the only major company that did not see a
year-on-year decline in the quarter, CINNO said in a summary of the report posted on its
official WeChat account.
As a result, the Huawei subsidiary's market share surged to 43.9 per cent, from 36.5 per
cent during the same period last year, and beat Qualcomm for the first time to become China's
top smartphone processor supplier. HiSilicon's steady performance comes at a time when the
Chinese smartphone industry is being battered by delayed product launches and dampened consumer
sentiment linked to the coronavirus pandemic. Smartphone shipments in the country
slumped by 34.7 per cent – more than a third – to 47.7 million units in the
first quarter of 2020, according to a report released earlier this month by the China Academy
of Information and Communications Technology.
US-based Qualcomm, the long-time market leader, fell to second place in the latest quarter
with a year-on-year decline in its market share from 37.8 per cent to 32.8 per cent. Taiwan's
Mediatek maintained its third-place position, but also saw its market share slide year-on-year
from 14 per cent to 13.1 percent
.
Table showing the market share of smartphone processor supplies according to
CINNO Research. Source: CINNO Research / WeChat
Huawei, HiSilicon's parent company, is at the
centre of a high-profile US-China tech war. The Trump administration
added the company to its Entity List last year, citing the risk that Huawei could give
Beijing access to sensitive data from telecommunications networks. The trade blacklist
effectively bars Huawei from buying US products and services. In response, the Chinese company,
which has denied the allegations, is
ramping up its own capabilities to produce more American component-free network gear,
including through HiSilicon.
Huawei is also reportedly shifting
production of HiSilicon-designed chips
away from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) and towards Shanghai-based
Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC) as Washington
readies new rules which would require foreign companies using US chipmaking equipment to
obtain a license before supplying chips to Huawei – a move that would directly affect
TSMC.
Over 90 per cent of Huawei phones in China now use HiSilicon processors, according to CINNO.
However, Huawei founder Ren Zhengfei said in an interview with Yahoo Finance last year that the
company would continue using chips from US vendors such as Intel and Qualcomm as long as it is
still allowed by US regulators.
In the face of the upcoming presidential elections, Republicans launched a new China Task
Force committee in US Congress on Thursday to attract attention despite its futile efforts to
pass the buck amid the pandemic. But this not-so-surprising move only shows how hysterical and
desperate Republicans have become as criticism of the government's mishandling of the domestic
coronavirus outbreak increases, experts said.
Following a series of anti-China moves the Trump administration has made when its epidemic
prevention spiraled out of control with more than 1.2 million infections - the world's largest
number - to date, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy announced on Thursday a proposal to set
up a new "China Task Force" which will develop legislative policies to curtail Chinese
influence. The committee currently consists of 15 Republicans with no Democrats joining.
McCarthy said the pandemic made it apparent "for a national strategy to deal with China."
The task force will hold meetings and briefings on China-related issues, which include China's
influence inside the US, presence on American campuses and control over important supply
chains, the Washington Post reported.
A search for the members in the China Task Force revealed their antagonism toward China. One
of them is Rep. Elise Stefanik, who in late April asked Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and the
attorney general to bring China to the International Court of Justice for the handling of
COVID-19, according to a report by The Adirondack Daily Enterprise.
Analysts said setting up the new China committee is the Republicans' new tactic to fuel
anti-China sentiment, but this won't help stop power from shifting from the West to East, which
was happening before the pandemic. The pandemic is very likely to speed up this process.
Democrats not joining the committee does not mean they are more China-friendly, but they
don't want Republicans to shift the focus of President Donald Trump's failure to handle the
pandemic. Since last year, both parties passed several bills regarding China's Xinjiang and
Hong Kong, interfering in China's internal affairs, Diao Daming, an associate professor at the
Renmin University of China in Beijing, told the Global Times on Friday.
Diao noted the Democrats in the Congress won't endorse the legislation but will support
other anti-China measures that the new committee aims to push forward.
"The pandemic will very likely further weaken the US and strengthen China," he said.
A man covering his face walks in Manhattan, New York on April 6 amid the serious outbreak
of COVID-19 in the US. Photo: AFP
Treating China as equals
In the past months, certain American politicians, including Pompeo, kept passing the buck,
making groundless accusations that China was responsible for the outbreak, and hyped
conspiracy theories by calling it the "China virus" to claim the virus originated from a
Wuhan lab. At Friday's media briefing, Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Hua Chunying
joked that the press conference was almost all about refuting Pompeo's lies.
The extreme atmosphere has made many people in the US worry for a return of the McCarthy
era, where free speech in the country was curtailed. A former US Ambassador to China pointed
out in a CNN interview the US is now similar to Germany in the 1930s.
Li Haidong, a professor at the Institute of International Relations of the China Foreign
Affairs University, told the Global Times on Friday the task force will fuel the existing
unfriendly atmosphere toward China at the local level in the country.
Trump administration's China policy focuses on conflicts, and the task force could further
aggravate tensions, he said.
Former US Ambassador to China Max Baucus said in an interview with CNN that "The [Trump]
administration's rhetoric is so strong against China. It's over the top. We're entering a
kind of an era which is similar to Joe McCarthy back when he was red-baiting the State
Department, attacking communism."
"A little bit like Hitler in the 30s. A lot of people knew what was going on was wrong.
They knew it was wrong, but they didn't stand up and say anything about it. They felt
intimidated," he said.
Analysts warned that China needs to stay alert as the US is trying to create a new
McCarthy era of international repression on China.
But, on the other hand, we should be aware that most countries won't follow the US, Li
said.
"It's difficult for the US to mobilize the world against China. People know how selfish
and self-centered the US is. So only a few of its allies will join," he told the Global
Times.
The US interception of other countries' anti-virus medical supplies and pointing a finger
at the WHO when international cooperation is urgently needed occupied world headlines.
Meanwhile, the Chinese government had provided over 150 countries and international
organizations with supplies, hosted over 120 video conferences with health experts from more
than 160 members of the international community, and dispatched 19 medical groups to 17
countries, according to the Zhang Ming, Chinese Ambassador to the European Union, at a
Coronavirus Global Response pledging event on Monday.
Li told the Global Times that most countries, including its traditional allies, such as
Germany and France, have different demands from the US. So they won't join this wave.
As early as February 1, the European Union had dispatched tons of medical supplies to
assist China. And in March when the continent was hit hard, China immediately provided more
than 2 million protective masks and sent medical groups. Positive reactions were constantly
heard in Europe on China.
Meanwhile, it has been reported that China faces a rising wave of hostility led by the US
amid the pandemic. The discrimination against Chinese people is growing in some parts of the
world.
Li said "The rising hostility shows some Western countries are not accustomed to a rising
China. It's a challenge for them to learn to see China on an equal footing, which adds to
their anxiety."
He added that they need to learn to respect differences and deal with other countries
equally.
Analysts noted that China should step up efforts to enhance its own capabilities in
high-tech, military and other fields. It should also conduct far-reaching international
cooperation and uphold multilateralism to share its benefits with other countries, rather
than being distracted by the anti-China wave.
Cooperation amid competition
The task force on China is not the first one in the West. On April 24, several UK
Conservative MPs launched a "China Research Group" to promote "factual debate" in dealing
with the "rapidly changing nature of the relationship" between China and the UK. The group
would attempt to look "beyond" the coronavirus pandemic to "examine China's long-term
economic and diplomatic aims," BBC reported.
Kevin Hollinrake, an MP and a member of the group, told the Global Times that the group
will make some inquiries on specific policy areas. The group will look at, for example, how
the Chinese political system and business work.
It will look at certain work streams and develop fact-based reports based on those work
streams. "They may be reported back to parliament or published in the public domain,"
Hollinrake said.
Although the group was set up at a time when the virus was rampant in the UK, "the
pandemic itself is not the underlying issue," Hollinrake noted.
The China Research Group is likely to "lobby for a less cooperative approach to China, and
for the UK to align more with the US on China policy," Tim Summers, senior consulting fellow
on the Asia-Pacific program at Chatham House, told the Global Times.
However, Chris Wood, the British Consul General in Shanghai, told the Global Times that
"We will see continued discussions and collaboration. There is no global challenge that can
be solved without China's participation. We recognize that we very much want to work with
China on these big global issues, and that will continue."
In the post-coronavirus era, China and Europe might continue to seek cooperation amid
competition, analysts said, pointing out that Europe's anxieties are, to a large extent,
provoked by the US.
In the early stages of the pandemic, despite old disputes, cooperation was the mainstream
in China-Europe interactions. But things have changed since the US became the new epicenter,
Sun Keqin, a research fellow at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations,
told the Global Times.
Sun told the Global Times that to reduce the negative influence from the US on European
countries, China needs to make efforts to let its voice heard in international public opinion
and seek cooperation opportunities. What the US is advocating is nothing but rumors and
conspiracy, and China must smash these lies with sound and reasonable evidence and awaken
European countries, Sun said.
The Arioch Casey •
5
hours ago> Also, really, how long would it take to relocate important industries
to the US?
I think it is a preposterous question. The real question how you gonna relocate the
markets for in-USA industries?
Okay, you hired mexicans or turkeys or chineses, they built you a new shiny factory, it
even produced some glomourous box, and...
....and that box is gathering dust in Walmart, because next shelf to it there is the same
box made-in-Far-East at half the price!
What you gonna do about THAT ? ...and it will be going all while USD is kept
overpriced.
As i see it, you have two options, as in "required condition" (but not neccesarily
sufficient one)
1. USSR way: make USD non-convertible and set very strict controls at floodgates, keep
cracking down on any foreign trade except for goverment-vetted bare minimum.
2. Capitalistic way: let USD crash until its true value found and production is USA becomes
competitive with ones in China and Vietnam.
Even this might be not enough, but those are required for even trying.
Both options however would be infringing one way or another on the priviliged American
style of life.
Basically America should be honestly turned into the sceond world or the third world for
some hope (but no waranties) to emerge.
Now, with Trump's crack-down on mexicans Americans got a load of vacant working places
in farmers fields - did they took those? Or were they way too exceptional for such a boring
and lowly work?
Will Trump and GOPs dare to use Coivid excuse to kill American Ponzi economy, before it
collapse on its own?
> Wouldn't that need to be a multi-generational project because you can;t turn
baristas into machinists over night?
First of all those baristas would have to accept that their salary - if measured in
Wallmart off the shelf goods - had shrunk many times. And that they are out for survival in
Wild Wild West, where making one's own 2-3 persons business - and finding any niche for it,
just any - is not a fashion but a chance ast survival.
Did you read Gone With The Wind? North's invasion killed South's economy. Then Scarlett,
never having much of a culture anyway, not being that refined lady, just luckily sees a
demand and uses new slave labor to kick-start her new business, one very few in the whole
city.
In those "holy 1990s" me and dad survived by buying 40kg cement bags, moving them into a
shack (last 30 meters by hands and a cart), and then splitting them into 1kg bags (by kid's
scoop), sealing them with makeshift hot wire, and then hiring our mate with a small truck
to race around Moscow stores and selling them those.
Cement dust all around, primitive work, radio for entertainment.
> at the very sight of your average run-of-the-mill CNC machine
The fuck! I would had seen CNC machine a privileged work, clean and interesting and
rewarding! But sadly there was no market for most anything CNC machines could do.
So that is it, when your nextdoor Americans will start outcompeting illegals in job
market, then there will be a chance for USA to start it all over again.
Good thing, it will not be "multi-generational". Like it was shown in Gone With The
Wind, BTW. Those "who will not fit the market" (c) will just die off, sooner or later. In
gang on gang shootouts, or if alcoholism or of homelessness, that varies. Those who did fit
- will go on. 10-20 years will suffice.
Casey •
19
hours ago So, is it correct that the DNC had some kind of Obama-era "chi-merica" project to
further their globalist, neolib project -- as it became obvious that the US was never going to
be able to pull off the unipolar Empire -- into the new century with a sort of US/China
alliance, with a substantial US aligned fifth-column (if that's the right phrase) working in
China to further the project? Then Trump came in a screwed that all up, trying to pretend to be
friendly to Russia, which the DNC promptly scuttled. And now the net result is Russia and China
growing relations, which is a very real nightmare for the US, the absolute worst possible
outcome for the globalists? Probably I have this all ass-backwards. Also, really, how long
would it take to relocate important industries to the US? Wouldn't that need to be a
multi-generational project because you can;t turn baristas into machinists over night? Also,
what prevents the US from taking over Venezuela right now, militarily, instead of those
apparently poorly organized attempts to infiltrate with mercenaries, as was recently
revealed?
If Uncle Sam defaults on his debts, that would be the biggest own goal ever. The whole
financial system is based on US Treasury bonds, and a default would send their value to zero.
The US Social Security Trust Fund is still worth almost three trillion dollars, most of it in
US Treasury bonds. Default means Goodbye Social Security Pensions, or at least a huge
"haircut".
I think Pompous Ass is bluffing. One reason is that Wall Street parasites have been
salivating over the Social Security trust fund for decades, and GW Bush was working on a plan
to give it to them. I don't think the bankster parasites will sit on their hands and let the
Trump idiots blow up their entire system. I think there would be a palace coup d'etat
first.
The US wants to сut industrial and supply dependence on China amid rising tensions between the two powers. However, not everyone
is eager to pack their bags and leave the lucrative Chinese market in the midst of the previous row.
The Trump administration has long been pushing American firms to get back to US soil, especially when trade tensions were flaring
between the two biggest global economies. Now the US has revived the trade war rhetoric again.
Read more
Asian markets plunge amid escalating US-China tensions
"We've been working on [reducing the reliance of our supply chains in China] over the last few years but we are now
turbo-charging that initiative,"
Under Secretary for Economic Growth, Energy and the Environment at the US State Department
Keith Krach told Reuters.
Krach as well as other officials told the agency that some critical and essential manufacturing should be moved from the
country, and the government may take steps on it soon. Apart from the US' seemingly favorite options of tariffs and sanctions,
the plans may include tax incentives and potential reshoring subsidies as well as closer relations with Taiwan – a move which has
always angered Beijing.
Washington is also mulling the creation of what one of the officials called 'Economic Prosperity Network' which would include
companies and groups from some
"trusted partners."
The network is set to share the same standards
"on everything
from digital business, energy and infrastructure to research, trade, education and commerce."
China's vital role in global supply chains was felt sharply amid the coronavirus pandemic as many international giants – from
tech to car industries – are reliant on the country. The pandemic has forced some US companies to seriously consider at least
partial relocation and changing supply chain strategy, according to one of the latest polls conducted by the American Chamber of
Commerce in China and its sister organization in Shanghai. However, the majority of firms said that the outbreak does push them
to turn their backs on China.
Nevertheless, one of the
"China hawks"
told Reuters that the virus created "a perfect
storm" as it
"crystallised all the worries that people have had about doing business with China"
and
the damages from Covid-19 have eclipsed possible profits.
When the trade war showed no signs of abating last year and the US and China were still hitting each other with tariffs,
another AmCham poll showed that the punitive measures were hurting US businesses operating in China. While over forty percent of
the 250 respondents were
"considering or have relocated"
production facilities outside China, some 35 percent of
companies said they would rather source within China and target the domestic market. Fewer than six percent wanted to move or
already shifted their factory operations to the US.
Set aside the enormous relocation costs – which the White House has recently pledged to cover should an American company
decide to ditch China – there is still another massive hurdle in this plan. China is still the world's top producer of rare earth
metals – the group of elements vital for production of multiple devices, from cell phones to some advanced military gear. Should
all the production be moved from China, it could ban exports of these materials. Last year Chinese media said the option was
already being mulled by Beijing, and it could consider the drastic measure again if trade war tensions further escalate.
The new rules will require licenses for US companies to sell certain items to companies
in China that support the military, even if the products are for civilian use. They also do
away with a civilian exception that allows certain US technology to be exported without a
license.
They come as relations between the United States and China have deteriorated amid the
new coronavirus outbreak
####
It's far too late and will be significantly damaging to US companies. No doubt Washington
still expects Beijing to buy Boeing airliners. If Beijing were to pull that plug, then it
would take out Arbus, P&W, GE, CFM all the suppliers, MRO ventures and collapse the whole
western airline supply chain. It would obviously kill any Chinese or Russian airline program
that has any western content . I doubt Beijing will go that far so they'll be looking
at actions, not words.
t-Rump and co need to show something sym-bollox to the American electorate that yet again
they are being 'tough on China' during this erection year but it requires China to play
along. It simply might not. It is reported that China is currently purchasing large
quantities of American LNG to fulfill 'Phase one' of t-Rump's Deal of the Century with
China.
Maybe that is the obvious counter, threatening to pull the whole DoC, starting with
dumping LNG purchases as a direct warning. t-Rump's Administration has pushed itself into a
smaller and smaller box, all of its own making. As I've always said and I still believe to be
true, the biggest threat to t-Rump's re-erection is t-Rump himself.
Paradoxically, the more Trump's belligerence and 'gut-based' trade policies damage
international trade, the more convinced his supporters become that only Trump can handle
increasingly-complicated trade relationships. This probably stems from his going into a
meeting under difficult conditions, emerging to fire off a miracle tweet, "China will now buy
massive quantities of our agricultural products", and ducking out the back without
elaboration. This leads to a misplaced belief that Trump can perform miracles, as much of a
jerk as he can be, because his loyalists rarely pay attention long enough for the rebuttal
which always comes, laying out his serial exaggerations. Remember when U.S. Steel was
building three new steel plants, on the strength of Trump's hard-ass negotiations in the
Canada-Mexico-USA Free Trade deal? Lighthizer's hard-ass negotiations, actually. Anyway,
yeah; totally made it up. He doesn't see anything wrong with making optimistic projections
which have no basis in fact.
Mind you, it would be a bit of a downer to have to explain again to Biden what 'oil' is,
every single time the subject comes up. But I wouldn't be too worried about that.
LNG is pretty cheap right now, like all energy products. I see China behaving much like
Russia; once it strikes an international bargain, it will stick to it until the terms play
out. But Trump might find a different China when he tries to strike the next agreement.
China can also take similar measures, sic (I read that) Alibaba and other gigantic Chinese
companies that rely on server farms are switching over to Chinese made chippery and not
buying foreign. Simply in lost sales for the foreseeable future is gigantic.
I imagine you are too young to remember Victor Kiam (he died in 2001) former president of the
Remington Razor Company. He had a popular line of commercials in the late 80's in which he
would say "I liked it so much, I bought the company".
The Chinese must have heard him, because they took his method to heart; Alibaba doesn't
just buy Chinese-made chips, they bought the company. Right after the United States started
up its
we-have-to-keep-priceless-American-technological-secrets-out-of-the-hands-of-the-thieving-Chinks
policies. Suit yourself, Sam.
Shanghai-based Semiconductor Manufacturing International, a $5.4 Billion company and one
of the largest such companies in China, pulled its listing from the NYSE.
In 2018, Skyworks Solutions had 83% of its business in China. Apple had 20%, but 20% of
Apple's revenue is a shitload of money. I had to laugh at the line, "Investors are
increasingly concerned over the prospect of rising global protectionism." 'Global
protectionism' pretty much covers The Donald's act.
Justin GLyn @ 65 is correct: New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern instituted a Stage
4 lockdown in her country in mid-to-late March with the aim of eliminating the virus from
Kiwi shores. That goal is no longer feasible but
the country has begun relaxing its lockdown to Stage 3 in an effort to revive its
economy.
The US failure to anticipate blowback can be understood in one way: assuming that the US
did indeed seed the virus in Wuhan, then we might speculate that the seeding was timed to
coincide with the flu season in China and with mass preparations for Chinese New Year. The
thinking was that the virus would spread through public transportation networks throughout
the country and Beijing would have a full-time job on its hands just dealing with massive
viral outbreaks all over the country, and fail to deal with them even adequately, leading to
mass riots and eventually widespread resistance to Beijing, and maybe even the eventual
disintegration of the CCP and its overthrow. US and other expatriates would be trapped in the
country, and foreign embassies and consulates might even be torched, prompting a US-led
coalition to invade parts of the country (like the south and the southeast) and take over in
a start to the balkanisation of the country cunningly disguised as foreign help to keep
order.
The US certainly did not anticipate that Chinese people trusted enough in Beijing to be
willing to carry out whatever orders Beijing issued; the US assumption seems to be that
everywhere around the planet, people yearn to be just as individualistic and suspicious of
Big Government as Americans are, and that what they think of their local councils and
regional governments is the same as what they think of their national governments.
The reality is that in many countries, whatever people think of their local councils and
regional (state, provincial) governments may not be true of what they think of their national
governments, because the functions of the three tiers of government in their countries may
not overlap to the extent that they might do in the Anglocentric world.
Neither did the US anticipate that Chinese society could be advanced in its own way
technologically with various functions such as public health, public transport and others
integrated enough that the Chinese could respond to a rapidly spreading crisis in the way
they did. That is in part because US society and values are based on competition, mutual
suspicion and top-down orders among other things, rather than co-operation, collective
behaviour and willingness to consider solutions based on ideas from divergent yet integrated
sources.
That is a very plausible working hypothesis, and I mean it working, the main assumption is
still to be proven but it explains many other observations of fact. But I will append a
variable in the main assumption: we could even replace the initiative's agent with some
non-state actor, ie Big Pharma. I am unable to "decide" between these possibilities. Are the
Imperial forces conflicting to the extent implied? Are we yet at the point that a non-state
actor is bold enough for such an action? I really don't want to stretch a perfectly good
hypothesis but am I?
I was in China at the time when this unfolded and note the following: 1: The Chinese
cultural mindset is totally different from the Western one, and the gap much greater than
most Westerners realise. Look at the videos of the 75th Anniversary of Modern China for a few
clues 2: As the worlds largest atheist nation, death is considered final, rituals
notwithstanding So they are motivated to survive..( and focus on delicious food to this end)
3: They talk. Incessantly. It is no accident that WeChat has grown exponentially.. What
happens in one part of China is pretty quickly spread to other parts And on the Flipside,
there are surveillance cameras everywhere
So when this unfolded, Mid Spring festival when the cities were emptied, the memory of the
SARS epidemic sprang to forefront of the official mind. Xi JingPing appeared on most TV
Channels, making it clear that he was taking responsibility for the government response. And
implicitly, that if he failed, he would be gone, in keeping with the long tradition of
Chinese leadership.
At this point we decided to bail, being prime targets to host the virus. Avoided getting
quarantined in HongKong by 4 hours, and quarantine in Manus Island, Aus by one phone
call.
There were 6 temperature checks and 4 police checks on route to HongKong Airport; arriving
in New Zealand expecting some major medical checks. None. Just 2 nurses at a deck asking if
we felt OK - handed a pamphlet and sent on our way. I did try to follow up but given official
discouragement. So NZ was asleep at the wheel for weeks, and just plain lucky. However, once
NZ woke up, the response was excellent; PM Jacinda Adern's speech was masterful and the
response excellent. We had only two CoVid cases yesterday, as we move into level 3.
There are big problems in economic recovery here, but the alternative scenarios would have
been far worse. And theres got to be a reason why various luxury private jets are turning up
unannounced and often unmarked at the airports here :-)
Each of your explanations are compelling in their own way.
A few things that your explanations left out (this is not meant to be a comprehensive
list):
The strange resignation/firing of John Bolton.
The strangely good timing of the ARAMACO IPO;
Trump's strange reversal of his stated intention to not do partial trade deals with
China - he did a partial deal in January a couple of weeks after the virus became
known;
The strange non-resistance by medical establishment to Trump's failure to respond - no
one resigned as the Trump dragged his feet.
IMO any theory of deliberate release should consider these points.
Bolton's was asked to leave the administration because he was involved in pushing
development of a virus which accidentally escaped the lab -OR- willingly left to give
Trump/Deep State a scapegoat in case it became known that the use of the virus was
deliberate? In either case, the virus was already "in the wild" ...
... which would explain why no medical professional resigned in Feb/March. It was never
going to be possible to contain the virus in the West.
This would also explain why virus discussion were classified.
Trump did a trade deal with China that he knew they would have trouble to satisfy the
terms of. The ARAMACO IPO - which had been delayed several times - came just about 6 weeks
before the new virus was identified. And it was done despite the Houthi attack on ARAMACO
facilities two months before (investors should've been very wary of the continuing war at
the super high valuation).
<> <> <> <> <>
PS I do know that New Zealand had a lock-down but they did that as soon as they found
'community spread' and their vigilance has allowed them to start lifting the lock-down after
only a short period.
As the usual suspects fret over the "stability" of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and
the Xi Jinping administration, the fact is the Beijing leadership has had to deal with an
accumulation of extremely severe issues: a swine-flu epidemic killing half the stock; the
Trump-concocted trade war; Huawei accused of racketeering and about to be prevented from
buying U.S. made chips; bird flu; coronavirus virtually shutting down half of China.
Add to it the incessant United States government Hybrid War propaganda barrage, trespassed
by acute Sinophobia; everyone from sociopathic "officials" to self-titled councilors are
either advising corporate businesses to divert global supply chains out of China or
concocting outright calls for regime change – with every possible demonization in
between.
There are no holds barred in the all-out offensive to kick the Chinese government while
it's down.
A Pentagon cipher at the Munich Security Conference once again declares China as the
greatest
threat , economically and militarily, to the U.S. – and by extension the West,
forcing a wobbly EU already subordinated to NATO to be subservient to Washington on this
remixed Cold War 2.0.
The whole U.S. corporate media complex repeats to exhaustion that Beijing is "lying" and
losing control. Descending to sub-gutter, racist levels, hacks even accuse BRI itself of
being a
pandemic , with China "impossible to quarantine".
All that is quite rich, to say the least, oozing from lavishly rewarded slaves of an
unscrupulous, monopolistic, extractive, destructive, depraved, lawless oligarchy which uses
debt offensively to boost their unlimited wealth and power while the lowly U.S. and global
masses use debt defensively to barely survive. As Thomas Piketty has conclusively shown,
inequality always relies on ideology.
We're deep into a vicious intel war. From the point of view of Chinese intelligence, the
current toxic cocktail simply cannot be attributed to just a random series of coincidences.
Beijing has serial motives to piece this extraordinary chain of events as part of a
coordinated Hybrid War, Full Spectrum Dominance attack on China.
Enter the Dragon Killer working hypothesis: a bio-weapon attack capable of causing immense
economic damage but protected by plausible deniability. The only possible move by the
"indispensable nation" on the New Great Game chessboard, considering that the U.S. cannot win
a conventional war on China, and cannot win a nuclear war on China.
A biological warfare weapon?
On the surface, coronavirus is a dream bio-weapon for those fixated on wreaking havoc
across China and praying for regime change.
Yet it's complicated.
This report is a decent effort trying to track the origins of coronavirus. Now compare it
with the insights by Dr. Francis Boyle, international law professor at the University of
Illinois and author, among others, of Biowarfare and Terrorism . He's the man who
drafted the U.S. Biological Weapons Anti-Terrorism Act of 1989 signed into law by George H.
W. Bush.
Dr. Boyle adds, "all these BSL-4 labs by United States, Europe, Russia, China, Israel are
all there to research, develop, test biological warfare agents. There's really no legitimate
scientific reason to have BSL-4 labs." His own research led to a whopping $100 billion, by
2015, spent by the United States government on bio-warfare research: "We have well over
13,000 alleged life science scientists testing biological weapons here in the United States.
Actually this goes back and it even precedes 9/11."
Dr. Boyle directly accuses "the Chinese government under Xi and his comrades" of a cover
up "from the get-go. The first reported case was December 1, so they'd been sitting on this
until they couldn't anymore. And everything they're telling you is a lie. It's
propaganda."
The World Health Organization (WHO), for Dr. Boyle, is also on it: "They've approved many
of these BSL-4 labs ( ) Can't trust anything the WHO says because they're all bought and paid
for by Big Pharma and they work in cahoots with the CDC, which is the United States
government, they work in cahoots with Fort
Detrick ." Fort Detrick, now a cutting-edge bio-warfare lab, previously was a notorious
CIA den of mind control "experiments".
Relying on decades of research in bio-warfare, the U.S. Deep State is totally familiar
with all bio-weapon overtones. From Dresden, Hiroshima and Nagasaki to Korea, Vietnam and
Fallujah, the historical record shows the United States government does not blink when it
comes to unleashing weapons of mass destruction on innocent civilians.
For its part, the Pentagon's Defense Advanced Research Project Agency (DARPA) has spent a
fortune researching bats, coronaviruses and gene-editing bio-weapons. Now, conveniently
– as if this was a form of divine intervention – DARPA's "strategic allies" have
been chosen to develop a genetic vaccine.
The 1996 neocon Bible, the Project for a New American Century (PNAC), unambiguously
stated, "advanced forms of biological warfare that can "target" specific genotypes may
transform biological warfare from the realm of terror to a politically useful tool."
There's no question coronavirus, so far, has been a Heaven-sent politically useful tool,
reaching, with minimum investment, the desired targets of maximized U.S. global power –
even if fleetingly, enhanced by a non-stop propaganda offensive – and China relatively
isolated with its economy semi paralyzed.
Yet perspective is in order. The CDC estimated that up to 42.9 million people got sick
during the 2018-2019 flu season in the U.S. No less than 647,000 people were hospitalized.
And 61,200 died.
This report
details the Chinese "people's war" against coronavirus.
It's up to Chinese virologists to decode its arguably synthetic origin. How China reacts,
depending on the findings, will have earth-shattering consequences – literally.
Setting the stage for the Raging Twenties
After managing to reroute trade supply chains across Eurasia to its own advantage and
hollow out the Heartland, American – and subordinated Western – elites are now
staring into a void. And the void is staring back. A "West" ruled by the U.S. is now faced
with irrelevance. BRI is in the process of reversing at least two centuries of Western
dominance.
There's no way the West and especially the "system leader" U.S.
will allow it. It all started with dirty ops stirring trouble across the periphery of Eurasia
– from Ukraine to Syria to Myanmar.
Now it's when the going really gets tough. The targeted assassination of Maj. Gen.
Soleimani plus coronavirus – the Wuhan flu – have really set up the stage for the
Raging Twenties. The designation of choice should actually be WARS – Wuhan Acute
Respiratory Syndrome. That would instantly give the game away as a War against Humanity
– irrespective of where it came from.
The USA has huge geographic advantages over China. We are separated from the world by the
Atlantic and Pacific oceans and bordered by two nations we are at peace with and who are no
threat to us. Our Founding Fathers recognized our geographic advantages from the start and
sought policies that took advantage of this. Today, our geographic situation is even more
secure than it was for much of our history.
China is bordered on all sides by rivals–Russia to the north, India to the south,
Japan and Taiwan boxing it in to the east, and Islamic states to the west. It has a long and
complex border it needs to defend from rivals and a relatively small coastline that offers
complications due to the many nations it shares seaways with. The USA has none of these
disadvantages.
America's current disadvantages and decline stem from policies that have been put in place
over the 20th century by elites who replaced the traditional American policies that made us
the richest and freest nation on Earth with globalist policies that use America's advantages
in ways that harm the average American and people all around the world. These elites usurped
our financial system, government, media and academia and have been trading away our wealth
and freedom for wars and economic imperialism in pursuit of non-American globalist goals.
Reversing American decline and increasing the prosperity and freedom of the average
American is a simple matter in regards to policy:
1. Return to the American System of economics as advocated by Alexander Hamilton, George
Washington, Abraham Lincoln, etc., as opposed to the English System of "free trade" that our
elites adopted after WWII. That means ending our current "free trade" policy and replacing it
with high tariffs on imports to protect American industry from overseas competition. Increase
tariffs and end the income tax. That was our trade policy before 1913 and what made us the
richest economy on Earth with the world's highest standard of living.
2. End our current foreign policy of interventionism abroad and replace it with neutrality
in foreign affairs and non-interventionism abroad as advocated by George Washington. End all
foreign wars, shut down American military bases overseas and bring the troops home. End all
entangling alliances like NATO and instead refocus the American military on defending the
North American continent only. We can do this easily with a strong Navy and Air Force based
at home and a small Army made up mostly of reservists. This would bring us greater national
security and enormous savings. "Isolationism" is a slur used by warmongers to brainwash
Americans into dying in overseas wars fought for foreign interests. That word should be
recognized as such. If China wants rocks in the South China Sea or Russia has border
conflicts with Ukraine or Israel has conflicts with its neighbors, that really is none of our
business and not something Americans should die over. That's their business not ours.
3. End mass immigration. America is the third most populous country on Earth after China
and India. We don't need more people. Immigration has lowered wages in the USA, increased
costs for such things as housing and education, increased pollution, increased traffic and
sprawl, etc. Immigration benefits the rich who want cheap labor and harms American citizens,
not to mention fills our country with people who have loyalties to other parts of the world,
not to our nation. End immigration and our standard of living will rise and the American way
of life will be preserved.
4. Kill the Federal Reserve and replace it with a U.S. Monetary Council with members
appointed by Congress. This U.S. Monetary Council should be based on American principles and
the U.S. Constitution with transparency and accountability to the electorate, tasked to
regulate the American money supply to benefit American commerce and the needs of the people,
unlike our current system that benefits a small clique of usurers, speculators and corporate
insiders that the Fed serves today.
These are simple policies that worked in the past. The difficulty is in enacting them due
to the current political climate and the monopoly the globalists have over our financial
system, media and academia. They have an army of think tank propagandists and lobbyists
working relentlessly to keep the current policies of "free trade," mass immigration, foreign
interventionism, overseas wars, and their destructive Federal Reserve in place.
The globalists are highly organized and have infinite monetary resources. The only way to
overcome them is through organization and action.
But America's own societal information system is vastly more skilled and experienced in
shaping reality to meet the needs of business and government leaders, and this very success
does tremendous damage to our country.
This is a very important insight. A hypertrophied media machine in the service of the
"elite" makes them dumber, greedier and less competent with time while the fortress they've
built turns into a house of cards. We need a reset – badly.
YOU are completely MISreading the events so yo miss the target by 90% NO it wasnt the
Russians . neither the Chinese..
IT was the FREEtraders NEOcons from Wallstreet and CFR, that transfer all american
manufacturing overseas (china) deabsing the dollar into fiat money, banktupted the USA
traesury The USA is entering its Byzanntyne Empire pahse a Spartan roque millitary nation
while inploding intrenally the Angloamerican zionists already ecided toi amke China de first
world power
@Anonymous How should I describe it? The Chinese Communist Party has formed a plutarchy
and an oligopoly "with Chinese characteristics".
Sometime before the 20th century closed, there was a term coined: the "Princelings". These
were the extravagantly wealthy offspring of many of the leadership of the CCP, and
grandchildren of the men who endured the "Long March".
"Genocide" is a term that is broadly applied to what is more accurately described as
"ethnic cleansing". The Hans have taken over Tibet and Xin Jiang, and have oppressed the
locals in a ruthless manner, that is comparable to what the Jews have done to
Palestinians.
Systematically, the Chinese are converting the indigenous populations of poorer countries
into indentured servants. These countries are so indebted to their Chinese "benefactors" that
they have no hope for redemption, unless the Chinese are prepared to forgive the loans. So
far, the Chinese have not been disposed to do so.
The effect and the consequence of these developments are close enough to warrant the
comparison.
"The vicious virus, the polarization of US politics and deepening international
divergences have plunged humanity into unprecedented uncertainties. A jumbled,
irresponsible and impulsive US greatly enhanced the risks the world is facing.
"What's worse, the US did not engage in any reflection, and the inability of its
government was only attributed to partisanship. The anti-China element in its public
opinion has been brewing with the instigation of the administration and some politicians.
This has greatly crumbled the US' self-correction ability.
"The harm on humanity caused by a virus, no matter how frightening it is, only remains
at the physical level. But the US destruction at the political level is amplifying this
crisis that endangers global governance. Even if the pandemic is put under control,
humanity has to face the turbulence post-pandemic. Such dual uncertainties have gone
beyond the imagination of people even with their decades of living experience."
IMO and contrary to the editorial's conclusion, "populist politics" had nothing to do
with Trump's beyond mediocre response; rather, it's all been ideological beginning with
the utter lack of preparation.
Is the troop deployment along the Canadian border is to stop anyone interfering in the
coming chaos?
Posted by: Ian2 | Mar 26 2020 20:34 utc | 36
You have a point there --the coming chaos after the COVID-19 Health crisis.
Wondering if Trudeau knows about the fences that were erected this morning?
Maybe I missed Trump's tweet on his declaration of War.
- He has imposed more sanctions on Iranians.
- Indicted Maduro of Venezuela on narco trafficking, sponsor of terrorism; placed a $15
million bounty on his head --straight from the Panama playbook.
and this beauty - continues his trade war on China because -----
(Reuters) - Senior officials in the Trump administration agreed to new measures to
restrict the global supply of chips to China's Huawei Technologies, sources familiar with
the matter said, as the White House ramps up criticism of China over coronavirus.
The move comes as ties between Washington and Beijing grow more strained, with both
sides trading barbs over who is to blame for the spread of the disease and an escalating
tit-for-tat over the expulsion of journalists from both countries.
Under the proposed rule change, foreign companies that use U.S. chipmaking equipment
would be required to obtain a U.S. license before supplying certain chips to Huawei. The
Chinese telecoms company was blacklisted last year, limiting the company's
suppliers.[.]
"This is going to have a far more negative impact on U.S. companies than it will on Huawei,
because Huawei will develop their own supply chain," trade lawyer Doug Jacobson said.
"Ultimately, Huawei will find alternatives."[.]
Huawei has been doing just that - finding alternatives. Trade wars have been proven to end
badly. They end up going hot.
Here was me thinking the Western elites wanted to continue making money on Chinese
growth.
Much of the US elite is sinecured in the media, foreign policy, and national security
state establishments, whose status depends on the relative power and prestige of the US
state. The relative power and prestige of the US state is jeopardized by the continued growth
of China.
If you follow US coverage of China in the US, you'll find that this US elite is generally
critical of China, although style and presentation vary. The liberal "China watchers" among
the US elite in the media and foreign policy establishment tend to focus on human rights,
democracy promotion, and liberalism as vectors to attack the Chinese state. They tend to be
polished and more subtle rather than explicitly hostile.
The US elite in the national security establishment tend to be more overt about military
containment and or confrontation with China, and on developing an anti-China coalition in the
Pacific.
"Perhaps this will finally burst the out-of-control asset price bubble and drop-kick the
Outlaw US Empire's economy into the sewer as the much lower price will rapidly slow the
recycling of what remains of the petrodollar. Looks like Trump's reelection push just fell
into a massive sinkhole as the economy will tank."
Posted by: karlof1 | Mar 9 2020 1:29 utc | 49
....
Call me crazy- but this Virus provides great cover as to why the economy plummets, the
Murikan sheeple will eat it up. Prepare for the double media blitz on the virus AND the
economy tanking as its result.
Don't worry...just continue to go shopping and take those selfies.
It will be hard for the American people to swallow that one. From day 1 I've read a lot of
"articles" and "papers" from know-it-all Western doctors and researchers from commenters here
in this blog, all of them claiming to have very precise and definitive data on what was
happening. A lot of bombastic conclusions I've read here (including one that claimed R0 was
through the roof - it's funny how the R0 is being played down after it begun to infect the
West; suddenly, it's all just a stronger cold...).
And that's just here, in MoA's comment section. Imagine what was being published in the
Western MSM. I wouldn't be surprised there was a lot of rednecks popping their beers
celebrating the fall of China already.
Since China allegedly had a lot of idle industrial capacity - that is, if we take the
Western MSM theories seriously (including the fabled "ghost towns" stories) - then boosting
production wouldn't be a problem to China.
Disclaimer: it's normal for any kind of economy - socialist or capitalist - to have a
certain percentage of idle capacity. That's necessary in order to insure the economy against
unexpected oscillations in demand and to give space of maneuvre for future technological
progress. Indeed, that was one of the USSR's mistakes with its economy: they instinctly
thought unemployment should be zero, and waste should also be zero, so they planned in a way
all the factories always sought to operate at 100% capacity. That became a problem when
better machines and better methods were invented, since the factory manager wouldn't want to
stop production so that his factory would fall behind the other factories in the five-year
plan's goals. So, yes, China indeed has idle capacity - but it is mainly proposital, not a
failure of its socialist planning.
By the latest count, in addition to yuan loans worth 113 billion U.S. dollars granted by
financial institutions and more than 70 billion U.S. dollars paid out by insurance companies,
the Chinese government has allocated about 13 billion U.S. dollars to counter fallout from
the outbreak.
The numbers could look abstract. However, breaking the data down reveals how the money is
being carefully targeted. The government is allocating the money based on a thorough
evaluation of the system's strengths.
...
Local governments are equipped with more local knowledge that allows them to surgically
support key manufacturers or producers that are struggling.
Together, they have borne the bulk of the financial responsibility with an allocation of
equivalently more than nine billion U.S. dollars. It is carefully targeted, divided into
hundreds of thousands of individual grants that are tailor-made by and for each county, town,
city and business.
This is the mark of a socialist system.
The affected capitalist countries will simply use monetary devices (so the private sector
can offset the losses) and burn their own reserves with non-profitable palliatives such as
masks, tests, other quarantine infrastructure etc.
Sounds like US socialism. Basically corporate socialism. Loans are just dollars created out
of thin air, same as in US. Insurance payouts come from premiums, nothing socialist about
that, pure capitalism. Government hand outs to provinces, cities, state owned
corporations,well all of these are run by the party elite, its called pork. US handed out a
lot of pork during the last financial crisis. None of it trickled down to the little people.
I doubt it does in China either.
All crisis are opportunities for the elite to get richer. Those Biolake firms in Wuhan
will make out like bandits. Chinese firms will double the price of API's sold to India and
US. China will knock out the small farmer in the wake of concurrent chicken and swine flu so
the big enterprises take over, a mimicry of the US practice over the last century. China tech
firms will double up on surveillance apps, censoring tools, surveillance and toughen up
social credit restrictions. 5G will allow China to experiment with nanobots to monitor
citizens health from afar (thanks to Harvards Dr Leiber).
Oh yes, socialism with Chinese characteristics is a technocratic capitalists dream. Thats
why the West has never imposed sanctions on China since welcoming them to the global elites
club. Sanctions are reserved for those with true socialism, especially those who preach
equality and god forbid, democracy.
Call me crazy- but this Virus provides great cover as to why the economy plummets, the
Murikan sheeple will eat it up. Prepare for the double media blitz on the virus AND the
economy tanking as its result.
Don't forget the Russians.. They have to be to blame. See they just kept the price of oil low
so now the rest of the world gets gas cheaper than the USA. The USA motorist now has to bail
out the dopey frackers and shale oil ponzis.
Global envy will eat murica. Maybe they will just pull out all their troops and go home.
;)
As far as I know, no one here has mentioned that because of the
globalization drive by Clinton, Bush, and Obama, 85% of the medicines
used in the United States are manufactured in China. Even U.S. troops
depend on medicines from China! China could bring the entire health
system in the U.S. to a stop in a matter of months. This is what our inept
elites have done to America – they gave away the shop. People are beginning
to realize that manufacturing our own medicines is a matter of national
security but it'll take years to bring the factories back to the U.S. So
much for globalization.
Rod Dreher's blog IMHO is the best source for quick info on the coronavirus
because he is in touch with American M.D.'s who are married to women
from China who in turn are in contact with relatives at home and the Chinese
media. Of course, Rod himself can be hysterical at times but, apparently,
that's what it takes to have a successful blog. The M.D.'s are reporting
that the U.S. is already beginning to run out of certain medications, and
recommend stocking up on the basic necessities, i.e., recommend assuming
the mental framework of the survivalists – have plenty of canned goods, etc
and refill your prescriptions ASAP. This is what many people here seem to
forget – the coronavirus's indirect effects due to having no access to medications
may be much worse than the direct pathogenic effects.
"... the American-led takedown of the post-World War II international system has shattered long-standing rules and norms of behavior. ..."
"... The combination of disorder at home and abroad is spawning changes that are increasingly disadvantageous to the United States. With Congress having essentially walked off the job, there is a need for America's universities to provide the information and analysis of international best practices that the political system does not. ..."
I think this would be very informative for anybody seriously interested in the USA foreign
policy. Listening to him is so sad to realize that instead of person of his caliber we have
Pompous Pompeo, who forever is frozen on the level of a tank repair mechanical engineer, as
the Secretary of State.
Published on Feb 24, 2020
In the United States and other democracies, political and economic systems still work in
theory, but not in practice. Meanwhile, the American-led takedown of the post-World War II
international system has shattered long-standing rules and norms of behavior.
The combination of disorder at home and abroad is spawning changes that are increasingly
disadvantageous to the United States. With Congress having essentially walked off the job,
there is a need for America's universities to provide the information and analysis of
international best practices that the political system does not.
Ambassador Chas W. Freeman, Jr. is a senior fellow at Brown University's Watson
Institute for International and Public Affairs, a former U.S. Assistant Secretary of
Defense, ambassador to Saudi Arabia (during operations Desert Shield and Desert Storm),
acting Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs, and Chargé d'affaires at
both Bangkok and Beijing. He began his diplomatic career in India but specialized in
Chinese affairs. (He was the principal American interpreter during President Nixon's visit
to Beijing in 1972.)
Ambassador Freeman is a much sought-after public speaker (see http://chasfreeman.net ) and the author of several
well-received books on statecraft and diplomacy. His most recent book, America's Continuing
Misadventures in the Middle East was published in May 2016. Interesting Times: China,
America, and the Shifting Balance of Prestige, appeared in March 2013. America's
Misadventures in the Middle East came out in 2010, as did the most recent revision of The
Diplomat's Dictionary, the companion volume to Arts of Power: Statecraft and Diplomacy. He
was the editor of the Encyclopedia Britannica entry on "diplomacy."
Chas Freeman studied at the Universidad Nacional Autónoma de México and in
Taiwan, and earned an AB magna cum laude from Yale University as well as a JD from the
Harvard Law School.
He chairs Projects International, Inc., a Washington-based firm that for more than three
decades has helped its American and foreign clients create ventures across borders,
facilitating their establishment of new businesses through the design, negotiation,
capitalization, and implementation of greenfield investments, mergers and acquisitions,
joint ventures, franchises, one-off transactions, sales and agencies in other
countries.
He is the author of several books including the most recent
Interesting times: China, America, and the shifting balance of prestige
(2013)
In unusually blunt statements, top Chinese officials hit back during last weekend's Munich Security Conference at Washington's
confrontational stance toward Beijing on a range of issues, including the Chinese tech giant Huawei and China's response to the coronavirus.
Trump administration officials, supported to the hilt by top Democrats, took a particularly aggressive attitude at the conference,
warning European powers that intelligence sharing could end if Huawei equipment were used in building 5G telecommunications networks.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo branded "Huawei and other Chinese state-backed tech companies" as "Trojan horses for Chinese
intelligence." In his speech, US Defence Secretary Mark Esper accused Beijing of carrying out a "nefarious strategy" through Huawei.
In a bid to intensify its pressure on its European allies, the US last week announced new charges of racketeering and theft of
trade secrets against Huawei. These follow the arrest of the company's chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, in Canada last year
after the US filed charges of fraud and sanctions evasion, and sought her extradition.
Esper made clear that the US attack on China was across the board. He declared that under President Xi Jinping's rule, "the Chinese
Communist Party is heading even faster and further in the wrong direction -- more internal repression, more predatory economic practices,
more heavy-handedness, and most concerning for me, a more aggressive military posture."
Asked about the speeches by Pompeo and Esper, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi did not mince words, branding the US allegations
as "lies." He said their remarks were part of "a common scenario" everywhere they went. "I don't want to waste our time responding
to each and every thing they've said. The thing I want to say is that all these accusations against China are lies and not based
on facts."
Wang pointed to the driving force behind the confrontation -- the US drive to ensure its continued global domination by every
available means. "The root cause of all these problems and issues is that the US does not want to see the rapid development and rejuvenation
of China, still less would they want to accept the success of a socialist country, but that is not fair, China has the right to develop."
China, with its burgeoning markets, stock exchanges, billionaires and deep social divide, is not a socialist country. In fact,
Huawei, as Wang said in countering US criticism, is a privately-owned company: the world's largest telecommunications equipment provider
with nearly 200,000 employees.
Wang described the US attack on Huawei as "immoral" and asked: "Why can't America accept that other countries' companies can also
display their talent in the economy, in technology? Perhaps deep down, it doesn't hope to see other countries develop." He accused
the US of resorting to rumours to defame Huawei and declared there was no credible evidence that the company has a so-called back
door that harms US security.
The US accusations against China and Huawei are utterly hypocritical. The revelations by the whistleblower Edward Snowden demonstrated
that the US routinely spies electronically on the world's population, including governments and government leaders, allies and rivals
alike, as well as its own citizens.
The US intelligence establishment has long relied on electronic "back doors" provided by American tech corporations to gather
intelligence. The use of Huawei equipment not only threatens the economic position of US companies, but could undermine US spying
operations.
China's forthright push back against heavy US criticism in Munich stems firstly from the relentless campaign by Washington, not
only in propaganda, but through trade war measures and a huge military build-up in Asia against Beijing. Secondly, the Chinese regime
is seeking support from the European powers. Wang's comments gained traction in Munich amid deepening conflicts between the US and
its erstwhile European allies.
Britain has given the go-ahead for the inclusion of Huawei components in non-core aspects of its 5G rollout, while Germany and
France have signaled they will do the same. The European decisions are largely driven by technical and economic factors, as Huawei
is a leader in 5G technology and produces at a lower cost.
Washington's threats to end intelligence-sharing arrangements with the European powers could end up affecting US spying operations
as much as those of its European rivals. The New York Times
The US has sought to exploit the coronavirus outbreak in China to add to the barrage of criticism against Beijing. Trump's
economic adviser Larry Kudlow last week complained about the lack of Chinese transparency over the disease. He declared that Washington
was disappointed that American health experts had not been allowed into China, and questioned Chinese statistics.
A considerable portion of Wang's speech to the Munich Security Conference was devoted to defending China's handling of the
outbreak. He said the coronavirus largely had been confined to the city of Wuhan and Hubei Province, and the number of cases outside
China was a small percentage of the total. Wang said this was the outcome of the rapid development of a test for the virus, the dispatch
of 20,000 health workers to the area and the building of new health facilities.
Wang said: "In the spirit of openness and transparency, we promptly notified the world about the outbreak and shared the genetic
sequence of the virus. We have been working closely with WHO [World Health Organisation], invited international experts to join our
ranks, and provided assistance and facilitation to foreign nationals in China."
In comments to Reuters, the Chinese foreign minister effectively criticised the harsh travel restrictions imposed by the US
on any foreign nationals coming from China. "Some countries have stepped up measures, including quarantine measures, which are reasonable
and understandable, but for some countries they have overreacted which has triggered unnecessary panic," he said.
If Washington expected European support on the issue, its hopes were dashed. Conference chairman Wolfgang Ischinger praised
China's response to the epidemic and declared it was "not getting a very fair deal I think China deserves a little bit of compassion
and cooperation, and encouragement rather than only criticism."
China's reaction to the US criticisms in Munich underscores again the sharpening geo-political rivalries and break-up of longstanding
alliances being fueled by worsening global economic conditions. Far from responding to the lack of support from Europe against China
by moderating its confrontation, the US will intensify its provocative campaign, not just against Beijing, but any threat to its
global position, including from its European allies.
That such cynicism was wholly justified became evident when Edward Snowden revealed the NSA
machinations. Soon thereafter Juniper Networks, a provider of large backbone equipment, was
found to
have at least two NSA backdoors in its operation system. Other 'western' telecommunication
equipment companies were similarly manipulated :
Even neutral countries firms are not off-limits to NSA manipulations. A former Crypto AG
employee confirmed that high-level US officials approached neutral European countries and
argued that their cooperation was essential to the Cold War struggle against the Soviets. The
NSA allegedly received support from cryptographic companies Crypto AG and Gretag AG in
Switzerland, Transvertex in Sweden, Nokia in Finland, and even newly-privatized firms in
post-Communist Hungary. In 1970, according to a secret German BND intelligence paper,
supplied to the author, the Germans planned to "fuse" the operations of three cryptographic
firms-Crypto AG, Grattner AG (another Swiss cipher firm), and Ericsson of Sweden.
So why was the allegedly secret CIA history of an already known story leaked right now? And
why was it also leaked to a German TV station?
If you want to understand why the US intelligence community is so freaked out about Huawei,
it's because they've been playing the same game for decades.
The warmed up Crypto AG story is a subtle smear piece against Huawei and Kapersky.
The U.S. wants to convince European countries to not buy Huawei products for their 5G
networks. It wants to remind them that telecommunication products can be manipulated. It wants
to instill fear that China would use Huawei to spy on foreign countries just like the U.S. used
Crypto AG.
This is also the reason for this recent misleading Reuters headline which the story
itself debunked:
"At the end of 2019, intelligence was passed to us by the U.S., according to which Huawei is
proven to have been cooperating with China's security authorities," the newspaper quoted a
confidential foreign ministry document as saying.
'U.S. intelligence' that is handed over to manipulate someone is of course not 'proof' for
anything.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared the Chinese Communist Party "the central threat of
our times" on Thursday, even as he sought to talk up the prospects of a United States trade
deal with Britain, which rebuffed American pressure to ban a Chinese company from future
telecommunications infrastructure.
The scathing criticism of the Chinese government was the strongest language Mr. Pompeo has
used as the Trump administration seeks to convince American allies of the risks posed by
using equipment from Huawei, a Chinese technology giant.
A week after Pompeo's panic message Trump took to the phone to convince Boris Johnson who
was
not impressed :
Donald Trump's previously close relationship with UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson looks close
to collapse, following new revelations that the president slammed down the phone on him.
Trump's behaviour during last week's call was described by officials as
„apoplectic," and Johnson has now reportedly shelved plans for an imminent visit to
Washington.
...
The call, which one source described to the Financial Times as „very difficult," came
after Johnson defied Trump and allowed Chinese telecoms company Huawei the rights to develop
the UK's 5G network.
Trump's fury was triggered by Johnson backing Huawei despite multiple threats by Trump and
his allies that the United States would withdraw security co-operation with the UK if the
deal went ahead.
Trump's threats reportedly „irritated" the UK government, with Johnson frustrated at
the president's failure to suggest any alternatives to the deal.
Huawei products are pretty good, relatively cheap and readily available. They are just as
buggy as the products of other equipment providers. The real reason why the U.S. does not want
anyone to buy Huawei products is that it is the one large network company the U.S. can not
convince to provide it with backdoors.
European countries do not fear China or even Chinese spying. They know that the U.S. is
doing similar on a much larger scale. Europeans do not see China as a threat and they do not
want to get involved in the escalating U.S.-China spat:
"Whose side should your country take in a conflict between the US and China?" Source - bigger
The U.S. just
indicted four Chinese military officers for the 2017 hacking of Equifax during which
millions of addresses and financial data were stolen. The former CIA Director General Michael
Hayden
had defended such pilfering as "honorable espionage" and Equifax had made it laughably easy
to
get into its systems :
[J]ust five days after Equifax went public with its breach -- KrebsOnSecurity broke the news
that the administrative account for a separate Equifax dispute resolution portal catering to
consumers in Argentina was wide open, protected by perhaps the most easy-to-guess password
combination ever: "admin/admin."
To indict foreign military officers for spying when they simply pilfered barely protected
servers is seen as offensive. What will the U.S. do when China does likewise?
Every nation spies. It is one of the oldest trades in this world. That the U.S. is making
such a fuss about putative Chinese spying when it itself is the biggest sinner is unbecoming.
Posted by b on February 11, 2020 at 18:52 UTC |
Permalink
thanks b...no shortage of hypocrisy in all this...
regarding @ 4 mike r which @8 ian2 linked properly to, i enjoyed the last paragraph which
i think sums it up well.. here it is..
"I continue to believe that the United States cannot effectively restrict the spread of a
technology under Chinese leadership without offering a superior product of its own. The fact
that the United States has attempted to suppress Huawei's market leadership in the absence of
any American competitor in this field is one of the oddest occurrences in the history of US
foreign policy. If the US were to announce something like a Manhattan Project for 5G
broadband and solicit the cooperation of its European and Asian allies, it probably would get
an enthusiastic response. As matters stand, America's efforts to stop Huawei have become an
embarrassment."
The reason European customers trust Huawei is because Huawei uses open-source software or at
least makes their code available for inspection by customers.
Closed-source software cannot provide secrecy or security. This was vividly demonstrated
last month when
NSA revealed a critical vulnerability in Windows 10 that rendered any cryptographic
security worthless.
Rashid's simulated attack exploits CVE-2020-0601, the critical vulnerability that
Microsoft patched on Tuesday after receiving a private tipoff from the NSA. As Ars
reported, the flaw can completely break certificate validation for websites, software
updates, VPNs, and other security-critical computer uses. It affects Windows 10 systems,
including server versions Windows Server 2016 and Windows Server 2019. Other versions of
Windows are unaffected.
The flaw involves the way the new versions of Windows check the validity of certificates
that use elliptic-curve cryptography. While the vulnerable Windows versions check three ECC
parameters, they fail to verify a fourth, crucial one, which is known as a base point
generator and is often represented in algorithms as 'G.' This failure is a result of
Microsoft's implementation of ECC rather than any flaw or weakness in the ECC algorithms
themselves.
The attacker examines the specific ECC algorithm used to generate the root-certificate
public key and proceeds to craft a private key that copies all of the certificate
parameters for that algorithm except for the point generator. Because vulnerable Windows
versions fail to check that parameter, they accept the private key as valid. With that, the
attacker has spoofed a Windows-trusted root certificate that can be used to mint any
individual certificate used for authentication of websites, software, and other sensitive
properties.
I do not believe this vulnerability was a bug. It is more likely a backdoor intentionally
left in the code for NSA to utilize. Whatever the case, NSA must have known about it for
years. Why did they reveal it now? Most likely someone else had discovered the back door and
may have been about to publish it.
(I
commented on these same issues on Sputnik a few weeks ago.)
The other possible US objection is that Huawei will only let their customers spy, not third
countries.
Posted by: Paul Cockshott | Feb 11 2020 21:57 utc | 24
It reminds me a joke about Emperor Napoleon arriving in a town. The population, the
notables and the mayor are greeting him, and the Emperor says "No gun salute, hm?". Mayor
replies "Sire, we have twenty reasons. Fist, we have canons", "Enough", replied Napoleon.
Isn't the "other possible US objection" exactly "Enough"? Of course, USA is not a mere
"third country", USA is the rule maker of rule based international order.
Last year I was so mad at USA bulling Huawei and ZTE, decided to buy a Huawei Honor View
V20 PCT-L29 Smartphone. Global version on T-Mobile network . Still fumbling
at the setting. This smartphone installed GPS and BeiDou (BDS). I never used Google searches
but instead DuckDuckGo long ago
I'm amazed that Chief Poodle Boris did not obediently obey His Master's Voice.
What is going on?
I could understand if this was DNC/CIA-MI6 passing orders down the line (a la Skripal) to
upset Trump but the US Intel Community has no interest in such a snub from the UK Govt.
Obviously this isn't the UK Govt asserting their independence from US instruction because
such a thing has never happened in my lifetime.
Wierd.
Anyway, too bad I won't be able to read the thread on my phone tomorrow as Bruce has just
broken the thread with his million-character link. :-(
I'm amazed that Chief Poodle Boris did not obediently obey His Master's Voice.
What is going on?
Posted by: Ash Naz | Feb 12 2020 0:20 utc | 39
However I cringe and the obedient vassals, and Boris who may well be the Chief Poodle,
given that exceedingly cute Justin is from another breed, Newtrumplander. But even poodles
have privacy concerns, you know? What you web surf, what you buy, whom do you send gifts and
WHAT gifts (dominatrix set?). However you trust NSA to use all that info solely for good
causes, well, you know, not everyone is an exhibitionist...
I'm amazed that Chief Poodle Boris did not obediently obey His Master's Voice.
Posted by: Ash Naz | Feb 12 2020 0:20 utc | 32
The reason is said to be that they've already bought and installed a lot of the
Huawei equipment, and the new decision is just a fake, to justify the position.
The reason is said to be that they've already bought and installed a lot of the Huawei
equipment, and the new decision is just a fake, to justify the position.
The financial angle makes sense, but what is the price of disobedience?
@Piotr Berman:
But even poodles have privacy concerns
The preventing blackmail angle makes sense too
And how useful to be able to use blackmail to get allies to jump when ordered? It's often
said that Washington has no real friends, just obedient vassals.
It would appear to me that the UK, by allowing Huawei (limited) access to their market,
are achieving several advantageous outcomes.
1) They are preventing potential for a duopoly of Eriksson & Nokia on the hardware by
allowing a third player into the market.
2) By only allowing a maximum of 35% of the market share, they prevent Huawei from quickly
out-competing the others on price and capturing a monopoly.
3) They are only allowing access to the network comm's market, and not the core of the
system, which may or may not protect against unwanted data capture and intrusion (by exactly
whom remains the question - as per the article above).
4) It allows the four main network providers (especially EE, owned by BT) and the
accompanying state surveillance apparatus the ability to familiarise themselves with Huawei
tech/code/vulnerabilities which may be invaluable going forward. On this point alone, the USA
(and Australia, among others) are doing themselves a great disservice by missing out on a
learning experience from arguably the world leader in this technology.
As md|Feb 12 2020 8:29 utc|44 alluded to, they are claiming to allow clintele access to
all code (and the freedom to modify it as desired). So denying them access to a particular
market only hinders the technical understanding of the technology and its implementation,
leaving such states behind.
The USA (and its' vassal client states) once again shoot themselves in the foot in a vain
attempt to create and re-create the archetypal "boogeyman" for the populace to wring their
hands over and keep them up at night. Fools.
I enjoy David Goldman (Spengler) article at Asia Times. He accurately notes the vast lead
Huawei/China has and then provides "but we can do something" bromides. What do mean "we",
kimosabe?
Per a quote from Newt Gingrich's book ""Trump vs. China: Facing America's Greatest Threat",
quoted recently by David Goldman. Gingrich didn't say who was the greatest threat, Trump or
China.
"It is not China's fault that in 2017, 89% of Baltimore eighth graders couldn't pass their
math exam
"It is not China's fault that too few Americans in K-12 and in college study math and
science to fill the graduate schools with future American scientists
"It is not China's fault that, faced with a dramatic increase in Chinese graduate students
in science, the government has not been able to revive programs like the 1958 National
Defense Education Act
"It is not China's fault the way our defense bureaucracy functions serves to create
exactly the 'military-industrial complex' that President Dwight Eisenhower warned about
"It is not China's fault that NASA has been so bureaucratic and its funding so erratic
that there is every reason to believe that China is catching up rapidly and may outpace us.
This is because of us not because of them
"It is not China's fault that the old, bureaucratic, entrenched American
telecommunications companies failed to develop a global strategy for 5G over the 11 years
that the Chinese company Huawei has been working to become a world leader "
Here is another Orwellian irony that has been forgotten down the MemoryHole.
Way back in 2014, Edward Snowden revealed that the Americans (and the NSA in particular)
were spying on Huawei dating back to at least 2007.
This American spying occurred before the current national security hysterics about Huawei,
indeed, before most people in the USA had even heard of the company itself.
As this article states,
"In the final analysis, the NSA spying campaign against Huawei has two fundamental
purposes. First, Huawei (unlike the American telecommunications companies) does not allow the
NSA free access to its infrastructure to conduct spying on its products' users. Accordingly,
as part of its mission of spying on the entire world's population, the NSA hacked into
Huawei's systems in order to gather information traveling through its infrastructure.
Second, the spying campaign against Huawei is part of broader efforts to protect the
profits and interests of American telecommunications companies at the expense of Huawei. This
is the purpose of the NSA's particular interest in Huawei's executives and their 'leadership
plans and intentions.'"
The other possible US objection is that Huawei will only let their customers spy, not third
countries.
Posted by: Paul Cockshott | Feb 11 2020 21:57 utc | 20
So it seems. In the words of Ren Zhengfei 'When we transfer the tech, they can modify code
on top of my tech, once that's through, it's not only shielded from me, it's shielded from
everyone else in the world US 5G will be their own thing, there's no security concern, the
only concern will be the U.S. keeping American companies (which bought it) in check.'
This corona virus panic is interesting. RT has an interesting piece that points out that
corona virus has been officially recognized in some 8,000 odd people and 200 odd people have
died from it, we need a sense of perspective. World wide seasonal flu, kills between 350,000
and 600,000 people each year. Tuberculosis kills over 1,000,000 people each year. Malaria
kills a similar number. AIDS killed over 500,000 last year. And we're panicking about 200 or
so?
Just had an email from a company I deal with in China, the relevant passages-
2. The company has been following instructions from the Chinese government to postpone
the Spring Festival holiday to Feb. 9th, 2020 if not any further postpone. But, we believe
most of our services should be provided as usual since then.
5. We also would like your attention that there's yet no evidence or cases to support
the transmission of the novel coronavirus through packages or imported goods. According to
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) of the US, because of poor survivability
of these coronaviruses on surfaces, there is likely very low risk of spread from products or
packaging that are shipped over a period of days or weeks at ambient temperatures. The
National Health Commission of the People's Republic of China advises that coronavirus is
spread most often by respiratory droplets from one person to another, regular packages from
Wuhan can be received as usual. Reference links are attached as the footnote below for your
references.[1]
6. The Company will take proactive measures like ultraviolet light to ensure a safe and
healthy environment of its warehouse. Disinfection work will be conducted before each
delivery.
"... The Americans are the ones who destroyed the country and wreaked havoc on it. They have refused to finish building the electrical system and infrastructure projects. They have bargained for the reconstruction of Iraq in exchange for Iraq giving up 50% of oil imports. So, I refused and decided to go to China and concluded an important and strategic agreement with it. Today, Trump is trying to cancel this important agreement. ..."
"... After my return from China, Trump called me and asked me to cancel the agreement, so I also refused, and he threatened [that there would be] massive demonstrations to topple me. Indeed, the demonstrations started and then Trump called, threatening to escalate in the event of non-cooperation and responding to his wishes, whereby a third party [presumed to be mercenaries or U.S. soldiers] would target both the demonstrators and security forces and kill them from atop the highest buildings and the US embassy in an attempt to pressure me and submit to his wishes and cancel the China agreement." ..."
"... It could also explain why President Trump is so concerned about China's growing foothold in Iraq, since it risks causing not only the end of the U.S. military hegemony in the country but could also lead to major trouble for the petrodollar system and the U.S.' position as a global financial power. Trump's policy aimed at stopping China and Iraq's growing ties is clearly having the opposite effect, showing that this administration's "gangster diplomacy" only serves to make the alternatives offered by countries like China and Russia all the more attractive. ..."
After the feed was cut, MPs who were present wrote down Abdul-Mahdi's remarks, which were
then given to the Arabic news outlet Ida'at .
Per that transcript , Abdul-Mahdi stated that:
The Americans are the ones who destroyed the country and wreaked havoc on it. They
have refused to finish building the electrical system and infrastructure projects. They have
bargained for the reconstruction of Iraq in exchange for Iraq giving up 50% of oil imports.
So, I refused and decided to go to China and concluded an important and strategic agreement
with it. Today, Trump is trying to cancel this important agreement. "
Abdul-Mahdi continued his remarks, noting that pressure from the Trump administration over
his negotiations and subsequent dealings with China grew substantially over time, even
resulting in death threats to himself and his defense minister:
After my return from China, Trump called me and asked me to cancel the agreement, so I
also refused, and he threatened [that there would be] massive demonstrations to topple me.
Indeed, the demonstrations started and then Trump called, threatening to escalate in the
event of non-cooperation and responding to his wishes, whereby a third party [presumed to be
mercenaries or U.S. soldiers] would target both the demonstrators and security forces and
kill them from atop the highest buildings and the US embassy in an attempt to pressure me and
submit to his wishes and cancel the China agreement."
"I did not respond and submitted my resignation and the Americans still insist to this day
on canceling the China agreement. When the defense minister said that those killing the
demonstrators was a third party, Trump called me immediately and physically threatened myself
and the defense minister in the event that there was more talk about this third party."
Very few English language outlets
reported on Abdul-Mahdi's comments. Tom Luongo, a Florida-based Independent Analyst and publisher of The Gold
Goats 'n Guns Newsletter, told MintPress that the likely reasons for the "surprising"
media silence over Abdul-Mahdi's claims were because "It never really made it out into official
channels " due to the cutting of the video feed during Iraq's Parliamentary session and due to
the fact that "it's very inconvenient and the media -- since Trump is doing what they want him
to do, be belligerent with Iran, protected Israel's interests there."
"They aren't going to contradict him on that if he's playing ball," Luongo added, before
continuing that the media would nonetheless "hold onto it for future reference .If this comes
out for real, they'll use it against him later if he tries to leave Iraq." "Everything in
Washington is used as leverage," he added.
Given the lack of media coverage and the cutting of the video feed of Abdul-Mahdi's full
remarks, it is worth pointing out that the narrative he laid out in his censored speech not
only fits with the timeline of recent events he discusses but also the tactics known to have
been employed behind closed doors by the Trump administration, particularly after Mike Pompeo
left the CIA to become Secretary of State.
For instance, Abdul-Mahdi's delegation to China ended on September 24, with the protests
against his government that Trump reportedly threatened to start on October 1. Reports of a
"third side" firing on Iraqi protesters were picked up by major media outlets at the time, such
as in this
BBC report which stated:
Reports say the security forces opened fire, but another account says unknown gunmen
were responsible .a source in Karbala told the BBC that one of the dead was a guard at a
nearby Shia shrine who happened to be passing by. The source also said the origin of the
gunfire was unknown and it had targeted both the protesters and security forces .
(emphasis added)"
U.S.-backed protests in other countries, such as in Ukraine in 2014, also saw evidence of a
"
third side " shooting both protesters and security forces alike.
After six weeks of intense protests , Abdul-Mahdi
submitted
his resignation on November 29, just a few days after Iraq's
Foreign Minister praised the new deals, including the "oil for reconstruction" deal, that had
been signed with China. Abdul-Mahdi has since stayed on as Prime Minister in a caretaker role
until Parliament decides on his replacement.
Abdul-Mahdi's claims of the covert pressure by the Trump administration are buttressed by
the use of similar tactics against Ecuador, where, in July 2018, a U.S. delegation at the
United Nations
threatened the nation with punitive trade measures and the withdrawal of military aid if
Ecuador moved forward with the introduction of a UN resolution to "protect, promote and support
breastfeeding."
The New York Times reported at the time that the U.S. delegation was seeking to
promote the interests of infant formula manufacturers. If the U.S. delegation is willing to use
such pressure on nations for promoting breastfeeding over infant formula, it goes without
saying that such behind-closed-doors pressure would be significantly more intense if a much
more lucrative resource, e.g. oil, were involved.
Regarding Abdul-Mahdi's claims, Luongo told MintPress that it is also worth
considering that it could have been anyone in the Trump administration making threats to
Abdul-Mahdi, not necessarily Trump himself. "What I won't say directly is that I don't know it
was Trump at the other end of the phone calls. Mahdi, it is to his best advantage politically
to blame everything on Trump. It could have been Mike Pompeo or Gina Haspel talking to
Abdul-Mahdi It could have been anyone, it most likely would be someone with plausible
deniability .This [Mahdi's claims] sounds credible I firmly believe Trump is capable of making
these threats but I don't think Trump would make those threats directly like that, but it would
absolutely be consistent with U.S. policy."
Luongo also argued that the current tensions between U.S. and Iraqi leadership preceded the
oil deal between Iraq and China by several weeks, "All of this starts with Prime Minister Mahdi
starting the process of opening up the Iraq-Syria border crossing and that was announced in
August. Then, the Israeli air attacks happened in September to try and stop that from
happening, attacks on PMU forces on the border crossing along with the ammo dump attacks near
Baghdad This drew the Iraqis' ire Mahdi then tried to close the air space over Iraq, but how
much of that he can enforce is a big question."
As to why it would be to Mahdi's advantage to blame Trump, Luongo stated that Mahdi "can
make edicts all day long, but, in reality, how much can he actually restrain the U.S. or the
Israelis from doing anything? Except for shame, diplomatic shame To me, it [Mahdi's claims]
seems perfectly credible because, during all of this, Trump is probably or someone else is
shaking him [Mahdi] down for the reconstruction of the oil fields [in Iraq] Trump has
explicitly stated "we want the oil."'
As Luongo noted, Trump's interest in the U.S. obtaining a significant share of Iraqi oil
revenue is hardly a secret. Just last March, Trump
asked Abdul-Mahdi "How about the oil?" at the end of a meeting at the White House,
prompting Abdul-Mahdi to ask "What do you mean?" To which Trump responded "Well, we did a lot,
we did a lot over there, we spent trillions over there, and a lot of people have been talking
about the oil," which was widely interpreted as Trump asking for part of Iraq's oil revenue in
exchange for the steep costs of the U.S.' continuing its now unwelcome military presence in
Iraq.
With Abdul-Mahdi having rejected Trump's "oil for reconstruction" proposal in favor of
China's, it seems likely that the Trump administration would default to so-called "gangster
diplomacy" tactics to pressure Iraq's government into accepting Trump's deal, especially given
the fact that China's deal was a much better offer. While Trump demanded half of Iraq's oil
revenue in exchange for completing reconstruction projects (according to Abdul-Mahdi), the deal
that was signed between Iraq and China would see around
20 percen t of Iraq's oil revenue go to China in exchange for reconstruction. Aside from
the potential loss in Iraq's oil revenue, there are many reasons for the Trump administration
to feel threatened by China's recent dealings in Iraq.
The Iraq-China oil deal – a prelude to something more?
When Abdul-Mahdi's delegation traveled to Beijing last September, the "oil for
reconstruction" deal was only
one of eight total agreements that were established. These agreements cover a range of
areas, including financial, commercial, security, reconstruction, communication, culture,
education and foreign affairs in addition to oil. Yet, the oil deal is by far the most
significant.
Per the agreement, Chinese firms will work on various reconstruction projects in exchange
for roughly 20 percent of Iraq's oil exports, approximately 100,00 barrels per day, for a
period of 20 years. According to Al-Monitor
, Abdul-Mahdi had the following to say about the deal: "We agreed [with Beijing] to set up a
joint investment fund, which the oil money will finance," adding that the agreement prohibits
China from monopolizing projects inside Iraq, forcing Bejing to work in cooperation with
international firms.
The agreement is similar to one negotiated
between Iraq and China in 2015 when Abdul-Mahdi was serving as Iraq's oil minister. That
year, Iraq joined China's Belt and Road Initiative in a deal that also involved exchanging oil
for investment, development and construction projects and saw China awarded several projects as
a result. In a notable similarity to recent events, that deal was put on hold due to "political
and security tensions" caused by unrest and the surge of ISIS in Iraq, that is until
Abdul-Mahdi saw Iraq rejoin the
initiative again late last year through the agreements his government signed with China
last September.
Chinese President Xi Jinping, center left, meet with Iraqi Prime Minister
Adil Abdul-Mahdi, center right, in Beijing, Sept. 23, 2019. Lintao Zhang | AP
Notably, after recent tensions between the U.S. and Iraq over the assassination of Soleimani
and the U.S.' subsequent refusal to remove its troops from Iraq despite parliament's demands,
Iraq quietly announced that it would dramatically increase its oil exports to China to
triple the
amount established in the deal signed in September. Given Abdul-Mahdi's recent claims about
the true forces behind Iraq's recent protests and Trump's threats against him being directly
related to his dealings with China, the move appears to be a not-so-veiled signal from
Abdul-Mahdi to Washington that he plans to deepen Iraq's partnership with China, at least for
as long as he remains in his caretaker role.
Iraq's decision to dramatically increase its oil exports to China came just one day after
the U.S. government
threatened to cut off Iraq's access to its central bank account, currently held at the
Federal Reserve Bank of New York, an account that
currently holds $35 billion in Iraqi oil revenue. The account was
set up after the U.S. invaded and began occupying Iraq in 2003 and Iraq currently removes
between $1-2 billion per month to cover essential government expenses. Losing access to its oil
revenue stored in that account would lead to the "
collapse " of Iraq's government, according to Iraqi government officials who spoke to
AFP .
Though Trump publicly promised to rebuke Iraq for the expulsion of U.S. troops via
sanctions, the threat to cut off Iraq's access to its account at the NY Federal Reserve Bank
was delivered privately and directly to the Prime Minister, adding further credibility to
Abdul-Mahdi's claims that Trump's most aggressive attempts at pressuring Iraq's government are
made in private and directed towards the country's Prime Minister.
Though Trump's push this time was about preventing the expulsion of U.S. troops from Iraq,
his reasons for doing so may also be related to concerns about China's growing foothold in the
region. Indeed, while Trump has now lost his desired share of Iraqi oil revenue (50 percent) to
China's counteroffer of 20 percent, the removal of U.S. troops from Iraq may see American
troops replaced with their Chinese counterparts as well, according to Tom Luongo.
"All of this is about the U.S. maintaining the fiction that it needs to stay in Iraq So,
China moving in there is the moment where they get their toe hold for the Belt and Road
[Initiative]," Luongo argued. "That helps to strengthen the economic relationship between Iraq,
Iran and China and obviating the need for the Americans to stay there. At some point, China
will have assets on the ground that they are going to want to defend militarily in the event of
any major crisis. This brings us to the next thing we know, that Mahdi and the Chinese
ambassador discussed that very thing in the wake of the Soleimani killing."
Indeed, according to news reports, Zhang Yao -- China's ambassador to Iraq -- " conveyed
Beijing's readiness to provide military assistance" should Iraq's government request it
soon after Soleimani's assassination. Yao made the offer a day after Iraq's parliament voted to
expel American troops from the country. Though it is currently unknown how Abdul-Mahdi
responded to the offer, the timing likely caused no shortage of concern among the Trump
administration about its rapidly waning influence in Iraq. "You can see what's coming here,"
Luongo told MintPress of the recent Chinese offer to Iraq, "China, Russia and Iran are
trying to cleave Iraq away from the United States and the U.S. is feeling very threatened by
this."
Russia is also playing a role in the current scenario as Iraq initiated talks with Moscow
regarding the
possible purchase of one of its air defense systems last September, the same month that
Iraq signed eight deals, including the oil deal with China. Then, in the wake of Soleimani's
death, Russia
again offered the air defense systems to Iraq to allow them to better defend their air
space. In the past, the U.S.
has threatened allied countries with sanctions and other measures if they purchase Russian
air defense systems as opposed to those manufactured by U.S. companies.
The U.S.' efforts to curb China's growing influence and presence in Iraq amid these new
strategic partnerships and agreements are limited, however, as the U.S. is increasingly relying on China
as part of its Iran policy, specifically in its goal of reducing Iranian oil export to zero.
China remains Iran's main crude oil and condensate importer, even after it reduced its imports
of Iranian oil significantly following U.S. pressure last year. Yet, the U.S. is now attempting to
pressure China to stop buying Iranian oil completely or face sanctions while also
attempting to privately sabotage the China-Iraq oil deal. It is highly unlikely China will
concede to the U.S. on both, if any, of those fronts, meaning the U.S. may be forced to choose
which policy front (Iran "containment" vs. Iraq's oil dealings with China) it values more in
the coming weeks and months.
Furthermore, the recent signing of the "phase one" trade deal with China revealed another
potential facet of the U.S.' increasingly complicated relationship with Iraq's oil sector given
that the trade deal
involves selling U.S. oil and gas to China at very low cost , suggesting that the Trump
administration may also see the Iraq-China oil deal result in Iraq emerging as a potential
competitor for the U.S. in selling cheap oil to China, the world's top oil importer.
The Petrodollar and the Phantom of the Petroyuan
In his televised statements last week following Iran's military response to the U.S.
assassination of General Soleimani, Trump insisted that the U.S.' Middle East policy is no
longer being directed by America's vast oil requirements. He
stated specifically that:
Over the last three years, under my leadership, our economy is stronger than ever before
and America has achieved energy independence. These historic accomplishments changed our
strategic priorities. These are accomplishments that nobody thought were possible. And
options in the Middle East became available. We are now the number-one producer of oil and
natural gas anywhere in the world. We are independent, and we do not need Middle East
oil . (emphasis added)"
Yet, given the centrality of the recent Iraq-China oil deal in guiding some of the Trump
administration's recent Middle East policy moves, this appears not to be the case. The
distinction may lie in the fact that, while the U.S. may now be less dependent on oil imports
from the Middle East, it still very much needs to continue to dominate how oil is traded and
sold on international markets in order to maintain its status as both a global military
and financial superpower.
Indeed, even if the U.S. is importing less Middle Eastern oil, the petrodollar system --
first forged in the 1970s -- requires that the U.S. maintains enough control over the global
oil trade so that the world's largest oil exporters, Iraq among them, continue to sell their
oil in dollars. Were Iraq to sell oil in another currency, or trade oil for services, as it
plans to do with China per the recently inked deal, a significant portion of Iraqi oil would
cease to generate a demand for dollars, violating the key tenet of the petrodollar
system.
Chinese representatives speak to defense personnel during a weapons expo organized
by the Iraqi defense ministry in Baghdad, March, 2017. Karim Kadim | AP
The takeaway from the petrodollar phenomenon is that as long as countries need oil, they
will need the dollar. As long as countries demand dollars, the U.S. can continue to go into
massive amounts of debt to fund its network of global military bases, Wall Street bailouts,
nuclear missiles, and tax cuts for the rich."
Thus, the use of the petrodollar has created a system whereby U.S. control of oil sales of
the largest oil exporters is necessary, not just to buttress the dollar, but also to support
its global military presence. Therefore, it is unsurprising that the issue of the U.S. troop
presence in Iraq and the issue of Iraq's push for oil independence against U.S. wishes have
become intertwined. Notably, one of the architects of the petrodollar system and the man who
infamously described U.S. soldiers as "dumb, stupid animals to be used as pawns in foreign
policy", former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger, has been advising
Trump and informing his China policy since 2016.
This take was also expressed by economist Michael Hudson,
who recently noted that U.S. access to oil, dollarization and U.S. military strategy are
intricately interwoven and that Trump's recent Iraq policy is intended "to escalate America's
presence in Iraq to keep control of the region's oil reserves," and, as Hudson says, "to back
Saudi Arabia's Wahabi troops (ISIS, Al Qaeda in Iraq, Al Nusra and other divisions of what are
actually America's foreign legion) to support U.S. control of Near Eastern oil as a buttress of
the U.S. dollar."
Hudson further asserts that it was Qassem Soleimani's efforts to promote Iraq's oil
independence at the expense of U.S. imperial ambitions that served one of the key motives
behind his assassination.
America opposed General Suleimani above all because he was fighting against ISIS and other
U.S.-backed terrorists in their attempt to break up Syria and replace Assad's regime with a
set of U.S.-compliant local leaders – the old British "divide and conquer" ploy. On
occasion, Suleimani had cooperated with U.S. troops in fighting ISIS groups that got "out of
line" meaning the U.S. party line. But every indication is that he was in Iraq to work
with that government seeking to regain control of the oil fields that President Trump has
bragged so loudly about grabbing. (emphasis added)"
Hudson adds that " U.S. neocons feared Suleimani's plan to help Iraq assert control of its
oil and withstand the terrorist attacks supported by U.S. and Saudi's on Iraq. That is what
made his assassination an immediate drive."
While other factors -- such as pressure
from U.S. allies such as Israel -- also played a factor in the decision to kill Soleimani,
the decision to assassinate him on Iraqi soil just hours before he was set to meet with
Abdul-Mahdi in a diplomatic role suggests that the underlying tensions caused by Iraq's push
for oil independence and its oil deal with China did play a factor in the timing of his
assassination. It also served as a threat to Abdul-Mahdi, who has claimed that the U.S.
threatened to kill both him and his defense minister just weeks prior over tensions directly
related to the push for independence of Iraq's oil sector from the U.S.
It appears that the ever-present role of the petrodollar in guiding U.S. policy in the
Middle East remains unchanged. The petrodollar has long been a driving factor behind the U.S.'
policy towards Iraq specifically, as one of the key triggers for the 2003 invasion of Iraq was
Saddam Hussein's decision to sell Iraqi oil in Euros opposed to dollars beginning in the year
2000. Just weeks before the invasion began, Hussein boasted that Iraq's Euro-based oil revenue
account was earning a higher interest rate than
it would have been if it had continued to sell its oil in dollars, an apparent signal to other
oil exporters that the petrodollar system was only really benefiting the United States at their
own expense.
Beyond current efforts to stave off Iraq's oil independence and keep its oil trade aligned
with the U.S., the fact that the U.S. is now seeking to limit China's ever-growing role in
Iraq's oil sector is also directly related to China's publicly known efforts to create its own
direct competitor to the petrodollar, the petroyuan.
Since 2017, China has made its plans for the petroyuan -- a direct competitor to the
petrodollar -- no secret, particularly after China eclipsed the U.S. as the world's largest
importer of oil.
The new strategy is to enlist the energy markets' help: Beijing may introduce a new way to
price oil in coming months -- but unlike the contracts based on the U.S. dollar that currently dominate global
markets, this benchmark would use China's own currency. If there's widespread adoption, as the
Chinese hope, then that will mark a step toward challenging the greenback's status as the
world's most powerful currency .The plan is to price oil in yuan using a gold-backed futures contract in
Shanghai, but the road will be long and arduous."
If the U.S. continues on its current path and pushes Iraq further into the arms of China and
other U.S. rival states, it goes without saying that Iraq -- now a part of China's Belt and Road
Initiative -- may soon favor a petroyuan system over a petrodollar system, particularly as the
current U.S. administration threatens to hold Iraq's central bank account hostage for pursuing
policies Washington finds unfavorable.
It could also explain why President Trump is so concerned about China's growing foothold
in Iraq, since it risks causing not only the end of the U.S. military hegemony in the country but
could also lead to major trouble for the petrodollar system and the U.S.' position as a global
financial power. Trump's policy aimed at stopping China and Iraq's growing ties is clearly having
the opposite effect, showing that this administration's "gangster diplomacy" only serves to make
the alternatives offered by countries like China and Russia all the more attractive.
One can see how all these recent wars and military actions have a financial motive at their
core. Yet the mass of gullible Americans actually believe the reasons given, to "spread
democracy" and other wonderful things. Only a small number can see things for what they really
are. It's very frustrating to deal with the stupidity of the average person on a daily basis.
This is not Trump's policy, it is American policy and the variation is in how he implements
it. Any other person would have fallen in line with it as well. US policy has it's own inner
momentum that can't change course. The US depends upon continuation of the dollar as the
world's reserve currency. Were that to be lost the US likely would descend into chaos without
end. When the USSR came apart it was eventually able to downsize into the Russian state. We
don't have that here; there is no core ethnicity with it's own territory left anymore, it's
just a jumble. For the US it's a matter of survival.
The Chinese, for now, are not contradicting the Trump administration on the promise of
Chinese mega-purchases, because when Trump is more amicable their interests align. If an empty
promise that wasn't even made means the trade war de-escalation goes on, that is fine with
them. They would like to calm the markets as much as Trump would, and in this way they have
added leverage on Trump. Should they change their minds they can always explode the fiction
later on and injure Trump, perhaps strategically right around October.
Now that the dust has settled on the US-China trade deal and analysts have had some time to
pore over its 90+ pages, various chapters and (non-binding) terms that comprise the body of the
agreement, one high-level observation noted by Rabobank, is that the agreement foresees the
total amount of goods exports from the US to China to reach above $ 290BN by end-2021.
The implication of this is that the chart for US exports to China should basically look like
this for the next two years:
As Rabobank's senior economist Bjorn Giesbergen writes, t here are probably very few
economists that would deem such a trajectory feasible (except for the perpetually cheerful
economics team at Goldman , of course), seeing that it took the US more than 15 years to
raise exports from around USD16bn in 2000 to USD 130bn in 2017.
Moreover, the Chinese purchases of goods are beneficial to US companies, but at the cost of
other countries, and the agreement is only for two years. If China will buy more aircraft from
the US, that could be to the detriment of the EU.
According to the document "the parties project that the trajectory of increases will
continue in calendar years 2020 through 2025." But "to project" does not sound as firm as
"shall ensure." So, as the Rabo economist asks, "are we going to see a repetition of the 2019
turmoil caused by the phase 1 trade negotiations after those two years? Or is this supposed to
be solved in the phase 2 deal that is very unlikely to be made? What's more, while the
remaining tariffs provide leverage for US trade negotiators, they are still a tax on US
importers and US consumers of Chinese goods."
But before we even get there, going back to the chart shown above, Bloomberg today points
out something we have pointed out in the past, namely that China's $200 billion, two-year
spending spree negotiated with the Trump administration appears increasingly difficult to
deliver, and now a $50 billion "hole" appears to have opened up : that is the amount of U.S.
exports annually left out and many American businesses still uncertain about just what the
expectations are.
Some background: while Trump officials stressed the reforms aimed at curbing
intellectual-property theft and currency manipulation that China has agreed to in the "phase
one" trade deal signed Wednesday, the Chinese pledge to buy more American exports has become an
emblem of the deal to critics and supporters alike.
The administration has said those new exports in manufactured goods, energy, farm shipments
and services will come over two years on top of the $130 billion in goods and $57.6 billion in
services that the U.S. sent to China in 2017 -- the year before the trade war started and
exports were hit by Beijing's retaliatory measures to President Donald Trump's tariffs.
And while
Goldman said it is certainly feasible that China can ramp up its purchases of US goods ,
going so far as providing a matrix "scenario" of what such purchases could look like
that now appears virtually impossible, because as Bloomberg notes, the list of goods
categories in the agreement covers a narrower group of exports to China that added up to $78.8
billion in 2017, or $51.6 billion less than the overall goods exports to the Asian nation that
year. The goods trade commitment makes up $162.1 billion of the $200 billion total, with $37.9
billion to come from a boost in services trade such as travel and insurance.
Here, the math gets even more ridiculous:
The target for the first year that the deal takes effect is to add $63.9 billion in
manufactured goods, agriculture and energy exports. According to Bloomberg economist Maeva
Cousin's analysis, that would be an increase of 81% over the 2017 baseline. In year two, the
agreement calls for $98.2 billion surge in Chinese imports, which would require a 125%
increase over 2017.
Importantly for China, the deal requires those purchases to be "made at market prices based
on commercial considerations," a caveat which spooked commodities traders, and led to a sharp
drop in ags in the day following the deal's announcement.
Can China pull this off? Yes, if Beijing tears up existing trade deals and supply chains and
imposes explicit procurement targets and demands on China's local business. As Bloomberg notes,
"critics argue that such pre-ordained demand amounts to a slide into the sort of
government-managed trade that U.S. presidents abandoned decades ago" and the very sort of act
of central planning that U.S. officials have , paradoxically, spent years trying to convince
China to walk away from.
This may also explain why a key part of the trade deal will remain secret: the purchase plan
is based on what the administration insists is a specific – if classified – annex
of Chinese commitments. "The 20-page public version of that annex lists hundreds of products
and services from nuclear reactors to aircraft, printed circuits, pig iron, soybeans, crude oil
and computer services but no figures for purchases."
Going back to the critics, it is this convoluted mechanism that has them arguing that
China's stated targets will likely never be met: "This is ambitious and it will create some
stresses within the supply system," said Craig Allen, the president of the U.S.-China Business
Council.
That's not all: as Allen said, among the outstanding questions was whether China would lift
its retaliatory duties on American products as the US keeps its tariffs on some $360 billion in
imports from China as Trump seeks to maintain leverage for the second phase of
negotiations.
Allen also made clear the overall purchase schedule left many U.S. companies uncomfortable
even as they saw benefits in other parts of the deal. "The vast majority of our members are
looking for no more than a level playing field in China," Allen said. "We are not looking for
quotas or special treatment."
As a result, for many manufacturers what is actually changing -- and what China has
committed to instead of given a "best efforts" promise to achieve -- remains unclear.
Major exporters such as Boeing Co., whose CEO Dave Calhoun attended Wednesday's signing
ceremony, have stayed mum about what exactly the deal will mean for their business with China.
In an attempt to "clarify", Trump tweeted that the deal includes a Chinese commitment to buy
$16 billion to $20 billion in Boeing planes. It was unclear if he meant 737 MAX planes which
nobody in the world will ever voluntarily fly inside again.
Finally, prompting the latest round of cronyism allegations, Trump's new China pact also
includes plans for exports of American iron and steel , "a potential gain for an industry close
to the president that has benefited from his tariffs and complained about Chinese production
and overcapacity for years." As Bloomberg adds, the text of the agreement lists iron and steel
products ranging from pig iron to stainless steel wire and railway tracks, but steel industry
sources said they had been caught by surprise and not been given any additional details on
China's purchase commitments.
It is unclear why Beijing would need US product s: after all, in its scramble to erect ghost
cities and hit a goalseeked GDP print, China produces more than 50% of the world's steel,
drawning criticism from around the world – if not Greta Thunberg – for the massive
coal-derived pollution that comes from flooding global markets with cheap steel.
This partly explains why the US is taking its battle on 5G technology with the Chinese so
seriously. As a faltering global leader, the Americans do not take it kindly when China tries
to snatch a lunch right from under their nose. As such, the US-China trade war goes beyond
economics and ideology. It is about global domination across every conceivable technology that
consumers and governments worldwide are addicted to these days.
Metaphorically, technology is the new opium that rakes in money, power and control. Take a
look at the way consumers across the world are utilizing technologies. From smartphones to
mobile apps, from cloud-computing to cybersecurity, trillions of dollars are being spent by
consumers and their governments. The Americans were laughing their way to the bank until the
Chinese came along and upset their game.
As greed has no boundary or limit, every challenger or opposition to the consumption of this
"new opium" means a loss in revenue, power and control for the US and its preferred allies.
Sharing the spoils with others is looking like an inconceivable option for them at this
stage.
To call the tension between the US and China a trade war undermines this greater reality.
From unilateral sanctions to outright destruction of economies, it is starting to look as if
the US is using technology to regain global domination at all costs.
"... Trump is covering his retraction by calling it a trade deal. China's part of the deal is to agree to purchase the US goods that it already intended to purchase. ..."
The first thing
to understand is that it is not a trade deal. It is Trump backing off his tariffs when he
discovered that the tarrifs fall on US goods and American consumers, not on China. Trump is
covering his retraction by calling it a trade deal. China's part of the deal is to agree to
purchase the US goods that it already intended to purchase.
The purpose of tariffs is to protect domestic producers from foreign competition by raising
the price of imported goods. What Trump, his administration, and the financial press did not
understand is that at least half of the US trade deficit with China is the offshored goods
produced in China by such corporations as Apple, Nike, and Levi. The offshored production of US
global corporations counts as imports when they are brought into the US to be sold to
Americans. Thus, the cost of the tariffs were falling on US corporations and US consumers.
Tariffs are not an effective way to bring offshored US manufacturing home. If Trump or any
US government wants to bring US manufacturing back to the US from its offshored locations, the
way to achieve this result is to change the way the US taxes corporations. The rule would be:
If a US corporation produces in the US with US labor for US markets, the firm's profits are
taxed at a low rate. If the corporation produces products for the US market abroad with foreign
labor, the tax rate will be high enough to more than wipe out the labor cost savings.
As I have emphasized for years, the offshoring of US manufacturing has inflicted massive
external costs on the United States. Middle class jobs have been lost, careers ended, living
standards of former US manufacturing workers and families have dropped. The tax base of cities
and states has shrunk, causing cutbacks in public services and undermining municipal and state
pension funds. You can add to this list. These costs are the true cost of the increased profits
from the lower foreign labor and compliance costs. A relatively few executives and shareholders
benefitted at the expense of a vast number of Americans.
This is the problem that needs to be addressed and corrected.
...if nothing had happened in the US-China trade war. Well, me might have gotten to where we
are supposed to be with the deal
..a honest question. In terms of the environment and global climate, is it a good thing that
farmers will be producing more monoculture grains, dairy, beef and pork for export?
There has been much hype about the signing of Phase One (and probably only) US-China trade
deal. However based on a front page story in today's Washington Post, there is not much there.
The US did not raise tariffs as planned, but tarifsf still remain on two thirds of the sectors
that had them, although some were halved. But numerous US sectors see no change at all and are
now viewing the situation as not likely to improve, with them suffering losses of business
likely to return. Among those are chemicals, apparel retailers, and auto parts. In these and
other sectors there is not much reduction of uncertainty regarding US-China trade, so not
likely much increase in investment.
The main items in it besides no worsening of tariffs, China has made promises not to
pressure US firms to turn over technology and also to increase imports from the US by $200
billion over the next two years, especially in energy and agriculture. So maybe US soybean
farmers will no longer need the bailouts of billions of $ Trump has been providing to them.
However, such promises have been made in the past.
As it is, I am watching commentators on Bloomberg, and about the most any of them are
willing to say is that this "puts a floor" on the "deterioration" of US-China trade relations.
That is far from some dramatic breakthrough, and most of the tariffs put on as part of the
US-China trade war remain in place.
Barkley Rosser
spencer , January 16, 2020 3:49 pm
This looks like it may be a way to make it a status quo or back burner issue until after
the election.
Of course Trump will always be able to blow it up if he decides that would be to his
advantage.
Bert Schlitz , January 16, 2020 4:53 pm
I don't see how they "buy" 200 billion worth of goods. The Chinese economy is slowing and
that is why purchases were flattening by 2014.
Its noise and circuses.
pgl , January 16, 2020 5:48 pm
Bert – I agree. Menzie Chinn over at Econbrowser has a lot of details on this noise
and circus. Check it out!
There has been much hype about the signing of Phase One (and probably only) US-China trade
deal. However based on a front page story in today's Washington Post, there is not much there.
The US did not raise tariffs as planned, but tarifsf still remain on two thirds of the sectors
that had them, although some were halved. But numerous US sectors see no change at all and are
now viewing the situation as not likely to improve, with them suffering losses of business
likely to return. Among those are chemicals, apparel retailers, and auto parts. In these and
other sectors there is not much reduction of uncertainty regarding US-China trade, so not
likely much increase in investment.
The main items in it besides no worsening of tariffs, China has made promises not to
pressure US firms to turn over technology and also to increase imports from the US by $200
billion over the next two years, especially in energy and agriculture. So maybe US soybean
farmers will no longer need the bailouts of billions of $ Trump has been providing to them.
However, such promises have been made in the past.
As it is, I am watching commentators on Bloomberg, and about the most any of them are
willing to say is that this "puts a floor" on the "deterioration" of US-China trade relations.
That is far from some dramatic breakthrough, and most of the tariffs put on as part of the
US-China trade war remain in place.
spencer , January 16, 2020 3:49 pm
This looks like it may be a way to make it a status quo or back burner issue until after
the election.
Of course Trump will always be able to blow it up if he decides that would be to his
advantage.
Bert Schlitz , January 16, 2020 4:53 pm
I don't see how they "buy" 200 billion worth of goods. The Chinese economy is slowing and
that is why purchases were flattening by 2014.
Its noise and circuses.
pgl , January 16, 2020 5:48 pm
Bert – I agree. Menzie Chinn over at Econbrowser has a lot of details on this noise
and circus. Check it out!
Coming decade could see the US take on Russia, China and Iran over the New Silk Road
connection
The Raging Twenties started with a bang with the targeted assassination of Iran's General
Qasem Soleimani.
Yet a bigger bang awaits us throughout the decade: the myriad declinations of the New Great
Game in Eurasia, which pits the US against Russia, China and Iran, the three major nodes of
Eurasia integration.
Every game-changing act in geopolitics and geoeconomics in the coming decade will have to be
analyzed in connection to this epic clash.
The Deep State and crucial sectors of the US ruling class are absolutely terrified that
China is already outpacing the "indispensable nation" economically and that Russia has
outpaced
it militarily . The Pentagon officially designates the three Eurasian nodes as
"threats."
Hybrid War techniques – carrying inbuilt 24/7 demonization – will proliferate
with the aim of containing China's "threat," Russian "aggression" and Iran's "sponsorship of
terrorism." The myth of the "free market" will continue to drown under the imposition of a
barrage of illegal sanctions, euphemistically defined as new trade "rules."
Yet that will be hardly enough to derail the Russia-China strategic partnership. To unlock
the deeper meaning of this partnership, we need to understand that Beijing defines it as
rolling towards a "new era." That implies strategic long-term planning – with the key
date being 2049, the centennial of New China.
The horizon for the multiple projects of the Belt and Road Initiative – as in the
China-driven New Silk Roads – is indeed the 2040s, when Beijing expects to have fully
woven a new, multipolar paradigm of sovereign nations/partners across Eurasia and beyond, all
connected by an interlocking maze of belts and roads.
The Russian project – Greater Eurasia –
somewhat mirrors Belt & Road and will be integrated with it. Belt & Road, the Eurasia
Economic Union, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and the Asia Infrastructure Investment
Bank are all converging towards the same vision.
Realpolitik
So this "new era", as defined by the Chinese, relies heavily on close Russia-China
coordination, in every sector. Made in China 2025 is encompassing a series of techno/scientific
breakthroughs. At the same time, Russia has established itself as an unparalleled technological
resource for weapons and systems that the Chinese still cannot match.
At the latest BRICS summit in Brasilia, President Xi Jinping told Vladimir Putin that "the
current international situation with rising instability and uncertainty urge China and Russia
to establish closer strategic coordination." Putin's response: "Under the current situation,
the two sides should continue to maintain close strategic communication."
Russia is showing China how the West respects realpolitik power in any form, and Beijing is
finally starting to use theirs. The result is that after five centuries of Western domination
– which, incidentally, led to the decline of the Ancient Silk Roads – the Heartland
is back, with a bang, asserting its preeminence.
On a personal note, my travels these past two years, from West Asia to Central Asia, and my
conversations these past two months with analysts in Nur-Sultan, Moscow and Italy, have allowed
me to get deeper into the intricacies of what sharp minds define as the Double Helix. We are
all aware of the immense challenges ahead – while barely managing to track the stunning
re-emergence of the Heartland in real-time.
In soft power terms, the sterling role of Russian diplomacy will become even more paramount
– backed up by a Ministry of Defense led by Sergei Shoigu, a Tuvan from Siberia, and an
intel arm that is capable of constructive dialogue with everybody: India/Pakistan, North/South
Korea, Iran/Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan.
This apparatus does smooth (complex) geopolitical issues over in a manner that still eludes
Beijing.
In parallel, virtually the whole Asia-Pacific – from the Eastern Mediterranean to the
Indian Ocean – now takes into full consideration Russia-China as a counter-force to US
naval and financial overreach.
Stakes in Southwest Asia
The targeted assassination of Soleimani, for all its long-term fallout, is just one move in
the Southwest Asia chessboard. What's ultimately at stake is a macro geoeconomic prize: a
land bridge from the Persian Gulf to the Eastern Mediterranean.
Last summer, an Iran-Iraq-Syria trilateral established that "the goal of negotiations is to
activate the Iranian-Iraqi-Syria load and transport corridor as part of a wider plan for
reviving the Silk Road."
There could not be a more strategic connectivity corridor, capable of simultaneously
interlinking with the International North-South Transportation Corridor; the Iran-Central
Asia-China connection all the way to the Pacific; and projecting Latakia towards the
Mediterranean and the Atlantic.
What's on the horizon is, in fact, a sub-sect of Belt & Road in Southwest Asia. Iran is
a key node of Belt & Road; China will be heavily involved in the rebuilding of Syria; and
Beijing-Baghdad signed multiple deals and set up an Iraqi-Chinese Reconstruction Fund (income
from 300,000 barrels of oil a day in exchange for Chinese credit for Chinese companies
rebuilding Iraqi infrastructure).
A quick look at the map reveals the "secret" of the US refusing to pack up and leave Iraq,
as demanded by the Iraqi Parliament and Prime Minister: to prevent the emergence of this
corridor by any means necessary. Especially when we see that all the roads that China is
building across Central Asia – I navigated many of them in November and December –
ultimately link China with Iran.
The final objective: to unite Shanghai to the Eastern Mediterranean – overland, across
the Heartland.
As much as Gwadar port in the Arabian Sea is an essential node of the China-Pakistan
Economic Corridor, and part of China's multi-pronged "escape from Malacca" strategy, India also
courted Iran to match Gwadar via the port of Chabahar in the Gulf of Oman.
So as much as Beijing wants to connect the Arabian Sea with Xinjiang, via the economic
corridor, India wants to connect with Afghanistan and Central Asia via Iran.
Yet India's investments in Chabahar may come to nothing, with New Delhi still mulling
whether to become an active part of the US "Indo-Pacific" strategy, which would imply dropping
Tehran.
The Russia-China-Iran joint naval exercise in late December, starting exactly from Chabahar,
was a timely wake-up for New Delhi. India simply cannot afford to ignore Iran and end up losing
its key connectivity node, Chabahar.
The immutable fact: everyone needs and wants Iran connectivity. For obvious reasons, since
the Persian empire, this is the privileged hub for all Central Asian trade routes.
On top of it, Iran for China is a matter of national security. China is heavily invested in
Iran's energy industry. All bilateral trade will be settled in yuan or in a basket of
currencies bypassing the US dollar.
US neocons, meanwhile, still dream of what the Cheney regime was aiming at in the past
decade: regime change in Iran leading to the US dominating the Caspian Sea as a springboard to
Central Asia, only one step away from Xinjiang and weaponization of anti-China sentiment. It
could be seen as a New Silk Road in reverse to disrupt the Chinese vision.
Battle of the Ages
A new book, The Impact of China's Belt and Road
Initiativ e , by Jeremy Garlick of the University of Economics in Prague, carries the
merit of admitting that, "making sense" of Belt & Road "is extremely difficult."
This is an extremely serious attempt to theorize Belt & Road's immense complexity
– especially considering China's flexible, syncretic approach to policymaking, quite
bewildering for Westerners. To reach his goal, Garlick gets into Tang Shiping's social
evolution paradigm, delves into neo-Gramscian hegemony, and dissects the concept of "offensive
mercantilism" – all that as part of an effort in "complex eclecticism."
The contrast with the pedestrian Belt & Road demonization narrative emanating from US
"analysts" is glaring. The book tackles in detail the multifaceted nature of Belt & Road's
trans-regionalism as an evolving, organic process.
Imperial policymakers won't bother to understand how and why Belt & Road is setting a
new global paradigm. The NATO summit in London last month offered a few pointers. NATO
uncritically adopted three US priorities: even more aggressive policy towards Russia;
containment of China (including military surveillance); and militarization of space – a
spin-off from the 2002 Full Spectrum Dominance doctrine.
So NATO will be drawn into the "Indo-Pacific" strategy – which means containment of
China. And as NATO is the EU's weaponized arm, that implies the US interfering on how Europe
does business with China – at every level.
Retired US Army Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin Powell's chief of staff from 2001 to 2005,
cuts to the chase: "America exists today to make war. How else do we interpret 19 straight
years of war and no end in sight? It's part of who we are. It's part of what the American
Empire is. We are going to lie, cheat and steal, as Pompeo is doing right now, as Trump is
doing right now, as Esper is doing right now and a host of other members of my political party,
the Republicans, are doing right now. We are going to lie, cheat and steal to do whatever it is
we have to do to continue this war complex. That's the truth of it. And that's the agony of
it."
Moscow, Beijing and Tehran are fully aware of the stakes. Diplomats and analysts are working
on the trend, for the trio, to evolve a concerted effort to protect one another from all forms
of hybrid war – sanctions included – launched against each of them.
For the US, this is indeed an existential battle – against the whole Eurasia
integration process, the New Silk Roads, the Russia-China strategic partnership, those Russian
hypersonic weapons mixed with supple diplomacy, the profound disgust and revolt against US
policies all across the Global South, the nearly inevitable collapse of the US dollar. What's
certain is that the Empire won't go quietly into the night. We should all be ready for the
battle of the ages.
An extremely rare candid and somewhat precise piece of journalism by the NYT (albeit telling
the story from the point of view of the Americans/capitalists):
What it does not do is tackle the root causes of the trade war. The deal leaves
untouched Beijing's subsidies for homegrown industries and its firm control over crucial
levers of its hard-charging economy . The deal also keeps in place most of Mr. Trump's
tariffs on $360 billion worth of Chinese goods, a much heavier tax than Americans pay for
products from practically anywhere else.
Solving those issues could take years.
Interesting to see what the Americans consider to be China's "root causes of the trade
war". And we still have people who believe the war against China is not a war between
capitalism and socialism, but between "freedom and tyranny". Pure middle class liberal
dellusion of grandeur.
--//--
In the last open thread, in my first comment, I highlighted how fast the Western MSM gave
up the idea the Labour Party should have its first female leader in order to prop up their
guy, Keir Starmer (literally the only male still in the dispute right now). The reason, of
course, is that his main rival - Rebecca Long-Bailey - is Corbyn's successor and, as such,
has Momentum's (and, probably, of the unions) support.
I have been stating here for some time now that the function of the middle class is to
serve as the battering ram of the capitalists. They are the class tasked with fabricating the
narratives and "theories" which all the society should believe and never question. They are
what that 007 villain (Spectre) called "visionaires", or what the far-rightists in America
call "the experts".
If that's true, then postmodernism is their ideological weapon of choice nowadays.
doesn't matter in which order they're read, but Escobar's
latest intersects with Alastair
Crooke's to provide Big Picture perspective.
Towards his conclusion, Escobar cites retired US Army Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, Colin
Powell's chief of staff from 2001 to 2005:
"We are going to lie, cheat and steal to do whatever it is we have to do to continue this
war complex. That's the truth of it. And that's the agony of it."
But nowhere in the citation does Wilkerson say that any of this effort's being done to
defend the USA, whereas its beyond clear that Iran, China and Russia are all working to
protect their nations and people. Rather, it appears as if "the profound disgust and revolt
against US policies all across the Global South" is finally being adopted by a majority of
the USA's polity as it becomes clear that all the lying, cheating and stealing is being done
at the expense of the 99% for the 1%'s benefit.
As Crooke alludes, wagging the dog a la Clinton might save Trump from being convicted and
removed by the Senate, but such a move will likely cost him the election, although much
depends on how those controlling the D-Party behave in the face of Sanders winning the
nomination via the primaries prior to the Convention.
Under the text of the Phase One deal - which
was released later in the day by the Office of the US Trade Representative - both sides
agree that they can formally complain to each other if either feels the other side is not
holding up its end of the bargain.
China Accepts Deal to Buy $200Bln in US Goods
First and foremost, the document obliges Beijing to purchase at least $200 billion worth of
US goods over the next two years.
"During the two-year period from January 1, 2020, through December 31, 2021, China shall
ensure that purchases and imports into China from the United States of the manufactured
goods, agricultural goods, energy products, and services identified in Annex 6.1 exceed the
corresponding 2017 baseline amount by no less than $200 billion", the text of the agreement
reads.
The agreement said China
will ensure that it buys $32.9 billion worth of US manufactured goods this year and $44.8
billion in 2021; $12.5 billion in US agricultural goods this year and $19.5 billion in 2021;
$18.5 billion in US energy products this year and $33.9 billion in 2021; and $12.8 billion in
US services this year and $25.1 billion in 2021.
US, China Agree to Protect Patents,
Fight Abuse of Trade Secrets
The United States and China agreed to protect patents, particularly in pharmaceuticals, and
ban counterfeit products and the misappropriation of trade secrets.
"China shall permit pharmaceutical patent applicants to rely on supplemental data to satisfy
relevant requirements for patentability, including sufficiency of disclosure and inventive
step, during patent examination proceedings, patent review proceedings, and judicial
proceedings", the text of the deal said. "The United States
affirms that existing US measures afford treatment equivalent to that provided for in
this Article".
Beijing and Washington also resolved to strengthen cooperation and coordination in combating
piracy, including counterfeiting on e-commerce platforms, in the agreement.
On the protection of trade secrets, the United States said China will treat as "urgent" the
use, or attempted use, of claimed trade secret information and provide its judicial authorities
the authority to order a preliminary injunction based on case facts and circumstances.
Washington pledged to do the same for China.
China to Boost US Energy Imports by $52
Bln
China also agreed to increase purchases of US energy products by $52 billion in the next two
years.
The US energy products will be part of the total $200 billion worth of US goods that China
will import through 2021, according to the agreement.
"For the category of energy products no less than $18.5 billion above the corresponding 2017
baseline amount is purchased and imported into China from the United States in calendar year
2020, and no less than $33.9 billion above the corresponding 2017 baseline amount is
purchased and imported into China from the United States in calendar year 2021", the text of
the deal said.
The agreement listed the US energy products that China will be buying as: crude oil,
liquefied natural gas, refined petroleum and coal.
China is the world's largest buyer of oil and the United States is the largest producer of
the commodity.
Oil prices, which hit five-week lows earlier on Wednesday, pared their losses after the
energy deal was announced by the US and Chinese governments.
Avoiding Currency
Manipulations
Under the Phase One deal China agrees to not engage in currency manipulation for the purpose
of achieving trade advantages over the United States.
"The Parties
shall refrain from competitive devaluations and not target exchange rates for competitive
purposes, including through large-scale, persistent, one-sided intervention in exchange
markets," the agreement states.
The United States and China will communicate regularly and consult on foreign exchange
markets, activities and policies as well as consult with each other regarding the International
Monetary Fund's assessment of the exchange rate of each country, the agreement states.
The agreement states that the United States and China should achieve and maintain a
market-determined exchange rate regime.
The agreement comes after two years of wrangling and numerous halts in discussions, during
which both sides piled hundreds of billions of dollars of tit-for-tat tariffs on each
other.
Despite the signing of the accord, the Trump administration
will maintain tariffs on $360 billion of Chinese goods in an attempt to hold Beijing
accountable to the deal, US officials said. The Chinese government has also said it will decide
later on the tariffs it has imposed on US imports, which last stood at $185 billion in
value.
The US-China trade war sparked in January 2019, when the Trump administration announced
duties on Chinese-made solar panels and washing machines. The Trump administration has since
placed tariffs on $550 billion worth of Chinese products.
'Phase Two' Will End US-China
Trade War?
US Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin commented earlier on Wednesday on the agreement and said
that certain technology and cybersecurity issues would be resolved in the next chapter of the
deal to end the trade dispute.
"I think a very significant amount of the technology issues are in Phase One. There are other
certain areas of services away from financial services that will be in Phase Two. There are
certain additional cybersecurity issues that will be in Phase Two [...] There still more
issues to deal with and we'll address those", Mnuchin said, cited by CNBC.
Although the timing and details of Phase Two remain vague, Mnuchin ruled out Huawei being
included,
claiming that the Chinese tech giant is part of "the national security dialogue".
Trump claimed during a news conference on Wednesday that he does not foresee a Phase Three
trade agreement with China, expecting to conclude the trade negotiations with Phase
Two.
"We've already begun discussions on a Phase 2 deal", Pence said, cited by Fox Business.
Trump said earlier that inking of the second phase of the deal may have to wait until after
the 2020 presidential election to allow time to negotiate a better agreement.
Phase One and Phase Two could reportedly ease trade tensions between the two major economic
powers but it would unlikely settle the dispute, The Washington Post reported.
According to the media outlet, the Trump administration is developing new export control
regulations aimed at limiting flows of sophisticated technology to China, while US officials
embarked on closely scrutinizing potential Chinese investments in the United States. Media
reports of alleged new economic and technology levies against Beijing sparked speculation
among analysts that Phase Three should not be excluded.
Despite the latest Sino-American phase one deal to ease tensions over trade, one former top
US official is now calling for a decoupling between both economies, reported the
South China Morning Post (SCMP).
Former US ambassador to India Ashley Tellis explains in a new book titled Strategic Asia
2020: US-China Competition for Global Influence -- that the world's two largest economies have
entered a new period of sustained competition.
Tellis said Washington had developed a view that "China is today and will be for the
foreseeable future the principal challenger to the US."
"The US quest for a partnership with China was fated to fail once China's growth in economic
capabilities was gradually matched by its rising military power," he said.
Tellis said Washington must resume its ability to support the liberal international order
established by the US more than a half-century ago, and "provide the global public goods that
bestow legitimacy upon its primacy and strengthen its power-projection capabilities to protect
its allies and friends."
He said this approach would require more strategic cooperation with allies such as
Australia, Japan, and South Korea.
"The US should use coordinated action with allies to confront China's trade malpractices
should pursue targeted decoupling of the US and Chinese economies, mainly in order to protect
its defense capabilities rather than seeking a comprehensive rupture."
The latest phase one deal between both countries is a temporary trade truce -- likely to be
broken as a strategic rivalry encompasses trade, technology, investment, currency, and
geopolitical concerns will continue to strain relations in the early 2020s.
A much greater decoupling could be dead ahead and likely to intensify over time, as it's
already occurring in the technology sector.
Tellis said President Trump labeling China as a strategic
competitor was one of "the most important changes in US-China relations."
The decoupling has already started as Washington races to safeguard the country's
cutting-edge technologies, including 5G, automation, artificial intelligence, autonomous
vehicle, hypersonics, and robotics, from getting into the hands of Chinese firms.
A perfect example of this is blacklisting Huawei and other Chinese technology firms from
buying US semiconductor components.
Liu Weidong, a US affairs specialist from the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told SCMP
that increased protectionism among Washington lawmakers suggests the decoupling trend between
both countries is far from over.
The broader shift at play is that decoupling will result in de-globalization ,
economic and financial fragmentation, and disruption of complex supply chains.
BEIJING, Dec. 21 (Xinhua) -- The
phase-one economic and trade deal between China and the United States benefits both sides and
the whole world, Chinese President Xi Jinping said Friday.
In a phone conversation with his U.S. counterpart, Donald Trump, Xi noted that the two
countries have reached the phase-one agreement on the basis of the principle of equality and
mutual respect.
Against the backdrop of an extremely complicated international environment, the agreement
benefits China, the United States, as well as peace and prosperity of the whole world, Xi
said.
For his part, Trump said that the phase-one economic and trade agreement reached between
China and the United States is good for the two countries and the whole world.
Noting that both countries' markets and the world have responded very positively to the
agreement, Trump said that the United States is willing to maintain close communication with
China and strive for the signing and implementation of the agreement at an early date.
Xi stressed that the economic and trade cooperation between China and the United States has
made significant contributions to the stability and development of China-U.S. relations and the
advancement of the world economy.
Modern economy and modern technologies have integrated the world as a whole, thus making the
interests of China and the United States more intertwined with each other, Xi said, adding that
the two sides will experience some differences in cooperation.
As long as both sides keep holding the mainstream of China-U.S. economic and trade
cooperation featuring mutual benefits and win-win outcomes, and always respect each other's
national dignity, sovereignty and core interests, they will overcome difficulties on the way of
progress, and push forward their economic and trade relations under the new historical
conditions, so as to benefit the two countries and peoples, Xi said.
China expresses serious concerns over the U.S. side's recent negative words and actions on
issues related to China's Taiwan, Hong Kong, Xinjiang and Tibet, Xi said.
He noted that the U.S. behaviors have interfered in China's internal affairs and harmed
China's interests, which is detrimental to the mutual trust and bilateral cooperation.
China hopes that the United States will seriously implement the important consensuses
reached by the two leaders over various meetings and phone conversations, pay high attention
and attach great importance to China's concerns, and prevent bilateral relations and important
agendas from being disturbed, Xi said.
Trump said he is looking forward to maintaining regular communication with Xi by various
means, adding he is confident that both countries can properly handle differences, and
U.S.-China relations can maintain smooth development.
Xi said he is willing to maintain contacts with Trump by various means, exchange views over
bilateral relations and international affairs, and jointly promote China-U.S. relations on the
basis of coordination, cooperation and stability.
The two heads of state also exchanged views on the situation of the Korean Peninsula. Xi
stressed that it is imperative to stick to the general direction of a political settlement,
saying all parties should meet each other halfway, and maintain dialogue and momentum for the
mitigation of the situation, which is in the common interests of all.
If true this china capitulation. Or some shrewd tactical maneuver, as the next year it is
China who hold trump cards -- it can derail Trump re-election with ease.
I have my doubts about Trump being the Grand Dealmaker he calls himself. Looking at seven
bankruptcies as a proof of that ... mythical skill I don't find much. I recall Trump suing the
Deutsche Bank after the bank wanted a credit back. His lawyers in court referred to the bank
crisis, called the Deutsche Bank as a bank responsible for that and said that thus they don't
deserve repayment. that was Chutzpah in the First Degree, For very obvious reasons Trump lost
that case and did pay back.
When Trunmp recently went on searching lawyers to work and sue for him he didn't find any. A
big corp lawyer anonymously briefly explained why: "Doesn't pay. Doesn't listen.'
A US-China trade deal was announced to chaotic fanfare late Friday Asian time – and we
are sceptical. First, we still don't have details other than that December tariffs were
postponed by both sides, the 15% US tariffs imposed on 1 September are to be reduced to 7.5% as
a sign of goodwill, and the 25% tariffs on USD250bn stay in place . Second, we aren't going to
get a signing ceremony between the US and Chinese leaders, which does not send an encouraging
signal. And third, what we see is close to the terms we previously criticized for being
unrealistic in reports such as 'A Great Deal of Nonsense" and "LOL-A-PLAZA".
The US Trade Representative (USTR) says the final text of the phase one
agreement is still being finalised, and he will sign it early next year for a likely incept
date of end-January 2020. The areas covered include: Intellectual Property (IP); Technology
Transfer; Agriculture; Financial Services; Currency; Expanding Trade; and Dispute Resolution.
Each of these promises much and yet potentially delivers little.
China has pledged to address issues of geographical indications, trademarks, and enforcement
against pirated and counterfeit goods. That's just after a Chinese court ruled that Japanese
retailer Muji doesn't own its own name in China and a local rival started years afterwards
does. Enforcement matters, not promises: more on that in a moment.
China has agreed to end forcing or pressuring foreign companies to transfer their tech as a
condition for obtaining market access or administrative approvals. Again, enforcement is all
that matters here. China also " commits to refrain from directing or supporting outbound
investments aimed at acquiring foreign technology pursuant to industrial plans that create
distortion. " That is China's reason for outbound investment! For example, Sweden's Defence
Research Agency just released a detailed survey of Chinese corporate acquisitions in their
country showing at least half are correlated with the "Made in China 20205" plan.
China will " support a dramatic expansion of US food, agriculture and seafood product
exports " , with the USTR stating the target is to jump to USD40bn in 2020, a USD16bn increase
over the pre-trade war level of USD24bn, and to aim for USD50bn. Part of that reflects China's
decimated pork herd, so is hardly a concession. Yet it is hard to conceive of how the total
figure can be achieved without China using the US to displace agri imports from other nations,
e.g., Argentinean and Brazilian soy, and perhaps Aussie and Kiwi farm goods. That also
increases China's economic exposure to the US at a time of rising geopolitical tensions between
the two (see news of the US' secret expulsion of two Chinese diplomats), and US' farmers
exposure to China in kind. For its part, the Chinese press are not mentioning these US hard
targets, and are talking about WTO trading terms, which bodes poorly.
The financial services chapter pledges China to an opening up already underway as it
searches for new sources of USD inflows, so again is not a concession. Interestingly, it also
says US ratings agencies will get access – which will be fun given the evident credit
stresses emerging in China just as US banks will be trying to sell China as an investment
destination. .
On currency the US is requiring "high-standard commitments" to refrain from competitive
devaluations and targeting of exchange rates. Everyone knows the CNY is not freely-traded
– but also that China is doing its best to prop it up, not to try to push it lower. The
key message is CNY is not going to be allowed to do what it ought to be doing, i.e., weakening,
as China is pledging new fiscal stimulus in 2020 that will decrease its external surplus. That
runs counter to market forces, and smacks of a kind of Plaza Accord. Of course, as long as this
US-China agreement holds that might be sustainable due to the promised higher capital
inflows...
Eexcept the expanding trade chapter implies the opposite. The USTR says China is pledging to
boost its 2020 imports of US goods and services by USD100bn over the level in 2017, and by
USD100bn again in 2021, for a total increase of USD200bn . Given 2017 was pre-trade war and US
exports to China dropped off a cliff in 2019, this means around a 110% y/y increase in
purchases in 2020 – and agri is only a portion of that. The problems should be obvious.
How can a slowing Chinese economy (imports are down y/y from most sources), see this kind of
increase without substituting US for world exports or local goods? How can a China with a USD
liquidity shortage serious enough to be driving said lowered import bill, and
'1USD-in/1USD-out' de facto capital controls, cope with the net reduction on the trade side? As
of November, the 12-month rolling Chinese global trade surplus with the US it was USD330bn and
globally was USD440bn. We are talking about reducing that US figure by 2/3 and the global total
by 1/2!
Which brings us to the last chapter: Dispute Resolution. Getting China to comply is far
harder than getting it to sign. The USTR notes the agreement " establishes strong procedures
for addressing disputes related to the agreement and allows each party to take proportionate
responsive actions that it deems appropriate ." In other words, each side can unilaterally do
what they want when they want! So much for the unilateral US control of the process.
So how to see this in summary? The reduction in tariffs from 15% to 7.5% is a positive,
albeit far less than the Wall Street Journal had promised. (NB, the USTR took the
extraordinary step of publicly chastising the WSJ journalists who wrote that story –
regular readers may recall I have also called them out more than once in the past.) Indeed, if
China really has agreed to all that is stated here then further incremental tariff rollbacks
can be seen – though the USTR has said the 25% tariffs will stay as collateral for a
phase two deal that nobody really expects to happen. Yet the terms of this phase one still seem
to be A Great Deal of Nonsense. How can China stop buying foreign tech? How can it buy as much
US stuff as pledged? How can it do so and not undermine the WTO? How can it do so and not
weaken CNY? And how can it do so with a strong CNY without increasing its USD debts, its
strategic reliance on the USD, and to US goods? In short, if China does as the USTR claims, the
US is a huge winner here (and there are lots of losers); if China does not comply with what
look an impossible import targets, then the US can frame China as the bad guy and the tariffs
can go back up again. Arguably, the question is not if that will happen, but when.
The most important thing about the "phase one" trade agreement announced Friday by U.S. and
Chinese officials is what won't happen: The two countries won't impose additional tariffs on
Sunday that would have further escalated the trade war.
There will also be a bit of de-escalation. In September, Trump imposed 15 percent
tariffs on $110 billion worth of Chinese consumer goods, such as clothing; those tariffs will
be cut in half, to 7.5 percent. But the largest piece of Trump's China tariffs -- a 25 percent
tariff on $250 billion in goods mostly sold to businesses rather than consumers -- will stay
unchanged, for now.
Awaited confirmation by China about the Trade Deal before writing about it. This article is what I
waited to be published: "Phase one trade deal a step forward, a new beginning," yes, an
optimistic tone, although tempered in the text:
"Rome was not built in a day. Trade protectionism has expanded in some places of the
world, affecting some people's thinking. It is not easy for China and the US to agree on the
text of the deal. But how to define this deal and whether it can keep its positive effects
on the global market and even accumulate more positive energy will depend on further efforts
from China and the US , as the global market has been disturbed by the trade war.
" We must see that the first phase of the trade agreement is a win-win outcome which
will deliver tangible benefits to the world . The response from investors around the
world is most real because they would not use their own money just to make a grand gesture.
However, some people in both China and the US may hype that their own country suffers loss
from this deal. This is a natural counter-stream of public opinion, but does not represent
the mainstream attitude on either side." [My Emphasis]
Gee, "benefits for the whole world," not just China and Outlaw US Empire? What forced the
Empire to compromise:
"The US-China trade war happens at a time when the US' strategic thinking on China has
changed. This requires Washington to find a strategic impetus to end the trade war. So what
would be such a strategic impetus?
"We believe as long as the US side is realistic, it is possible that such a strategic
impetus can be formed and gradually expanded. The trade war is not an effective way to
resolve the strategic competition between China and the US. It can neither scare China nor
effectively weaken China, but will cause a gradual rise in the cost of the US economy" .
[My Emphasis]
IMO, China's assessment's correct. The financialized economy of the Evil Outlaw US Empire
has drained it of the resilience it once enjoyed and that China's economy has obtained. Plus,
as I wrote several months ago, China's employing geoeconomic levers which the Empire can no
longer deploy and is thus stuck with using the only remaining tool it has--its waning
geopolitical levers.
Awaited confirmation by China about the Trade Deal before writing about it. This article is what I
waited to be published: "Phase one trade deal a step forward, a new beginning," yes, an
optimistic tone, although tempered in the text:
"Rome was not built in a day. Trade protectionism has expanded in some places of the
world, affecting some people's thinking. It is not easy for China and the US to agree on the
text of the deal. But how to define this deal and whether it can keep its positive effects
on the global market and even accumulate more positive energy will depend on further efforts
from China and the US , as the global market has been disturbed by the trade war.
" We must see that the first phase of the trade agreement is a win-win outcome which
will deliver tangible benefits to the world . The response from investors around the
world is most real because they would not use their own money just to make a grand gesture.
However, some people in both China and the US may hype that their own country suffers loss
from this deal. This is a natural counter-stream of public opinion, but does not represent
the mainstream attitude on either side." [My Emphasis]
Gee, "benefits for the whole world," not just China and Outlaw US Empire? What forced the
Empire to compromise:
"The US-China trade war happens at a time when the US' strategic thinking on China has
changed. This requires Washington to find a strategic impetus to end the trade war. So what
would be such a strategic impetus?
"We believe as long as the US side is realistic, it is possible that such a strategic
impetus can be formed and gradually expanded. The trade war is not an effective way to
resolve the strategic competition between China and the US. It can neither scare China nor
effectively weaken China, but will cause a gradual rise in the cost of the US economy" .
[My Emphasis]
IMO, China's assessment's correct. The financialized economy of the Evil Outlaw US Empire
has drained it of the resilience it once enjoyed and that China's economy has obtained. Plus,
as I wrote several months ago, China's employing geoeconomic levers which the Empire can no
longer deploy and is thus stuck with using the only remaining tool it has--its waning
geopolitical levers.
The take away quotes
"
...... the FT reports that Beijing has ordered all government offices and public institutions
to remove foreign computer equipment and software within three years.
..........
The take home message here is that US PC and software giants are about to lose billions in
sale to Chinese customers, a move that will infuriate Trump who will, correctly, see such
attempts to isolate the Chinese PC market from US vendors.
"
This is going to be difficult for China but they have a domestic OS, the Kylin OS, that is
Unix/Linux based, so much Open Source software is available to replace the Microsoft/Apple
software they currently use until they develop their own.
This speaks to Trump saying he can wait for a trade deal until after the (s)election but
it seems obvious that his negotiating position is going to get weaker by the day.
-------------------------------
Another aspect of the tech war that is financial also is that I am reading the China is on
the cusp of releasing a digital fiat RMD currency. This will have serious disintermediation
effects on the BIS, City of London Corp and others doing currency exchange if any can do such
on their phones. I am reading about digital currencies needing a blockchain underpinning but
if the US dollar can exist without one currently then what are the show stoppers except the
private finance dead weight in the middle?
"... When you factor in reelection worries, Trump needs to find a mutually agreeable solution to at least pause the trade war. Such a move will surely revive economic growth hurt by sanctions and ensure the smoothest possible path toward a second term. People vote with their wallets, and Trump gets that. ..."
"... Nothing could be worse for Xi than the markets concluding that China is in a recession with one of its prime economic centers now in open revolt. Just as quickly as China was dubbed the next rising superpower, her economic and political obituary could be written. ..."
"... Here is where a so-called Phase One trade deal could help patch up the relationship and give both sides the short-term domestic boost their leaderships are looking for. ..."
"... But there are reasons to worry. A recent report in Axios claims that China is quite angry over Trump's decision to sign the Hong Kong bill, and as a result talks between the two nations have "stalled." Still, both sides have ample reasons to get a trade deal done. However, if Trump does indeed get reelected and China feels stable domestically once again, the pull of history -- specifically, which nation will dominate geopolitics in the 21st century -- may be too strong to resist. ..."
Consider America's position. President Trump surely has incentives to push for what I would
call a strategic pause in his quest to contain a rising China through tough trade moves. At the
moment, staring down a possible vote on articles of impeachment and a Senate trial, rising
trade tensions, which could reignite fears of a recession, are the last thing the president
needs. When you factor in reelection worries, Trump needs to find a mutually agreeable
solution to at least pause the trade war. Such a move will surely revive economic growth hurt
by sanctions and ensure the smoothest possible path toward a second term. People vote with
their wallets, and Trump gets that.
Chinese president Xi Jinping, meanwhile, has similar concerns. China's 6 percent economic
growth, something Washington can only dream of, is likely a number that exists only on paper,
for Beijing is known to cook their books. With growth more than likely just barely in positive
territory, thanks in large part to U.S. trade tariffs, and the challenges in Hong Kong not
looking as if they will subside anytime soon, Xi needs to deliver what he can claim is a
victory that also revives economic growth, at least for the time being. This will help
stabilize China domestically, plus give Xi time to allow Hong Kong's protests to burn out while
not having to worry about economic troubles at the same time.
Nothing could be worse for Xi than the markets concluding that China is in a recession
with one of its prime economic centers now in open revolt. Just as quickly as China was dubbed
the next rising superpower, her economic and political obituary could be written.
Here is where a so-called Phase One trade deal could help patch up the relationship and
give both sides the short-term domestic boost their leaderships are looking for. A
potential deal could involve China rolling back tariffs on all U.S. goods, agreeing to a large
purchase of American agricultural goods, and providing basic protections on all U.S.
intellectual property involving high-technology goods (think 5G, computers, and robotics). In
turn, America would roll back all tariffs -- something China wants very badly --
including, and most importantly, agreeing not to launch the scheduled new round of massive
tariffs on December 15, which are viewed as potentially the most damaging to date. While such
an interim deal is far from perfect -- China hawks will surely go ballistic, calling the deal
nothing more than appeasement or select your other favorite neocon smear -- Xi and Trump are
pragmatic enough to see that a deal is in both sides' interests.
But there are reasons to worry. A recent report in Axios claims that China is
quite angry over Trump's decision to sign the Hong Kong bill, and as a result talks between the
two nations have "stalled." Still, both sides have ample reasons to get a trade deal done.
However, if Trump does indeed get reelected and China feels stable domestically once again, the
pull of history -- specifically, which nation will dominate geopolitics in the 21st century --
may be too strong to resist.
Harry J. Kazianis is a senior director at the Center for the National Interest and the
executive editor of The National Interest magazine.
By offering Hong Kong official tools of support, President Trump has broadened the trade
dispute...
Throughout negotiations, the Chinese have been reluctant to get a deal over the line,
walking away from agreed upon terms several times. By supporting Hong Kong, President Trump is
showing the Chinese Communist Party that he will not sit idly by while they jerk trade
negotiations around.
American tech companies are
getting the go-ahead to resume business with Chinese smartphone giant Huawei Technologies
Co., but it may be too late: It is now building smartphones without U.S. chips.
Huawei's latest phone,
which it unveiled in September -- the Mate 30 with a curved display and wide-angle
cameras that competes with Apple
Inc.'s iPhone 11 -- contained no U.S. parts, according to an analysis by UBS and Fomalhaut Techno Solutions, a Japanese
technology lab that took the device apart to inspect its insides.
In May, the Trump administration banned U.S. shipments to Huawei as trade tensions with
Beijing escalated. That move stopped companies like Qualcomm Inc. and Intel Corp. from exporting chips to the company, though
some shipments of parts resumed over the summer after companies determined they weren't
affected by the ban.
Meanwhile, Huawei has made significant strides in shedding its dependence on parts from
U.S. companies. (At issue are chips from U.S.-based companies, not those necessarily made in
America; many U.S. chip companies make their semiconductors abroad.)
Huawei long relied on suppliers like Qorvo Inc., the North Carolina maker of chips that are used
to connect smartphones with cell towers, and Skyworks Solutions Inc., a Woburn, Mass.-based company that
makes similar chips. It also used parts from Broadcom Inc., the San Jose-based maker of Bluetooth and
Wi-Fi chips, and Cirrus Logic Inc.,
an Austin, Texas-based company that makes chips for producing sound.
Yet Another Trump Trade Win
Trump cut off supplies so China looked elsewhere.
Trump changed his mind.
This is what constitutes a win.
"When Huawei came out with this high-end phone -- and this is its flagship -- with no U.S.
content, that made a pretty big statement," said Christopher Rolland, a semiconductor analyst
at Susquehanna International Group.
Huawei executives told Rolland that the company was moving away from American parts, but it
was still surprising how quickly it happened.
This was likely going to happen anyway, but Trump escalated the speed at which it
happened.
The trade war is the first act in the much larger game of hegemony.
Both sides are disentangling.
Apple finished their Indian plant.
Huawei went ex-US (but almost certainly not US IP)
Europe is already muttering about human rights in Hong Kong and Xiangjang.
We're nearly ready for act 2. That's when Europe joins in on squeezing trade, and the rest
of the democratic world and a few others is bullied and bribed to follow.
Do you know why Russia still sells rocket engines to US after being hit US sanctions?
Don't tell me they need US dollar.
Do you know that China is facing US embargo under the pretext of national security from
1949 until now and things allowed to export to China mostly agriculture produce, gas and oil?
This is the reason they develop their own technologies which the media told me stolen from
the US even that the US doesn't have like 5G, quantum satellite, hypersonic weapons just to
name a few.
russia needs to stop selling those engines to merica and cut them out of space... what a
dumb move... russia always trying to be friends with evil merica
Plainly, China will never buy the same amount of soybeans or chips than before as Russia
will never accumulate US dollars in its Reserve. They have discovered than US is not a
reliable partner.
Those that think that China is only about ripping off US technology are going to be
surprised. Sure that was once China's main method as it was for the early USA to rip off
British textile secrets. Trump trying to take down China's biggest technology company has
been a real wake up call for them. Now, they will own all of the content and will dominate in
Asian markets, the middle east, etc. They already did it in solar panels and much else. They
have a plan. They build infrastructure, we let it ours decay. They invest in education, we
leave out students in debt up to their eyeballs and then give them Starbucks jobs. They have
high speed trains everywhere, we have Amtrak. They are looking outward, we are looking
inward. America first, rah rah. This will end badly - for the USA.
no average american benefits from international trade unless the product is unattainable
state side. if we can grow it, we should. if we can make it, we should. excess can be sold
outside the nation but since everything has been weaponized, we are the ones caught in the
middle who suffer.
tariffs are good and we should use them to protect our industries. the problem is that our
industry was destroyed before implementing tarrifs.. that part doesn't make sense and all of
our major corporations have sold out anyways, further screwing john q public because lets be
real, companies are out for profit and shareholder return, not protecting employees and
consumers. so they could care less where its being made / sold as long as they see their
bottom line increase, no worries.
problem is big business doesn't want to pay it. it has always been that way. when the
money system was put in place, business owners didn't like the idea of increased competition
(less slaves and more company owners) and therefore they were given the ability to claim you
for tax purposes, hence why anytime you take a job they want your SS#. investment in the past
happened because of things that were to come in the future. the future in america from her
current vantage is trans/post humanism with the idea of automation, human/machine integration
and that leaves little room or interest in building $100m slave factories for working class
people to grind away in
chips have been made consistently in Malaysia, Taiwan and Korea for the better part of
almost 25 years, not real sure how any of what you said is relative to current events. just
syncrhonicity and morons like you saying dumb ****.
Wow, the article is really insulting to the Chinese. Like building a smart phone for them
was like landing on the moon or something. They steal everything from everyone anyways, so
who cares what they build.......
This is why they are trying to ban Chinese hardware... not because they fear they are
spying on us but because their govt mandated backdoors aren't installed on Chinese hardware.
The US govt wants to ban their use because they can't spy on them... That is the real
reason.
US is losing the technology race against China. In the first phase China copied the tech,
now it is on par, and in five to ten years the murican chip manufacturers are out of
business.
The point is this: the muricans are lazy bastards, most of the brain power is imported.
They lived too long off the dollar reserve currency status, soon enough nobody will
interested in that toilet paper anymore.
Two years ago, Donald *** Trumptard on behalf of his handler, the US War State/Dark
State/Deep State , launched a world wide war against the Chinky company, Huawei, in order, to
kill it.
But that failed spectacularly. Not only is Huawei not dead, but its revenue actually grown
24% in 2019.
Now, its smart phones, and 5G cell tower equipments are totally free of US components.
WHY IS THE US DARK STATE SO TERRIFIED OF HUAWEI'S 5G WIRELESS TECHNOLOGY?
The US Dark State/War State/Deep State, that is the NSA/CIA/Pentagon/MIC/MSM . . . etc has
forced every western tech companies to install backdoors and malwares on their equipments,
except Huawei. They have tried to force Huawei to install those NSA backdoors and malwares,
in 2014, but the company categorically refused.
"The real issue is that nothing has changed since a 2014 report from The Register that
Huawei categorically refuses to install NSA backdoors into their hardware to allow unfettered
intelligence access to the data that crosses their networks.
All our emails, text messages, phone calls, internet searches, web browsing, library
records, . . . etc, are recorded and stored by NSA/CIA's vast servers farms.
Now, Huawei is not only the leading 5G wireless provider, but it is the only one, so far.
The other companies like Nokia and Ericsson are far behind.
5G is going to completely replace 4G and 3G. It is about 200 times faster than 4GLTE, in
download speed.
What this means is that if the world adopts the Huawei equipments and standards, it will
threaten to UNDO the US Dark State's vast global surveillance network.
This is what terrifies the US Dark State. Their vast Global Surveillance Network is the
basis of its power, and tools to enslave mankind.
There is a very good reason, why the American Founding Fathers , enacted every measures,
to protect our rights and privacy, so that we will not be controlled and enslaved by the
tyranny of totalitarian government, which is already upon us, in the form of US Dark
State/War State .
The US Dark State/Deep State/War State does not represent America. It is Un-American. It
is not the American Republic founded by our Founding Fathers, and enshrined in the US
Constitution.
Maybe so, Asoka. I think the Rothschild Clan plays both sides. They are in China. Some
purport the family carrying that lineage is named Li.
The U.S. is slowly but surely being isolated for The Great Fall...when we lose world
currency status. The Banking Cartel will evidently make huge money and gain enormous power
once the U.S. collapses. China already has the massive surveillance state, lack of privacy,
institutionalized social scoring, and workers' living cubes located on factory premises...so
the Rothshilds are in love. Sigh. So much control!! So much degradation!!! They're in
love!!!
"I think the Rothschild Clan plays both sides. They are in China. Some purport the family
carrying that lineage is named Li."
They are trying hard to infiltrate China. But the Chinese banks and financial service
firms are State Owned . They are hard penetrate. That is why they are using Donald *** Trump
to launch the Mother of All Great Trade War , to force the Chinese to open up their financial
sector for infiltration and plundering.
Plus, Chinese and westerner looks distinctively different. And so, they are trying the
inter-marriage trick with the rich and powerful Chinese families.
"... More generally, I think AI gets far too much of the billing in authoritarian apocalypse forecasts. Cheap, ubiquitous cameras, microphones, and location trackers are the real issue. If the state can track everyone's movements and conversations, then it can build a better Stasi even with crude, simple ai. ..."
The theory behind this is one of strength reinforcing strength – the strengths of
ubiquitous data gathering and analysis reinforcing the strengths of authoritarian repression to
create an unstoppable juggernaut of nearly perfectly efficient oppression. Yet there is another
story to be told – of weakness reinforcing weakness. Authoritarian states were always
particularly prone to the deficiencies identified in James Scott's Seeing Like a State
– the desire to make citizens and their doings legible to the state, by
standardizing and categorizing them, and reorganizing collective life in simplified ways, for
example by remaking cities so that they were not organic structures that emerged from the
doings of their citizens, but instead grand chessboards
with ordered squares and boulevards, reducing all complexities to a
square of planed wood . The grand state bureaucracies that were built to carry out these
operations were responsible for multitudes of horrors, but also for the crumbling of the
Stalinist state into a Brezhnevian desuetude, where everyone pretended to be carrying on as
normal because everyone else was carrying on too. The deficiencies of state action, and its
need to reduce the world into something simpler that it could comprehend and act upon created a
kind of feedback loop, in which imperfections of vision and action repeatedly reinforced each
other.
So what might a similar analysis say about the marriage of authoritarianism and machine
learning? Something like the following, I think. There are two notable problems with machine
learning. One – that while it can do many extraordinary things, it is not nearly as
universally effective as the mythology suggests. The other is that it can serve as a magnifier
for already existing biases in the data. The patterns that it identifies may be the product of
the problematic data that goes in, which is (to the extent that it is accurate) often the
product of biased social processes. When this data is then used to make decisions that may
plausibly reinforce those processes (by singling e.g. particular groups that are regarded as
problematic out for particular police attention, leading them to be more liable to be arrested
and so on), the bias may feed upon itself.
This is a substantial problem in democratic societies, but it is a problem where there are
at least some counteracting tendencies. The great advantage of democracy is its openness to
contrary opinions and divergent perspectives . This opens up democracy to a specific set of
destabilizing attacks but it also means that there are countervailing tendencies to
self-reinforcing biases. When there are groups that are victimized by such biases, they may
mobilize against it (although they will find it harder to mobilize against algorithms than
overt discrimination). When there are obvious inefficiencies or social, political or economic
problems that result from biases, then there will be ways for people to point out these
inefficiencies or problems.
These correction tendencies will be weaker in authoritarian societies; in extreme versions
of authoritarianism, they may barely even exist. Groups that are discriminated against will
have no obvious recourse. Major mistakes may go uncorrected: they may be nearly invisible to a
state whose data is polluted both by the means employed to observe and classify it, and the
policies implemented on the basis of this data. A plausible feedback loop would see bias
leading to error leading to further bias, and no ready ways to correct it. This of course, will
be likely to be reinforced by the ordinary politics of authoritarianism, and the typical
reluctance to correct leaders, even when their policies are leading to disaster. The flawed
ideology of the leader (We must all study Comrade Xi thought to discover the truth!) and of the
algorithm (machine learning is magic!) may reinforce each other in highly unfortunate ways.
In short, there is a very plausible set of mechanisms under which machine learning and
related techniques may turn out to be a disaster for authoritarianism, reinforcing its
weaknesses rather than its strengths, by increasing its tendency to bad decision making, and
reducing further the possibility of negative feedback that could help correct against errors.
This disaster would unfold in two ways. The first will involve enormous human costs:
self-reinforcing bias will likely increase discrimination against out-groups, of the sort that
we are seeing against the Uighur today. The second will involve more ordinary self-ramifying
errors, that may lead to widespread planning disasters, which will differ from those described
in Scott's account of High Modernism in that they are not as immediately visible, but that may
also be more pernicious, and more damaging to the political health and viability of the regime
for just that reason.
So in short, this conjecture would suggest that the conjunction of AI and authoritarianism
(has someone coined the term 'aithoritarianism' yet? I'd really prefer not to take the blame),
will have more or less the opposite effects of what people expect. It will not be Singapore
writ large, and perhaps more brutal. Instead, it will be both more radically monstrous and more
radically unstable.
Like all monotheoretic accounts, you should treat this post with some skepticism –
political reality is always more complex and muddier than any abstraction. There are surely
other effects (another, particularly interesting one for big countries such as China, is to
relax the assumption that the state is a monolith, and to think about the intersection between
machine learning and warring bureaucratic factions within the center, and between the center
and periphery).Yet I think that it is plausible that it at least maps one significant set of
causal relationships, that may push (in combination with, or against, other structural forces)
towards very different outcomes than the conventional wisdom imagines. Comments, elaborations,
qualifications and disagreements welcome.
Ben 11.25.19 at 6:32 pm (no link)
This seems to equivocate between two meanings of bias. Bias might mean a flaw that leads to
empirically incorrect judgements and so to bad decisions, and it's true that that type of
bias could destabilize an authoritarian state. But what we usually worry about with machine
learning is that the system will find very real, but deeply unjust, patterns in the data, and
reinforce those pattern. If there's a particular ethnic group that really does produce a
disproportionate number of dissidents, and an algorithm leads to even-more-excessive
repression of that group -- I'm not sure why an authoritarian state would see a stability
threat in that tendency.
More generally, I think AI gets far too much of the billing in authoritarian
apocalypse forecasts. Cheap, ubiquitous cameras, microphones, and location trackers are the
real issue. If the state can track everyone's movements and conversations, then it can build
a better Stasi even with crude, simple ai.
I'd just like to point out (re: the tweet in the original post) that the "Uighur
face-matching AI" idea is bullshit invented by scaremongers, with no basis in fact and
traceable to a shoddy reddit thread. The Chinese government is not using facial recognition
to identify Uighur, and the facial recognition fears about the Chinese government are vastly
overstated.
Australia's border control facial recognition software is far more advanced than
China's, as is the UK's, and facial recognition is actually pretty common in democracies. See
e.g. the iPhone.
The main areas in which China uses facial recognition are in verifying ID for some high
cost functions (like buying high speed rail tickets), and it's quite easy to avoid these
functions by joining a queue and paying a human. The real intrusiveness of the Chinese
security state is in its constant bag searches and very human-centric abuses of power in
everyday life in connection with "security". Whether you get stopped and searched depends a
lot on very arbitrary and error prone judgments by bored security staff at railway stations,
in public squares, and on buses, not some evil intrusive state technology.
Conversely, the UK is a world leader in installing and using CCTV cameras, and has been
for a long time. Furthermore, these CCTV cameras are a huge boon to law-abiding citizens,
since they act as both excellent forms of crime prevention (I have had this experience
myself) and for finding serious criminals. The people responsible for the death of those 39
Vietnamese labourers in the ice truck were caught because of CCTV; so was the guy who
murdered that woman on the street in Melbourne a few years ago.
Finally to address another point that's already been raised (sadly): China no longer
harvests organs, and the 2019 report that says it does is a sham. The social credit system is
also largely a myth, and nobody from China even seems to know wtf it is.
If you're going to talk about how state's work, and the relative merits of autocratic vs.
democratic states and their interaction with technology, it's a really good idea to get the
basic facts right first.
Nathanael 11.26.19 at 6:10 am (no link)
I'll add that John Quiggin's point that Xi has already lost control of the provinces is
correct -- but it DOES threaten his position as dictator. Once the provincial governors know
they can act with impunity, it is absolutely standard for the next step to be getting rid of
that annoying guy who is pretending to be dictator. It may take a few years but Xi now has
dozens of powerful insiders who know that he's a weakling. They'll bide their time but when
he crosses too many of them they'll take him out. And if China doesn't shut down coal, he's
going to look like a weakling internationally too, in a couple of years. This will create a
new group of ambitious insiders with a different reason to take him out.
Xi broke the "technocratic consensus" which was present after Deng, of central committee
members who strove for competence and fact-based decision-making. That was a surprisingly
effective type of junta government which led to lots of thinkpieces about whether
authoritarian China would beat the democratic west. But it succumbed to the succession
problem, like all authoritarian systems; Xi made himself Premier-for-life and the country is
now exhibiting all the usual failures of authoritarian countries.
Hidari 11.26.19 at 9:08 am (no link)
@11 Yes it's strange that allegations of Chinese use of facial recognition software is
gaining so much traction at a time when the Trump regime is deliberately ratcheting up
tensions with China to pursue nakedly imperial goals, when the objective facts of Israeli use
of similar software, which the Israelis boast about (
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/all/why-did-microsoft-fund-israeli-firm-surveils-west-bank-palestinians-n1072116
) doesn't cause so much interest, at a time when the Trump regime has simple decreed that the
Israeli invasion/colonisation of Palestine is 'legal under international law'.
One of life's little mysteries I guess.
If we must talk about China could we at least bring it back to areas where we are
responsible and where, therefore, we can do something about it?
So in due course the trade war was replaced by the full scale cold war.
Notable quotes:
"... Needless to say, no differences will be "settled amicably" and now China will have no choice but to retaliate, aggressively straining relations with the US, and further complicating Trump's effort to wind down his nearly two-year old trade war with Beijing. ..."
"... The legislation, S. 1838, which was passed virtually unanimously in both chambers, requires annual reviews of Hong Kong's special trade status under American law and will allow Washington to suspend said status in case the city does not retain a sufficient degree of autonomy under the "one country, two systems" framework. The bill also sanctions any officials deemed responsible for human rights abuses or undermining the city's autonomy. ..."
"... The House cleared the bill 417-1 on Nov. 20 after the Senate passed it without opposition, veto-proof majorities that left Trump with little choice but to acquiesce, or else suffer bruising fallout from his own party. the GOP. ..."
"... In accordance with the law, the Commerce Department will have 180 days to produce a report examining whether the Chinese government has tried use Hong Kong's special trading status to import advanced "dual use" technologies in violation of US export control laws. Dual use technologies are those that can have commercial and military applications. ..."
"... The new law directs the US secretary of state to "clearly inform the government of the People's Republic of China that the use of media outlets to spread disinformation or to intimidate and threaten its perceived enemies in Hong Kong or in other countries is unacceptable." ..."
"... The state department should take any such activity "into consideration when granting visas for travel and work in the United States to journalists from the People's Republic of China who are affiliated with any such media organizations", the law says. ..."
"... Yes I think getting the western financial institutions out of HK is the plan. I'm sure they appreciate the US doing this for them, but of course they could never admit that. ..."
Less than an hour after Trump once again paraded with yet another all-time high in the
S&P...
... and on day 510 of the trade war, it appears the president was confident enough that a
collapse in trade talks won't drag stocks too far lower, and moments after futures reopened at
6pm, the White House said that Trump had signed the Hong Kong bill backing pro-democracy
protesters, defying China and making sure that every trader's Thanksgiving holiday was just
ruined.
In a late Wednesday statement from the White House, Trump said that:
I signed these bills out of respect for President Xi, China, and the people of Hong Kong.
They are being enacted in the hope that Leaders and Representatives of China and Hong Kong
will be able to amicably settle their differences leading to long term peace and prosperity
for all.
Needless to say, no differences will be "settled amicably" and now China will have no
choice but to retaliate, aggressively straining relations with the US, and further complicating
Trump's effort to wind down his nearly two-year old trade war with Beijing.
Trump's signing of the bill comes during a period of unprecedented unrest in Hong Kong,
where anti-government protests sparked by a now-shelved extradition bill proposal have
ballooned into broader calls for democratic reform and police accountability.
"The Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act reaffirms and amends the United States-Hong
Kong Policy Act of 1992, specifies United States policy towards Hong Kong and directs
assessment of the political developments in Hong Kong," the White House said in a statement.
"Certain provisions of the act would interfere with the exercise of the president's
constitutional authority to state the foreign policy of the United States."
The legislation, S. 1838, which was passed virtually unanimously in both chambers,
requires annual reviews of Hong Kong's special trade status under American law and will allow
Washington to suspend said status in case the city does not retain a sufficient degree of
autonomy under the "one country, two systems" framework. The bill also sanctions any officials
deemed responsible for human rights abuses or undermining the city's autonomy.
The House cleared the bill 417-1 on Nov. 20 after the Senate passed it without
opposition, veto-proof majorities that left Trump with little choice but to acquiesce, or else
suffer bruising fallout from his own party. the GOP.
Trump also signed into law the PROTECT Hong Kong act, which will prohibit the sale of
US-made munitions such as tear gas and rubber bullets to the city's authorities.
While many members of Congress in both parties have voiced strong support for protesters
demanding more autonomy for the city, Trump had stayed largely silent, even as the
demonstrations have been met by rising police violence.
Until now.
The bill's author, Senator Marco Rubio of Florida, said that with the legislation's
enactment, the US now had "new and meaningful tools to deter further influence and interference
from Beijing into Hong Kong's internal affairs."
In accordance with the law, the Commerce Department will have 180 days to produce a
report examining whether the Chinese government has tried use Hong Kong's special trading
status to import advanced "dual use" technologies in violation of US export control laws. Dual
use technologies are those that can have commercial and military applications.
One other less discussed but notable provision of the Hong Kong Human Rights Act targets
media outlets affiliated with China's government. The new law directs the US secretary of
state to "clearly inform the government of the People's Republic of China that the use of media
outlets to spread disinformation or to intimidate and threaten its perceived enemies in Hong
Kong or in other countries is unacceptable."
The state department should take any such activity "into consideration when granting
visas for travel and work in the United States to journalists from the People's Republic of
China who are affiliated with any such media organizations", the law says.
* * *
In the days leading up to Trump's signature, China's foreign ministry had urged Trump to
prevent the legislation from becoming law, warning the Americans not to underestimate China's
determination to defend its "sovereignty, security and development interests."
"If the U.S. insists on going down this wrong path, China will take strong countermeasures,
" said China's foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang at a briefing Thursday in Beijing. On
Monday, China's Vice Foreign Minister Zheng Zeguang summoned the U.S. ambassador, Terry
Branstad to express "strong opposition" to what the country's government considers American
interference in the protests, including the legislation, according to statement. The new U.S.
law comes just as Washington and Beijing showed signs of working toward "phase-one" of deal to
ease the trade war. Trump would like the agreement finished in order to ease economic
uncertainty for his re-election campaign in 2020, and has floated the possibility of signing
the deal in a farm state as an acknowledgment of the constituency that's borne the brunt of
retaliatory Chinese tariffs.
Last week China's Vice Premier and chief trade negotiator Liu He said before a speech at the
Bloomberg New Economy Forum in Beijing, that he was "cautiously optimistic" about reaching the
phase one accord. He will now have no choice but to amend his statement.
In anticipation of a stern Chinese rebuke, US equity futures tumbled, wiping out most of the
previous day's gains... Still, the generally modest pullback - the S&P was around 2,940
when Trump announced the Phase 1 deal on Oct 11 - suggests that despite Trump's signature,
markets expect a Chinese deal to still come through. That may be an aggressive and overly
"hopeful" assumption, especially now that China now longer has a carte blanche to do whatever
it wants in Hong Kong, especially in the aftermath of this weekend's
landslide victory for the pro-Democracy camp which won in 17 of the city's 18
districts.
"Following last weekend's historic elections in Hong Kong that included record turnout, this
new law could not be more timely in showing strong US support for Hongkongers' long-cherished
freedoms," said Rubio
This is another attempt by the US to stop BRICS. They care NOTHING about HK, only its
usefulness in the US war on Chinas growing importance in world trade.
but no no no... trading with communists brings jobs to sell cheap crap. oh what was I
thinking.... cheap crap, jobs, and the richest of the rich get richer... my bad.
it ain’t like the commies are going to use the money to build up their military..
Of course the obvious solution is to just let people choose whatever or whomever they want
to associate with and be respected and left alone for their choice.
But no. We all have to live and abide by the wishes of other people bcuz of "unity" and
****.
Eh guys, you still do not understand that all this (not only China and Hong Kong) is a
very big "elite" performance for ordinary people to keep you (the rest of the boobies) in
subjection. It's like in boxing - contractual fights. Do you think world "elites" benefit
from peace and order? You are mistaken - these guys have the world as death (the death of
their Power and their Control). An example from the history of Europe - in the 18-19 and
early 20th century, Europe only did what it fought. But the funny thing is that the monarchs
(the real owners of Europe) were relatives among themselves. The First World War was
popularly called “The War of Three Cousins” (English monarch, German Kaiser and
Russian emperor). But the Europeans paid for the dismantling of relatives. Now the "monarchs"
are bankers and your position has not changed, you changed only the owners after 1918.
Problem with Hong Kong is, it is dependent on China to survive. That is not only true for
the most basic neccessities, but also as a port for international trade. However, in the last
25 years, Shenzhen and Guangzhou have built up their own trade hubs, which has pulled trade
away from being concentrated in Hong Kong, and consequently more dependent on China. Our
ideas of Hong Kong remaining an independent island nation isn't going to work for three
reasons:
1. Without being a doorway to China, there is no other reason for its existence.
2. Hong Kong is indeed Chinese sovereign territory, that was taken away from it to be made
into a trade colony by the British in 1841, under the Treaty of Nanking. The British gave up
Hong Kong in 1997, under the 1984 signed Sino-British Joint Declaration, in which Britain
agreed to return not only the New Territories but also Kowloon and Hong Kong itself. China
promised to implement a "One Country, Two Systems" regime, under which for fifty years Hong
Kong citizens could continue to practice capitalism and political freedoms forbidden on the
mainland. So, when the year 2047 comes around, Hong Kong will be fully absorbed and
integrated in a One Country, One system Chinese regime. In otherwords, Hong Kong's fate was
already sealed in 1984, and there is nothing America can legally do about it.
3. Hong Kong still needs the basic neccessities from China to survive. Don't count on
either the British or the Americans to provide it.
Yes I think getting the western financial institutions out of HK is the plan. I'm sure
they appreciate the US doing this for them, but of course they could never admit
that.
Xi Jinping tells that bullshit little story about China's 5,000 year History, but the truth
is really much more pragmatic: China doesn't aim to be an empire for the simple reason it
learned from America's mistakes.
The CCP already knows that being the sole superpower is unsustainable and, in the medium
term, goes even against its main objective, which is to establish a "moderately prosperous
society" in China until 2030 (they consider the 2000s Belgium as the standard for "moderately
prosperous").
Socialist China has shown, so far, an incredible capacity of learning from other nations'
mistakes:
1) It correctly read the historical conjuncture of the late 1960s, by concluding that the
historical cycle of socialist revolutions was over, and moved on to try to break the Cold War
embargo in order to initiate a cycle of wealth production. They achieved that in 1972. This was
when Mao Zedong was still alive and commanding China with absolute authority, so it's a myth
China "freed itself" only when and because Mao died (1976);
2) It learned from the failed experiment of the Brazilian liberal dictatorship, by doing
exactly the opposite of the Zona Franca de Manaus . The result was the creation of the
Special Economic Zones, which allowed capitalist investment from abroad to come to China but in
quarentene, and with technological transfer.
3) It learned from the trap the USSR fell, and used a peaceful geopolitical strategy. It
avoided an arms race and was able to expand its allied nations portfolio and slowly tightened
its grip over the American economy.
4) It learned from the the failure of Soviet socialism in producing very good quality
consumer goods. It solved this problem by "opening up" for capitalist exploitation the sectors
which produced and distributed consumer goods, without affecting the strategic sectors
(defense, finance, natural resources, etc.).
5) It learned from the failure of the American empire of maintaining its status as the
world's "lonely superpower" by not adopting a war culture in China and by being more tolerant
with its neighbors. But that didn't mean they didn't consolidated position: military spending
continues to go up and the Armed Forces continues to be modernized and under firm CCP control.
The South China Sea is a "corridor of life" for the Chinese, so the CCP quickly, but in a
peaceful manner, took control of it, very aware that it would probably cost the Vietnamese
friendship. But that was the exception that proves the rule, an exceptional situation where the
benefits were greater than the costs.
This isn't the only
article I've read over the past several days suggesting China won't agree to a trade deal
anytime soon. The following are amongst the reasons why:
"China's trade has gradually steadied as the nation moves to explore third markets. 'A
substantial decline in trade and a drastic fall in economic growth which some international
observers were worried about didn't occur, pointing to the potential and resilience of the
Chinese economy,' he went on to say.
"The US, for its part, has seen its current account deficit as a percentage of GDP shoot
up from 2.9 percent to 3.2 percent. This suggests the trade war is failing to address the
issue of the US' current account deficit, stressed Zhu, who is currently the Chairman of the
National Institute of Financial Research at Tsinghua University. He added that, more
worryingly, tariffs mean additional costs are put on US companies and consumers."
Evil Outlaw US Empire planners in their hubristic zeal to decouple from China's economy
erred massively in thinking China would be the one harmed and come begging for a trade deal.
Instead, China's geoeconomic strategy is clearly working and is more potent than what the
Empire can bring to the table--Oops! China can now play Trump.
psychohistorian 63
I see Trump's envoy Kissinger is standing next to Xi. Seems like Trump is trying to cook
something up with Kissinger regularly on the scene when it comes to Russia and China.
Interesting that Kissinger is there . Steve Pieczenik takes the very strong view
that Pompeo is a dead man walking. Worth every second of his five minute discourse . What I like
about Steve and his various takes on people of note is that he assassinates them immediately
and intensely with a quick turn of phrase.
Kissinger was also Nixon's envoy. He engineered the split between China and the Soviet
Union amongst other things. China and Russia's current leadership though may be above
Kissinger's pay grade.
Numbers show joke is on the US, not Huawei US ban lit a fire under Huawei, seen
taking lead in smartphones and awash in cash as bonds trade at a premium
By Umesh Desai
Unlisted Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei Technologies was made an international
pariah by US regulators earlier this year after a ban on buying key parts and on access to
crucial markets.
You think that sounded the death knell for the company? Think again.
This week, Huawei announced a US$286 million
bonuses bonanza to its employees . Its bonds continue to trade above par, and its cash
balances are massive. Hardly the signs of a company struggling under sanctions.
The company has repeatedly denied US allegations that it is a front for the Chinese
government – the justification Washington cited for banning US companies from using
Huawei-manufactured gear.
Huawei is the world's biggest telecom equipment maker and it's the second biggest smartphone
maker.
According to data from International Data Corporation, smartphone shipments in the
July-September quarter rose 18.6% to 66.6 million, just behind global leader Samsung's 78.2
million.
"Huawei has been gaining market share in China and overseas despite US trade war frictions
and may become the leading smartphone maker in the next two quarters," said Nitin Soni,
director of corporate ratings at Fitch Ratings.
He said telcos across emerging markets, which are facing capital expenditure pressures
and limited 5G business viability in the short term, may be willing to buy Huawei's 5G
equipment given it is cheaper and has better technology than European counterparts.
It's not just Soni. Industry leaders also acknowledge Huawei's quality standards
.
Indian telco Bharti Enterprises' chairman Sunil Mittal said recently, for example, "I can
safely say their products in 3G and 4G that we have experienced are significantly superior to
Ericsson and Nokia. I use all three of them. "
Indeed, the bond-market performance of the unrated, unlisted company confirms Huawei's
strength. Its dollar-denominated bonds traded in global markets are changing hands at above
par, indicating bond investors are confident about the company's cash position and liquidity
situation.
Its bonds due 2025, which pay a coupon of 4.125%, are trading at a price of $104 while the
holder would only get $100 at maturity. The premium would be compensated by the annual coupon,
which would reduce the yield. The bonds are currently yielding 3.4% compared with the 4.25%
yield at the time of the issuance. In price terms the bonds have rallied from $99 in 2015 to
$104. Prices move inversely to yields.
The financial highlights also betray no signs of weakness. The company has a cash hoard of
$39 billion and generates $10 billion from operations each year.
So, in fact, the US ban on Huawei may be helping the company.
"A ban on US companies such as Google to supply software to Huawei may lead to faster
innovation by Huawei to develop its own operating system and chips," said Soni.
China Communist Party to the extent it is a theocratic state generates its special flavor of corruption typical for theocratic states
where high priests of the cult enjoy virtual impunity. It is the same type of corruption that doomed the USSR. So it is institutional
Notable quotes:
"... In China, there is an additional emphasis of the moral aspect and it is less constrained by laws. An immoral action, even if it is legal, may still be considered a corruption by the Chinese society. For example, if a relative of Xi would to give a speech, and then received an exorbitant fee, it probably would be considered a corruption in China. However, in US, this is perfectly legal (and a reason many ex-politicians and ex-government employees become very rich) and it won't be considered a corruption. ..."
"... In case you hadn't noticed from prior postings, "Godfree Roberts" is a fake name for a CCP propaganda writer who scours the Internet for things to promote official views for, such as this absurd piece. ..."
"... The CCP knows corruption/graft, etc. is poison to their authoritarian one party state dictatorship. It is endemic in all such states. So periodically there are huge purges, trials, executions, etc. and a new set of stooges are risen up. Some get the message, most just bow humbly and wait for the storm to pass. It is as old as China. Of course government corruption is hardly unique to China. But in places where party leaders can be voted out (not merely a few shot for effect) it can be cleaned out periodically. Chinese are wisely quiet and cynical about this. ..."
"... What mechanisms are in place to keep this from going too far? That is, accusing someone for personal reasons, for example, to further one's own career. ..."
"... I have viewed Xi Jinping with more suspicion because his family has a lot of wealth and he sent his daughter to Harvard. He also did not agitate for rehabilitating the cultural revolution when it would have been more politically risky for him to have done so, like Bo Xilai did. ..."
"... I wonder if the Government would have something to say if he spoke out against the party and against Xi? Considering that people have received jail sentences (of years) for calling Xi a steamed bun, and that Winnie the Pooh is banned because poor Xi can't handle light hearted criticism I think we all know the answers here ..."
"... This is the ultimate corruption that a society faces – the inability to communicate freely and to criticise those accountable. Every Chinese citizen is under the CCP Yoke regardless of how this CCP shill wants to spin it. ..."
"... Corruption exists everywhere. It's just that it depends on what level it occurs. Heck, in the West, it's legal! Lobbying, they call it You can't bribe a cop to forgive a ticket, but goddamn you can bribe a politician to drive the country into the ground. ..."
"... If you want accurate information about China, stilted prose is inevitable. Real writers, professionals, are paid to lie about China. Anyone who tries to tell the truth is shunned, not only by our mainstream media, but by the PRC, which prefers to let its accomplishments speak for themselves. ..."
"... Udo Ulfkotte[3], Editor of Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, says that no significant European journalist, including himself, was free of CIA influence. Singapore's Lee Kwan Yew[4] outlined the consequences: ..."
"... The first is to do what Confucian states are always supposed to do: recruit your brightest sparks, promote the most honest, competent of them until the topmost are the very best you've got. As its track record demonstrates, the current dynasty has earned everyone's trust by doing that consistently. ..."
"... At this stage, any one who still believes in the western propaganda about China is simply too brain-washed and not too smart for any cure. Excuse me, I should say "too dumb for any cure". ..."
"... For example, Nathan Rich's recent video shows how media biased reporting of Hong Kong compare with Ukraine riots. The contrast can't be anymore stark: ..."
"... People view the world through narratives, and the value of a narrative lies only in how closely it follows and "explains" the widest possible array of empirical facts. ..."
"... Corrupt Chinese have practically taken over the US West Coast and Northeast. There isn't anywhere you could go in LA, Bay Area or Seattle without encountering mandarin speaking people. 99.9% Chinese nationals in the US are corrupt. With a nominal per capita GDP of $8,600, the only people who could afford to emigrate or send their children abroad for education are the rich, and China is so corrupt, no one can get rich without being corrupt, either by taking bribes or giving them. These are the corrupt factory owners who leave behind polluted rivers and air for their countrymen to die from while they escape to greener pastures with their family, and the government officials they bribed to pollute at will. ..."
"... This country is destroyed by (((lawyers))). As Niall Ferguson said, we no longer have the rule of law, we have the rule of (((lawyers))). ..."
The men of Qi presented the government of Lu with a troupe of singing girls. Ji Huanzi accepted them and for three days
failed to appear at court. Confucius left the state . Analects
Everywhere, since ancient times, peole have feared government corruption for, unlike war or fraud, corrupt policies cripple nations
for centuries. No society has suffered more grievously from–nor waged more protracted war against–official corruption than the Chinese.
Today however, though the story not over, it is nearing a goal that could make them the envy of the world and, like most Chinese
stories, theirs is a long one.
Corruption–nepotistic, pecuniary, blatant, discreet, major and minor–has been subverting governments since governments were invented.
Roman politicians were scandalously corrupt, Christianity failed to improve them, and their legacy of official impunity, bribery,
influence peddling, patronage, nepotism and cronyism, electoral fraud, embezzlement, kickbacks, unholy alliances, and involvement
with organized crime afflicts us today and we have become numb to it.
Had I thoroughly eradicated corrupt officials in addition to those already imprisoned I would have been dealing with two thousand
men from just two prefectures, men with no useful occupation who used my prestige to oppress people. No-one outside government
knew how wicked they were, so everyone said my punishments were harsh, for they saw only the severity of the law and didn't know
that these villains had used the government's good name to engage in evil practices. In the morning I punished a few and, by evening,
others had committed the same crimes. I punished those in the evening and next morning there were more violations! Although the
corpses of the first had not been removed others were already lined up to follow in their path, day and night! The harsher the
punishment, the more violations. I didn't know what to do, but I couldn't rest. If I was lenient the law became ineffectual, order
deteriorated, people thought me weak and engaged in still more evil practices. If I punished them, others regarded me as a tyrant.
How could anyone lead a peaceful life in such circumstances? Really, my situation was dreadful.
Confucians fought corruption more effectively than the Romans, partly because of public participation. The people retained the
right to withdraw the Mandate of Heaven–and, according to the constitution, still do–and many governments met grisly ends when they
failed to honor the Four Principles–propriety, justice, honesty, and honor–or their officials lacked the Eight Virtues–loyalty, filial
piety, benevolence, love, integrity, righteousness, harmony and peace.
From the earliest days, officials transferred to provinces were forbidden to bring their parents lest their needs conflict with
the Emperor's. They were rotated every three years and, after each rotation, their successors were encouraged to report discrepancies
for fear that they be blamed for them. Palace officials were regularly moved between departments and the seriously corrupt were strangled
and their families sold into slavery.
Every Chinese, from humble farmers to eminent politicians, knows this history and understands that promoting honest men to leadership
is the way to prevent corruption. Many still living saw how a century of chaos devastated public morality, as Mao observed during
a 1950 anti-corruption drive, "Today, you can buy a branch secretary for a few packs of cigarettes, not to mention marrying a daughter
to him." Mao's slogan, "The masses have sharp eyes," encouraged people to report wrongdoing and corruption fell dramatically. His
insistence on merely shaming corrupt officials worked because, says Sydney Rittenberg
[3] An old friend of the party assesses China's
new leaders. Rob Schmitz. Marketplace. November 19, 2012 . "Nobody locked their doors. The banks–there was a local bank branch
on many, many corners–the door was wide open, the currency was stacked up on the table in plain sight of the door, there were no
guards and they never had a bank robbery, ever."
As its accomplishments demonstrate, postwar China was free of corruption at the policy-making level but, especially during the
forty year Reform and Opening, lower level corruption flourished. Anticipating this in 1980, planners redesigned officials' incentives
so that bribers would effectively be rewarding them for expediting the plan, says Yukon Huang
[4] Yukon Huang was the World Bank's Director
for China. The Diplomat , "The system countered the growth‐inhibiting aspects of corruption by setting investment and production
targets that gave local officials incentives to promote expansion. It fostered a unity of purpose so that, even when corruption flourished,
the collaborators still made growth the guiding principle of their actions. This was reinforced by competition between localities
to meet targets and support productivity‐enhancing economic reforms. The competitive element helped curb waste and ensured a modicum
of efficiency despite the high degree of state intervention in commercial activities." Sometimes though, as throughout Chinese history,
things got out of hand.
Acting on a tipoff about smuggling, Beijing secretly sent detectives to Xiamen Port in 1999 but the smugglers, tipped off, set
fire to the investigators' hotel and killed them as they slept. On national television the next day, Premier Zhu Rongji declared
war and ordered a hundred coffins, "Ninety-nine for the crooks and one for me." Detectives from across the country converged on the
city and what they found staggered them: four million tons of imported diesel fuel had bypassed customs in just two years. They tracked
hundreds of suspects, locked escapees in a local hotel with armed guards on each floor, and spent three years unravelling a case
so complex that the customs files alone would be higher than a ten-story building. The gang had bribed the vice-minister of Public
Security, Li Jizhou, through his wife and daughter, and Li and thirteen others were sentenced to death, his wife to thirty months
in prison and three hundred officials were tried for aiding or abetting the criminals. The ringleader, farmer-turned-smuggler Lai
Changxing, fled to Canada, was extradited, and jailed for life in 2009.
In 1985 Bo Xilai, son of a Revolutionary Immortal and Xi Jinping's schoolmate, had ignored his father's pleas to stay out of politics,
"You know nothing of the sufferings of ordinary people and just want to capitalize on my name." Xilai cultivated a charismatic image,
was named one of Time's Most Influential People, rose rapidly to provincial governor and publicly campaigned for a cabinet position.
But, as conservative scholar Cheng Li said at the time, "Nobody really trusts him. A lot of people are scared of him, including several
princelings who are supposed to be his power base." Michael Wines wrote that, though he possessed prodigious charisma and deep intelligence,
"He possessed a studied indifference to the wrecked lives that littered his path to power Mr. Bo's ruthlessness stood out." With
the help of Justice Minister Zhou Yongkang, Bo had even wiretapped President Hu.
Despite considerable internal resistance, Vice Premier Wu Yi, the nation's highest woman official, demanded an open investigation
and a 2012 trial revealed that Bo owned expensive properties around the world and that his wife had murdered a British agent. They
were jailed for life and joined a long line of disgraced elites like the grandson of China's Head of State and founder of the Red
Army, Zhu De, who was executed for rape, and Yan Jianhong, wife of Guizhou's powerful Party Secretary, who was executed for corruption.
With prosperity assured, and elite corruption confronted, Congress anointed Xi Jinping, the most honest, competent official of
his generation, to succeed President Hu. In its first year, Xi's anti-corruption campaign saw ten thousand officials passed over
for promotion for concealing information and one-hundred thirty-thousand demoted or disciplined for making false declarations. By
2016, prosecutors had charged sixty-three senior officials and ministers with corruption, released confessions from fifty-seven thousand
Party members who made restitution and accepted demotions and seen Yunnan's corrupt Party Secretary, Bai Enpei, sentenced to death.
By 2018, anti-corruption squads had investigated 1.3 million bureaucrats, filed a million court cases, issued one hundred thousand
indictments, captured thousands of overseas fugitives and jailed or executed one-hundred twenty high-ranking officials–including
five national leaders, twelve generals, a dozen CEOs and Sun Zhengcai, former Chongqing Party chief, who was sentenced to life in
prison for taking huge bribes. After a 2019 industrial explosion in Tianjin killed one-hundred sixty-five people, the magistrate
found that petty bribery had led to weak code enforcement, sentenced the responsible official to death, and jailed forty-nine of
his colleagues.
Graft investigators unannounced inspections now resemble elite athletes' doping tests. An Anhui inspection team telephoned an
official four times between 7:31-7:35 one evening about his poverty alleviation efforts. He was showering and, when he failed to
answer, they reported him for obstruction and moved to dismiss him. Happily, through social media, the public came to his defense
and he was exonerated.
Knowing that that ten percent of their statements will be audited, even deputy county officials now report their marital status,
overseas travel, criminal record, wages, other earnings, family properties, stocks, funds, insurance and investments. If they refuse
to answer questions, or collude with, or protect accomplices, they are detained immediately.
Bureaucrats–especially those with leadership ambitions–endure increasing scrutiny as they advance, says Zhao Bing Bing
[6] Daniel Bell and Zhao Bing Bing, The China
Model. , "The selection criteria are: a person must have 'both ability and moral integrity and the latter should be prioritized
[7] The same wording as the Chief Censor used
in the Tang Dynasty. .'" Midlevel officials must report their own assets and those of their parents, wives, children, children's
spouses and cousins, children from previous marriages, children born out of wedlock and foster children. They must report their income,
savings, real estate, stock portfolios, insurance policies, unit trusts, bonds, assets in overseas accounts and, "Income shall include
salary and various bonuses, allowances, subsidies, and payment you receive from lectures, writing, consultation, reviewing, painting
and calligraphy." Says a scion of a prominent family:
I am a Party Member in China and all my family are Party members. What I think of Xi is that the life is really changing after
he came to power. A relative of mine works for the government as a vital governor in my city Chengdu (which is a big city like
BeiJing or ShangHai), then all my family people are like in the hierarchy of privilege. We pay nothing when go out for dinner,
the Party pays. We pay nothing for filling in oil, the Party pays. It seems like we don't need to pay for anything with our salaries,
cause either the Party pays, or someone will pay for us (who wants to flatter us). I smoke the best, I drink the best, sometimes
I even drive without license when drunk, because I fear no one.
In past times, yes we did have privilege everywhere, I felt so arrogant to be superior to others that's also true. But the
problem is, there is a tradeoff. We drank quite a lot of alcohol to show respect to others, we had to accept bribes even we know
it's risky, cause we have to consider about our clan (like the interest of my boss). We had to do some many things we don't want
to do, that's the rule of living in Party, care about the interest of Clan more than your own. That's how we united. We have to
fear a lot of threats from ordinary people, colleagues, and bosses. We cannot keep our own passports, Party keeps it in case of
we flee.
But life changed after Xi came to power, he did real things on anti-corruption. No one dare to present gifts to governors and
the abuse of public funds is strictly monitored. The Party took back the public cars from my family and even we have to pay for
the parking fee now! But..my family and I are actually happy with this, we are thankful to President Xi. Cause he seems like dragging
China to a healthier future. My relatives don't need to go out for dinner with other governors as social intercourse daily, they
don't need to drink so much on the table. And they start to learn to pay for the bill by turns, cause the Party will no longer
do this for them. They start to learn how to take bus or metro. That's good, actually. People start to think about what kind of
lifestyle is called 'healthy,' they are more like human now, no longer some conceited stupid with expanding power. That's how
our life changed after Xi came.
Senior ministers' lives have become excruciatingly transparent. Their private activities are scrutinized and their children must
adopt assumed names to avoid influence-seekers. Their meetings must have third-party observers as one-on-one appointments are taken
as evidence of impropriety. A record of excessive, or poor quality, government debts is treated as prima facie evidence of corruption
and automatically investigated. Senior officials are audited annually after retirement, remain responsible for the consequences of
all their decisions until the day they die and, even then, clawback provisions apply.
Xi invited amateur corruption fighters to join the campaign and Beijing publishes a monthly scoresheet. Citizens text tips and
complaints to the Rules and Discipline Committee (founded in the Tang Dynasty) at #12388 and often post accusations and photographs
of evidence on social media and request additional witnesses. Social media have made the masses' eyes sharper. Netizens scrutinizing
a news photograph noticed the work safety boss of Shaanxi province grinning broadly as he assessed the twisted wreckage of a bus
and a methanol tanker following an accident that left 36 people dead. They spotted his expensive timepiece and their tipoff and subsequent
investigation sent Yang Dacai, Brother Watch, to jail for fourteen years for taking a million dollars in bribes.
Today visitors burn incense at the shrines of great corruption fighters, the battle with official corruption still accounts for
half of all Chinese dramas, and millions watch TV dramas about 'Justice Bao' Zheng, the incorruptible Prefect of the Capital in 1000
AD. A popular TV series, 'In the Name of People,' depicts current-day intra-Party power struggles in the fictional city of Jingzhou.
There a prosecutor and a handful of honest local officials help laid-off workers protest a corrupt land deal, foil corrupt bureaucrats
sabotaging an arrest warrant, and stop fake police bulldozing honest citizens' homes. The show's writers say they have no shortage
of material.
Until 2018, anti-corruption work was shared by the National Bureau of Corruption Prevention, which recommended anti-corruption
policies and handled international anti-corruption coordination. The Supreme People's Procuratorate investigated various kinds of
malfeasance. The Central Commission for Discipline Inspection enforced party loyalty, anti-graft, ethical and Party lifestyle requirements
among civil servants and leading officials who are Party members, but turned criminal evidence over to the state for prosecution.
The Ministry of Supervision, MOS, supervised civil servants who were non-Party members, investigated graft, misappropriation of public
funds and other duty-related violations.
The Commission subsumes their functions into an independent, fourth arm of government that ranks with the Supreme Court and the
Department of Justice. As the most powerful such agency on earth, it employs legislation, digital technology (including face recognition
and AI), the sharp eyes of the people, and great investigative powers. With the goal of making corruption impossible, it centralizes
all anti-corruption processes and exercises authority over all civil servants within and outside the Party, the government, the People's
Congresses, the local supervisory commissions, the people's courts and procuracy, the People's Congresses, the eight democratic parties,
federations of industry and commerce, and everyone who works in, or consults for, organizations managing public affairs. With extensive
powers to interrogate, search, wiretap, detain suspects and freeze their assets, its writ extends to managers of state owned enterprises,
state educational, scientific, research, cultural, health care, sports, and similar agencies, think tanks, village and urban residents
committees, and 'all other personnel who perform public duties' and oversees provincial, city, and county level anti-corruption agencies.
Congress appoints the Commission's senior staff and Yang Xiaodu, its first director was, like Xi, a sent-down youth who performed
manual labour in Anhui province during the Cultural Revolution. Staff need not be Party members but they can never work in another
arm of government for the rest of their lives. The Commission is a political, not administrative body, and is exempt from the extensive
procedural and substantive constraints on administrative organs like the police. Though the law requires staff to pay compensation
'in accordance with law' for infringing people's lawful rights and interests, it does not provide a right of further recourse through
the courts, but does permit targets to appeal to higher-level organs for re-examination of the Commission's decisions and to challenge
unlawful conduct like prolonged detention.
If the Commission comes even close to its goal of making corruption impossible, grateful citizens will credit Confucius and the
First Emperor for limiting political power to a single lifetime and confining it to those who demonstrate both honesty and intelligence.
They will credit the present dynasty for testing officials in the wilderness and imposing extraordinary transparency, themselves
for their unwillingness to tolerate corruption, and Xi Jinping for creating the most powerful corruption-fighting agency in history.
Looking back only ten years, it is difficult to believe that corruption in China is on track to rival Singapore's by 2021.
* Corruption in Eighteenth-Century China. Nancy E. Park. The Journal of Asian Studies, vol. 56, no. 4, 1997.
Notes
[1] Qu Yuan, 340-278 BC, was a Chu
kingdom official and government minister who wrote some of the greatest poetry in Chinese history.
[2] From Huáng-Míng Zǔxùn (Instructions
of the Ancestor of the August Ming), admonitions left to his descendants by the Hongwu Emperor Zhu Yuanzhang, founder of the Ming
dynasty (1368 to 1644).
[3] An old friend of the party assesses
China's new leaders. Rob Schmitz. Marketplace. November 19, 2012
[4] Yukon Huang was the World Bank's
Director for China. The Diplomat
[5] China's Meritocratic Examinations
and the Ideal of Virtuous Talents. Xiao, H., & Li, C. (2013). In D. Bell & C. Li (Eds.), The East Asian Challenge for Democracy:
Political Meritocracy in Comparative Perspective: Cambridge University Press.
[6] Daniel Bell and Zhao Bing Bing,
The China Model.
[7] The same wording as the Chief
Censor used in the Tang Dynasty.
[8] The National Supervision Commission was
formed at the first session of the 13th National People's Congress in 2018 and absorbed the Central Commission for Discipline Inspection
of the Communist Party of China.
One salient difference between the Chinese and the Western concept of corruption is the role of laws. For people in the west,
the definition of corruption is strongly tied to, and in fact mostly defined through laws. To put it very crudely: anything legal
is not corruption, and vice versa (i.e. all corruption is illegal).
In China, there is an additional emphasis of the moral aspect and it is less constrained by laws. An immoral action, even
if it is legal, may still be considered a corruption by the Chinese society. For example, if a relative of Xi would to give a
speech, and then received an exorbitant fee, it probably would be considered a corruption in China. However, in US, this is perfectly
legal (and a reason many ex-politicians and ex-government employees become very rich) and it won't be considered a corruption.
There is really no right or wrong in either approaches. Both contains their pros and cons. The Western way has the advantage
of transparency that make it easier to follow. But it favors the rich and powerful people who can find loopholes and workarounds
to the laws. It also has the disadvantage of difficulty in keeping abreast with advances and changes of society and technologies
. The Chinese way has the advantage of flexibility to meeting the moral standard and demands from the people, but may become confusing
and uncertain for many people like businessmen or foreigners.
In case you hadn't noticed from prior postings, "Godfree Roberts" is a fake name for a CCP propaganda writer who scours the
Internet for things to promote official views for, such as this absurd piece.
The stilted prose and logic is evident. His stuff is full of charts and graphs which magically appear on his computer, unlike
yours or mine. Much of that might be "true" in the sense of basic historical writings, but selectively edited. Current Chinese
leader Xi here is extolled as chasing "corruption" away. Ha!
The CCP knows corruption/graft, etc. is poison to their authoritarian one party state dictatorship. It is endemic in all
such states. So periodically there are huge purges, trials, executions, etc. and a new set of stooges are risen up. Some get the
message, most just bow humbly and wait for the storm to pass. It is as old as China. Of course government corruption is hardly
unique to China. But in places where party leaders can be voted out (not merely a few shot for effect) it can be cleaned out periodically.
Chinese are wisely quiet and cynical about this.
Meanwhile Mr. "Roberts" probably earns a very nice salary doing this work. Maybe even teaches English and propaganda messaging
part time. Billions are spent censoring the Internet there and creating rosy statistics. Some gullible foreigners buy into that.
Fair enough. Every State has its hired liars and propaganda artists. But China has really set the mark for its effort.
Just avoid going there and saying anything negative. Their prisons are not like ours.
What mechanisms are in place to keep this from going too far? That is, accusing someone for personal reasons, for example,
to further one's own career.
I thought Bo Xilai was a maoist and so was Zhou Yongkang, both also had countryside experiences similar to Xi Jinping, and Bo
Xilai as mayor of Chongqing was very much aligned with Maoists and worked on rehabilitating the memory of the cultural revolution.
I have viewed Xi Jinping with more suspicion because his family has a lot of wealth and he sent his daughter to Harvard.
He also did not agitate for rehabilitating the cultural revolution when it would have been more politically risky for him to have
done so, like Bo Xilai did.
Xi Jinping isn't anywhere near the leftist Bo Xilai was.
Godfree did you communicate with Chinese who lived in Chongqing under Bo Xilai's mayorship, what did they say then? I recall
the corrupt wealthy hating him and the poor loving him. let's not forget Bo Xilai also had anti-corruption anti-gang campaigns.
I am a Party Member in China and all my family are Party members. What I think of Xi is that the life is really changing
after he came to power
I wonder if the Government would have something to say if he spoke out against the party and against Xi? Considering that
people have received jail sentences (of years) for calling Xi a steamed bun, and that Winnie the Pooh is banned because poor Xi
can't handle light hearted criticism I think we all know the answers here.
This is the ultimate corruption that a society faces – the inability to communicate freely and to criticise those accountable.
Every Chinese citizen is under the CCP Yoke regardless of how this CCP shill wants to spin it.
Corruption exists everywhere. It's just that it depends on what level it occurs. Heck, in the West, it's legal! Lobbying,
they call it You can't bribe a cop to forgive a ticket, but goddamn you can bribe a politician to drive the country into the ground.
@Muggles I am a US expat, and happen
to live in the China Mainland, and my impression is that most Chinese believe Xi Jinping is doing a great job. What do you care
really? Do you have any dogs in this race?
Talk about propaganda. Tell me then whom are the following:
Falun Gong
Shen Yun
Epoch Times
New Tang Dynasty
China Uncensored
There is no doubt in my mind China is a threat to the hegemony of the West. I definitely prefer Western civilization. But if
forced to choose between Chung Kuo and Babel 2.0, I'll take the former every time.
@Muggles It's not often someone
gets so many things wrong in such a tight space. Congratulations.
I've published at least six books, none about China, my bio is all over the place, and I run a business in under my own name.
If you want accurate information about China, stilted prose is inevitable. Real writers, professionals, are paid to lie
about China. Anyone who tries to tell the truth is shunned, not only by our mainstream media, but by the PRC, which prefers to
let its accomplishments speak for themselves.
I estimate that, since 1950, we taxpayers have spent $100 billion creating and disseminating lies about China–$1.5 billion
annually. Money well spent, if you're in the top 1%, because it convinces the masses that, in Margaret Thatcher's words, there
is no alternative to our failing system.
CIA Director William Casey[1] confirmed this when he told President Reagan in 1981, "We'll know our disinformation campaign
has worked when everything the American public believes is false." Carl Bernstein[2], of Watergate fame, revealed that four hundred
journalists had 'secretly carried out assignments for the Central Intelligence Agency.' All major US media outlets cooperated,
he said, including ABC, NBC, AP, UPI, Reuters, Newsweek, Hearst, the Miami Herald, and the New York Herald‑Tribune.
Udo Ulfkotte[3], Editor of Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, says that no significant European journalist, including himself,
was free of CIA influence. Singapore's Lee Kwan Yew[4] outlined the consequences:
The Philippines press enjoys all the freedoms of the US system but fails the people: a wildly partisan press helped Philippines
politicians flood the marketplace of ideas with junk and confuse and befuddle the people so that they could not see what their
vital interests were in a developing country. And, because vital issues like economic growth and equitable distribution were
seldom discussed, they were never tackled and the democratic system malfunctioned. Look at Taiwan and South Korea: their free
press runs rampant and corruption runs riot. The critic itself is corrupt yet the theory is, if you have a free press, corruption
disappears. Now I'm telling you, that's not true. Freedom of the press, freedom of news critics, must be subordinated to the
overriding needs of the integrity of Singapore and to the primacy of purpose of an elected government.
Says Ann Lee[5], "
A reporter and friend of Michael Massing[6] who worked at the Beijing office of The Wall Street Journal told him that the
editors in Washington regularly changed material information and opinions in his articles. Given the twelve-hour time difference,
by the time his stories went to press in the West, the editors had replaced all the Chinese interviews with statements from
American talking heads who work at think tanks promoting anti-China perspectives."
The weird result of this enormous, expensive effort is that, while we were busy lying to ourselves about China, the Chinese
were busy eating our lunch, and now it's too late. By 2021 every Chinese will have a home, a job, plenty of food, education, safe
streets, health- and old age care. 300,000,000 urban Chinese will have more net worth and disposable income than the average American,
their mothers and infants will be less likely to die in childbirth, their children will graduate from high school three years
ahead of American kids and live longer, healthier lives and there will be more drug addicts, suicides and executions, more homeless,
poor, hungry and imprisoned people in America than in China.
What's more, they'll be ahead of us in science and technology–they're already ahead in math, chemistry, engineering and computer
science–because they have 10x more geniuses and spend 3x more on R&D than we do.
They pulled it off because rubes like you believed the bs you read in our media and insulted anyone who tried to tell you the
truth. Congratulations.
____________________________________________________________
[1] A direct quote, provided and authenticated by Barbara Honegger, White House Policy Analyst and Special Assistant to the Assistant
to the President for Domestic Policy in the first Reagan Administration, 1981–83, who was present at the briefing and confirmed
it with other witnesses.
[2] "The CIA and the Media: How America's Most Powerful News Media Worked Hand in Glove with the Central Intelligence Agency and
Why the Church Committee Covered It Up." Carl Bernstein. Rolling Stone, 1977.
[3] Gekaufte Journalisten (Bought Journalists), Udo Ulfkotte. Kopp Verlag. 2014. The English language edition, Journalists For
Hire: How The CIA Buys The News, has been suppressed.
[4] A Third World Perspective on the Press. RH Lee Kwan Yew, Prime Minister of Singapore. C-SPAN, APRIL 14, 1988
[5] What the U.S. Can Learn from China: An Open-Minded Guide to Treating Our Greatest Competitor as Our Greatest Teacher, by Ann
Lee, 2012
[6] Editor of The Columbia Journalism Review.
The first is to do what Confucian states are always supposed to do: recruit your brightest sparks, promote the most honest,
competent of them until the topmost are the very best you've got. As its track record demonstrates, the current dynasty has earned
everyone's trust by doing that consistently.
The next step is making the process transparent: publish the rules, put an accountable person in charge of the process–someone
with a great deal to lose if they're perceived as being unfair or dishonest (interestingly, Rome's Chief Censor was also such
a person) and China's current censor is one of the most admired people in the country.
Then, have a transparent appeals process so that everyone can watch issues being thrashed out.
It's a human and therefore, imperfect, process but people don't expect perfection of their leaders, just best efforts–and that's
what the PRC delivers.
@Anonymous Bo was very popular in
Chongqing and people still point to the trees he planted and to the rapid progress they made under his administration.
But that is a sine qua non in Chinese government. Even someone as high born as Bo can only hope for advancement if they
show dramatic, tangible progress in their area of responsibility.
I suspect from his profile that Bo was a high functioning sociopath whose birth allowed him to bypass many of the filters in
the system.
He is often spoken of as a 'rival' of Xi Jinping, but that is simply a Western projection. China's elite knew about Bo's liabilities
for decades and one of the reasons Xi got the nod was that he ranked as high as Bo socially. Do you remember how Xi 'disappeared'
for ten days following his promotion to the Peacock Throne? He was meeting with his and Bo's peers–their age cohort–to get their
blessing on the cleanup he had planned.
@Tusk Nobody has suffered from calling
Xi a steamed bun.
However, Chinese don't call their leaders names because their relationship to officials is entirely different from our (Roman)
relationship. Martin Jacques explains it well:
The Chinese state enjoys much greater legitimacy than any Western state. The Chinese treat the state with a reverence and
respect that is more or less unknown in the West; and the reason clearly has nothing to do with democracy. In other words,
a state's legitimacy cannot be reduced to the existence or otherwise of democracy: on the contrary, democracy is not necessarily
the most important factor in a state's legitimacy and may, as in the case of China, be relatively unimportant. The underlying
reason for the legitimacy of the Chinese state is that, as discussed earlier, it is seen by the people as the embodiment and
guardian of Chinese civilization, enjoying, as a consequence, something akin to a spiritual significance. It follows that what
would undermine the legitimacy of a government, the present one included, is a threat to the country's unity. The attitude
of the Chinese towards the state, thus, is very different to that of Westerners. For the latter, the state is an outsider,
a stranger, even an interloper, whose presence should, as far as possible, be limited and confined. This is most obviously
the case in the United States, with those who identify with the Tea Party, for example, regarding the state as an alien body,
but even in Europe it is viewed with varying degrees of suspicion. In China, in contrast, the state and society are seen as
on the same side and part of the same endeavour: the state enjoys the status of an intimate and is treated like a member of
the family, not just any member but the head of the family – the patriarch himself. We can only understand the immense authority
of the Chinese state in these terms, an authority which has been reinforced by the fact that, unlike in the West, it has had
no serious rivals for over a millennium.
"The weird result of this enormous, expensive effort is that, while we were busy lying to ourselves about China "
At this stage, any one who still believes in the western propaganda about China is simply too brain-washed and not too
smart for any cure. Excuse me, I should say "too dumb for any cure".
For example, Nathan Rich's recent video shows how media biased reporting of Hong Kong compare with Ukraine riots. The contrast
can't be anymore stark:
@Godfree Roberts Here is a good
analysis of how the main stream media (MSM) gang up to give propaganda, and how I wish they have objective comments about China
or any country they do not like.
All these so-called anti communist slant against countries, I suspect, have its origins in the Vatican. People seem to forget
that they should bear false witness
Are you sharing the 10′ of 1″ pipe through which you view the world with Muggles? Are you aware that Muggles did nothing but
add a few more feet to it?
People view the world through narratives, and the value of a narrative lies only in how closely it follows and "explains"
the widest possible array of empirical facts. Muggles' ignores the vast majority – perhaps even all – of the facts.
Ergo, it renders neither yourself nor your readers any value to champion it. Why make the effort to propagate such an obvious
failure? Have you never wondered why you lack the dignity and common sense to desist from promoting something whereof you would
more usefully remain silent? Are you even aware of the shortfall?
Corrupt Chinese have practically taken over the US West Coast and Northeast. There isn't anywhere you could go in LA, Bay
Area or Seattle without encountering mandarin speaking people. 99.9% Chinese nationals in the US are corrupt. With a nominal per
capita GDP of $8,600, the only people who could afford to emigrate or send their children abroad for education are the rich, and
China is so corrupt, no one can get rich without being corrupt, either by taking bribes or giving them. These are the corrupt
factory owners who leave behind polluted rivers and air for their countrymen to die from while they escape to greener pastures
with their family, and the government officials they bribed to pollute at will.
They are bribing the US congress to end the per country cap on EB5 visas, where 80% of applicants are corrupt Chinese. The
House passed the HR 1044 bill a few months ago scrapping the H1b cap for India and EB5 cap for China. Now Senator Mike Lee (R-UT)
is trying to get the same bill passed in the Senate. Chuck Grassley and Diane Feinstein tried to kill off the EB5 a few times,
but Trump and SIL wouldn't let them. The Kushner family relies on EB5 money for their real estate development.
EB5 is the #1 get out of jail on the cheap card for corrupt Chinese. Many are now buying homes in the US and letting their
high school and college age children live in those houses, sometimes 16 year olds who could barely speak English living in million
dollar homes by themselves, attending our local high schools for free.
I know of a woman from China in my area who works for JP Morgan, who handles all rich clients from China. It wouldn't surprise
me one bit if the FBI shows up at her house one day and walks her out in handcuffs, for helping rich Chinese launder their money
in the US. The US needs to deport every single last one of these disgusting corrupt pigs to let them go back to China and face
trial.
Curious to see the author responding 6 times now (in only 20 posts) to commentors. Aren't the new site rules against this? It's
a little off-putting to see an article author respond at all, not to mention that it buttresses Muggles's assertions.
I have no reason to doubt Roberts.
Years ago I read a news report on the execution of a Chinese manufacturing official who was bribed into buying some cheaper ingredient,
I think it was, that turned out to sicken or poison people.
Maybe Roberts remembers that.
Some executions or long prison terms for the corrupt in the US would be a good thing.
@d dan You are right the US is also
very corrupt. The book Tailspin – The People and Forces Behind America's Fifty Year Fall by Steven Brill is a great read.
America is destroyed by its effed up laws, mostly crafted by Jewish lawyers, who basically built corruption into laws sanctioned
by the Supreme Court through cases like Citizens United and Super PAC.
This country is destroyed by (((lawyers))). As Niall Ferguson said, we no longer have the rule of law, we have the rule
of (((lawyers))).
Germany and the Scandinavian countries would consider our campaign financing and lobbying industry as corruption on a mass
scale. Hitler lost the battle of WWII but won the war for Germany by ridding them of the Jews, until Merkel the idiot came along
but that's another story.
United Front Work Department of the Chinese Communist Party, that is.
As
.The United Front, which is supported by considerable resources and a vast bureaucratic operation, was called one of his
"magical weapons" by Chinese President Xi Jinping in September 2014. One of the objectives is to co-opt ethnic Chinese individuals
and organizations in foreign countries
and
.Xi has delivered multiple speeches and made it formal policy to demand loyalty and commitment from diasporas who the Party
refers to as the "sons and daughters" of China. The United Front is the apparatus of choice.
and
.In Australia, the majority of Chinese-language press are owned by entities with at least partial links to Beijing.
Now, that line of thought could go even further in this pub . but, let's skip that, for the moment.
I had a roommate in college who was from China. He pretty much said that if you know people in the government or have money you
could get away with a lot. One of his parents was a customs official, and so he would talk about different things he planned on
smuggling to China when he returned with no worries. This was in the late 90's, though.
At this stage, any one who still believes in the western propaganda about China is simply too brain-washed and not too smart
for any cure. Excuse me, I should say "too dumb for any cure".
Exactly right.
And speaking of media bias, Gordon Chang is one of the worst US anti-China propagandist there is he is never right.
The naivete displayed in this article concerning the unavoidable, true, core, fundamental nature of all governments everywhere,[past
present, or future], is, sadly, very, very common in both East, West and all points between.
Reality fact: All governments are 100% corrupt, all the time.
Its impossible for them to be anything else, given the sources of their entirely unearned income.[see first quote below].
To make an exception in the case of modern China succeeds only in highlighting the extreme naivete and gullibility of the articles
author. Either that [naivete/gullibility], or the author is just another communist party hack who has no idea [or doesn't care]
about the extreme danger to all humanity that the communist "ideology" represents, and in particular, has zero idea about how
centralized, top down economic systems all inevitably must "work", and what inevitably must/will happen to majority of the population
in a country that enforces the idiotic, anti- free market, top-down economic policies of any of the various brands of collectivism,
be those policies be labelled "communism", "fascism" ,"nationalism", "democratic socialism", or whatever. Hint: it's called "extreme
poverty and enslavement".
Even the historical record of the 20th century vis a vis all forms of collectivism, [including that of Chinas' "great leap
forward", is consistently ignored/ covered up.[ "That was then, this is now"!]
In "defense" of this author, I'll just remind myself that the very same false assumptions concerning the true nature of all
governments are at the core of almost every Unz.com article I've read here in the last 6 months since I started reading this site.
Indeed, the exact same false assumptions concerning the true nature of all governments are consistently evident in the articles
by the sites owner, Ron Unz. Recently, I even experienced the pleasure of being banned by one author here [A. Karlin], for pointing
out that his own revered "nationalism" was just another brand of socialism.
And so it goes .. :
"Because they are all ultimately funded via both direct and indirect theft [taxes], and counterfeiting [via central bank
monopolies], all governments are essentially, at their very cores, 100% corrupt criminal scams which cannot be "reformed","improved",
nor "limited" in scope, simply because of their innate criminal nature." onebornfree
"Taking the State wherever found, striking into its history at any point, one sees no way to differentiate the activities
of its founders, administrators and beneficiaries from those of a professional-criminal class." Albert J. Nock
"Why should any self-respecting citizen endorse an institution grounded on thievery? For that is what one does when one votes.
If it be argued that we must let bygones be bygones, see what can be done toward cleaning up the institution of the State so that
it might be useful in the maintenance of orderly existence, the answer is that it cannot be done; you cannot clean up a brothel
and yet leave the business intact. We have been voting for one "good government" after another, and what have we got?" Frank
Chodorov, Out of Step (1962)
"Government is a disease masquerading as its own cure." Robert LeFevre
@d dan " ..media biased Hong Kong
reporting ."
How would American cops react to punks tossing Molotov Cocktails at them? Arson is a felony but there would be no need for a trial
just a coroner.
@Godfree Robertson, What do you think the Chinese diaspora especially in Canada, U.S., and Australia do? The ones that hold foreign
passports I mean. And my experience with Chinese people is they largely dislike the government, but have an extreme aggressive
nationalism for their country which only manifests when a 外国人 says something. Because as far as I can tell Chinese rush to get
out of China and you yourself don't seem to live there either. I personally don't doubt your claims that China will be better
off than America, but why is there still a lot of emigration? Another question are you aware of any attempts or plans to fix the
massive pollution problem? look forward from hearing back from you.
My former employer had no use for corruption, even a paperclip was accounted for due to the office spy. We had only 20 employees
and nobody dared badmouth the boss. My job was terminated when the office spy reported me taking home paper cups from the water
fountain. My boss received his jobs from the local government by bribing a few politicians. But he demanded honesty from his staff.
@onebornfree Reality fact: All you
(((LoLbertarians))) are 100% pedo, all the time.
"In short, we must face the fact that the purely free society will have a flourishing free market in children ." -Murray
Rothbard (1926-1995) was the dean of the Austrian School of economics, a founder of lolbertarianism
@Tusk If propaganda is information,
especially of a biased or misleading nature, used to promote or publicize a particular political cause or point of view ,
then the PRC doesn't put much out. 80% of Chinese trust it, compared to the 30% of us who trust our media.
And remember, the Chinese are smarter, better educated and more widely traveled than us.
@FatPanda "What do you care really?
Do you have any dogs in this race?"
He is offering thoughts on an article posted on an American website. Perhaps as an expat living in China you've become too
accustomed to only viewing "approved" opinions.
Another drawn out piece from the guy who could not get rich in the capitalist usa and lives the good life in bang-cock thailand
on social. But, whatever, china is for the Chinese and not for the anglo saxons; he is not allowed in but worships from afar.
My 77 years as a participant observer tell me that corruption and criminality are endemic to any large human society so, therefore,
utopianism is a pipe dream.
America's misguided war on Chinese technology By Jeffrey D Sachs November 8,
2019
The worst foreign-policy decision by the United States of the last generation – and
perhaps longer – was the "war of choice" that it launched in Iraq in 2003 for the stated
purpose of eliminating weapons of mass destruction that did not, in fact, exist. Understanding
the illogic behind that disastrous decision has never been more relevant, because it is being
used to justify a similarly misguided US policy today.
The decision to invade Iraq followed the illogic of then-US vice-president Richard Cheney,
who declared that even if the risk of WMD falling into terrorist hands was tiny – say, 1%
– we should act as if that scenario would certainly occur.
Such reasoning is guaranteed to lead to wrong decisions more often than not. Yet the US and
some of its allies are now using the Cheney Doctrine to attack
Chinese technology. The US government argues that because we can't know with certainty that
Chinese technologies are safe, we should act as if they are certainly dangerous and bar
them.
Proper decision-making applies probability estimates to alternative actions. A generation
ago, US policymakers should have considered not only the (alleged) 1% risk of WMD falling into
terrorist hands, but also the 99% risk of a war based on flawed premises. By focusing only on
the 1% risk, Cheney (and many others) distracted the public's attention from the much greater
likelihood that the Iraq war lacked justification and that it would gravely destabilize the
Middle East and global politics.
The problem with the Cheney Doctrine is not only that it dictates taking actions predicated
on small risks without considering the potentially very high costs. Politicians are tempted to
whip up fears for ulterior purposes.
That is what US leaders are doing again: creating a panic over Chinese technology companies
by raising, and exaggerating, tiny risks. The most pertinent case (but not the only one) is the
US government attack on the wireless broadband company Huawei. The US is closing its markets to
the company and trying hard to shut down its business around the world. As with Iraq, the US
could end up creating a geopolitical disaster for no reason.
I have followed Huawei's technological advances and work in developing countries, as I
believe that fifth-generation (5G) and other digital technologies offer a huge boost to ending
poverty and other Sustainable Development Goals. I have similarly interacted with other telecom
companies and encouraged the industry to step up actions for the United Nations' SDGs. When I
wrote a short foreword (without compensation) for a
Huawei report on the topic, and was criticized by foes of China, I asked top industry and
government officials for evidence of wayward activities by Huawei. I heard repeatedly that
Huawei behaves no differently than trusted industry leaders.
The US government nonetheless argues that Huawei's 5G equipment could undermine global
security. A "back door" in Huawei's software or hardware, US officials claim, could enable the
Chinese government to engage in surveillance around the world. After all, US officials note,
China's laws require Chinese companies to cooperate with the government for purposes of
national security.
Given the technology's importance for their sustainable development, low-income economies
around the world would be foolhardy to reject an early 5G rollout. Yet despite providing no
evidence of back doors, the US is telling the world to stay away from Huawei
Now, the facts are these. Huawei's 5G equipment is low-cost and high-quality, currently
ahead of many competitors, and already rolling out. Its high performance results from years of
substantial spending on research and development, scale economies, and learning by doing in the
Chinese digital marketplace. Given the technology's importance for their sustainable
development, low-income economies around the world would be foolhardy to reject an early 5G
rollout.
Yet despite providing no evidence of back doors, the US is telling the world to stay away
from Huawei. The US claims are generic. As a US Federal Communications Commissioner
put it , "The country that owns 5G will own innovations and set the standards for the rest
of the world, and that country is currently not likely to be the United States." Other
countries, most notably the United Kingdom, have
found no back doors in Huawei's hardware and software. Even if back doors were discovered
later, they could almost surely be closed at that point.
The debate over Huawei rages in Germany, where the US government threatens to curtail
intelligence cooperation unless the authorities exclude Huawei's 5G technology. Perhaps as a
result of the US pressure, Germany's spy chief recently made a claim
tantamount to the Cheney Doctrine: "Infrastructure is not a suitable area for a group that
cannot be trusted fully." He offered no evidence of specific misdeeds. Chancellor Angela
Merkel, by contrast, is fighting
behind the scenes to leave the market open for Huawei.
Ironically, though predictably, the US complaints partly reflect America's
own surveillance activities at home and abroad. Chinese equipment might make secret
surveillance by the US government more difficult. But unwarranted surveillance by any
government should be ended. Independent UN monitoring to curtail such activities should become
part of the global telecommunications system. In short, we should choose diplomacy and
institutional safeguards, not a technology war.
The threat of US demands to blockade Huawei concerns more than the early rollout of the 5G
network. The risks to the rules-based trading system are profound. Now that the US is no longer
the world's undisputed technology leader, President Donald Trump and his advisers don't want to
compete according to a rules-based system. Their goal is to contain China's technological rise.
Their simultaneous attempt to neutralize the World Trade Organization by
disabling its dispute settlement system shows the same disdain for global rules.
If the Trump administration "succeeds" in dividing the world into separate technology camps,
the risks of future conflicts will multiply. The US championed open trade after World War II
not only to boost global efficiency and expand markets for American technology, but also to
reverse the collapse of international trade in the 1930s. That collapse stemmed in part from
protectionist tariffs imposed by the US under the 1930 Smoot-Hawley Act , which
amplified the Great Depression, in turn contributing to the rise of Adolf Hitler and,
ultimately, the outbreak of World War II.
In international affairs, no less than in other domains, stoking fears and acting on them,
rather than on the evidence, is the path to ruin. Let's stick to rationality, evidence and
rules as the safest course of action. And let us create independent monitors to curtail the
threat of any country using global networks for surveillance of or cyberwarfare on others. That
way, the world can get on with the urgent task of harnessing breakthrough digital technologies
for the global good.
The world's worst negotiating strategy is to give the other side everything they want in
exchange for worthless empty promises, yet this is exactly what Trump and his trade team are doing.
All
the Chinese trade team has to do to get rid of tariffs and other U.S. bargaining chips is mutter
some empty phrase about "agreeing in principle" and the U.S. surrenders all its bargaining chips.
If the other side are such naive chumps that they give you everything you want without
actually committing to anything remotely consequential, why bother with a formal agreement?
Just
play the other side for the chumps they are: if they threaten to reinstate tariffs, just issue
another worthless press release about "progress has been made."
The other guaranteed losing strategy in negotiation is advertise your own fatal
weakness, which in Trump's case is his obsession with pushing the U.S. stock market to new highs.
There
is no greater gift he could hand the Chinese trade team than this monumental weakness, for all they
have to do is talk tough and the U.S. stock market promptly tanks, sending the Trump Team into a
panic of appeasement and empty claims of "progress."
The Chinese team has gotten their way for a year by playing Trump's team as chumps and
patsies, so why stop now?
The Chinese know they can get way without giving anything away
by continuing to play the American patsies and using the president's obsession with keeping U.S.
stocks lofting higher to their advantage: declare the talks stalled, U.S. stocks crater, the
American team panics and rushes to remove anything that might have enforcement teeth, reducing any
"trade deal" to nothing but empty promises.
Given their success at playing America's team, why do a deal at all? Just play the
chumps for another year,
and maybe Trump will be gone and a new set of even more naive
patsies enter the White House.
If we put ourselves in the shoes of the Chinese negotiators, we realize there's no need
to sign a deal at all:
the Trump team has gone out of its way to make it needless for
China to agree to anything remotely enforceable. All the Chinese have to do is issue some stern
talk that crushes U.S. stocks and the Trump Team scurries back, desperate to appease so another
rumor of a "trade deal" can be issued to send U.S. stocks higher.
It would be pathetic if it wasn't so foolish and consequential.
BUT – getting back to the real topic of this thread and –
"Meanwhile, the United States, which had been the primary promoter of the worldwide
rules-based WTO model, shifted its focus to one-on-one agreements unencumbered by rules, such
as the Australia-US FTA, where it could take advantage of its superior bargaining power".
and
"We're entering a world with few rules "
and
"To prepare for this likely outcome, the EU has set up structures that would allow it to
retaliate against the US on a far larger scale than WTO rules would allow".
"... Pompeo said the United States had long cherished its friendship with the Chinese people, adding the Communist government was not the same thing as the people of China. ..."
"... We are in a civilization war about the global social contract and whether sovereign public finance gets a chance to be compared against the Western centuries old private finance controlled world. ..."
"... The USA has been successful at bribing foreign leaders, taking them under their wing, and getting them to accept their place in the world order. They think they can do this with anybody. ..."
"... The US never really counts on foreign leaders taking their peoples interests at heart and standing up to the hegemon. As far as Pompeo goes this is classic projection. It is a sign they are losing and are worried about it. ..."
Below is a Reuters posting about Mike Pompeo presenting the public/private finance "dog
whistle" at a Hudson Institute think tank gala dinner....the pot calling the kettle
black.
"
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Wednesday stepped up recent
U.S. rhetoric targeting China's ruling Communist Party, saying Beijing was focused on
international domination and needed to be confronted.
Pompeo made the remarks even as the Trump administration said it still expected to sign
the first phase of deal to end a damaging trade war with China next month, despite Chile's
withdrawal on Wednesday as the host of an APEC summit where U.S. officials had hoped this
would happen.
Pompeo said the United States had long cherished its friendship with the Chinese people,
adding the Communist government was not the same thing as the people of China.
"They are reaching for and using methods that have created challenges for the United
States and for the world and we collectively, all of us, need to confront these challenges
... head on," Pompeo said in an address to a gala dinner in New York of the conservative
Hudson Institute think tank.
"It is no longer realistic to ignore the fundamental differences between our two systems,
and the impact that the differences in those systems have on American national security."
"
I posted the above about 6 hours ago on the Weekly Open thread and now get up to read that
the financial markets are down and Trump is tweeting that it is the Fed's fault for not
lowering rates even further even though there are a couple of ZH postings that refer to
China's response to Pompeo's remarks as offensive and maybe a trade deal won't get
signed...
We are in a civilization war about the global social contract and whether sovereign public
finance gets a chance to be compared against the Western centuries old private finance
controlled world.
Haha. The fight is an old one. Who is to be master and who is to be slave. China was supposed to happily be the world's
cheap manufacturer and not get too big for its britches. The USA has been successful at bribing foreign leaders, taking
them under their wing, and getting them to accept their place in the world order. They think they can do this with anybody.
They think every leader is a budding Lenin Moreno or that they can arrange a coup and force into office another Lenin
Moreno. Russia, China, and India will not allow it.
All have at one time or another (Russia quite recently) been under the heel of Western empire. All have old and proud
civilizations.
The US never really counts on foreign leaders taking their peoples interests at heart and standing up to the hegemon.
As far as Pompeo goes this is classic projection. It is a sign they are losing and are worried about it.
Chinese Patriotism: Huawei Smartphone Sales Jump 66% In China As Apple iPhone Sales Slump
by
Tyler Durden
Wed, 10/30/2019 - 13:50
0
SHARES
We're starting to get first-hand knowledge of what we're coining as the
"
blowback
period
"
in the trade war. This is a point in time when Chinese consumers, downright
furious of President Trump's protectionist policies that targeted Chinese companies over the
summer, have collectively stood up to an aggressor (the US), and have
secretly fired back,
targeting US firms by abandoning their products for domestic ones, all in the name of patriotism.
Honestly, over time, the trade war, if solved next month or next year, or who knows at this point
when it'll be solved, will have devastating consequences for corporate America as their market
share in China will erode as patriotism forces consumers to gravitate towards domestic brands.
A new report from
Canalys
, an
independent research firm focused on technology, has linked patriotism in China for the jump in
Huawei smartphone sales in the third quarter.
Huawei's 3Q19 smartphone sales soared by 66% YoY in China
, compared with a 31%
increase in 2Q19.
Between 2Q-3Q, President Trump escalated the trade war to near full-blown, and also attacked
individual companies with economic sanctions and banned certain ones from doing business in the US.
Chinese consumers responded by
ditching American products, like Apple iPhones
, as
this is some of the first evidence we've seen of the blowback period, likely to worsen in 4Q19
through 1Q20.
As shown in the chart below, the July-September period of 2019 was a devastating quarter for
Huawei's top rivals, including Vivo, Oppo, Xiaomi (other Chinese brands), along with depressing
sales from Apple.
Smartphone shipments overall were 97.8 million, down 3% from 100.6 million for the same period
last year.
Apple's YoY slump gained momentum from -14% in 2Q to -28% for 3Q
.
Chinese patriotism
allowed Huawei's market share in the country to expand from
24.9% to 42.4% over the past year.
Canalys analyst Mo Jia said, "The U.S.-China trade war is also creating new opportunities,"
adding that, "
Huawei's retail partners are rolling out advertisements to link Huawei with
being the patriotic choice, to appeal to a growing demographic of Chinese consumers willing to take
political factors into account when making a purchase decision.
"
The blowback period has begun, and corporate America should be terrified that their market share
in China is about to evaporate.
"As I have stated strongly before, and just to reiterate, if Turkey does anything that
I, in my great and unmatched wisdom, consider to be off limits, I will totally destroy
and obliterate the Economy of Turkey
(I've done before!)
"
Donald J. Trump
"China uses a host of monopolizing strategies to extend its geopolitical and commercial
power, everything from below cost pricing to grab market share, patent trolling,
espionage, mergers, and financial manipulation. In fact, the CCP is best understood as
a giant monopoly that also controls a nation of 1.4 billion people and a large military
apparatus...
China's biggest asset in gaining power was how most people in the West just didn't
realize that the CCP aimed to use it. Now China's cover is blown. The raw exercise of
power to censor a random Houston Rockets basketball executive has made millions of
people take notice. Everyone knows, the Chinese government isn't content to control its
own nation, it must have all bow down to its power and authority.
Matt overstates the headline I think. The empowerment of China may have gone into higher
gear with Bill Clinton perhaps, but has been fully supported by every President, both
parties, and especially the moneyed interests in the US, who place their short term greed
first and foremost.
Follow the money. China is certainly not alone among organizations, and even nations, in
playing on the personal greed, divided loyalties, and lust for power of our political and
financial class.
This in itself is nothing new. But the extent of it, and the fashionable acceptance of it
amongst our society's elites, the industrialization of political corruption and big money
in politics, has been breathtaking.
That looks like vast and generally incorrect exaggeration. While China mode substantial
progress in catching up with the West, the technology is still dominated by the West.
But as technological revolution is slowing down and in some areas coming to the end (die size
in semiconductors in one example; it is impossible to shrink it further; smartphones reached
saturation level, and hardware wise their capabilities are far above what a regular user needs or
wants) it is easier for other countries to catch up.
In any case, the main reason for trade war with China is to try to slow down its
ascendance.
The problem for China is that China converted to neoliberalism, and as such (like Russia) is
subject to all the ills the neoliberal society tend to bring into the country. Including a very
high level of inequality.
And while backlash against neoliberalism is growing and in the USA
neoliberalism entered a prolong crisis with secular stagnation as the "new normal" , the question
is what is that alternative ? And while backlash against neoliberalism is growing and in the USA
neoliberalism entered a prolong crisis with secular stagnation as the "new normal" , the question
is what is that alternative ?
Notable quotes:
"... Precisely! The war against the Soviet Union was hardly a war for economic survival of the United States. It was an ideological battle, which the United States, unfortunately won, because it utilized both propaganda and economic terror (the arms race and other means). ..."
"... Now, China is next on the list, and the White House is not even trying to hide it. But China is savvy. It is beginning to understand the game. And it is ready, by all means, to defend the system which has pulled almost all its citizens out of misery, and which could, one day soon, do the same for the rest of the world. ..."
"... China has more problems than the United States. Taiwan, Tibet, Hong Kong, persecuting Uyghurs in Xinjiang, Indonesia and Malaysia because of Islam, Inner Mongolia separatists, Kashmir and India, USA trade pressure, Japan and South Korea are competitors. ..."
It is very popular these days to talk and write about the "trade war" between the United
States and China. But is there really one raging? Or is it, what we are witnessing, simply a
clash of political and ideological systems : one being extremely successful and optimistic, the
other depressing, full of dark cynicism and nihilism?
In the past, West used to produce almost everything. While colonizing the entire planet (one
should just look at the map of the globe, between the two world wars), Europe and later the
United States, Canada and Australia, kept plundering all the continents of natural resources,
holding hundreds of millions of human beings in what could be easily described as 'forced
labor', often bordering on slavery.
Under such conditions, it was very easy to be 'number one', to reign without competition,
and to toss around huge amounts of cash, for the sole purpose of indoctrinating local and
overseas 'subjects' on topics such as the 'glory' of capitalism, colonialism (open and hidden),
and Western-style 'democracy'.
It is essential to point out that in the recent past, the global Western dictatorship (and
that included the 'economic system) used to have absolutely no competition. Systems that were
created to challenge it, were smashed with the most brutal, sadistic methods. One only needs
recall invasions from the West to the young Soviet Union, with the consequent genocide and
famines. Or other genocides in Indochina, which was fighting its wars for independence, first
against France, later against the United States.
*
Times changed. But Western tactics haven't.
There are now many new systems, in numerous corners of the world. These systems, some
Communist, others socialist or even populist, are ready to defend their citizens, and to use
the natural resources to feed the people, and to educate, house and cure them.
No matter how popular these systems are at home, the West finds ways to demonize them, using
its well-established propaganda machinery. First, to smear them and then, if they resist, to
directly liquidate them.
As before, during the colonial era, no competition has been permitted. Disobedience is
punishable by death.
Naturally, the Western system has not been built on excellence, hard work and creativity,
only. It was constructed on fear, oppression and brutal force. For centuries, it has clearly
been a monopoly.
*
Only the toughest countries, like Russia, China, Iran, North Korea or Cuba, have managed to
survive, defending they own cultures, and advancing their philosophies.
To the West, China has proved to be an extremely tough adversary.
With its political, economic, and social system, it has managed to construct a
forward-looking, optimistic and extraordinarily productive society. Its scientific research is
now second to none. Its culture is thriving. Together with its closest ally, Russia, China
excels in many essential fields.
That is precisely what irks, even horrifies the West.
For decades and centuries, Europe and the United States have not been ready to tolerate any
major country, which would set up its own set of rules and goals.
China refuses to accept the diktat from abroad. It now appears to be self-sufficient,
ideologically, politically, economically and intellectually. Where it is not fully
self-sufficient, it can rely on its friends and allies. Those allies are, increasingly, located
outside the Western sphere.
*
Is China really competing with the West? Yes and no. And often not consciously.
It is a giant; still the most populous nation on earth. It is building, determinedly, its
socialist motherland (applying "socialism with the Chinese characteristics" model). It is
trying to construct a global system which has roots in the thousands of years of its history
(BRI – Belt and Road Initiative, often nicknamed the "New Silk Road").
Its highly talented and hardworking, as well as increasingly educated population, is
producing, at a higher pace and often at higher quality than the countries in Europe, or the
United States. As it produces, it also, naturally, trades.
This is where the 'problem' arises. The West, particularly the United States, is not used to
a country that creates things for the sake and benefit of its people. For centuries, Asian,
African and Latin American people were ordered what and how to produce, where and for how much
to sell the produce. Or else!
Of course, the West has never consulted anyone. It has been producing what it (and its
corporations) desired. It was forcing countries all over the world, to buy its products. If
they refused, they got invaded, or their fragile governments (often semi-colonies, anyway)
overthrown.
The most 'terrible' thing that China is doing is: it is producing what is good for China,
and for its citizens.
That is, in the eyes of the West, unforgiveable!
*
In the process, China 'competes'. But fairly: it produces a lot, cheaply, and increasingly
well. The same can be said about Russia.
These two countries are not competing maliciously. If they were to decide to, they could
sink the US economy, or perhaps the economy of the entire West, within a week.
But they don't even think about it.
However, as said above, to just work hard, invent new and better products, advance
scientific research, and use the gains to improve the lives of ordinary people (they will be no
extreme poverty in China by the end of 2020) is seen as the arch-crime in London and
Washington.
Why? Because the Chinese and Russian systems appear to be much better, or at least, simply
better, than those which are reigning in the West and its colonies. And because they are
working for the people, not for corporations or for the colonial powers.
And the demagogues in the West – in its mass media outlets and academia – are
horrified that perhaps, soon, the world will wake up and see the reality. Which is actually
already happening: slowly but surely.
*
To portray China as an evil country, is essential for the hegemony of the West. There is
nothing so terrifying to London and Washington as the combination of these words: "Socialism/
Communism, Asian, success". The West invents new and newer 'opposition movements', it then
supports them and finances them, just in order to then point fingers and bark: "China is
fighting back, and it is violating human rights", when it defends itself and its citizens. This
tactic is clear, right now, in both the northwest of the country, and in Honk Kong.
Not everything that China builds is excellent. Europe is still producing better cars, shoes
and fragrances, and the United States, better airplanes. But the progress that China has
registered during the last two decades, is remarkable. Were it to be football, it is China 2:
West 1.
Most likely, unless there is real war, that in ten years, China will catch up in many
fields; catch up, and surpass the West. Side by side with Russia.
It could have been excellent news for the entire world. China is sharing its achievements,
even with the poorest of the poor countries in Africa, or with Laos in Asia.
The only problem is, that the West feels that it has to rule. It is unrepentant, observing
the world from a clearly fundamentalist view. It cannot help it: it is absolutely, religiously
convinced that it has to give orders to every man and woman, in every corner of the globe.
It is a tick, fanatical. Lately, anyone who travels to Europe or the United States will
testify: what is taking place there is not good, even for the ordinary citizens. Western
governments and corporations are now robbing even their own citizens. The standard of living is
nose-diving.
China, with just a fraction of the wealth, is building a much more egalitarian society,
although you would never guess so, if you exclusively relied on Western statistics.
*
So, "trade war" slogans are an attempt to convince the local and global public that "China
is unfair", that it is "taking advantage" of the West. President Trump is "defending" the
United States against the Chinese 'Commies'. But the more he "defends them", the poorer they
get. Strange, isn't it?
While the Chinese people, Russian people, even Laotian people, are, 'miraculously', getting
richer and richer. They are getting more and more optimistic.
For decades, the West used to preach 'free trade', and competition. That is, when it was in
charge, or let's say, 'the only kid on the block'.
In the name of competition and free trade, dozens of governments got overthrown, and
millions of people killed.
And now?
What is China suppose to do? Frankly, what?
Should it curb its production, or perhaps close scientific labs? Should it consult the US
President or perhaps British Prime Minister, before it makes any essential economic decision?
Should it control the exchange rate of RMB, in accordance with the wishes of the economic tsars
in Washington? That would be thoroughly ridiculous, considering that (socialist/Communist)
China will soon become the biggest economy in the world, or maybe it already is.
There is all that abstract talk, but nothing concrete suggested. Or is it like that on
purpose?
Could it be that the West does not want to improve relations with Beijing?
On September 7, 2019, AP reported:
White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow compared trade talks with China on Friday to the
U.S. standoff with Russia during the Cold War
"The stakes are so high, we have to get it right, and if that takes a decade, so be it,"
he said.
Kudlow emphasized that it took the United States decades to get the results it wanted with
Russia. He noted that he worked in the Reagan administration: "I remember President Reagan
waging a similar fight against the Soviet Union."
Precisely! The war against the Soviet Union was hardly a war for economic survival of
the United States. It was an ideological battle, which the United States, unfortunately won,
because it utilized both propaganda and economic terror (the arms race and other
means).
Now, China is next on the list, and the White House is not even trying to hide it. But
China is savvy. It is beginning to understand the game. And it is ready, by all means, to
defend the system which has pulled almost all its citizens out of misery, and which could, one
day soon, do the same for the rest of the world.
US is hemorrhaging around $1.7 trillion dollars(according to the bond king) a year with
the “greatest economy ever” and near zero interest rate. Clearly, this is not
sustainable and can’t last much longer. When the jig is up, whoever has the most
guns(not gold) will prevail. .
China has more problems than the United States. Taiwan, Tibet, Hong Kong, persecuting
Uyghurs in Xinjiang, Indonesia and Malaysia because of Islam, Inner Mongolia separatists,
Kashmir and India, USA trade pressure, Japan and South Korea are competitors.
China has some bright spots with Pakistan, North Korea and a very open hand negotiated
with the African Union to colonize that continent etc. Russia is neutral but if it is to fall
it will probably be towards Europe not the East.
Vietnam is falling away leaving Myanmar and Cambodia. Thailand might already be a Western
proxy.
You've broken down nothing. China can sell somewhere else, since it makes all the stuff.
The US makes very little and will pay far more Chinese equivalent goods. Further, China's GDP
is now 80% domestically generated; of the remaining 20% export income, the US accounts for
only 30% of it, ie 6%. China can stand a loss of 6% easily. While the Americans, led the
Ape-in-Chief have been thumping their chests, the nimble Chinese have taken markets
everywhere, diversified their manufacturing bases and transportation systems. The US is
shouting at the Moon. Enjoy the tan...
'The war against the Soviet Union was hardly a war for economic survival of the United
States. It was an ideological battle, which the United States, unfortunately won,'
Really !!! have a read of Gulag Archipelago before you come out with anything this
stupid.
The author apparently has never been to China to know what their perspective is. Instead,
he is superimposing what western ideologs think it is. To Americans, it is political and
ideological struggle. To the Chinese, it's basic economics and the welfare of its people. The
Chinese know better than anyone else, what it was like being down in the gutter for almost
200 years, about the time the British showed up with their opium trade in the 1830's. The
Chinese have made great strides in the last 45 years to get their people out of poverty,
modernize, and build an industrialized economy that rivals any other economy in the world.
The truth is, it's a feat that Americans are tacitly envious of, and will do whatever it
takes to cut the Chinese down.
The problem is, America is not the shining example of success and exceptionalism it thinks
it is. It has fallen behind the power curve and isn't competitive any longer. Free trade is
far and away better in China than what you will find in America. Don't believe it? Go there
and see for yourself. Then ask yourself, why did the greater chunk of American manufacturing
left and went to China in the first place, (besides chasing cheap labor), If it wasn't for
free trade?
Many other countries don't share the same ideology or values with Americans either,
particularly when America can't provide for the welfare of its own people, so why would they
want to copy that model of decay?
attractive properties in shenzhen or any tier 1 chinese cities are in the millions or tens
of millions of dollars. not likely to jump higher anytime soon but whole lot of downside
potential. Vancouver is full up. why not seattle, DC or somewhere with "cheap" prices?
They have two alternatives to SWIFT - CIPS & NSPK. Further, both Russia and China are
using their own and local currencies in trade, bypassing not only SWIFT fees and delays, but
the USD exchange rate rip-off.
Frankly ZH readers are about 10 yrs behind the latest developments, hence the rednecks
ranting about their already lost cause. Do some research.
"So far, China has exercised restraint." ...because they don't want the world to see what
a truly monstrous regime runs that country...much like Israhell tries to silence and stifle
criticism of its monstrous racist and supremacist regime.
Meanwhile the West is on meds as it willingly takes the dagger someone is handing it to
enable it to commit suicide..
I wonder who is pulling strings in the background?
Canada and australia most certainly did NOT plunder the world, at anytime. We have all the
resources we will ever need,and we have never sought an empire. Don't try to drag us down
into your pit for company. It is your pit, along with Britain. Let the British keep you
company.
China "is ready to defend the system which has pulled almost all its citizens out of
misery"
China is very late to the game of "printing debt" It has taken the USA 100 years to
bankrupt itself. China with it's 350% of GDP has managed it in 30 years.
That looks like vast and generally incorrect exaggeration. While China mode substantial progress in catching up with the West, the
technology is still dominated by the West.
But as technological revolution is slowing down and in some areas coming to the end (die size in semiconductors in one example;
it is impossible to shrink it further; smartphones reached saturation level, and hardware wise their capabilities are far above what
a regular user needs or wants) it is easier for other countries to catch up.
In any case, the main reason for trade war with China is to try to slow down its ascendance.
The problem for China is that China converted to neoliberalism, and as such (like Russia) is subject to all the ills the neoliberal
society tend to bring into the country. Including a very high level of inequality.
Notable quotes:
"... Precisely! The war against the Soviet Union was hardly a war for economic survival of the United States. It was an ideological battle, which the United States, unfortunately won, because it utilized both propaganda and economic terror (the arms race and other means). ..."
"... Now, China is next on the list, and the White House is not even trying to hide it. But China is savvy. It is beginning to understand the game. And it is ready, by all means, to defend the system which has pulled almost all its citizens out of misery, and which could, one day soon, do the same for the rest of the world. ..."
It is very popular these days to talk and write about the "trade war" between the United States and China. But is there really
one raging? Or is it, what we are witnessing, simply a clash of political and ideological systems : one being extremely successful
and optimistic, the other depressing, full of dark cynicism and nihilism?
In the past, West used to produce almost everything. While colonizing the entire planet (one should just look at the map of the
globe, between the two world wars), Europe and later the United States, Canada and Australia, kept plundering all the continents
of natural resources, holding hundreds of millions of human beings in what could be easily described as 'forced labor', often bordering
on slavery.
Under such conditions, it was very easy to be 'number one', to reign without competition, and to toss around huge amounts of cash,
for the sole purpose of indoctrinating local and overseas 'subjects' on topics such as the 'glory' of capitalism, colonialism (open
and hidden), and Western-style 'democracy'.
It is essential to point out that in the recent past, the global Western dictatorship (and that included the 'economic system)
used to have absolutely no competition. Systems that were created to challenge it, were smashed with the most brutal, sadistic methods.
One only needs recall invasions from the West to the young Soviet Union, with the consequent genocide and famines. Or other genocides
in Indochina, which was fighting its wars for independence, first against France, later against the United States.
*
Times changed. But Western tactics haven't.
There are now many new systems, in numerous corners of the world. These systems, some Communist, others socialist or even populist,
are ready to defend their citizens, and to use the natural resources to feed the people, and to educate, house and cure them.
No matter how popular these systems are at home, the West finds ways to demonize them, using its well-established propaganda machinery.
First, to smear them and then, if they resist, to directly liquidate them.
As before, during the colonial era, no competition has been permitted. Disobedience is punishable by death.
Naturally, the Western system has not been built on excellence, hard work and creativity, only. It was constructed on fear, oppression
and brutal force. For centuries, it has clearly been a monopoly.
*
Only the toughest countries, like Russia, China, Iran, North Korea or Cuba, have managed to survive, defending they own cultures,
and advancing their philosophies.
To the West, China has proved to be an extremely tough adversary.
With its political, economic, and social system, it has managed to construct a forward-looking, optimistic and extraordinarily
productive society. Its scientific research is now second to none. Its culture is thriving. Together with its closest ally, Russia,
China excels in many essential fields.
That is precisely what irks, even horrifies the West.
For decades and centuries, Europe and the United States have not been ready to tolerate any major country, which would set up
its own set of rules and goals.
China refuses to accept the diktat from abroad. It now appears to be self-sufficient, ideologically, politically, economically
and intellectually. Where it is not fully self-sufficient, it can rely on its friends and allies. Those allies are, increasingly,
located outside the Western sphere.
*
Is China really competing with the West? Yes and no. And often not consciously.
It is a giant; still the most populous nation on earth. It is building, determinedly, its socialist motherland (applying "socialism
with the Chinese characteristics" model). It is trying to construct a global system which has roots in the thousands of years of
its history (BRI – Belt and Road Initiative, often nicknamed the "New Silk Road").
Its highly talented and hardworking, as well as increasingly educated population, is producing, at a higher pace and often at
higher quality than the countries in Europe, or the United States. As it produces, it also, naturally, trades.
This is where the 'problem' arises. The West, particularly the United States, is not used to a country that creates things for
the sake and benefit of its people. For centuries, Asian, African and Latin American people were ordered what and how to produce,
where and for how much to sell the produce. Or else!
Of course, the West has never consulted anyone. It has been producing what it (and its corporations) desired. It was forcing countries
all over the world, to buy its products. If they refused, they got invaded, or their fragile governments (often semi-colonies, anyway)
overthrown.
The most 'terrible' thing that China is doing is: it is producing what is good for China, and for its citizens.
That is, in the eyes of the West, unforgiveable!
*
In the process, China 'competes'. But fairly: it produces a lot, cheaply, and increasingly well. The same can be said about Russia.
These two countries are not competing maliciously. If they were to decide to, they could sink the US economy, or perhaps the economy
of the entire West, within a week.
But they don't even think about it.
However, as said above, to just work hard, invent new and better products, advance scientific research, and use the gains to improve
the lives of ordinary people (they will be no extreme poverty in China by the end of 2020) is seen as the arch-crime in London and
Washington.
Why? Because the Chinese and Russian systems appear to be much better, or at least, simply better, than those which are reigning
in the West and its colonies. And because they are working for the people, not for corporations or for the colonial powers.
And the demagogues in the West – in its mass media outlets and academia – are horrified that perhaps, soon, the world will wake
up and see the reality. Which is actually already happening: slowly but surely.
*
To portray China as an evil country, is essential for the hegemony of the West. There is nothing so terrifying to London and Washington
as the combination of these words: "Socialism/ Communism, Asian, success". The West invents new and newer 'opposition movements',
it then supports them and finances them, just in order to then point fingers and bark: "China is fighting back, and it is violating
human rights", when it defends itself and its citizens. This tactic is clear, right now, in both the northwest of the country, and
in Honk Kong.
Not everything that China builds is excellent. Europe is still producing better cars, shoes and fragrances, and the United States,
better airplanes. But the progress that China has registered during the last two decades, is remarkable. Were it to be football,
it is China 2: West 1.
Most likely, unless there is real war, that in ten years, China will catch up in many fields; catch up, and surpass the West.
Side by side with Russia.
It could have been excellent news for the entire world. China is sharing its achievements, even with the poorest of the poor countries
in Africa, or with Laos in Asia.
The only problem is, that the West feels that it has to rule. It is unrepentant, observing the world from a clearly fundamentalist
view. It cannot help it: it is absolutely, religiously convinced that it has to give orders to every man and woman, in every corner
of the globe.
It is a tick, fanatical. Lately, anyone who travels to Europe or the United States will testify: what is taking place there is
not good, even for the ordinary citizens. Western governments and corporations are now robbing even their own citizens. The standard
of living is nose-diving.
China, with just a fraction of the wealth, is building a much more egalitarian society, although you would never guess so, if
you exclusively relied on Western statistics.
*
So, "trade war" slogans are an attempt to convince the local and global public that "China is unfair", that it is "taking advantage"
of the West. President Trump is "defending" the United States against the Chinese 'Commies'. But the more he "defends them", the
poorer they get. Strange, isn't it?
While the Chinese people, Russian people, even Laotian people, are, 'miraculously', getting richer and richer. They are getting
more and more optimistic.
For decades, the West used to preach 'free trade', and competition. That is, when it was in charge, or let's say, 'the only kid
on the block'.
In the name of competition and free trade, dozens of governments got overthrown, and millions of people killed.
And now?
What is China suppose to do? Frankly, what?
Should it curb its production, or perhaps close scientific labs? Should it consult the US President or perhaps British Prime Minister,
before it makes any essential economic decision? Should it control the exchange rate of RMB, in accordance with the wishes of the
economic tsars in Washington? That would be thoroughly ridiculous, considering that (socialist/Communist) China will soon become
the biggest economy in the world, or maybe it already is.
There is all that abstract talk, but nothing concrete suggested. Or is it like that on purpose?
Could it be that the West does not want to improve relations with Beijing?
On September 7, 2019, AP reported:
White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow compared trade talks with China on Friday to the U.S. standoff with Russia during
the Cold War
"The stakes are so high, we have to get it right, and if that takes a decade, so be it," he said.
Kudlow emphasized that it took the United States decades to get the results it wanted with Russia. He noted that he worked
in the Reagan administration: "I remember President Reagan waging a similar fight against the Soviet Union."
Precisely! The war against the Soviet Union was hardly a war for economic survival of the United States. It was an ideological
battle, which the United States, unfortunately won, because it utilized both propaganda and economic terror (the arms race and other
means).
Now, China is next on the list, and the White House is not even trying to hide it. But China is savvy. It is beginning to understand the game. And it is ready, by all means, to defend the system which has pulled
almost all its citizens out of misery, and which could, one day soon, do the same for the rest of the world.
That said, as
Bloomberg
noted, Liu didn't address specifics about the trade talks in his speech. Instead, the
vice premier said China would expand investments in core technologies to ensure the economic
restructuring of the economy was stable, adding that economic activity in the year ahead is "very
bright."
"We're not worried about short-term economic volatility. We have every confidence in our
ability to meet macroeconomic targets for the year," he said.
As reported on Friday, ahead of the latest round of talks, President Trump's top economic
advisors and industry experts warned him of an economic downturn if a further escalation in the
trade war is seen by 2020. As such, it is likely that a lite trade deal could be on the table next
month.
But as our readers have recently learned, the trade war didn't start the synchronized global
downturn, which has been almost entirely a function of China's clogged up credit impulse...
... so any deal - lite or otherwise - won't result in an immediate acceleration of global
growth; indeed, as some speculate, failure to observe a substantial economic rebound following a
"deal" could well mark the point when central banks and governments finally throw in the towel, as
they finally usher in the final lap in the global race to
debase
destroy fiat currencies and
hyperinflate away the debt: MMT and Helicopter Money.
Trump's pathetic Trade war accomplished nothing. US exports down
18% globally. Farmer destroyed. US markets for all goods harmed.
The world is offloading any and all dependence on US products.
Impulsive stupid jerk. 45% of the world population on US
Sanctions, rising black markets, US supply chain disruptions, US
manufacturing in a recession.
Tariffs are tax deductible so they
do not accumulate any tax benefit to the US Treasury. They are
virtually all rolled over into the national debt. So while the
consumer may not notice a rising CPI, they are getting drown in
Trump Debt, the largest spending deficits in US history, largest
debt to GDP of over 110% and rising. Trump has the fastest
acceleration of US debt of any white house occupancy nearly 4
trillion in 2.7 years. It is obvious Trump is clueless in
virtually everything. Has no capacity to comprehend a thing.
Look at this scatterbrained Turkey Kurds fiasco. Impulsive,
thoughtless and accomplished nothing. US troops now guarding
Syrian oil. Astonishing. Everything this guy touches turned into a
burning crap filled dumpster fire.
'I will be so good at the military, your head will spin'
"When those 'gunds' start shooting they tend to do things"
Then there are no deals from the self-proclaimed "art of the
Deal"... nothing. Look at Iran. He has made negative progress
across the board. Thank to the orange stupid nations across the
globe are circumventing US Dollar Reserve. Each day the US
importance and more importantly reliability is diminished.
Look at Trump in high tech... Merck has developed an Ebola
vaccine in EUROPE not the USA. The USA hasn't even approved it
yet. What is Trump doing... ATTACKING BIG PHARMA. Trumptards love
seeing that. Yet it is the Trumptards that keep screaming to buy
Murica products but if they have to pay more for them, then
suddenly they demonize the US companies. Big Pharma will be the
next sector to joint Semiconductor to leave the USA.
Trump blacklist Big tech. Why? Tech products have a very short
shelf life. If the US doesn't sell tech product what do they have
that others want? COAL? Soy Beans? From smart to stupid. Look at
Intel and Microsoft. Trump band Intel Chip sales to China and
threatens Microsoft operating software. In one year China now has
RISC V chips from Alibaba, all open source and the Chinese
Military has switched to Linux and UNIX GNU. So who loses here?
The US tech businesses. Look at Micron dying on the vine, tossed
from China.
Meanwhile China has 5G and has replaced all US components in
its boards with the help of Hitachi and Panasonic who are doing
the same with all their electronics to avoid Trump Blacklist
compliance. Trump is low tech and dumb as dirt. The US Tech sector
is being carpet bombed under Trump... and without tech, what
products does the US have to sell that world markets want? Not a
god damn thing.
Let's remember that Trump didn't want a partial deal... Now he
will take anything to get him out of his self-made wreckage.
Meanwhile impeachment is coming... Mista no deals is going down in
flames.
Last year 300,000 us farmers grew soy
and had 110 mmt. This year there are 100,000 us Soy farmers
left and they grew 34 mmt... not enough to export.
...
Arbitrary and capricious meddling by US politicians in
commodity contracts renders all contracts voidable under
force majeure. I would have thought with your handle you
would have known this. Those markets will never come back.
They will forever be marginalized and smaller. Trump's
damage to US trade is permanent.
In other words, consolidation among large corp farmers,
decimation of the smaller family farmers? I am truly
asking, but seems to remind me of the trend since the
1980s.
Trump and China claimed "substantial progress" this past spring,
and it all fell apart within a couple months. The same thing will
happen on this "deal"....
Former World Leaders: The Trade War Threatens
the World's Economy https://nyti.ms/2MAFOTC
NYT - Kevin Rudd, Helen Clark and Carl Bildt - October 11
Despite an interim deal, global peace and prosperity
remain at risk if the United States and China do not
fully resolve their conflict.
(The authors are former prime ministers
of Australia, New Zealand and Sweden.)
This piece has been updated to reflect news developments.
The 18-month trade war between the United States and China represents the single greatest
threat to global economic growth.
President Trump announced on Friday a preliminary trade détente with China, saying
that the two countries have a verbal agreement for an initial phase of a deal. The agreement
reportedly includes concessions from China to protect American intellectual property, to
accept guidelines on managing its currency and to buy tens of billions worth of American
agricultural products. Washington, for its part, will not go through next month with placing
more tariffs on Chinese products.
This is an encouraging sign, but a verbal agreement is just a first step. A failure to
bring the trade war to a final conclusion significantly increases the risk of recession next
year in the United States, Europe, Japan and other developed and emerging economies. It would
also seriously undermine China's near-term growth prospects.
That's why, as representatives of a group of 10 former prime ministers and presidents from
center-left and center-right governments that have enjoyed close relations with both the
United States and China, we are writing to urge Presidents Donald Trump and Xi Jinping to
reach a substantive trade agreement by year's end. It's time to bring this source of global
economic uncertainty to a close.
America's and China's prosperity have been built on global free trade. America has
profited immensely from access to global markets since its birth. China, since opening up 40
years ago, has lifted millions of its people out of poverty largely through global trade.
Indeed, much of the prosperity enjoyed by people across the world is anchored in our ability
to sell goods and services freely across national boundaries.
Now, however, we see global growth in trade lagging behind general economic growth for the
first time in decades. In part, this is the product of the expanding trade war between
America and China, the world's two largest economies. In part, it is because of a more
general outbreak of protectionism around the world. Both these factors threaten continued
global prosperity.
We recognize, as former leaders of countries with longstanding economic relationships with
China, the real difficulties regarding a number of Beijing's trade and economic practices. We
understand, for example, the challenges that arise from Chinese policies on intellectual
property and technology transfer, its restrictions on access to its markets, and its
subsidization of private and public companies that are active in the global marketplace. We
believe that these practices need to change in whichever countries may use them. But it is
particularly important in China, because it is the world's second-largest economy.
At the same time, as countries long committed to the principles of free trade, we do not
see the ever-widening tariff war, started by the United States, as an effective way to
resolve trade and economic disputes. Tariffs, by definition, are the enemy of free trade.
Their cumulative impact, particularly combined with the current resurgence of protectionism
worldwide, only depresses economic growth, employment and living standards. Tariffs raise the
cost of living for working families as consumer prices are driven up.
Stock markets rose on Friday with the news of the preliminary deal. The tariff war has
been creating economic uncertainty, depressing international investor confidence, compounding
downward pressure on growth and increasing the risk of recession. The disruption of global
supply chains is already profound, and it may continue until a final deal is reached.
We believe that the World Trade Organization, despite its limitations, is best positioned
to address China's trade practices. We also believe that the W.T.O. is the most appropriate
forum in which to resolve trade disputes. So we urge the United States and China to work with
other member states to strengthen the W.T.O.'s institutional capacity.
Our group of former prime ministers and presidents includes François Fillon of
France, Joe Clark of Canada, Enrico Letta of Italy, Jan Peter Balkenende of the Netherlands,
Felipe Calderón and Ernesto Zedillo of Mexico, and Han Seung-soo of South Korea. Given
our collective experience, we are not naïve about the inherent complexities in
negotiating trade agreements. Many of us have negotiated free-trade pacts with both the
United States and China. We are deeply familiar with the concerns of each country, including
the domestic political constituencies that argue for continued protection.
Many of those domestic concerns have focused on the long-term enforcement of any
agreement. On this point, we argue that it is in China's own long-term economic interest to
ensure the effective implementation of any new trade deal -- whether involving intellectual
property, technology transfer, state subsidies or market access. Such policies would also
need to apply to all of China's trading partners, just as they would need to apply to its
relationship with the United States.
On the question of enforcement, China must be acutely aware that if it fails to comply
with the terms of the agreement, an already damaging trade war is likely to resume. A new
trade agreement should include strong enforcement provisions, along with strengthened W.T.O.
dispute-resolution mechanisms, to give greater confidence to both parties.
For these reasons, and given the gravity of the global economic outlook for 2020, we urge
both countries to exercise every effort to reach a substantive agreement this year. We also
urge the United States to withdraw the punitive tariffs it has imposed -- and that China do
the same with the reciprocal tariffs it has enacted.
Beyond trade, we are anxious about the wider strategic impact of any further decoupling of
the Chinese and the American economies, particularly in technology and finance. Such a
decoupling would present a long-term threat to global peace and security.
It would also effectively constitute the first step in the declaration of a new Cold War.
As with the last Cold War, many nations would be forced to choose between the two powers. And
that is a choice none of us wants to make.
"... Meanwhile, Chinese consumers aren't paying higher prices for U.S. imports. A study by the Peterson Institute for International Economics shows that since the beginning of 2018, China has raised the average tariff rate on U.S. imports from 8.0 percent to 21.8 percent and has lowered the average tariff rate on all its other trading partners from 8.0 percent to 6.7 percent. China imposed tariffs only on U.S. commodities that can be replaced with imports from other countries at similar prices. It actually lowered duties for those U.S. products that can't be bought elsewhere more cheaply, such as semiconductors and pharmaceuticals. Consequently, China's import prices for the same products have dropped overall, in spite of higher tariffs on U.S. imports. ..."
"... Beijing has proved much more capable than Washington of minimizing the pain to its consumers and economy. ..."
"... The uncomfortable truth for Trump is that U.S. trade deficits don't spring from the practices of U.S. trading partners; they come from the United States' own spending habits. ..."
"... The United States has run a persistent trade deficit since 1975, both overall and with most of its trading partners. Over the past 20 years, U.S. domestic expenditures have always exceeded GDP, resulting in negative net exports, or a trade deficit. ..."
"... Even a total Chinese capitulation in the trade war wouldn't make a dent in the overall U.S. trade deficit. ..."
"... The U.S. economy, on the other hand, has had the longest expansion in history, and the inevitable down cycle is already on the horizon: second-quarter GDP growth this year dropped to 2.0 percent from the first quarter's 3.1 percent. ..."
"... If the trade war continues, it will compromise the international trading system, which relies on a global division of labor based on each country's comparative advantage. Once that system becomes less dependable -- when disrupted, for instance, by the boycotts and hostility of trade wars -- countries will start decoupling from one another. ..."
Everyone Loses in the US-Chinese Clash
-- but Especially Americans
... Economists reckon the dead-weight loss arising from the existing tariffs on $200
billion in Chinese imports to be $620 per household, or about $80 billion, annually. This
represents about 0.4 percent of U.S. GDP. If the United States continues to expand its tariff
regime as scheduled, that loss will more than double.
Meanwhile, Chinese consumers aren't paying higher prices for U.S. imports. A study by the
Peterson Institute for International Economics shows that since the beginning of 2018, China
has raised the average tariff rate on U.S. imports from 8.0 percent to 21.8 percent and has
lowered the average tariff rate on all its other trading partners from 8.0 percent to 6.7
percent. China imposed tariffs only on U.S. commodities that can be replaced with imports
from other countries at similar prices. It actually lowered duties for those U.S. products
that can't be bought elsewhere more cheaply, such as semiconductors and pharmaceuticals.
Consequently, China's import prices for the same products have dropped overall, in spite of
higher tariffs on U.S. imports.
Beijing's nimble calculations are well illustrated by the example of lobsters. China
imposed a 25 percent tariff on U.S. lobsters in July 2018, precipitating a 70 percent drop in
U.S. lobster exports. At the same time, Beijing cut tariffs on Canadian lobsters by three
percent, and as a result, Canadian lobster exports to China doubled. Chinese consumers now
pay less for lobsters imported from essentially the same waters.
THE INESCAPABLE DEFICIT
Beijing has proved much more capable than Washington of minimizing the pain to its
consumers and economy. But the trade war would be more palatable for Washington if its
confrontation with China were accomplishing Trump's goals. The president thinks that China is
"ripping off" the United States. He wants to reduce the United States' overall trade deficit
by changing China's trade practices. But levying tariffs on Chinese imports has had the
paradoxical effect of inflating the United States' overall trade deficit, which, according to
the U.S. Census Bureau, rose by $28 billion in the first seven months of this year compared
with the same period last year.
The uncomfortable truth for Trump is that U.S. trade deficits don't spring from the
practices of U.S. trading partners; they come from the United States' own spending habits.
The United States has run a persistent trade deficit since 1975, both overall and with most
of its trading partners. Over the past 20 years, U.S. domestic expenditures have always
exceeded GDP, resulting in negative net exports, or a trade deficit. The shortfall has
shifted over time but has remained between three and six percent of GDP.
Trump wants to boost
U.S. exports to trim the deficit, but trade wars inevitably invite retaliation that leads to
significant reductions in exports. Moreover, increasing the volume of exports does not
necessarily reduce trade deficits unless it is accompanied by a reduction in the country's
spending in terms of consumption and investment. The right way to reduce a trade deficit is
to grow the economy faster than concurrent domestic expenditures, which can be accomplished
only by encouraging innovation and increasing productivity. A trade war does the opposite,
damaging the economy, impeding growth, and hindering innovation.
Even a total Chinese capitulation in the trade war wouldn't make a dent in the overall
U.S. trade deficit. If China buys more from the United States, it will purchase less from
other countries, which will then sell the difference either to the United States or to its
competitors.
For example, look at aircraft sales by the U.S. firm Boeing and its European
rival, Airbus. At the moment, both companies are operating at full capacity. If China buys
1,000 more aircraft from Boeing and 1,000 fewer from Airbus, the European plane-maker will
still sell those 1,000 aircraft, just to the United States or to other countries that might
have bought instead from Boeing.
China understands this, which is one reason it hasn't put
higher tariffs on U.S.-made aircraft. Whatever the outcome of the trade war, the deficit
won't be greatly changed.
A RESILIENT CHINA
The trade war has not really damaged China so far, largely because Beijing has managed to
keep import prices from rising and because its exports to the United States have been less
affected than anticipated.
This pattern will change as U.S. importers begin to switch from
buying from China to buying from third countries to avoid paying the high tariffs. But
assuming China's GDP continues to grow at around five to six percent every year, the effect
of that change will be quite modest.
Some pundits doubt the accuracy of Chinese figures for
economic growth, but multilateral agencies and independent research institutions set Chinese
GDP growth within a range of five to six percent.
Skeptics also miss the bigger picture that China's economy is slowing down as it shifts to
a consumption-driven model. Some manufacturing will leave China if the high tariffs become
permanent, but the significance of such a development should not be overstated. Independent
of the anxiety bred by Trump's tariffs, China is gradually weaning itself off its dependence
on export-led growth. Exports to the United States as a proportion of China's GDP steadily
declined from a peak of 11 percent in 2005 to less than four percent by 2018. In 2006, total
exports made up 36 percent of China's GDP; by 2018, that figure had been cut by half, to 18
percent, which is much lower than the average of 29 percent for the industrialized countries
of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. Chinese leaders have long
sought to steer their economy away from export-driven manufacturing to a consumer-driven
model.
To be sure, the trade war has exacted a severe psychological toll on the Chinese economy.
In 2018, when the tariffs were first announced, they caused a near panic in China's market at
a time when growth was slowing thanks to a round of credit tightening. The stock market took
a beating, plummeting some 25 percent. The government initially felt pressured to find a way
out of the trade war quickly. But as the smoke cleared to reveal little real damage,
confidence in the market rebounded: stock indexes had risen by 23 percent and 34 percent on
the Shanghai and Shenzhen exchanges, respectively, by September 12, 2019. The resilience of
the Chinese economy in the face of the trade war helps explain why Beijing has stiffened its
negotiating position in spite of Trump's escalation.
China hasn't had a recession in the past 40 years and won't have one in the foreseeable
future, because its economy is still at an early stage of development, with per capita GDP
only one-sixth of that of the United States. Due to declining rates of saving and rising
wages, the engine of China's economy is shifting from investments and exports to private
consumption. As a result, the country's growth rate is expected to slow. The International
Monetary Fund projects that China's real GDP growth will fall from 6.6 percent in 2018 to 5.5
percent in 2024; other estimates put the growth rate at an even lower number.
Although the
rate of Chinese growth may dip, there is little risk that the Chinese economy will contract
in the foreseeable future. Private consumption, which has been increasing, representing 35
percent of GDP in 2010 and 39 percent last year, is expected to continue to rise and to drive
economic growth, especially now that China has expanded its social safety net and welfare
provisions, freeing up private savings for consumption.
The U.S. economy, on the other hand, has had the longest expansion in history, and the
inevitable down cycle is already on the horizon: second-quarter GDP growth this year dropped
to 2.0 percent from the first quarter's 3.1 percent. The trade war, without taking into
account the escalations from September, will shave off at least half a percentage point of
U.S. GDP, and that much of a drag on the economy may tip it into the anticipated downturn.
(According to a September Washington Post poll, 60 percent of Americans expect a recession in
2020.) The prospect of a recession could provide Trump with the impetus to call off the trade
war. Here, then, is one plausible way the trade war will come to an end. Americans aren't
uniformly feeling the pain of the tariffs yet. But a turning point is likely to come when the
economy starts to lose steam.
If the trade war continues, it will compromise the international trading system, which
relies on a global division of labor based on each country's comparative advantage. Once that
system becomes less dependable -- when disrupted, for instance, by the boycotts and hostility
of trade wars -- countries will start decoupling from one another.
China and the United States are joined at the hip economically, each being the other's
biggest trading partner. Any attempt to decouple the two economies will bring catastrophic
consequences for both, and for the world at large. Consumer prices will rise, world economic
growth will slow, supply chains will be disrupted and laboriously duplicated on a global
scale, and a digital divide -- in technology, the Internet, and telecommunications -- will
vastly hamper innovation by limiting the horizons and ambitions of technology firms.
...
"... Yes, the U.S. government can hurt Huawei in the short term by limiting their access to technology (and to certain foreign markets). But, absent a viable competitor, this won't have much impact in the long term. Because Huawei is fundamentally not a technology company. Huawei is a human resources company. And is kind of obsessed with survival. ..."
"... Huawei's fundamental purpose has always been about survival. ..."
"... Huawei, like most engineering-based enterprises, has only one real resource, which is the cumulative brainpower of its people. This is the resource that creates the products and sells them to their customers. And as technology changes quickly, they must continually create and recreate the products – and therefore the value of the enterprise. Huawei's main strength is the system they have developed for the creation, assessment and distribution of value by over 190,000 people. It's about HR strategy. ..."
Huawei is going to beat Trump with human resources
By Jeff Towson
President Trump's placement of Huawei on the U.S. entity list was a body blow. The
magnitude of the hit should not be understated. Being cut off from U.S. technology so
suddenly staggered the multinational. But, to their credit, Huawei didn't go down. They took
the hit and stayed on their feet.
I'm not really sure what the U.S. government thought it would achieve with the ban. To
stop Huawei's growth in international markets? To shift 5G market share to Ericsson and
Nokia? To cripple the company? Just an assertion of principle?
I think they really just don't understand Huawei.
Yes, the U.S. government can hurt Huawei in the short term by limiting their access to
technology (and to certain foreign markets). But, absent a viable competitor, this won't have
much impact in the long term. Because Huawei is fundamentally not a technology company.
Huawei is a human resources company. And is kind of obsessed with survival.
Huawei's core strategy has always been about survival.
If you read Ren Zhengfei's talks and papers going back to the early 1990's, what jumps out
at you is how different Huawei is. The goal of the company has never really been about money.
Nor about becoming a tech giant. Nor about innovation. And it has definitely not been about
going public and getting a big payday. Huawei's fundamental purpose has always been about
survival.
"Being big and strong temporarily is not what we want. What we want is the ability and
resilience to survive sustainably," said Ren in 2001.
Actually he has been talking for literally decades about how Huawei can survive long-term
– and about the common causes of corporate decline. My simplistic take is that Ren came
up with a fairly logical plan for long-term survival: Serve your customers no matter what.
Then get big and slowly grind your competitors down with lower costs and greater R&D
spending. And within this, the only resource you really have are your people and their
cumulative brainpower.
Huawei's main resource is its people.
Huawei, like most engineering-based enterprises, has only one real resource, which is the
cumulative brainpower of its people. This is the resource that creates the products and sells
them to their customers. And as technology changes quickly, they must continually create and
recreate the products – and therefore the value of the enterprise. Huawei's main
strength is the system they have developed for the creation, assessment and distribution of
value by over 190,000 people. It's about HR strategy.
Unlike the companies in the U.S. and Europe, where the shareholders are the stakeholders
with ultimate say or multiple stakeholders, such as employees, owners and the community, at
Huawei, the only stakeholders you ever really hear about are the current employees. It's all
about the top contributing, current employees. Shareholders, providers of capital, retired
employees and even the founders are all a distant second in importance.
Note how different this is to other large engineering-focused companies (say GM and
Bosch), where much of the value goes into guaranteed salaries (regardless of contribution)
and into post-retirement benefits (i.e., not current employees). Huawei is not only focused
primarily on this one group, they are also operating much more as a meritocracy with regards
to labor.
Huawei to me looks a lot like what 3G capital has been doing in consumer-facing companies
like Budweiser and Burger King. They have instituted "meritocracy and partnership" on a
massive scale in a knowledge business. There is a lot of ownership. And you rise and fall
based on your performance.
Huawei is awesome at inspiring dedication in their top contributing, current employees.
And that is pretty logical. If brainpower is Huawei's main resource, this is the group that
creates that value. So recruiting and motivating this group is the biggest priority. And they
don't just want them motivated. They want them "all in."
In practice, this is actually pretty complicated. It's a big company. Employees are at
different stages of their lives and careers. How do you get current staff, senior staff and
incoming staff to go "all in" in creating value for customers – and therefore the
enterprise?
My outsider's take is that Huawei is mostly focused on motivating teams and team managers.
High-performance teams with aggressive and dedicated managers are the engine of Huawei. And
these are mostly in sales and marketing and R&D. They make the largest contributions to
the customers and therefore the enterprise. You motivate at the team level and within the
departments that matter most. And then you scale it up.
But how do you assess contributed value?
Staff are rated every 6-12 months across metrics such as sales performance (usually
team-based), talent, dedication, and the potential for advancement. The phrases I keep coming
across in my reading are "dedicated employees" and "high-performance teams." In fact, the
book on their HR book is titled Dedication.
Once assessed, how do you reward performance?
High-performing contributors are given higher bonuses, of course. But they are also
identified and given more opportunities (and responsibilities). They are given more training
and the option to participate in the employee share ownership program (very important). Low
performers, in contrast, are demoted or exited. Meritocracy works in both directions.
And this brings us back to the main point of this article: How does the U.S. tech ban
impact any of this? How does it impact an HR system for motivating the more than 190,000
employees that continually recreate the company and ensure its survival?
In the long term, it doesn't.
Yes, the company took a big hit in the short term in terms of its access to tech
(especially in semiconductors and in the consumer business) and to a few markets. But the
core of the company is still churning along like it has for 30 years. And I think it is very
likely Huawei will overcome these supply chain problems. And, ironically, the current crisis
is probably resulting in increased motivation and dedication across the company.
White House Weighs Blocking Chinese Companies From U.S. Exchanges
By Alan Rappeport and Ana Swanson
WASHINGTON -- The Trump administration is discussing whether to block Chinese companies
from listing shares on American stock exchanges, the latest push to try to sever economic
ties between the United States and China, according to people familiar with the
deliberations.
The internal discussions are in their early stages and no decision is imminent, these
people cautioned.
The talks come as senior officials from both countries are scheduled to resume trade
negotiations in Washington early next month. President Trump, who has continued to give mixed
signals about the prospect of a trade deal with China, said earlier this week that an
agreement could come "sooner than you think." His decision to delay an increase in tariffs
until mid-October and China's recent purchases of American agricultural products has fueled
optimism that the talks could produce an agreement.
But the prospect of further limiting American investment in China underscores the
challenge that the two sides will continue to face even as they try to de-escalate a trade
war that has shaken the global economy. The administration has already increased scrutiny of
foreign investment with a particular eye toward China, including expanding the types of
investments that can be subject to a national security review.
Last week, the Treasury Department unveiled new regulations detailing how a 2018 law, the
Foreign Investment Risk Review Modernization Act, will work to prevent foreign firms from
using investments like minority stakes to capture sensitive American information. And the
United States has already blacklisted some Chinese companies, including Huawei, effectively
barring them from doing business with American companies.
Stocks dropped on Friday after a report on the deliberations was published by Bloomberg
News. The market continued to slide through most of the day. At close, the S&P 500 was
down 0.5 percent and the Nasdaq composite index was down 1.1 percent.
Losses were particularly steep in the technology sector, and among semiconductor stocks,
two parts of the market that have been sensitive to the latest updates on the economic
tensions between China and the United States.
Details of how the United States would restrict Chinese companies from American stock
markets were still being worked out and the idea remained in its early stages, the people
familiar with the deliberations said.
China hawks within the administration have discussed the possibility of tighter
restrictions on listed Chinese companies for many months. Supporters say the efforts would
close longstanding loopholes that have allowed Chinese companies with links to its government
to take advantage of America's financial rules and solicit funds from American investors
without proper disclosure.
Skeptics caution that the move could be deeply disruptive to markets and the economy and
risk turning American investors and pension funds into another casualty of the trade war.
The effect of limiting Chinese firms from raising capital inside the United States could
be significant. As of the beginning of this year, 156 Chinese companies were listed on
American exchanges and had a total market capitalization of $1.2 trillion, according to the
U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission.
"The underlying concerns have merit, but how to deal with them without creating a lot of
collateral damage is tricky," Patrick Chovanec, managing director at Silvercrest Asset
Management, wrote in a post on Twitter. "Abruptly delisting Chinese firms en masse would
clearly send shock waves through markets."
The idea gained traction on Capitol Hill this summer when Republicans and Democrats in the
Senate and the House introduced legislation that would delist firms that were out of
compliance with American regulators for three years. The lawmakers argued that Chinese
companies have been benefiting from American capital markets while playing by a different set
of rules.
American complaints center on a lack of transparency into the ownership and finances of
Chinese firms. The business community has long criticized China for classifying some auditor
reports on company finances as state secrets and outlawing cross-border transfers of
auditors' documentation.
In 2015, the Chinese affiliates of the Big Four accounting firms -- Deloitte Touch
Tohmatsu, KPMG, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Ernst & Young -- paid $500,000 each to settle
a dispute about their refusal to provide documentation on Chinese companies to the Securities
and Exchange Commission, which an American judge had ruled was a violation of United States
law.
The White House has grown more interested in blocking Chinese firms in recent weeks, with
some in the administration describing it as a top priority. Officials say the topic is not
yet an issue in bilateral negotiations with the Chinese and inserting it into the talks could
lead negotiations to fall apart again.
"This would be another step in ratcheting up the pressure," said Michael Pillsbury, a
China scholar at the Hudson Institute who said he raised the concept of investment
restrictions with the White House after negotiations with China broke down in the spring.
The White House declined to comment.
The concept has divided Mr. Trump's advisers along their usual fault lines, with Peter
Navarro, Mr. Trump's trade adviser, advocating action and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin
urging caution....
A house bill bans using Huawei and ZTE phones; also adds 1 billion in taxpayer paid for
equipment to be donated to to USA companies so the USA companies can trash the China made
equipment and exchange if for 1 billion in USA and Israel made equipment.
I wonder does this mean the USA and Israel cannot compete with the Chinese?
"... With the inaugural "Huawei AppGallery" emerging with the Mate 30, the company has now positioned itself on an investment trajectory to create a new "Huawei core" to compete with the world of Google-led Android systems outright. ..."
"... Beyond Apple and the iPhone, the Android operating system dominates in the global smartphone market. Describing it as an "operating system" is barely fitting; it might otherwise be described as "an ecosystem" with a wide range of Google orientated services within it. ..."
"... They include the popular browser Chrome, the YouTube video service, Google mail and, most critically, the "Google Playstore," which, owing to its popularity, attracts more developers and investors than any other unofficial App stores. This "ecosystem" creates a "web of comfort" which effectively entrenches the consumer in the Android orbit. ..."
"... p until May 2019, Huawei was a part of this orbit. Its subsequent estrangement from Android owing to the American government's decision has forced some difficult choices. It has made markets keen to observe how the Mate 30 will perform given its lack of Google applications and the need for users to obtain some apps through third-party stores. ..."
"... So, the question is: How are they now adapting and making that transition? Bengt Nordstrom of North Stream research in Sweden notes that "they have a strategy to become completely independent from U.S. technology. And in many areas, they have become independent." ..."
"... Huawei's announced bid to invest over 1 billion U.S. dollars in developing its own application "core" or ecosystem. This, in essence, is an effort to get developers to establish applications for the new "Huawei App store" and thus establish a self-reliant, independent path from the world of Android. ..."
"... To achieve this, the company has pledged a competitive revenue sharing scheme of 15 percent to developers, half of that what Apple and Google demand for participation in their own app-stores. ..."
September 21, 2019
Huawei's pivotal moment
By Tom Fowdy
Huawei launched its Mate 30 series on Friday, the first new device produced by the
Shenzhen telecommunications firm since it has been blacklisted by the United States
government and excluded from American technology markets.
The subsequent result of the listing had led Google to sever ties with the company and
prohibit new devices from using its Play Store services and operating system, something which
ultimately impacts the Mate 30 Series, which is using an open-source version of Android.
The impact of it all has led Western commentators to ask questions about Huawei's future
in Western smartphone markets, particularly what applications can it access.
However, not all is bleak, and what may start off as a hindrance for the company is set to
transform into an opportunity. The United States' assault on the company has forced Huawei to
innovate.
With the inaugural "Huawei AppGallery" emerging with the Mate 30, the company has now
positioned itself on an investment trajectory to create a new "Huawei core" to compete with
the world of Google-led Android systems outright.
In this case, what seems like a detriment is part of a broader pivotal moment for Huawei.
The company's portfolio is about to change forever.
Beyond Apple and the iPhone, the Android operating system dominates in the global
smartphone market. Describing it as an "operating system" is barely fitting; it might
otherwise be described as "an ecosystem" with a wide range of Google orientated services
within it.
They include the popular browser Chrome, the YouTube video service, Google mail and,
most critically, the "Google Playstore," which, owing to its popularity, attracts more
developers and investors than any other unofficial App stores. This "ecosystem" creates a
"web of comfort" which effectively entrenches the consumer in the Android orbit.
U p until May 2019, Huawei was a part of this orbit. Its subsequent estrangement from
Android owing to the American government's decision has forced some difficult choices. It has
made markets keen to observe how the Mate 30 will perform given its lack of Google
applications and the need for users to obtain some apps through third-party stores.
So, the question is: How are they now adapting and making that transition? Bengt
Nordstrom of North Stream research in Sweden notes that "they have a strategy to become
completely independent from U.S. technology. And in many areas, they have become
independent."
First of all, we are well aware that Huawei is developing its own Harmony Operating System
as a contingency measure, although it has not chosen to apply it to the Mate 30 as an olive
branch to Google.
Second, and most excitingly is Huawei's announced bid to invest over 1 billion U.S.
dollars in developing its own application "core" or ecosystem. This, in essence, is an effort
to get developers to establish applications for the new "Huawei App store" and thus establish
a self-reliant, independent path from the world of Android.
To achieve this, the company has pledged a competitive revenue sharing scheme of 15
percent to developers, half of that what Apple and Google demand for participation in their
own app-stores.
This effort is combined with a wider scope in research and development from the company,
which is also designed to forfeit dependence upon American technology chains in terms of
critical components and other parts.
We have already seen massive investment pledges from Huawei to build new research and
development centers in the United Kingdom, Belgium, Italy and Brazil. They are not empty
promises, but a serious and strategic effort.
In this case, what was intended to be a political effort to destroy and contain Huawei is
likely to prove a pivotal turning point in the company's history with huge repercussions for
global smartphone and technology markets.
Instead of having once been reliant on and thus beneficial to American technology markets,
the outcome is that Huawei will re-emerge independent of and competing against it.
Armed with a pending new operating system, a new application development drive and a
broader research effort, what seemed otherwise a detriment is likely to bring a massive
opportunity. Thus, it is very important to examine the long-term prospects for the company's
fortunes ahead of short-term challenges.
"... "The Kirin 990 is not only an SoC and a 5G modem glued together. We put a lot of effort in integrating the two chips. So the new chip uses less power and generates less heat while getting the job done," said Huawei fellow Ai Wei before the launch event. ..."
"... The whole Kirin 990 5G chip is so dense that it contains 10.3 billion semiconductors, the first and largest of its kind. ..."
"... Another example is AI-based video quality improvements, which takes in a low quality video and render a better one. Objects in the rendered video have much sharper edges. Huawei technicians refused to explain how they made it, but the underlying tech seems to be object recognition, content-based pixel generation and noise reduction, since these are the tricks AI does well. ..."
"... Huawei's P30 Pro smartphone, together with the Kirin 980 chip, has taken "smartphone zoom to the next level," according to third-party review site DxOMark. The phone was on top of all smartphones when it comes to photography in DxOMark's ranking. The Kirin 990 is packed with more graphic features to continue Huawei's dominance. ..."
Smartest and fastest: Huawei reveals new smartphone chip Kirin 990 5G
By Gong Zhe
Chinese smartphone giant Huawei, which has been under heavy attack from the U.S.
government during the last few months, just revealed its next-generation smartphone
system-on-a-chip (SoC) product "Kirin 990 5G," signaling the company's business is not
stalled by foreign strangling.
The launch event was held simultaneously at IFA electronic show in Berlin, Germany, and in
Beijing on Friday.
In his keynote speech, Huawei's head of gadgets Richard Yu told the press that the chip is
more advanced than other flagship smartphone SoCs, because it has a built-in 5G modem.
Current rivals of the chip, like Qualcomm's Snapdragon 855, have no 5G modem and have to
rely on an extra chip to support 5G.
"The Kirin 990 is not only an SoC and a 5G modem glued together. We put a lot of
effort in integrating the two chips. So the new chip uses less power and generates less heat
while getting the job done," said Huawei fellow Ai Wei before the launch event.
The whole Kirin 990 5G chip is so dense that it contains 10.3 billion semiconductors,
the first and largest of its kind.
Flexible AI power
The chip also features three AI cores, two larger than the other smaller. This design,
first in smartphones, saves battery power by only using the small core to process simple AI
tasks, while resorting to the larger cores for more complex jobs.
The company named the cores "Ascend Lite" and "Ascend Tiny" to relate the cores to
Huawei's new, self-proclaimed "fastest AI training chip in the world," the Ascend 910.
Huawei built a showcase at the Beijing launch event to demonstrate the chip's AI power.
They showed a FaceID-like face recognition feature in a Kirin 990-powered developer board
that can work when the person is four meters away from the phone, times further than Apple's
current product.
Another example is AI-based video quality improvements, which takes in a low quality
video and render a better one. Objects in the rendered video have much sharper edges. Huawei
technicians refused to explain how they made it, but the underlying tech seems to be object
recognition, content-based pixel generation and noise reduction, since these are the tricks
AI does well.
Even better photos
Huawei's P30 Pro smartphone, together with the Kirin 980 chip, has taken "smartphone
zoom to the next level," according to third-party review site DxOMark. The phone was on top
of all smartphones when it comes to photography in DxOMark's ranking. The Kirin 990 is packed
with more graphic features to continue Huawei's dominance.
A Kirin 990-powered smartphone can shoot 4K videos (3840 x 2160 pixels) at 60 frames per
second, on par with market flagship phones.
The chip can also run DSLR-level noise-reduction algorithm – namely "Block Match 3D"
– to bring professional tech to consumer devices.
"Porting an algorithm from DSLR to smartphone may be easy. But getting the program to run
fast enough can be hard for any phone maker," Ai told CGTN Digital.
Non-U.S. tech
The design of Kirin 990 is still based on technology Huawei bought from British tech
company ARM, used by several mainstream brands.
After the U.S. began imposing restrictions on Huawei, ARM cut ties with the Chinese phone
maker. Despite this, Huawei has been able to use and modify AMRv8 technology thanks to its
permanent ARM license. Hence why chips like Kirin 990 can still be legally built and
sold.
In addition to ARM, there are other major smartphone tech companies cutting ties with
Huawei, forcing the Chinese company to create its own alternatives. After Google announced to
bar Huawei phones from installing their apps, Huawei started porting its IoT system "Harmony"
to smartphones.
But Huawei still wishes to use technologies from all over the world. As Ai Wei explained
at the launch event, "Huawei will not deliberately remove all U.S. tech from its smartphones.
But when the supply from U.S. was cut, Huawei has to find a way to survive."
"That's why Huawei chose to create its own technology," Ai added....
The point in article after article is that China is emphasizing technical advance in building
the economy from rural to urban applications and the emphasis will not be lessened. The rural
applications I am reading about are especially exciting.
I appreciate the interview, but Clayton Dube as director of the University of Southern
California's U.S.-China Institute knows remarkably little about China or American relations
with China. Possibly Dube is being especially cautious, but still:
"The air in Los Angeles," the academic explains by way of an example, "is influenced by
the air coming out of northern China. But of course, that bad air in China is produced by
factories often producing for the American market. And so we have not only outsourced
production, we've outsourced pollution."
This is absurdly wrong. China has been working on cleaning the environment for years now
and the effects as monitored have been dramatic.
The idea that China thinks of 1849 to 1949 as a colonial period that took them 100 years to
get free from, for instance, immediately helps me understand some of where they are coming
from.
The idea that China thinks of 1849 to 1949 as a colonial period that took them 100 years to
get free from, for instance, immediately helps me understand some of where they are coming
from.
[ Surely so, this very day is "International Day of Peace in Nanjing" in memory of the
victims of the terrible Japanese occupation:
Four Years After Declaring War on Pollution, China Is Winning
Research gives estimates on the longer lives that are now possible in the country.
By Michael Greenstone
On March 4, 2014, the Chinese premier, Li Keqiang, told almost 3,000 delegates at the
National People's Congress and many more watching live on state television, "We will
resolutely declare war against pollution as we declared war against poverty."
China has had the benefit of skipping over other advanced nation's Legacy infrastructure.
Leapfrogging ahead in some areas of development is smart and saves money for China as
well, but that doesn't make China superior to other advanced nations.
The U.S. Has a Fleet of 300 Electric Buses. China Has 421,000
The rest of the world will struggle for years to match China's rapid embrace of electric
transit.
By Brian Eckhouse - Bloomberg
Fearing 'Spy Trains,' Congress May Ban a Chinese Maker of Subway Cars
By Ana Swanson
CHICAGO -- America's next fight with China is unfolding at a glistening new factory in
Chicago, which stands empty except for the shells of two subway cars and space for future
business that is unlikely to come.
A Chinese state-owned company called CRRC Corporation, the world's largest train maker,
completed the $100 million facility this year in the hopes of winning contracts to build
subway cars and other passenger trains for American cities like Chicago and Washington.
But growing fears about China's economic ambitions and its potential to track and spy on
Americans are about to quash those plans. Congress is soon expected to approve legislation
that would effectively bar the company from competing for new contracts in the United States,
citing national security and economic concerns. The White House has expressed its support for
the effort....
Terrific discussion on how the West perceives China...
[ Actually a discussion that shows a remarkable misperception of China even by an American
China academic-specialist. As such the discussion is important though discouraging. ]
"... I always thought globalization was about the opportunity for a handful of businesses and corporations to control major industries around the world. ..."
"... There is an anti-China hawks faction based in the Republican party that has made its present felt. People like Robert Lighthizer, Peter Navarro and Steve Bannon. I have seen this sentiment spill over into Australian politics but they have not reached the stage where they are asking: "Are you now, or have you ever been, born Chinese?". ..."
"... We have also seen hawk factions against Russia, Iran and not long ago Venezuela. The ones for Russia and Iran have been long going but the ones against China and Venezuela were sudden and new. It may be that tomorrow that Trump will do the same against Cuba and threaten any country that does trade with them. Who knows what other country may fall within his sights? ..."
"... it seems business people in the government are being pushed aside by hawkish factions who do not care what effect it has on the economy or the country. Great! ..."
"... Those are the same "hawks" that are busy destroying the rest of America as well. ..."
"... As it is now, China literally has the US by the jewels, and if a serious conflict ever arose, could squeeze them hard. Just their dominance in manufacturing a large percentage of the pharmaceuticals consumed by US patients alone creates a serious vulnerability. ..."
"... Situating the manufacturing in countries that are part of the Chinese sphere of influence won't help much in a conflict. China would probably be able to sweep through much of Southeast Asia quickly or interdict shipments if there was war. ..."
"... the world wide presence/threat of the USA military and diplomatic corps allows globalization to be less risky for USA businesses, so, in effect, the patriotic "spreading of democracy" around the world via military actions is a factor in USA job loss. This is yet another cost of the bloated military to the general USA population. ..."
"... Trump, as usual, got his strings pulled by the Deep State when he went for actual implementation of a campaign promise. The DS doesn't care about working Americans, they are simply against China. ..."
"... as Julius Krein, editor of American Affairs, writes: "United States industry is losing ground to foreign competitors on price, quality and technology. In many areas, our manufacturing capacity cannot compete with what exists in Asia." ..."
"... Back in the early 80s I saw a massive warehouse full of machine tools, Bridgeport mills, and such lined up, it seemed forever, the guy there said they were going to China. I asked my Dad about it, and he told me we were selling them to the Chinese for the price of scrap. The whole thing is mindless and pathetic, but the really maddening thing is the slippery way our 'leaders' can keep dodging the blame by simply pointing a finger in whatever direction, and everybody's eyes move in unison. ..."
"... The argument/discussion is not about how and where to outsource our jobs, it's about how stupid it was to do it in the first place ..."
"... Also the Chinese internal market continues to attract MNC's and this attraction will continue to grow far into the future. China's middle class is already larger than the total population of the US and it continues to grow rapidly. While down presently the Chinese internal consumption continues to grow at an annual rate of some 8.5%. ..."
"... Trump's approach to trade is isolating the US, blocking its Co's from the Chinese market, and incentivizing the Chinese to offer better conditions to Co's of the rest of the world. How can that help the US ? ..."
"... The relentless neoliberal race to the bottom, outsourcing, and austerity that marked the death blow to American Labor is over. In that light it makes little difference whether our corporations pull out of China, go to Vietnam, or come home. The exploitation of the poorest is coming to an end. And none too soon. ..."
"... I hope some candidates discuss the imperative to have the US start making it's own medications again. ..."
"... I could not believe the government has allowed the entire supply chain of building blocks of ALL our antibiotics to be sourced almost solely from China. To me THAT'S the national security issue we need to deal with immediately. As well as other vital drugs.. ..."
"... Chinese manufacturers have the wealth and experience to teach production line workers and make things anywhere. Western companies manufacturing in China have belatedly looked for facilities in neighboring countries and found the Chinese are already there. ..."
"... Trump doesn't give a damn about getting manufacturing jobs back into the United States! (Or at least his advisors don't). ..."
"... Low housing costs, lead to lower wages so UK employers were able to compete in a free trade world. William White (BIS, OECD) talks about how economics really changed over one hundred years ago as classical economics was replaced by neoclassical economics. ..."
"... He thinks we have been on the wrong path for one hundred years. Free trade requires a low cost of living and what was known in the 19th century had disappeared by the 20th. The West's high cost of living means high wages and an inability to compete in a free trade world. ..."
By Marshall Auerback, a
market analyst and commentator. Produced by Economy for All, a project of the Independent Media
Institute
"Chimerica" is a term originally coined by the historian Niall Ferguson and economist Moritz
Schularick to describe the growing economic relationship between the U.S. and China since the
latter's entry into the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001. In the words of Ferguson : "The Chinese did the saving, the
Americans the spending. The Chinese did the exporting, the Americans the importing. The Chinese
did the lending, the Americans the borrowing." Much of the pre-crisis boom in global trade was
driven by this economic symbiosis, which is why successive American presidents tolerated this
marriage of convenience
despite the increasing costs to the U.S. economy . The net benefits calculation, however,
began to change after 2008, and the conflict has intensified further after the 2016
presidential election result. Today, the cumulative stress of Donald Trump's escalating trade
war is leading to if not an irreparable breach between the two countries, then certainly a
significant fraying. The imminent resumption of trade talks notwithstanding, the rising cost of
the tariffs is already inducing some U.S. manufacturers to exit China. But in most instances,
they are not returning to home shores.
It may have taken Trump to point out the pitfalls of the Chimerica link, but coming up with
a coherent strategy to replace it is clearly beyond the president's abilities. America is
likely to remain a relative manufacturing wasteland, as barren as Trump's own ill-conceived
ideas on trade. At the same time, it's not going to be an unmitigated victory for China either,
as Beijing is increasingly suffering from a large confluence of internal and external
pressures.
Chimerica helped to launch China as a global trade power. To the extent that this marriage
helped the U.S. economy, it skewed toward the largely blue state coastal regions. Wall Street
banks located on the East Coast happily collected lucrative commissions and investment banking
fees, as China's export proceeds were recycled into U.S. treasuries, stocks, and high-end real
estate while the capital markets boomed; on the West Coast, "new economy" companies thrived,
their growth and profitability unhindered by the onslaught of Chinese manufactured exports. By
contrast, facilitated by technological advances that permitted large-scale outsourcing by U.S.
manufacturers, Chimerica laid waste to much of what was left of America's Rust Belt, and the
politics of many of the displaced workers mutated to the extent that Donald Trump became an
appealing alternative to the establishment in 2016.
The major legacy of Chimerica, then, is that too many American workers have been
semi-permanently replaced by low-cost offshored labor. Prior to great advances in technology,
along with globalization, displacement of the current labor force could only have occurred
through immigration of workers into the country. Historically, displacement by immigrants
generally began at the menial level of the labor force, and became more restrictive as when it
became correlated with significant unemployment. Given the rise of globalization and the
corresponding liberalization of immigration in the past few decades, however, policy no longer
arrests the displacement of American workers. The policy backlash has consequently manifested
itself more via trade protectionism. Trump has sought to consolidate his Rust Belt base of
supporters by launching a trade war, especially versus Beijing, the ultimate effects of which
he hoped would be to re-domicile supply chains that had earlier migrated to China.
Early on in his presidency, there was some hope that Trump's protectionism was at best a
bluff or, at worst, an aberration, and that the return of a Democrat to the White House in 2020
would eventually reestablish the status quo ante. But the president still can't get a wall, and
his protectionism has become more pronounced almost as if to compensate. The problem today is
that even if Trump is voted out of office in 2020, corporate America is becoming less inclined
to wait out the end of his presidency to return to the pre-Trump status quo of parking the bulk
of their manufacturing in China. There is too much risk in putting all of one's eggs in the
China basket, especially given
growing national security concerns . Hence, U.S. companies are taking action. In spite of
decades of investment in these China-domiciled supply chains, a number of American companies
are pulling out:
toy manufacturer Hasbro , Illinois-based
phone accessories manufacturer Xentris Wireless, and lifestyle clothing company PacSun are
a few of the operators who are exiting the country.
But they are not coming back to the U.S., relocating instead to places like Vietnam,
Bangladesh, Mexico, the Philippines and Taiwan. The chief financial officer of Xentris, Ben
Buttolph, says
that the company will never return to China: "We are trying to have multiple locations
certified for all of our products, so that if all of a sudden there's an issue with one of the
locations, we just flip the switch." Likewise, the CEO of Hasbro, Brian Goldner,
recently spoke of "great opportunities in Vietnam, India and other territories like
Mexico."
All is not lost for the U.S., however, as Goldner did celebrate the success of Hasbro's
facility in East Longmeadow, Massachusetts, which has resumed
production of Play-Doh in the U.S. for the first time since 2004 . It is doubtful, however,
that this represents the recapturing of the high value-added supply chains that Trump envisaged
when he first launched his trade assault on Beijing.
In general, as Julius Krein,
editor of American Affairs , writes: "United States industry is losing ground to foreign
competitors on price, quality and technology. In many areas, our manufacturing capacity cannot
compete with what exists in Asia."
These are not isolated examples.
Defense One also notes the following development:
It came without a breaking news alert or presidential tweet, but the technological
competition with China entered a new phase last month. Several developments quietly heralded
this shift: Cross-border investments between the United States and China plunged to their
lowest levels since 2014, with the tech sector suffering the most precipitous drop. U.S. chip
giants Intel and AMD abruptly ended or declined to extend important partnerships with Chinese
entities. The Department of Commerce halved the number of licenses that let U.S. companies
assign Chinese nationals to sensitive technology and engineering projects.
This development consequently makes it hard to proclaim Beijing a winner in this dispute
either. The country still needs access to U.S. high tech. The government announced yet
another fiscal stimulus to the economy earlier this month in response to a cluster of
weakening economic data, much of which is related to the trade shock. It is also the case that
China is being buffeted politically, both externally and internally: externally, in addition to
the escalating trade war, China's own efforts to counter the effects of rising protectionism by
creating a " reverse
Marshall Plan " via the Belt and Road Initiative is
floundering .
China's "iron brother," Pakistan, is increasingly being victimized by India's aggressive
Hindu-centric nationalism . It is hard to imagine the Modi government opportunistically
taking the step of annexing Kashmir and undermining Pakistan, had it not sensed Beijing's
increasing vulnerability.
Internally, Beijing is finding it increasingly challenging as it seeks to enforce its "One
China" policy in Hong Kong and Taiwan. The
withdrawal of the controversial extradition law that first precipitated widespread
demonstrations in Hong Kong has not alleviated the political pressures in the territory, but
simply allowed an even bigger protest culture to take root and strengthen an independent
political mindset. Similarly, Taiwan has also openly supported the Hong Kong protesters,
pledging help to those seeking asylum . Both regions now constitute both a huge humiliation
and challenge to the primacy of China's ruling Communist Party. And now on top of that, foreign
manufacturers are leaving the country, weakening a totally leveraged manufacturing complex.
The implications of this divorce go well beyond the U.S. and China. They constitute another
step toward regionalization, another step away from a quaint ideological "post-history"
construct that saw Washington, D.C., as the head office and the rest of the world as a bunch of
branch plants for "America, Inc." It's hardly comforting to contemplate that the last time we
reached this historic juncture was the early 1900s, when a similarly globalized economy broke
down, followed by the Great War. As Niall Ferguson points out , "a high level of economic integration does not
necessarily prevent the growth of strategic rivalry and, ultimately, conflict." There's no
doubt that both Washington and Beijing will likely making soothing noises to the markets in
order to create favorable conditions for the trade talks in October, but their actions suggest
that they are both digging in
for a longer struggle . Today's trade wars, therefore, are likely to morph into something
more destructive, which is a lose-lose in an era where human advancement depends on greater
integration between economic powers.
There may be another aspect to this development and that is of geopolitics. You can see
that in Marshall's article when the CFO of Xentris said: "We are trying to have multiple
locations certified for all of our products, so that if all of a sudden there's an issue with
one of the locations, we just flip the switch." There is an anti-China hawks faction based in
the Republican party that has made its present felt. People like Robert Lighthizer, Peter
Navarro and Steve Bannon. I have seen this sentiment spill over into Australian politics but
they have not reached the stage where they are asking: "Are you now, or have you ever been,
born Chinese?".
So we have seen a long string of sanctions and tariffs at play so that China will change its
laws and institutions to suit American interests. Yeah, I can't see that happening anytime
soon but hey, America First, Baby. We have also seen hawk factions against Russia, Iran and
not long ago Venezuela. The ones for Russia and Iran have been long going but the ones
against China and Venezuela were sudden and new. It may be that tomorrow that Trump will do
the same against Cuba and threaten any country that does trade with them. Who knows what
other country may fall within his sights?
That being the case if you were running an international country, you can no longer just have
your manufacturing base or service operations just in one country. If Xentris is an example,
US companies may have to split manufacturing into several countries in case one fine day that
Trump will sanction yet another country that your company depends on.
I would imagine that it
would not be so efficient but it seems business people in the government are being pushed
aside by hawkish factions who do not care what effect it has on the economy or the country.
Great!
Those are the same "hawks" that are busy destroying the rest of America as well. Another
four years of this will, effectively, dismantle what democracy is left. The world trade won't
be the big issue. The departure of millions of Americans will.
If that happens, be sure to thank the Catfood Democrats for it. Because they are the
people who will do their very best and hardest to throw the next election to Trump, one way
or another.
It seems like diversification of supply chains can only be a good thing. As it is now,
China literally has the US by the jewels, and if a serious conflict ever arose, could squeeze
them hard. Just their dominance in manufacturing a large percentage of the pharmaceuticals
consumed by US patients alone creates a serious vulnerability.
I really don't think it matters if manufacturing jobs are repatriated to the US, or just
set up and spread around elsewhere for now – since they'll be obsolete jobs in the near
future anyway, as robotics and AI get increasingly efficient at doing the work that human
workers currently do.
Situating the manufacturing in countries that are part of the Chinese sphere of influence
won't help much in a conflict. China would probably be able to sweep through much of
Southeast Asia quickly or interdict shipments if there was war.
So the status quo was preferable? The tone of the article seems to suggest that America should accept it place as a
third-world manufacturer, as if these Asian nations have some magical sauce that can't be
replicated. Gawd.
The US does have a lot of magic. Like one third of FDI related to tax evasion. Pulling Mac
Book manufacturing out of Austin for the lack of one 'screw', etc. So is the premise of going after China on trade and IP policies good. I would agree. Maybe
not in strategy, but at least someone has opened the box.
I agree with your comment, the article suggests the status quo was preferable. Of note, Trump has shown his supporters that something CAN be done other than follow the
"resistance is futile" path of the Bill Clinton/Bush Jr./Obama administrations.
I also suggest that the world wide presence/threat of the USA military and diplomatic
corps allows globalization to be less risky for USA businesses, so, in effect, the patriotic
"spreading of democracy" around the world via military actions is a factor in USA job
loss. This is yet another cost of the bloated military to the general USA population.
I worked in the electronics industry for 30+ years and watched high margin manufacturing
move to Asia. Now the lower level component manufacturers (PCBs, passives) are firmly established in
Asia as the USA companies have helped train worthy competitors overseas. It took 25+ years to move much of USA manufacturing overseas, indicating to me that it
will take a long time to bring it back significantly, well outside the Trump time frame.
But I suspect Trump voters will appreciate Trump's headline efforts. If the Democrats push for more Free Trade as good for the USA, it will hurt them at the
ballot box.
The second time as farce. How tragicomic that Trump has succeeded in little more than
repatriating the manufacture of Play-Doh. On the other hand, the shipping cost of unbaked brick seems a rational factor in Hasbro's
decision. A GND that shortens supply lines would be more effective in repatriating heavy
industry, but then printed circuit boards aren't all that heavy .
The thing is Trump, as usual, got his strings pulled by the Deep State when he went for
actual implementation of a campaign promise. The DS doesn't care about working Americans,
they are simply against China.
So he goes and puts tariffs on a country, not a product. And surprise, said product
doesn't come back on-shore. Comical (and yeah, cosmically a bit just) that Vietnam is getting
so much of that manufacturing. Wasn't what he was elected for.
In general, as Julius Krein, editor of American Affairs, writes: "United States industry
is losing ground to foreign competitors on price, quality and technology. In many areas, our
manufacturing capacity cannot compete with what exists in Asia."
As a engineer up to my elbows in manufacturing for forty years, this was awfully easy to
predict way back then (I gave up complaining about it about 2000), and then watch happen
– real time. And to once again state the obvious, China did not TAKE American jobs,
American CEOs GAVE them our jobs. We will not fix this problem until we identify and fix the
root cause.
Now the only way to fix it is (once again obviously) massive government investment such as
mandated by the GND. We need the GND, it is not only required to save the world, it will save
our country.
Agree, it was predictable, and it was predicted. What we've been talking about is the "Giant sucking sound" Ross Perot foretold would
happen prior to the passing of NAFTA. It wasn't hard back then to see that he was right, but it took a few decades for the
public to feel the impact, boiling frogs and all that.
Back in the early 80s I saw a massive warehouse full of machine tools, Bridgeport mills,
and such lined up, it seemed forever, the guy there said they were going to China. I asked my Dad about it, and he told me we were selling them to the Chinese for the price
of scrap. The whole thing is mindless and pathetic, but the really maddening thing is the slippery
way our 'leaders' can keep dodging the blame by simply pointing a finger in whatever
direction, and everybody's eyes move in unison.
NAFTA and China are two completely separate things. I have actually supported NAFTA in
principle because we should encourage trade to be focused on our immediate neighbors. A
wealthier and safer Mexico and Central America would create markets for us and virtually
eliminate illegal immigrants as the southern border.
China is on the other side of the world and is not part of NAFTA. While we should have
cordial relations with it, if we are looking for inexpensive labor, south of the border is
the better place to focus on that. So Trump's tariffs on China are not the wrong thing to do
per se. The problem is that they are being done in a vacuum of general trade policy where he
is looking at everything as transaction bilateral relations with every country on the planet,
which requires an immense amount of detailed thought and negotiation, neither of which appear
to be a focus of this administration.
The countries that the companies are talking about moving their operations to are
generally part of the new TPP which the US is not part of. So, we have removed ourselves from
having trade relations with countries US CEOs are setting up operations in, but those
countries are now starting to work together to counter both China (original TPP purpose) and
the US (now that the US has bailed on it). Sounds like a recipe for a replay of China's giant
sucking sound.
The argument/discussion is not about how and where to outsource our jobs, it's about how
stupid it was to do it in the first place. Anyone smart enough to breath knows that Mexico is next door, and China is on the other
side of the world, but they are both part of the same giant sucking sound. The fact that you support both NAFTA ,think it was unwise to back out of the TPP, and
think the issue is the present administration's lack of " detailed thought and negotiation
" indicate a truly unbelievable level of denial.
NAFTA and MFN for China were two different actions towards the same goal . . . the use of
Free Trade to dismantle thingmaking in America and re-mantle thingmaking in foreign
export-aggression platforms to use against America.
Free Trade is the new Slavery. Militant Belligerent Protectionism is the new
Abolition.
I remember when a Midwest Democrat (Stabenow?) tried to get a law passed that would
prohibit a US corporation from deducting, from their federal taxes, the cost of moving
factories overseas. A very minor disincentive, but a disincentive nonetheless. The Repubs beat it down as "anti-business". Concern about American workers is something to express in political speeches around
election time but not in legislation.
Hidden within this narrative is the fact that some countries, and not only China, have for
long been playing beggar-thy-neighbor policies by restraining internal consumption and
redirecting savings to the rest of the world that in turn finance their exporting machines.
IMO, the biggest mistake made by China has been not to force fast enough a transition from a
saving economy to a consumer economy with more balanced external relationships.
These kind of
policies are confrontational. As confrontational as tariffs or even as economic sanctions in
my view. Yet, the prevailing economic narrative is that saving and exporting is the right
economic thing to do. In this sense I think it matters a lot to which countries are being re
directed investments of american companies leaving China. My intuition is that, for instance,
Vietnam migth be willing to play this game while Mexico not. Investing in countries that save
too much migth be counterproductive.
I very much regret this aggressive narrative that has become common place in which
countries are identified simply as competitors, if not enemies, in a global chess game.
Political moves are confrontational and or humiliating. These Game of Thrones dynamics are
played precisely when some international consensus in more important things like figthing
climate change would be more than desirable. We are headed to truly bad times.
Here is
an article by Steve Dickinson from the layers office Harris Bricken McVay Sliwoski that
is based on his Co's China practice. Steve's conclusion goes as follows:
The Chinese system put in place from 1992 to 2005 was a unique system and not likely to
be replaced in S.E./South Asia or in any other region of the world. So for manufacturers,
moving to a new region means doing the analysis from the ground up. Simply taking what they
do in China and moving it to a new location is not likely to be a workable solution.
Also the Chinese internal market continues to attract MNC's and this attraction will
continue to grow far into the future. China's middle class is already larger than the total
population of the US and it continues to grow rapidly. While down presently the Chinese
internal consumption continues to grow at an annual rate of some 8.5%.
Personal savings deposited in bank accounts reach the equivalent of some $US 30 Trillion !
Compare that to consumer debt at some $US 6.5 Trillion. In other words China is growing into
the largest consumer market on earth and the biggest advantage that its internal market
procures is its 'economies of scale' that make Chinese productions hyper-competitive. In
other words China is gaining the kind of advantage that the US had along the 20th century.
The advantage of a super large market size that dwarfs other national markets.
Trump's approach to trade is isolating the US, blocking its Co's from the Chinese market,
and incentivizing the Chinese to offer better conditions to Co's of the rest of the world.
How can that help the US ?
The biggest problem of the West and particularly the US is its ideological approach to
economics. The Chinese adopted a pragmatic approach and it has served them well. Time to
relearn the meaning of political economics (économie politique).
I read Dickinson's PR piece linked by laodan. I used to work for a big law firm that had
an international practice group focusing on moving US businesses to China ( I was not
involved in that practice area, did environmental law and litigation.) The firm's PR
department tasked lawyers with certain expertise to generate these kinds of come-ons as part
of the compensation weighting scheme -- publish, and bring in business, or lose out in the
annual "whining for dollars" partnership division of spoils. Eat what you kill.
Dickinson is talking his book, of course. I have no idea if his read of the history and
the current state of affairs in China and the "Asian Tigers" (does anyone use that term any
more?) is accurate and complete, but what he describes is his firm's readiness to help
supranational (emphasize SUPRAnational) and post-national corporate entities get a leg up in
the race to the bottom. He'll help you find the places where the ruling class will give away
the biggest share of the "national birthright" so the corporate entity can maximize profit by
streamlining production and consumption, and of course growth. All the stuff that is killing
the planet. But his time frame, his personal time frame, presumably, as well as the framing
of the corporate shark entities which he is a remora to, cares nothing for the bigger
economic and ecological effects of more stuff, more shipping, more energy use, and of course
more combustion and consumption.
And I'd note that he carefully omits all the baksheesh and greasing of palms that i read
is such an important part of "doing business" at any kind of scale, to varying degrees
everywhere in the world. I wonder if his custom analyses of the relative merits of, say,
Vietnam vs. China vs. Cambodia vs. Taiwan includes sketching out the bribes that have to be
paid to close on the sale of national birthrights on the way to the bottom that the globalist
business model drives everything toward?
I'm sure he would be happy to have the ear and hourly billings of all the great decision
makers of all the various kinds of businesses, high to low tech, wanting to take full
advantage of the "opportunities" that may be on offer, on how to ride the asymptotically
downward curve of the race to the bottom, for fun and profit
Looks like China has had a pretty effective industrial policy, unlike the US where
corporate vampire capital dominion and corruption have bled the mopery white (not a racial
reference, of course ) Do economists and policy wonks in the US even dare to use the phrase
"industrial policy" any more? Or is it just presumed that "shareholder value" trumps all
else? Especially as the author puts it, again quoting Ferguson, where we are "in an era where
human advancement depends on greater integration between economic powers."
The relentless neoliberal race to the bottom, outsourcing, and austerity that marked the
death blow to American Labor is over. In that light it makes little difference whether our
corporations pull out of China, go to Vietnam, or come home. The exploitation of the poorest
is coming to an end. And none too soon.
For national security reasons at minimum, I hope some candidates discuss the imperative to
have the US start making it's own medications again.
Makes more sense to subsidize our production of medication than to give billions in subsidies
to very profitable oil companies.
I agree. I could not believe the government has allowed the entire supply chain of
building blocks of ALL our antibiotics to be sourced almost solely from China. To me THAT'S
the national security issue we need to deal with immediately. As well as other vital
drugs..
Anecdotally, I have started making this my number one political conversation issue –
replete with references ( because of course not a soul believes it at first).. I have yet to
find a single person Repub or Demo who isn't horrified and against it .
Any nation with this much power over our drug supply they could kill millions of us in short
order
Even getting manufacturing out of China will not bankrupt that country as intended. If USA
is intent on pursuing a nationalistic basis to sanctions, I think its bound to fail. Trade
always finds a way as we can well remember from our own commercial / industrial
development.
Chinese manufacturers have the wealth and experience to teach production line workers and
make things anywhere. Western companies manufacturing in China have belatedly looked for
facilities in neighboring countries and found the Chinese are already there. What's still
available is land far from roads and rivers with little power supply.
Another thing is preserving wealth. US Industrialists will keep their money offshore and
remit only as much as they need in the homeland. A major problem imo is a mental restraint in USA thinking. Life is all about competition
and winning. The actual activity, whatever it is, provides no joy unless you win. That
fearful tag "No-one remembers who came second" is banded about. Thats not a philosophy for
happiness. It forces the population into displacement activities few of which are wholesome.
Here endeth the lesson.
It's not a bug, it's a feature! Trump doesn't give a damn about getting manufacturing jobs back into the United States!
(Or at least his advisors don't).
The trick is to move them out of nationalistic China, which is setting itself up as a
competitor for power, and move the jobs into nice docile low-wage colonies, like Mexico and
Indonesia and Bangladesh.
The only catch: China has all the integrated supply lines and is stable. Moving your
manufacturing into a dozen different uncoordinated unstable third-world banana republics has
its own down side.
The UK repealed the Corn Laws to embark on free trade. This reduced the price of bread, and lowered the cost of living, so UK employers could pay
internationally competitive wages. Disposable income = wages – (taxes + the cost of living)
Employees get their money from wages and the employer pays through wages, so the employer
is paying for that bread through wages. Expensive bread leads to higher wages making UK employers unable to compete in a free
trade world. "The interest of the landlords is always opposed to the interest of every other class
in the community" Ricardo 1815 / Classical Economist
Disposable income = wages – (taxes + the cost of living) Employees get their money from wages and the employer pays via wages. Employees get less disposable income after the landlords rent has gone.
Employers have to cover the landlord's rents in wages reducing profit. Ricardo is just talking about housing costs, employees all rented in those days. The appalling conditions UK workers lived in during the 19th century were well
documented.
Low housing costs, lead to lower wages so UK employers were able to compete in a free
trade world. William White (BIS, OECD) talks about how economics really changed over one hundred years
ago as classical economics was replaced by neoclassical economics.
He thinks we have been on the wrong path for one hundred years. Free trade requires a low cost of living and what was known in the 19th century had
disappeared by the 20th. The West's high cost of living means high wages and an inability to
compete in a free trade world.
Never mind our companies can off-shore to where employers can pay lower wages for higher
profits. Look at the US cost of living Donald; this is why those jobs ain't coming back. It's hard to make a good profit in the US, when employers have to cover the US cost of
living in wages, reducing profit. The cost of living = housing costs + healthcare costs + student loan costs + other debt
repayments + food + other costs of living
A multi-polar world became a uni-polar world with the fall of the Berlin Wall and Francis
Fukuyama said it was the end of history.
It was all going so well, until the neoliberals got to work.
The US created an open, globalised world with the Washington Consensus.
China went from almost nothing to become a global super power.
That wasn't supposed to happen, let's get the rocket scientists onto it.
Maximising profit is all about reducing costs.
China had coal fired power stations to provide cheap energy.
China had lax regulations reducing environmental and health and safety costs.
China had a low cost of living so employers could pay low wages.
China had low taxes and a minimal welfare state.
China had all the advantages in an open globalised world.
It did have, but now China has become too expensive and developed Eastern economies are
off-shoring to places like Vietnam, Bangladesh and the Philippines.
An open, globalised world is a race to the bottom on costs.
"The Washington Consensus was always going to work better for China than the US"
the rocket scientists.
Several years ago Naked Capitalism ran an article about how a young George Ball was one of
the New Immoralists for International Corporate Globalonial Plantationism. And that was
before neoliberalism.
"[A]n era where human advancement depends on greater integration between economic
powers."
Oh, by all the gods, no. And what, pray, defines 'human advancement'? What the hell is Mr Auerback talking
about?
Further integration only propels the speed at which resources are extracted and the planet
dies incrementally more. The future will not be one fully integrated planet guided by
whatever-the-hell oligarchs and their 'meritocratic' servitors deign the best options. The
future will of necessity be vastly more local, vastly more hand-made, vastly less energy- and
resource-intensive, and there will be vastly less intercontinental and intra-continental
trade. World-spanning – even continent-spanning political-economic arrangements have no
long term viability whatsoever. Trying to maintain such is a foolish waste of effort and
resources that could be more usefully be directed at de-growth and de-industrialization.
And with that, The Lord Curmudgeon shook his cane one last time at the kids on his lawn
and returned to the troll's cave from which he came.
The last engine of global growth, China, has now reached the end of the line as they have
seen their Minsky Moment coming. China was the latest victim of neoclassical economics. The biggest danger to capitalism is neoclassical economics; it brought capitalism to its
knees in the 1930s and is having another go now.
1929 and 2008 look so similar because they are; it's the same economics and thinking. Richard Vague has analysed the data for 1929 and 2008 and they were even more similar than
they initially appear. Real estate lending was actually the biggest problem in 1929.
Margin lending was another factor in 2008.
The 1920s US mistake is now global.
Japan, the UK, the US, Euro-zone and now China. The last engine of global growth, China, has now reached the end of the line as they have
seen their Minsky Moment coming. The debt fuelled growth model not only runs out of steam, all the debt in the economy then
acts like a drag anchor holding the economy back. Japan has been like this for thirty years.
Richard Koo explains the processes at work in the Japanese economy since the 1990s, which
are at now at work throughout the global economy.
"... Furthermore, because of the horrific legacy of the one-child policy, China faces a rapidly aging population that will strain resources and reduce the number of working-age people . By 2050, it is estimated that the average Chinese will be 56 years of age. In contrast, the average American will be 44. No amount of spending or legal reform will prevent Beijing's coming demographic crisis. ..."
Part of the Trump administration's
latest round of 15 percent tariffs on Chinese imports went into effect Sunday, with the
rest to follow on December 15. These increases will impact the prices of many consumer goods
that Americans rely on, including clothing, appliances, televisions, smartwatches, textbooks,
diapers, coffee, and even whiskey. And given their timing, they'll likely have an effect on
holiday shopping. This makes all the more welcome President Trump's
recent statement during the G7 summit that China is looking to end the trade war and that
he too is open to making a deal.
Trump is right to negotiate with Chinese President Xi Jinping, as finding an off-ramp from
the trade war should be Washington's priority. America's interest is in out-competing Beijing,
not hurting our own economy in an attempt to damage theirs. The United States has a better hand
here, but we must play it to our advantage.
America's great strength is in our freedom, our market economy, and our democratic system.
The United States has attained a level of prosperity unseen in human history, and that economic
engine is what fuels our military power. Without a strong economy, we cannot have a strong
military. Thus an endless trade war endangers American security in the long term: as both sides
pile on retaliatory tariffs, the risk of recession increases. American consumers will feel each
new trade barrier as it hits their pocketbooks.
Washington must not pursue policies that hurt those it governs. And the suffering inflicted
by a trade war wouldn't just be limited to the pricing of consumer goods. It would also make us
weaker for no good reason. And it would lower tax revenues, requiring America to go further
into debt to maintain our present level of security.
Advertisement
Moreover, long-term trade attacks on China are unnecessary, because China already has more
problems than America. Beijing suffers from high national debt, a lack of clear economic
reform, and a rapidly aging population. It has few, if any, good or timely solutions to these
pressing issues.
According to the Institute of International Finance, China's total national, corporate, and
household debt is now
over 300 percent of its GDP. What makes this especially bad for Beijing is that the debt
was taken on very quickly after the 2008 global recession, without the power of a global
reserve currency to make borrowing easier, as the United States has. Moreover, this debt is
largely corporate and China's state-capitalist system makes it harder for Chinese companies
survive market pressures. Beijing has used cheap credit to fuel its exports and its economic
rise through fully and partially state-controlled national companies.
The Chinese economic system has undergone some reforms in recent years but
still remains too top-down and too focused on exports over consumption as compared to more
developed economies. In other words, China needs to transition to a full market economy like
Taiwan and South Korea did on their paths to prosperity, but it hasn't done so yet.
Furthermore, because of the horrific legacy of the one-child policy, China faces a
rapidly aging population that will strain resources and reduce the number of
working-age people . By 2050, it is estimated that the average Chinese will be 56 years of
age. In contrast, the average American will be 44. No amount of spending or legal reform will
prevent Beijing's coming demographic crisis.
This comparative weakness is why it makes sense to find a trade war off-ramp sooner rather
than later. China needs one badly and will eventually want a deal -- if it doesn't already. As
for the United States, recession may be inevitable, but it would be better if it were not
self-inflicted.
Already the trade war has cost American billions in higher prices for
imported products. American farmers have
been hit hard by China's retaliatory tariffs and, according to
a report by IHS Markit, U.S. manufacturing has shrunk for the first since 2009. Economists
polled by Reuters believe the trade war has increased the risk of a recession, with a
median of those surveyed giving a 45 percent chance of a downturn over the next two years.
Additionally, major
banks have
expressed concerns , as the stock market takes hits with every new tariff increase and
angry statement between Washington and Beijing.
I couldnt disagree more. I want more tariffs against China and Europe. I want closed borders
and zero migration. China has infiltrated our government, our defense agencies, our nuclear
agencies, our major research centers, our college campuses, our media and bribed our
politicians. China is an imminent threat to Hong Kong, Taiwan and its militarization of the
islands in the South China Sea are a threat to all of South Asia. China has been stealing US,
Canadian and European technology for decades to leapfrog the US into technological dominance
globally. China's plan is to force the US our of the Asia Pacific. China has infiltrated
Canada and Australia to a similar degree (if not more) than the US. If you pander to these
free trade globalists then you will be paving the way for a military conflict between Chinese
and American Hegemony in Asia and elsewhere around the world. I dont know about you but I
will take a tariff and trade war over a military war any day. Ramp up those tariffs and shift
those supply chains out of China toward more benevolent allies and the world be be all the
safer for it.
China has been waging a one sided trade war against us for over 30 years, it's about time we
resisted. Becoming more economically intertwined with our dangerous and genocidal rival
doesn't sound like the right answer to me, especially when China will continue protectionist
policies and currency manipulation regardless of what we do. America has allowed its
industrial base to hemorrhage since the 70s, and bending over for our enemy to keep cheap
trash flowing and American factories closed is not the right answer.
Is this a white box article the Chamber of Commerce is using to astroturf?
China is a Monstrous regime that is killing and enslaving its citizens. It will simply
kill everyone over 65, then 60 if it becomes convenient like they did with their one child
policy. Problem solved.
You wish to keep trading with criminals, polluters, and pirates so you can get cheap junk
at WalMart?
You have a job. I wish you would lose yours and that dozens of blue collar had working but
laid off Americans can find one. It isn't how much something costs in dollars (or how much of
your soul it costs), it is how much it costs in your virtuous labor. I'd rather pay double
for stuff but get triple wages rather than pay half but be all but permanently
unemployed.
Well said. Calling off the trade would be good for US consumers and the economy in general.
But while we are on the subject,calling off the war on immigration would also be good for US
consumers and the economy in general.
Wow. This article is off-base on any number of levels.
"These increases will impact the prices of many consumer goods that Americans rely
on,"
No, no they won't. Tariffs are paid for by the importer, not the consumer. If the importer
could randomly increase prices, they would do so without tariffs. The market sets prices.
"America's interest is in out-competing Beijing, not hurting our own economy in an attempt
to damage theirs."
If America could out-compete Beijing, American manufacturing would not have moved to
China. It turns out, the American people simply don't want to live according to 3rd world
standards. We want decent homes and stuff. We don't want to live in a cesspool of pollution.
I'm sure the Chinese people have the same preferences, they just don't get a choice.
"Moreover, long-term trade attacks on China are unnecessary, because China already has
more problems than America."
I agree with the author here, but not for the same reasons. Attacking China doesn't
resolve anything. American companies will just move to a different 3rd world country with
whom we can't complete. Why should I care if my clothes come from China or Vietnam?
I am 100% supportive of the trade war and building the wall and tariffs. I say zero
immigration and make all Chinese Tariffs permanent. Negotiate a trade deal with the tariffs
intact. Id rather have a trade war with China and permanent tariffs than a war with China.
China has been stealing technology and has infiltrated media, government, defense,
education, government officials (usually through bribes) from the US, Canada, Australia and
Europe. China is proving itself to be a threat to Hong Kong, Taiwan, Vietnam, Philippines,
Indonesia, India and South Asia.
Much of this "so called Russia Collusion" is actually a deflection of democratic
politicians China is bribing to take down Trump in order to continue their military and
technological theft, their existing preferential trade and their existing network. China is a
serious danger to the US and the rest of the world. It is preferential to sacrifice a small
amount of prosperity today for long term peace with China.
Propaganda. The aging of Chinese population? Not to worry, China has no real Social Security
system, and so relies on massive surpluses of savings. The 300% consumer debt ratio? That
would cripple any country with no help from trade. Should we let Wells Fargo and Goldman
refinance them?
Farmers hit hard? As I recall we have had the worst corn harvest in decades, and shame on
us for not growing more wheat, oats, and sugar cane. Our beef and poultry prices will be
affected, not to mention our fast food industry, which has been whipsawed by political
correctness. But China will effectively ration its pork, as it faces an even worse African
Swine Flu crisis, and an additional one on grains from the Black Army Worm.
US decline in manufacturing? Look first at our glut of automobiles, and the self vetting
of plant capacity by GM. Don't forget the crisis in car leases, which have made older cars
worth less than their outstanding loans. And note, that the fall in lithium prices indicates
that China's car electrification initiative is falling flat.
One thing left out of the equation is oil. And why should China live high on Iranian oil
(mostly wastefully burned in power plants, mind you, and not cars) while we suffer attacks on
Saudi oil from Iranian proxies (all on ChiRussia's dime)? Puts our trade negotiations in
clear perspective, doesn't it?
Stopping the war will not bring back China as our major trading partner. China is not going
to be in this vulnerable position with America again. She is going to develop other markets
Fearing 'Spy Trains,' Congress May Ban a Chinese Maker of Subway Cars
By Ana Swanson
CHICAGO -- America's next fight with China is unfolding at a glistening new factory in
Chicago, which stands empty except for the shells of two subway cars and space for future
business that is unlikely to come.
A Chinese state-owned company called CRRC Corporation, the world's largest train maker,
completed the $100 million facility this year in the hopes of winning contracts to build subway
cars and other passenger trains for American cities like Chicago and Washington.
But growing fears about China's economic ambitions and its potential to track and spy on
Americans are about to quash those plans. Congress is soon expected to approve legislation that
would effectively bar the company from competing for new contracts in the United States, citing
national security and economic concerns. The White House has expressed its support for the
effort.
Washington's attempt to block a Chinese company from selling train cars inside America is
the latest escalation in a trade war that has quickly expanded from a spat over tariffs and
intellectual property to a broader fight over economic and national security.
President Trump and lawmakers from both parties are increasingly anxious about the economic
and technological ambitions of China, which has built cutting-edge global industries, including
those that produce advanced surveillance technology. Those fears have prompted Washington to
take an expansive view of potential risks, moving beyond simply trying to curtail Chinese
imports.
In addition to slapping tariffs on $360 billion worth of Chinese products, the
administration has banned Chinese companies like Huawei, the telecom giant, from buying
sensitive American technology. It is moving to curb the ability of firms to export technology
like artificial intelligence and quantum computing from the United States to China. And
Congress has given the administration expansive power to block Chinese investment on national
security grounds.
Now lawmakers have added a provision to a military spending bill that would prevent the use
of federal grants to buy subway trains from state-owned or state-controlled companies, a
measure that would effectively block CRRC's business.
The bill has gained bipartisan support from lawmakers who say companies like CRRC pose a
threat to the United States. Part of the concern is economic: Flush with cash from its rapid
growth, China has pumped money into building globally competitive businesses, often creating
overcapacity in markets like steel, solar panels and trains.
That has lowered prices for consumers -- including American taxpayers who pay for subway
cars. While a subway car has not been manufactured solely by an American company in decades,
CRRC's low prices have raised concerns among American freight train companies that the company
could ultimately move into -- and demolish -- their business.
CRRC has consistently underbid its competitors, winning over urban transit agencies that
are saddled with aging infrastructure and tight budgets. For the Chicago L, CRRC's Chicago
subsidiary bid $1.55 million per car, compared with a bid of $1.82 million per car by
Bombardier, the Canadian manufacturer. And CRRC also proposed to build the Chicago facility and
create 170 new jobs.
Legislators argue that Chinese state-owned companies are not pursuing profit, but the policy
aims of the Chinese government to dominate key global industries like electric cars, robotics
and rail.
"When you can subsidize, when you can wholly own an enterprise like China does, you can
create a wholly unlevel playing field," said Senator Tammy Baldwin, a Wisconsin Democrat who is
a co-sponsor of the legislation. "We're used to that unlevel playing field existing between the
U.S. and China, but now it's happening in our own backyard."
Another more nefarious worry is also at play. Lawmakers -- along with CRRC's competitors --
say they are concerned that subway cars made by a Chinese company might make it easier for
Beijing to spy on Americans and could pose a sabotage threat to American infrastructure, though
CRRC says it surrenders control of all technology in the cars to its buyers. Nonetheless,
critics speculate that the Chinese firm could incorporate technology into the cars that would
allow CRRC -- and the Chinese government -- to track the faces, movement, conversations or
phone calls of passengers through the train's cameras or Wi-Fi.
Scott Paul, the president of the Alliance for American Manufacturing, which represents
manufacturers and the United Steelworkers, said the risks of giving a Chinese company the
ability to monitor or control American infrastructure could not be understated given recent
laws requiring Chinese companies to turn over data to Beijing upon request.
"I just think it would be irresponsible to assume the Chinese government to which this firm
must answer would be a reliable security partner, given its well documented track record," Mr.
Paul said.
Whether those fears are justified remains uncertain. Proponents of the bill have not made
clear how subway cars manufactured by a Chinese company would pose a greater espionage threat
than everything else that China makes and sells in the United States, including laptops, phones
and home appliances.
Dave Smolensky, a spokesman for CRRC, said the company was being unfairly targeted by
companies that wanted to legislate a competitor out of business under the guise of national
security. He said the firm was a victim to "an aggressive multimillion-dollar media
disinformation campaign," funded mostly by domestic freight train companies, intended to play
on popular fears about China's rise.
Employees at the Chicago factory also dismissed the concerns, saying they had not seen any
evidence that they were working to construct "spy trains."
"I haven't seen any secret wires yet," said Perry Nobles, an electrician for CRRC who was
rigging wires in the interior of the trains. "With the world full of cellphones and computers,
I'd think there's an easier way to get information."
Rising fears of China's ambitions in Washington have prompted officials to adopt an
unsparing view, with policymakers and national security officials warning domestic and foreign
governments not to trust Chinese equipment.
American officials have waged a global offensive against Huawei, telling other countries
that allowing a Chinese company to build the world's next generation of wireless networks would
be akin to handing national secrets to a foreign agent.
Like CRRC, the fear surrounding Huawei is largely based on concerns about technological
dominance by China's authoritarian government. No one has yet disclosed finding a backdoor in
Huawei's products that would allow it to snoop -- but officials say by the time one is
discovered, it may be too late.
"The Chinese are working to put their systems in networks all across the world so they can
steal your information and my information," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said in an interview
in May. "This administration is prepared to take this on."
As Senator John Cornyn, Republican of Texas, introduced the provision in March, he said,
"China poses a clear and present danger to our national security and has already infiltrated
our rail and bus manufacturing industries."
Representative Kevin McCarthy, a Republican whose California district is home to a Chinese
bus maker, BYD, had opposed a version of the provision that would apply to buses as well as
trains. House lawmakers dropped the bus provision, but the Senate bill would apply to both.
Congress will take the issue up again in the coming weeks as part of the annual defense
bill.
The legislation would not affect the thousands of American subway cars that CRRC previously
won contracts to build, including an 846-car order for the Chicago L. But it would block the
company from future contracts, such as those under consideration by the Chicago Metra and the
Washington Metro.
The Chicago facility is the company's second in the United States. A factory in
Massachusetts that employs more than 150 people is already building trains for Boston, Los
Angeles and Philadelphia, prompting concerns that the company plans to expand rapidly in the
United States as it has in other foreign markets.
Like many Chinese state enterprises, CRRC is guided by Beijing's Made in China 2025 plan,
which lays out an agenda to dominate key industries.
In its 2018 annual report, Liu Hualong, the company's chairman and party secretary, pledged
to pursue the dual goals of "Party construction as well as developing into a world-leading
company with global competitiveness."
"We conscientiously followed the important instructions of General Secretary Xi Jinping,"
the report said, referring to the Chinese president and Communist Party leader.
The last American firm to make passenger rail cars, the Pullman Company, produced its final
car in 1981. Since then, major American cities have bought subway cars from Bombardier and
Japanese manufacturers like Kawasaki, Hyundai and Hitachi.
But American manufacturers of freight rail cars, including the Greenbrier Companies and
TrinityRail, which is based in Mr. Cornyn's home state of Texas, say CRRC could use its footing
in the United States to steal its business. Together with unions and others, they have mounted
a lobbying campaign against CRRC under an umbrella group known as the Rail Security
Alliance.
The group says American taxpayer dollars should not be spent in China, where the empty rail
cars are made before being shipped to the United States for further work at the company's
facilities in Illinois or Massachusetts.
"We think those dollars should stay here," said Erik Olson, the vice president of the Rail
Security Alliance.
CRRC sends over experts from its giant headquarters in Qingdao, China, to plants in other
countries. In Chicago, the American employees call these Chinese citizens "shifu," a polite
term for a skilled worker meaning "master" or "teacher."
On a sunny day in July, the company break room was split between shifus, wearing white
jumpsuits and eating stuffed buns, and American workers, many of whom had joined the company in
the last few months. The gleaming concrete factory floor was bare, save for a few dozen people
installing wiring, air ducts and other components into the empty shells of two rail cars.
"We are a little concerned because it's our livelihood," said Mr. Nobles, who was hired in
March from a previous factory job making frames for the Ford Explorer.
This summer, CRRC replaced the Chinese flag outside the factory with a Chicago flag. It has
also retained two Washington lobbying firms, Squire Patton Boggs and Crossroads Strategies, to
plead its case in Congress.
It may be too late. Senator Sherrod Brown, Democrat of Ohio, said he helped sponsor the bill
to prevent the American transit system from being "controlled by a foreign country that is not
particularly friendly to us."
"They spell out in black and white they're going to use foreign investment as a weapon, and
we're taking action to defend ourselves," Mr. Brown said.
According to the great military thinker, Maj. Gen. J.F.C. Fuller, 'the object of war is not
victory. It is to achieve political goals.'
Too bad President Donald Trump does not read books. He has started economic wars against
China, Russia, Iran, Cuba and Venezuela without any clear strategic objective beyond inflating
his ego as the world's premier warlord and punishing them for disobedience.
Trump's wars are economic. They deploy the huge economic and financial might of the United
States to steamroll other nations that fail to comply with orders from Washington. Washington's
motto is 'obey me or else!' Economic wars are not bloodless. Imperial Germany and the Central
Powers were starved into surrender in 1918 by a crushing British naval blockade.
Trade sanctions are not making America great, as Trump claims. They are making America
detested around the globe as a crude bully. Trump's efforts to undermine the European Union and
intimidate Canada add to this ugly, brutal image.
Worse, Trump's tariff war against China has damaged the economy of both nations, the world's
leading economic powers, and raised tensions in Asia. The world is facing recession in large
part due to Trump's ill-advised wars. All to prove Trump's power and glory.
Trump and his advisors are right about China's often questionable trade practices. I did 15
years of business in China and saw a kaleidoscope of chicanery, double-dealing, and corruption.
A favorite Chinese trick was to leave imports baking in the sun on the docks, or long delaying
them by 'losing' paperwork.
I saw every kind of craziness in the Wild East Chinese market. But remember that it's a
'new' market in which western-style capitalism is only one generation old. Besides, China
learned many of its fishy trade practices from France, that mother of mercantilism.
China indeed steals technical and military information on a mass scale. But so does the US,
whose spy agencies suck up information across the world. America's claims to be a victim are
pretty rich.
What Trump & Co don't understand is that China was allowed into America's Greater Asia
Co-Prosperity Sphere by the clever President Nixon to bring it under US influence – just
as Japan and South Korea were in the 1950's. China's trade surplus with the US is its dividend
for playing by Washington's rules. If China's trade bonus is stripped away, so will China's
half-hearted acceptance of US policies. Military tensions will rise sharply.
In China's view, the US is repeating what Great Britain did in the 19th century by declaring
war to force opium grown in British-ruled Burma onto China's increasingly addicted people.
Today the trade crop is soya beans and wretched pigs.
Trump's ultimate objective, as China clearly knows, is to whip up a world crisis over trade,
then dramatically end it – of course, before next year's elections. Trump has become a
master dictator of US financial markets, rising or lowering them by surprise tweets. No
president should ever have such power, but Trump has seized it.
There is no telling how much money his minions have made in short or long selling on the
stock market thanks to insider information. America's trillion dollar markets have come to
depend on how Trump feels when he wakes up in the morning and watches Fox news, the Mother of
Misinformation.
It staggers the imagination to believe that Trump and his minions actually believe that they
can intimidate China into bending the knee. China withstood mass devastation and at least 14
million deaths in World War II in order to fight off Japanese domination. Does the White House
really think Beijing will cave in over soya beans and semi-conductors in a daft war directed by
a former beauty contest and casino operator? China's new emperor, Xi Jinping, is highly
unlikely to lose face in a trade war with the US. Dictators cannot afford to retreat. Xi can
wait it out until more balanced minds again occupy the White House.
Trade wars rarely produce any benefits for either side. They are the equivalent of sending
tens of thousands of soldiers to be mowed down by machine guns on the blood-soaked Somme
battlefield in WWI. Glory for the stupid generals; death and misery for the common soldiers
This fool's war of big egos will inevitably end in a face-saving compromise between
Washington and Beijing. Get on with it.
"... The old adage that the 'sea is always the sea' holds true for US foreign policy. And Iran repeating the same old routines, whilst expecting different outcomes is, of course, one definition of madness. A new US Administration will inherit the same genes as the last. ..."
"... And in any case, the US is institutionally incapable of making a substantive deal with Iran. A US President – any President – cannot lift Congressional sanctions on Iran. The American multitudinous sanctions on Iran have become a decades' long knot of interpenetrating legislation: a vast rhizome of tangled, root-legislation that not even Alexander the Great might disentangle: that is why the JCPOA was constructed around a core of US Presidential 'waivers' needing to be renewed each six months. Whatever might be agreed in the future, the sanctions – 'waived' or not – are, as it were, 'forever'. ..."
"... "[So] decoupling is already in motion. Like the shift of tectonic plates, the move towards a new tech alignment with China increases the potential for sudden, destabilizing convulsions in the global economy and supply chains. To defend America's technology leadership, policymakers must upgrade their toolkit to ensure that US technology leadership can withstand the aftershocks. ..."
"... "The key driver of this shift has not been the President's tariffs, but a changing consensus among rank-and-file policymakers about what constitutes national security. This expansive new conception of national security is sensitive to a broad array of potential threats, including to the economic livelihood of the United States, the integrity of its citizens personal data, and the country's technological advantage". ..."
"... A Quinnipiac University survey last week found for the first time in Trump's presidency, more voters now say the economy is getting worse rather than better, by a 37-31 percent margin – and by 41-37 percent, voters say the president's policies are hurting the economy. ..."
"... This is hugely significant. If Trump is experiencing a crisis of public confidence in respect to his assertive policies towards China, the last thing that he needs in the run-up to an election is an oil crisis, on top of a tariff/tech war crisis with China. A wrong move with Iran, and global oil supplies easily can go awry. Markets would not be happy. (So Trump's China 'bind' can also be Iran's opportunity ). ..."
There is consensus amongst the Washington foreign policy élite that all factions in
Iran understand that – ultimately – a deal with Washington on the nuclear issue
must ensue. It somehow is inevitable. They view Iran simply as 'playing out the clock', until
the advent of a new Administration makes a 'deal' possible again. And then Iran surely will be
back at the table, they affirm.
Maybe. But maybe that is entirely wrong. Maybe the Iranian leadership no longer believes in
'deals' with Washington. Maybe they simply have had enough of western regime change antics
(from the 1953 coup to the Iraq war waged on Iran at the western behest, to the present attempt
at Iran's economic strangulation). They are
quitting that failed paradigm for something new, something different.
The pages to that chapter have been shut. This does not imply some rabid anti-Americanism,
but simply the experience that that path is pointless. If there is a 'clock being played out',
it is that of the tic-toc of western political and economic hegemony in the Middle East is
running down, and not the 'clock' of US domestic politics. The old adage that the 'sea is
always the sea' holds true for US foreign policy. And Iran repeating the same old routines,
whilst expecting different outcomes is, of course, one definition of madness. A new US
Administration will inherit the same genes as the last.
And in any case, the US is institutionally incapable of making a substantive deal with
Iran. A US President – any President – cannot lift Congressional sanctions on Iran.
The American multitudinous sanctions on Iran have become a decades' long knot of
interpenetrating legislation: a vast rhizome of tangled, root-legislation that not even
Alexander the Great might disentangle: that is why the JCPOA was constructed around a core of
US Presidential 'waivers' needing to be renewed each six months. Whatever might be agreed in
the future, the sanctions – 'waived' or not – are, as it were, 'forever'.
If recent history has taught the Iranians anything, it is that such flimsy 'process' in the
hands of a mercurial US President can simply be blown away like old dead leaves. Yes, the US
has a systemic problem: US sanctions are a one-way valve: so easy to flow out, but once poured
forth, there is no return inlet (beyond uncertain waivers issued at the pleasure of an
incumbent President).
But more than just a long chapter reaching its inevitable end, Iran is seeing another path
opening out. Trump is in a 'China bind': a trade deal with China now looks "tough to
improbable", according to White House officials, in the context of the fast deteriorating
environment of security tensions between Washington and Beijing. Defense One spells it out:
"It came without a breaking news alert or presidential tweet, but the technological
competition with China entered a new phase last month. Several developments quietly heralded
this shift: Cross-border investments between the United States and China plunged to their
lowest levels since 2014, with the tech sector suffering the most precipitous drop. US chip
giants Intel and AMD abruptly ended
or declined to extend important partnerships with Chinese entities. The Department of Commerce
halved the number of
licenses that let US companies assign Chinese nationals to sensitive technology and engineering
projects.
"[So] decoupling is already in motion. Like the shift of tectonic plates, the move
towards a new tech alignment with China increases the potential for sudden, destabilizing
convulsions in the global economy and supply chains. To defend America's technology leadership,
policymakers must upgrade their toolkit to ensure that US technology leadership can withstand
the aftershocks.
"The key driver of this shift has not been the President's tariffs, but a changing
consensus among rank-and-file policymakers about what constitutes national security. This
expansive new conception of national security is sensitive to a broad array of potential
threats, including to the economic livelihood of the United States, the integrity of its
citizens personal data, and the country's technological advantage".
Trump's China 'bind' is this: A trade deal with China has long been viewed by the White
House as a major tool for 'goosing' the US stock market upwards, during the crucial
pre-election period. But as that is now said to be "tough to improbable" – and as US
national security consensus metamorphoses, the consequent de-coupling, combined with tariffs,
is beginning to bite. The effects are eating away at President Trump's prime political asset:
the public confidence in his handling of the economy: A Quinnipiac University
survey last week
found for the first time in Trump's presidency, more voters now say the economy is getting
worse rather than better, by a 37-31 percent margin – and by 41-37 percent, voters say
the president's policies are hurting the economy.
This is hugely significant. If Trump is experiencing a crisis of public confidence in
respect to his assertive policies towards China, the last thing that he needs in the run-up to
an election is an oil crisis, on top of a tariff/tech war crisis with China. A wrong move with
Iran, and global oil supplies easily can go awry. Markets would not be happy. (So Trump's China
'bind' can also be Iran's opportunity ).
No wonder Pompeo acted with such alacrity to put a tourniquet on the brewing 'war' in the
Middle East, sparked by Israel's simultaneous air attacks last month in Iraq, inside Beirut,
and in Syria (killing two Hizbullah soldiers). It is pretty clear that Washington did not want
this 'war', at least not now. America, as Defense One
noted , is becoming acutely sensitive to any risks to the global financial system from
"sudden, destabilizing convulsions in the global economy".
The recent Israeli military operations coincided with Iranian FM Zarif's sudden summons to
Biarritz (during the G7), exacerbating fears
within the Israeli Security Cabinet that Trump might meet with President Rouhani in NY at
the UN General Assembly – thus threatening Netanyahu's anti-Iran,
political 'identity' . The fear was that Trump could begin a 'bromance' with the Iranian
President (on the Kim Jong Un lines). And hence the Israeli provocations intended to stir some
Iranian (over)-reaction (which never came). Subsequently it became clear to Israel that Iran's
leadership had absolutely no intention to meet with Trump – and the whole episode
subsided.
Trump's Iran 'bind' therefore is somehow similar to his China 'bind': With China, he
initially wanted an easy trade achievement, but it has proved to be 'anything but'. With Iran,
Trump wanted a razzmatazz meeting with Rohani – even if that did not lead to a new 'deal'
(much as the Trump – Kim Jung Un TV spectaculars that caught the American imagination so
vividly, he may have hoped for a similar response to a Rohani handshake, or he may have even
aspired to an Oval Office spectacular).
Trump simply cannot understand why the Iranians won't do this, and he is peeved by the snub.
Iran is unfathomable to Team Trump.
Well, maybe the Iranians just don't want to do it. Firstly, they don't need to: the Iranian
Rial has been recovering steadily over the last four months and manufacturing output has
steadied. China's General Administration of Customs (GAC) detailing the country's oil imports
data shows that China has not cut its Iranian supply after the US waiver program ended on 2
May, but rather, it has
steadily increased Iranian crude imports since the official end of the waiver extension, up
from May and June levels. The new GAC data shows China imported over 900,000 barrels per day
(bpd) of crude oil from Iran in July, which is up 4.7% from the month before.
And a new path is opening in front of Iran. After Biarritz, Zarif flew directly to Beijing
where he discussed a huge, multi-hundred
billion (according to
one report ), twenty-five-year oil and gas investment, (and a separate) 'Road and Belt'
transport plan. Though the details are not disclosed, it is plain that China – unlike
America – sees Iran as a key future strategic partner, and China seems perfectly able to
fathom out the Iranians, too.
But here is the really substantive US shift taking place. It is that which is termed
"a new normal" now
taking a hold in Washington:
"To defend America's technology leadership, policymakers [are] upgrading their toolkit to
ensure that US technology leadership can withstand the aftershocks Unlike the President's trade
war, support for this new, expansive definition of national security and technology is largely
bipartisan, and likely here to stay.
with many of the president's top advisers viewing China first and foremost as a national
security threat, rather than as an economic partner – it's poised to affect huge parts of
American life, from the cost of many consumer goods to the nature of this country's
relationship with the government of Taiwan.
"Trump himself still views China primarily through an economic prism. But the angrier he
gets with Beijing, the more receptive he is to his advisers' hawkish stances toward China that
go well beyond trade."
"The angrier he gets with Beijing" Well, here is the key point: Washington seems to have
lost the ability to summon the resources to try to fathom either China, or the Iranian 'closed
book', let alone a 'Byzantine' Russia. It is a colossal attenuation of consciousness in
Washington; a loss of conscious 'vitality' to the grip of some 'irrefutable logic' that allows
no empathy, no outreach, to 'otherness'. Washington (and some European élites) have
retreated into their 'niche' consciousness, their mental enclave, gated and protected, from
having to understand – or engage – with wider human experience.
To compensate for these lacunae, Washington looks rather, to an engineering and
technological solution: If we cannot summon empathy, or understand Xi or the Iranian Supreme
Leader, we can muster artificial intelligence to substitute – a 'toolkit' in which the US
intends to be global leader.
This type of solution – from the US perspective – maybe works for China, but not
so much for Iran; and Trump is not keen on a full war with Iran in the lead up to elections. Is
this why Trump seems to be losing interest in the Middle East? He doesn't understand it; he
hasn't the interest or the means to fathom it; and he doesn't want to bomb it. And the China
'bind' is going to be all absorbing for him, for the meantime.
Your tariffs are 10-25 percent, that means the great workers in the U.S. are paying the
bill.
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
"China is eating the Tariffs." Billions pouring into USA. Targeted Patriot Farmers getting
massive Dollars from the incoming Tariffs! Good Jobs Numbers, No Inflation (Fed). China having
worst year in decades. Talks happening, good for all!
When President Donald Trump wants to convey that something is a big deal, he often reaches
for the same big number: 10,000.
He says it's the number of points the Dow Jones Industrial Average would be up had the
Federal Reserve not raised interest rates. It's the number of people attending his rallies --
or the number forced to wait outside because they couldn't get in.
It's also the number of jobs a company plans to create, the headcount of captured Islamic
State fighters, the number of migrants in a caravan headed to the U.S., and the Allied casualty
count on D-Day.
Sometimes the number is accurate. Other times, it's a wild guess -- or wildly wrong.
Trump on Wednesday predicted the Dow would be up -- another 10,000 points -- if he hadn't
embarked on a trade war with China.
"If I wanted to do nothing with China, my stock market -- our stock market -- would be
10,000 points higher than it is right now," Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.
That would be a dramatic rise. With the Dow closing at 26,728 on Thursday, another 10,000
points would represent a 37% increase.
Memorable Number
From a marketing standpoint, there's a great reason to use 10,000: It's memorable.
"He uses this round number in particular because it seems big," said Jonah Berger, marketing
professor at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, which Trump often boasts of
attending.
"He wants to convey something is a big problem, or something would be quite different, so he
uses a big round number to try and sway his audience," said Berger, author of "Contagious: Why
Things Catch On."
Trump has used the number since his 2016 campaign -- in speeches, remarks to reporters and
one-on-one interviews -- but it could take on new significance as he seeks to burnish his
record with the approach of the 2020 election.
The president has repeatedly sought to use 10,000 to his political advantage, even when it
doesn't neatly match reality.
'Horrible People'
For instance, he said in January that Immigration and Customs Enforcement officers last year
removed 10,000 known or suspected gang members whom he described as "horrible people." (The
agency actually reported arresting that number but removing 5,872 known or suspected gang
members in fiscal year 2018.)
The White House declined to comment on Trump's use of 10,000.
The president has other verbal habits. He has often cited self-imposed two week deadlines
for major announcements.
While Trump is often faulted by fact-checkers for making false statements, his spokeswoman
has said journalists take the president's words too literally.
"I think the president communicates in a way that some people, especially the media, aren't
necessarily comfortable with," White House press secretary Stephanie Grisham told the
Washington Post in a recent interview. "A lot of times they take him so literally. I know
people will roll their eyes if I say he was just kidding or was speaking in hypotheticals, but
sometimes he is."
'Truthful Hyperbole'
Trump defended his use of what he called "truthful hyperbole" in his 1987 book "The Art of
the Deal," calling it an "innocent form of exaggeration."
"People may not always think big themselves, but they can still get very excited by those
who do," Trump wrote. "People want to believe that something is the biggest and the greatest
and the most spectacular."
Wittingly or not, Trump has taken to a number that comes up often in history, religion and
culture.
The army of the Ten Thousand marched against Artaxerxes II of Persia. During the conquest of
Mecca, Muhammad was said to have 10,000 soldiers. The King James Bible has dozens of references
to 10,000. Minnesota's nickname is the Land of 10,000 Lakes. A television game show called "The
$10,000 Pyramid" debuted in the U.S. in the early 1970s.
But Trump's references typically are rooted in current affairs.
The president used the number in July to talk about attendance at a North Carolina rally
where his supporters chanted "Send her back!" after he invoked the name of Representative Ilhan
Omar, a Minnesota Democrat.
"We had thousands and thousands of people that wanted to come, and we said, 'Please don't
come,'" Trump said. "It held 10,000 people. It was packed. We could've sold that arena 10
times."
Authorities said 8,000 people got into the arena in Greenville, filling it to capacity,
according to WITN-TV in North Carolina. About 2,000 were denied entry and between 750 and 1,000
were in an overflow area, the station said, citing police estimates.
Booing Ryan
In July, Trump used the number to attack former House Speaker Paul Ryan after the Wisconsin
Republican was quoted in a book saying the president doesn't know how government works.
"I remember a day in Wisconsin -- a state that I won -- where I stood up and made a speech,
and then I introduced him and they booed him off the stage -- 10,000 people," Trump told
reporters at the White House.
The president appeared to be referring to a December 2016 post-election rally in West Allis,
Wisconsin, where he publicly thanked Ryan, who was in the crowd. Audible, but not deafening,
boos were heard as Trump tried to quiet his supporters by telling them that Ryan had improved
"like a fine wine."
Then there's job creation -- a Cameron LNG liquefied natural gas export facility in
Louisiana or an Intel Corp. semiconductor plant in Arizona.
In separate statements, Trump said they'd each create 10,000 jobs.
Bringing Credibility
Whether Trump's use of the number is accurate or not, the specificity can bring credibility
to the president's claims, said Manoj Thomas, a behavioral scientist and marketing professor at
Cornell University's SC Johnson College of Business.
"Using a number to quantify a claim -- even implausible numbers -- makes it more credible
because numbers are concrete," Thomas said. "Claims without any numbers, for example, 'The Dow
would be much higher if not for the trade war,' are more difficult for the human mind to
instinctively process because the information is abstract and lacks specificity."
Trump could add even more credibility to his claim by making the number even more specific,
Thomas said.
For instance, Thomas suggested: "The Dow would be 4,600 points higher if not for the trade
war."
Markets Soar on News of China Talks, but Hopes
for Progress Are Low https://nyti.ms/2LrdVwH
NYT - Ana Swanson and Matt Phillips - September 5
WASHINGTON -- President Trump's decision to renew talks with China in the coming weeks
sent financial markets soaring on Thursday, as investors seized on the development as a sign
that both sides could still find a way out of an economically damaging trade war.
The rally sent the S&P 500 up more than 1 percent, underscoring just how much
financial markets are subsisting on hopes and fears about the trade war. Shares fell through
most of August, as Mr. Trump escalated his fight with China and imposed more tariffs, only to
snap back on Thursday after news of the talks.
But expectations for progress remain low, and many in the United States and China see the
best outcome as a continued stalemate that would prevent a collapse in relations before the
2020 election. Both Mr. Trump and President Xi Jinping of China are under pressure from
domestic audiences to stand tough, and the talks will happen after Mr. Trump's next round of
punishing tariffs take effect on Oct. 1.
"Continuing to talk soothes markets a little bit," said Eswar Prasad, the former head of
the China division at the International Monetary Fund. "But the political cost to making
major concessions is, I think, too high for either side."
The skepticism stems in part from what is emerging as a familiar pattern for Mr. Trump,
for whom China is both a source of leverage and a potential vulnerability heading into an
election year. The president has so far imposed tariffs on more than $350 billion worth of
Chinese goods and routinely shifts from blasting China and threatening additional punishment
to trying to calm the waters in the face of jittery markets and negative economic news.
Over two weeks, Mr. Trump has called Mr. Xi an enemy of America, ordered companies to stop
doing business in China and suggested the United States was in no rush to reach a trade deal.
On Sunday, he moved ahead with his threat to eventually tax every golf club, shoe and
computer China sends into the United States, placing tariffs on another $112 billion of
Chinese goods.
Stock investors have zeroed in on the threat the trade war poses to the economy, buying
and selling in tandem with Mr. Trump's trade whims. Thursday's rally was the fifth positive
performance for the market in the past six sessions. It brought the S&P 500 to within
striking distance -- less than 2 percent -- of its high of 3025.86, reached on July 26.
The coming weeks could result in more of the same, analysts say: tough words when the
president wants to rally his base and a temporary cooling off when it seems to be hurting an
economy that is one of his main arguments for re-election.
Mr. Trump and his advisers are wary of a potential challenge from Democrats who will try
to paint the president as weak on China. Officials are cognizant that striking a deal based
on the kind of limited concessions China is currently offering would most likely be a
political liability in the president's bid for re-election. Democrats, along with some
Republicans, have previously accused Mr. Trump of buckling on China after he reached a deal
that allowed ZTE, the Chinese telecom company, to avoid tough American punishment.
Yet as collateral damage from the trade war increases, Mr. Trump is facing pressure to
relent. The bond market has been flashing warning signs of a potential recession, and both
consumer confidence and the manufacturing sector have slowed.
The trade war is also clearly weighing on the Chinese economy, which is growing at its
slowest pace in more than two decades. But China has responded defiantly, imposing
retaliatory tariffs on $75 billion worth of American goods. The country is preparing to
celebrate the 70th anniversary of its founding on Oct. 1, and analysts say Beijing would be
unlikely to make concessions at such a politically delicate moment.
People familiar with Chinese economic policymaking have said in recent weeks that Chinese
leaders remain interested in reaching a trade deal with the United States, but that they are
wary of what appear to be ever-increasing demands from the United States and what they
describe as frequent shifts in the American negotiating position.
The Chinese government continues to insist that it will not accept any agreement that is
unequal, or that prevents it from pursuing economic policies that it needs for continued
growth.
While both countries have motivation to come to an agreement, each is still insisting the
other will be the first to bend.
"China and the US announced new round of trade talks and will work to make substantial
progress," Hu Xijin, the editor of the state-run Global Times, wrote on Twitter. "Personally
I think the US, worn out by the trade war, may no longer hope for crushing China's will.
There's more possibility of a breakthrough between the two sides." ...
"... Can China then depend on widening internal demand to maintain its global edge? There are two reasons why not. The present authorities worry that a widening middle stratum could jeopardize their political control and seek to limit it.[a] ..."
"... The second reason, more important, is that much of the internal demand is the result of reckless borrowing by regional banks, which are facing an inability to sustain their investments. If they collapse, even partially, this could end the entire economic edge[b] of China. ..."
A structural crisis is chaotic. This means that instead of the normal standard set of
combinations or alliances that were previously used to maintain the stability of the system,
they constantly shift these alliances in search of short-term gains. This only makes the
situation worse. We notice here a paradox – the certainty of the end of the existing
system and the intrinsic uncertainty of what will eventually replace it and create thereby a
new system (or new systems) to stabilize realities .
Now, let us look at China's role in what is going on. In terms of the present system,
China seems to be gaining much advantage. To argue that this means the continuing functioning
of capitalism as a system is basically to (re)assert the invalid point that systems are
eternal and that China is replacing the United States in the same way as the United States
replaced Great Britain as the hegemonic power. Were this true, in another 20-30 years China
(or perhaps northeast Asia) would be able to set its rules for the capitalist
world-system.
But is this really happening? First of all, China's economic edge, while still greater
than that of the North, has been declining significantly. And this decline may well amplify
soon, as political resistance to China's attempts to control neighboring countries and entice
(that is, buy) the support of faraway countries grows, which seems to be occurring.
Can China then depend on widening internal demand to maintain its global edge? There are
two reasons why not. The present authorities worry that a widening middle stratum could
jeopardize their political control and seek to limit it.[a]
The second reason, more important, is that much of the internal demand is the result of
reckless borrowing by regional banks, which are facing an inability to sustain their
investments. If they collapse, even partially, this could end the entire economic edge[b] of
China.
In addition, there have been, and will continue to be, wild swings in geopolitical
alliances. In a sense, the key zones are not in the North, but in areas such as Russia,
India, Iran, Turkey, and southeastern Europe, all of them pursuing their own roles by a game
of swiftly and repeatedly changing sides. The bottom line is that, though China plays a
very big role in the short run, it is not as big a role as China would wish and that some in
the rest of the world-system fear. It is not possible for China to stop the disintegration of
the capitalist system. It can only try to secure its place in a future
world-system.
As far as Wallerstein's bottom line: The proof is in the pudding. That said, there seems to
be a tendency to regard Xi as all-powerful. IMNSHO, that's by no means the case, not only
because of China's middle class, but because of whatever China's equivalent of deplorables is.
The "wild swings in geopolitical alliances" might play a role, too; oil, Africa's minerals.
NOTES [a] I haven't seen this point made elsewhere. [b] Crisis, certainly. "Ending the
entire economic edge"? I'm not so sure.
"... That assumption looks to be incorrect. New Deal Democrat sent us the latest post from China Law Blog, written by lawyers who specialize in Chinese law with an eye to helping businesses get set up and operate in China. The post by Dan Harris is every bit as firm as its headline: Repeat After Me: There Will be No US-China Trade Deal . It also contains a good summary of key developments and detail on the various goods targeted. Key sections: ..."
"... But what should you make of President Trump's ordering US companies to immediately start looking for an alternative to China? He can't really do that, can he? No, but in many respects this is exactly what Trump has been doing since the U.S.-China trade war began. Trump cannot literally require American companies to pull out of China, but he can and has made it so difficult that they all but have to leave China. And this is what most of the international lawyers and international trade lawyers at my firm have come to believe has been Trump's plan all along. ..."
"... Every step of the way, Trump has made it all but impossible for China to make a trade deal with the United States, which is why this blog has been consistently clear that there will be no trade deal between the United States and China . If the US-China trade war/cold war were really about trade imbalances, it would have ended long ago with China buying more soybeans and Boeing airplanes from the United States. But from the very beginning, the U.S. has demanded China stop stealing IP and open its markets for foreign companies, and there is just no way China will agree to either of these things. Lead negotiator Robert Lighthizer is without a doubt smart enough to have known this all along. All this leads us to believe that the U.S. plan has always been to force a slow decoupling of the U.S. and China and then work to convince the rest of the democratic world (the EU, Australia, Canada, Latin America, Japan, etc.) to decouple from China, as well. In June, in Does China WANT a Second Decoupling? The Chinese Texts Say That it Does we wrote of how China wants this decoupling, as well. ..."
"... The fact that Trump issues this "order" amidst rising recession fears only highlights how ending U.S.-China trade is at the top of his to-do list. ..."
"... The critical part of the China Law Blog's reading is that the Trump Administration is deadly serious about its two big asks, intellectual property and market access. It's credible to attribute that to Trump's US Trade Representative, Lighthizer. As Lambert put it, Lighthizer is the closest thing this Administration has to a Jim Baker. Lighthizer started at Covington & Burling, then served in the Regan Administration as Deputy USTR before going to Skadden. Lighthizer is as fierce a China hawk as they come and has a long history of saying that the entry of China into the WTO was at the expense of US jobs (see here , for instance) and even making a full-throated defense of protectionism . ..."
"... In April, China made a concession to the US by designating all fetanyl products as controlled substances, in the hope that that would reduce shipments to the US. The DEA has stated that China is the main source of US fentanyl . Fentanyl accounted 18,000 overdose deaths in 2018, one fourth of the total. If you count all synthetic opioids, the toll rises to 28,000. China nevertheless claimed even then that fentanyl shipments to the US were "extremely limited" . ..."
"... Fentanyl featured in the escalation on Friday, and it could conceivably serve as the basis for a national emergency threat (even though, per the discussion earlier, it would have good odds of being overturned). One of Trump's four tweets urged US carriers to do more to halt shipments arriving from China or other destinations (Mexico is believed to be a route for the entry of Chinese fentanyl to the US). ..."
"... In May I had a conversation with a long-time friend. My friend works for a global manufacturer with a household name. He has helped oversee construction of plants around the world. He helps source components from around the world. He told me that "everybody's moving out" (of China). ..."
"... A few short years ago they had the Trans-Pacific Partnership being negotiated. This was nicknamed the "everybody but China" pact as that was its mission – to cut China out of the Pacific. Add to that the "Pivot to Asia" introduced by Obama which was to militarily threaten China and the writing was on the wall for China. They were to be boxed in and shut down. Trump may be the front man now for this effort but all the China-hawks have come out of the woodwork to be let loose in the government. ..."
"... I suppose that the plan is to force US companies to bail out of China and relocate to places like Vietnam, India, Bangladesh, etc. But the question is whether these countries have the infrastructure to support these new factories? ..."
"... I have mentioned before the idea of a multipolar world and I believe that we re seeing it now in action. The US and its vassals will be one pole and another one is forming around China, Iran and Russia. I doubt that the EU will be another as they are following what Trump orders even if reluctantly. There may be another factor. For centuries we have had an economy predicated on growth but I suspect that by the end of this century will will have one based on contraction due to climate change and depletion of resources. Better strap in. It could be a bumpy ride. ..."
Trump has been up to what he seems to like to do best: whipsawing those who might be affected by his plans. On Friday, he put
Mr. Market and huge swathes of Corporate America in a tizzy by retaliating against China's tariff increases. China announced that
it would impose new tariffs on $75 billion of US goods and the restart of tariffs on autos and auto parts. Trump tweeted that he
would increase tariffs on Chinese goods already subject to tariffs: the $250 billion at 25% would go to 30% on October 1and the $300
billion at 10% would go to 15% in phases, on September 1 and December 1. Trump also "hereby ordered" US companies to pull out of
China, suggesting that he'd rely on the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977.
Then, as most of you have likely heard, Trump made remarks at the G-7 summit that we widely interpreted as an indicator that he'd
back off again, by admitting to regrets about how the trade spat was going. When the press took up that line, Trump doubled down,
with the White House releasing a statement that Trump's sole regret was not raising tariffs higher.
Needless to say, the all-too-typical Trump to-ing and fro-ing made for an easy target.
From the Washington Post :
Former treasury secretary Lawrence Summers, a veteran of the Clinton and Obama administrations, said the White House's conflicting
statements were just the latest in a string of mixed messages that had made it impossible for people to understand its agenda.
"Deeply misguided policy and strategy has been joined for some time by dubious negotiating tactics, with promises not kept
and threats not carried out on a regular basis," Summers said in an interview. "We are at a new stage now with very erratic presidential
behavior and frequent denials of obvious reality. I know of no U.S. historical precedent."
And despite rousing himself to make a show of his resolve, the Administration did back down on one part of Trump's Friday missives,
that of "ordering" US companies to get out of Dodge, um, China.
From
the Wall Street Journal :
Aides to President Trump said Sunday he has no plans to invoke emergency powers and force companies to relocate operations
from China
"What he is suggesting to American businesses," [economic adviser] Mr. [Larry] Kudlow said, is that "you ought to think about
moving your operations and your supply chains away from China and secondly, we'd like you to come back home."
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin also weighed in, telling "Fox News Sunday" that the president didn't have plans to invoke
emergency powers to force U.S. companies out of China.
"I think what he was saying is he's ordering companies to start looking," Mr. Mnuchin said."
The Journal also pointed out that Trump might have trouble forcing companies to exit:
Both Messrs. Mnuchin and Kudlow said that the president could theoretically force U.S. companies to leave China by invoking
a law known as the International Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977, or IEEPA .
According to the Congressional Research Service, IEEPA can be used to deal with "any unusual and extraordinary threat" outside
the U.S. "to the national security, foreign policy or economy of the United States, if the president declares a national emergency
with respect to such threat."
The president is required "in every possible instance" to consult with Congress before exercising authorities granted by IEEPA,
and to specify in a report to lawmakers why the circumstances constitute a threat and why the actions are necessary, CRS said
in a briefing paper on the law issued earlier this year. The president must submit follow-up reports every six months .
Rod Hunter, a partner at Baker McKenzie and expert on international trade, said Mr. Trump could declare a state of emergency
and issue the order, but that doesn't mean it will stand.
"Congress could effectively override such a decision, and private parties would certainly challenge the action as an unconstitutional
takings, a violation of due process rights and beyond the statutory authority granted to the president by Congress," Mr. Hunter
said in an email.
Mind you, just like Brexit, there is a way to do what Trump wants to do that would not be so destructive and shambolic. Trump's
China policy appears to be intended to make American more economically self-sufficient so as to improve the prosperity of US workers,
as well as curb a competing imperialist.
But as we've described at some length in earlier posts, restoring America's manufacturing capabilities isn't just a matter of
weaning itself off cheap Chinese imports. The US has ceded a tremendous amount of know-how, from the factory floor on up. Getting
that back is a generation-long undertaking, requiring commitment to a national strategy that would include significant government
investment in fundamental research, renewed emphasis on education, including much cheaper higher education and vocational training
for those that aren't suited or inclined to go to college, and a reorientation of government spending and subsidies to favor productive
sectors over the connected. Not only would it be difficult to get any Administration to embrace open industrial policy, particularly
one that would break a lot of rice bowls (such as in our hugely wasteful arms industry and our bloated financial sector), maintaining
it beyond even a two-term Presidency would be an even taller order.
But where is the Trump tariff cage match likely to wind up? Given how often Trump has backed off when Mr. Market has had a hissy,
most commentator appear to have assumed before Friday's tit for tat that Trump would back down, if nothing else, in the form of allowing
a lot of exceptions, and the US and China would find a way for Trump to get enough concessions from China that he could declare peace
with honor.
That assumption looks to be incorrect. New Deal Democrat sent us the latest post from China Law Blog, written by lawyers who
specialize in Chinese law with an eye to helping businesses get set up and operate in China. The post by Dan Harris is every bit
as firm as its headline:
Repeat After
Me: There Will be No US-China Trade Deal . It also contains a good summary of key developments and detail on the various goods
targeted. Key sections:
The US-China Trade War Is and Will be the New Normal
I hate to say we told you so, but for nearly a year, WE TOLD YOU SO. Since October, 2018 we have been all but screaming at
anyone and everyone who has product made in China and sold into the United States to get out of China fast, if at all possible.
We say this and we set out the below timeline to prove this not so much to show that we have been right all along, but to try
to convince you that we are right when we now say there will be no resolution to the US-China trade war for a very long
time and you need to act accordingly.
The below is our timeline/proof of our having predicted a straight-line decline in US-China trade relations
But what should you make of President Trump's ordering US companies to immediately start looking for an alternative
to China? He can't really do that, can he? No, but in many respects this is exactly what Trump has been doing since the U.S.-China
trade war began. Trump cannot literally require American companies to pull out of China, but he can and has made it so difficult
that they all but have to leave China. And this is what most of the international lawyers and international trade lawyers at my
firm have come to believe has been Trump's plan all along.
Every step of the way, Trump has made it all but impossible for China to make a trade deal with the United States, which
is why this blog has been consistently clear that there will be no trade deal between the United States and China . If the US-China
trade war/cold war were really about trade imbalances, it would have ended long ago with China buying more soybeans and Boeing
airplanes from the United States. But from the very beginning, the U.S. has demanded China stop stealing IP and open its markets
for foreign companies, and there is just no way China will agree to either of these things. Lead negotiator Robert Lighthizer
is without a doubt smart enough to have known this all along. All this leads us to believe that the U.S. plan has always been
to force a slow decoupling of the U.S. and China and then work to convince the rest of the democratic world (the EU, Australia,
Canada, Latin America, Japan, etc.) to decouple from China, as well. In June, in
Does China WANT a Second Decoupling? The Chinese Texts Say That it Does we wrote of how China wants this decoupling, as well.
This latest Trump "order" does not have the force of law, so in that respect it is not an order at all. But in most other respects
it is. This order indicates Trump's passionate desire to rid the United States of what he sees as the China
scourge . More importantly, it is yet another
clear signal that he will continue to escalate this war with China until such time as he considers the United States to be victorious.
The fact that Trump issues this "order" amidst rising recession fears only highlights how ending U.S.-China trade is at the
top of his to-do list.
So in terms of what this means for your business, it means that you must stop believing there will be a solution to the trade
war that will allow you to go back to doing business with China the way you used to do business with China. You need to instead
recognize that this situation is the New Normal as between the United States and China and that, if anything, things are way more
likely to get worse than they are to get better.
I'm persuaded by this point of view because these writers have adopted the perspective that we've found to be very useful in other
geopolitical negotiations, which is to look at the bargaining position of both sides and see if there is any overlap. If there isn't,
there won't be an agreement unless one of both parties makes a significant concession.
One reason that other observers have likely missed what the China Law Blog discern is that there's an Anglo-American tendency
to assume that differences can be settled and a deal can be had. But as Sir Ivan Rogers pointed out with Brexit, and you have similar
dynamics with the US and China, there aren't precedents for trade deals where the two sides want to get further apart rather than
closer. Sir Ivan is of the point of view that the desire to disengage makes it much harder to come to terms.
The critical part of the China Law Blog's reading is that the Trump Administration is deadly serious about its two big asks,
intellectual property and market access. It's credible to attribute that to Trump's US Trade Representative, Lighthizer. As Lambert
put it, Lighthizer is the closest thing this Administration has to a Jim Baker. Lighthizer started at Covington & Burling, then served
in the Regan Administration as Deputy USTR before going to Skadden. Lighthizer is as fierce a China hawk as they come and has a long
history of saying that the entry of China into the WTO was at the expense of US jobs (see
here , for instance)
and even making a full-throated defense of
protectionism .
A part of the trade spat that hasn't gotten the attention it warrants and seems to confirm the China Law Blog's thesis is the
arm-wrestling over China's fetanyl exports to the US. It's not hard to see that this is an inherently important issue, since as I
understand it, fentanyl is so potent that it is very easy to overdose on it, making it markedly more dangerous than other addictive
drugs. In other words, the high death rate of fentanyl may make reducing supply a more effective strategy than it normally is in
"the war on drugs". Substitution with just about any other controlled substance would be less dangerous. And if Trump were to make
a dent in this problem, it would serve as a PR offset to some of the costs of his China strategy, like lost soyabean exports.
Fentanyl featured in the escalation on Friday, and it could conceivably serve as the basis for a national emergency threat
(even though, per the discussion earlier, it would have good odds of being overturned). One of Trump's four tweets urged US carriers
to do more to halt shipments arriving from China or other destinations (Mexico is believed to be a route for the entry of Chinese
fentanyl to the US).
In other words, it's not clear where this row ends, but there doesn't seem to be a path to depressurization, much the less resolution.
President Trump said China called U.S. officials on Sunday evening and said "let's get back to the table," a day after the
White House said the president regretted not escalating tariffs further on Chinese goods.
Speaking to reporters alongside Egyptian President Abdel Fattah Al Sisi, Mr. Trump called the discussions a "very positive
development." .
The Chinese government didn't immediately respond to Mr. Trump's remarks or to requests to corroborate the president's account
of a phone call having taken place. Chinese government officials have repeatedly said that Beijing wants to negotiate differences
on trade. On Monday, Beijing's lead trade negotiator, Vice Premier Liu He, told a conference that China still wants to continue
trade talks with the U.S. following heightened tensions in the past few days.
In May I had a conversation with a long-time friend. My friend works for a global manufacturer with a household name. He
has helped oversee construction of plants around the world. He helps source components from around the world. He told me that
"everybody's moving out" (of China).
The ones who can have not waited for Trump's message of Friday.
A few short years ago they had the Trans-Pacific Partnership being negotiated. This was nicknamed the "everybody but China"
pact as that was its mission – to cut China out of the Pacific. Add to that the "Pivot to Asia" introduced by Obama which was
to militarily threaten China and the writing was on the wall for China. They were to be boxed in and shut down. Trump may be the
front man now for this effort but all the China-hawks have come out of the woodwork to be let loose in the government.
I suppose that the plan is to force US companies to bail out of China and relocate to places like Vietnam, India, Bangladesh,
etc. But the question is whether these countries have the infrastructure to support these new factories? Do they have a trained,
educated workforce to man these factories? Is there a will to move to such places? As far as those countries are concerned, these
new companies could be seen as a two-edged sword. Yes they will bring investment and opportunities in those countries. But how
will they know if a Trump or someone like him later on will not order those factories out if there is a dispute or if the US demands
that those countries change their laws and open themselves up to financial exploitation? Trump is demanding the same of China
right now. And will Trump demand that all the other western countries move out of China?
I have mentioned before the idea of a multipolar world and I believe that we re seeing it now in action. The US and its
vassals will be one pole and another one is forming around China, Iran and Russia. I doubt that the EU will be another as they
are following what Trump orders even if reluctantly. There may be another factor. For centuries we have had an economy predicated
on growth but I suspect that by the end of this century will will have one based on contraction due to climate change and depletion
of resources. Better strap in. It could be a bumpy ride.
This is all pretty interesting. More theater than trade. And the reason is that there is no demand. Demographics has a lot
to do with it as well. It might not make any difference now how much a company can cut costs by moving to SE Asia because nobody
will be very eager to buy more crap anyway. And manufacturing cannot up and move cheaply if they have to reinvent and retool their
processes to make them more environmentally acceptable. It's a sea change. And a tap-dance.
According to this article,"
The DEA has stated that
China is the main source of US fentanyl. " I followed the link, and found "The DEA has said China is a main
source of fentanyl and other synthetic opioids." Which I take as meaning that even if the US could totally shut down Chinese
synthetic opioid production, someone will still be making and supplying it.
So, if the facts as given above are reconfigured, all it would take is for the Chinese producers of synthetic opioids to pay
the US patent holders their due. Problem solved! All kidding aside, the demands to get intellectual property paid for requires
a very pliant judicial system to actually recognize that an idea should be rightfully owned by a person.
Individual agency is a product of 'enlightenment' thinking which opened the pathway for an idea to be the creation of a person
who willed the idea into existence. A few steps later, a corporation becomes a person and then a group of people can somehow own
a single idea and be able to rent that idea out. To think that the Chinese would accept this cockamamie/historically embedded/English
common law idea would be to deny their own culturally based motivated reasoning.
I don't know how this situation will be resolved, but it is quite laughable that the diversion through tariffs of IP revenues
which in US legal logic should be paid to Corporations is actually going to go to the US Treasury.
"All this leads us to believe that the U.S. plan has always been to force a slow decoupling of the U.S. and China and then
work to convince the rest of the democratic world (the EU, Australia, Canada, Latin America, Japan, etc.) to decouple from China,
as well"
That is about right, and I do not doubt that this is the desire of Trump's negotiating team. Nor do I doubt that they can easily
steer talks to fail as described (by asking for concessions on market access favorable to the US side, AND by refusing to back
down on Huawei etc).
However, while effectively forcing a decoupling of China and US is straightforward, controlling its speed is not. Pull the
plug too fast (which China can threaten to accelerate), and some big US companies eat it. While Lighthizer and friends may be
willing to pay that price, it will make a lot of others very nervous.
Then, perhaps more importantly, is forcing the rest of the world to follow suit (or else there is no point). JP, ROK, DE (the
high tech suppliers besides US) all trade at least as much with China as US. The world market buying Chinese made goods is also
bigger than the US. It would take some skillful diplomacy to make it happen. This is not only beyond the level of the Trump admin,
but I would say all US administrations since the year 2000, with the Iran deal maybe the only exception I can think of.
China will end up defending itself by getting the overly aggressive and self-discrediting Team Trump reelected. By openly provoking
a small proxy conflict for example. Trump gets to do his Ronald Reagan act, which is what his audience wants. It will be a weird
political symbiosis. (an oversized personality can't survive without a suitably inflated enemy, and Joe Biden is no Hillary Clinton.
The media will play along – such drama is the only thing keeping them in business now.)
Anyway, if there is a counterbalancing force to prevent this, I would think it is wall street.
Apparently the US federal workers pension plan has started investing in index funds which include some Chinese companies that
have been in Trump & Co's target list. From the FT this morning:
The letter -- a copy of which was seen by the Financial Times -- said an impending investment shift by the FRTIB would mean
that about $50bn in US government pensions becomes exposed to the "severe and undisclosed" risks of being invested in selected
Chinese companies.
The letter, dated August 26, was copied to senior US officials including Mike Pompeo, US secretary of state, and Steven
Mnuchin, Treasury secretary.
"The Federal Retirement Thrift Investment Board made a short-sighted -- and foolish -- decision to effectively fund the
Chinese government and Communist party's efforts to undermine US economic and national security with the retirement savings
of members of the US Armed Services and other federal employees," Mr Rubio told the Financial Times.
One thing I remember from early on in this dispute was the US wanting more opportunities to invest in the Chinese market beyond
just exports/manufacturing. If pension funds are getting involved I would think that private investors would like to do the same
thing, which would make long-term decoupling more difficult, especially if US businesses also want to sell things to people in
China even if those things are made elsewhere.
As always your post was very informative and helpful and I certainly believe that pulling the US out of China is the goal of
this whole trade dispute. I just wonder if things like this will put a damper on their plans.
i just re-read all your posts on the last thread..
U.S. Decoupling From China Forces Others To Decouple From U.S. thanks for those posts..
they were very informative! there was no mention of usa going off gold in that same time
frame - 1972 area.. i was mildly curious about your thoughts on that and gold in general.. it
seems china, india and russia continue to acquire it...i am not a gold bug and don't want to
detract from the many informative ideas you bring in the last thread..
here is a quote from your first link @34.. "The US accounts for only 10 per cent of global
trade and 15 per cent of global GDP but half of trade invoices and two-thirds of global
securities issuance, the BoE governor said. As a result, "while the world economy is being
reordered, the US dollar remains as important as when Bretton Woods collapsed" in 1971." this
is what i was trying to tell grieved in the previous thread... the usa mimics a bank and this
is a lot of it's gdp and growth - in derivatives, currency exchange, and etc. etc. banking /
wall st stuff.. the usa has also relied on the imf / world bank providing the loans in us$
thru wall st.. i think this game is coming to an end, as more and more see it for what it
is..
i want to ask you what you think the way forward is here, given mark carney and trumps
comments at this juncture... what do you envision as a way forward??
Capitalism is the first system where wealth gains life, becomes a consicious subject. It
doesn't matter which country produces what and which country prints what: all it matters is
the profit rate. Since capitalism reduces all forms of social labor into an abstract
substance called "value", they only difference it sees is quantitative: more or less value.
Hence capitalism is a system that can be better illustrated as an unstoppable pump of labor
and natural resources (labor is only labor when natural matter is transformed on the human
image) -- it needs infinite growth to exist (as Marx demonstrated in book II).
Neither Trump's nor Carney's plans will solve capitalism's profitability crisis. Money
doesn't have a race or gender, so just exchanging the nationality of the global elite and of
the factory worker won't solve the problem.
China Did Not Trick the US -- Trade Negotiators Served Corporate Interests
By Dean Baker
The New York Times ran an article * last week with a headline saying that the 2020
Democratic presidential contenders faced a serious problem: "how to be tougher on trade than
Trump." Serious readers might have struggled with the idea of getting "tough on trade." After
all, trade is a tool, like a screwdriver. Is it possible to get tough on a screwdriver?
While the Times's headline may be especially egregious, it is characteristic of trade
coverage which takes an almost entirely Trumpian view of the topic. The media portray the
issue of some countries, most obviously China, benefiting at the expense of the United
States. Nothing could be more completely at odds with reality.
China has a huge trade surplus with the United States, about $420 billion (2.1 percent of
GDP) as of 2018. However, this doesn't mean that China is winning at the expense of the
United States and because of "stupid" trade negotiators, as Trump puts it.
The U.S. trade deficit with China was not an accident. Both Republican and Democratic
administrations signed trade deals that made it easy to manufacture goods in China and other
countries, and then export them back to the United States.
In many cases, this meant that large U.S. corporations, like General Electric and Boeing,
outsourced parts of their operations to China to take advantage of low-cost labor there. In
other cases, retailers like Walmart set up low-cost supply chains so that they could undercut
their competitors in the U.S. market.
General Electric, Boeing, Walmart and the rest did not lose from our trade deficit with
China. In fact, the trade deficit was the result of their efforts to increase their profits.
They have little reason to be unhappy with the trade deals negotiated over the last three
decades.
It is a very different story for workers in the United States. As a result of the
exploding trade deficit, we lost 3.4 million manufacturing jobs between 2000 and 2007, 20
percent of the workers in the sector. This is before the collapse of the housing bubble led
to the Great Recession. We lost 40 percent of all unionized jobs in manufacturing.
This job loss not only reduced the pay of manufacturing workers, but as these displaced
workers flooded into other sectors, it put downward pressure on the pay of less-educated
workers generally. This is a pretty awful story, but it is not a story of China tricking our
so-called stupid negotiators; it is a story of smart negotiators who served well the interest
of corporations.
For some reason, the media always accept the Trumpian narrative that the large trade
deficits the U.S. runs with China (and most of the rest of the world) were the result of
other countries outsmarting our negotiators, or at least an accidental result of past trade
deals. The media never say that large trade deficits were a predictable outcome of a trade
policy designed to serve the wealthy.
The fact that trade is a story of winners and losers within countries, rather than between
countries, is especially important now that our trade conflicts are entering a new phase,
especially with China. While not generally endorsing Trump's reality TV show tactics, most
reporting has taken the position that "we" in the U.S. have genuine grounds for complaint
with China.
The complaints don't center on the under-valuation of China's currency, which is a problem
for manufacturing workers. Rather, the issue that takes center stage is the supposed theft by
China of our intellectual property.
While this sort of claim is routinely asserted, the overwhelming majority of people in the
United States have never had any intellectual property stolen by China. It is companies like
Boeing, GE, Pfizer and Merck that are upset about China not respecting their patent and
copyright claims, and they want the rest of us to have a trade war to defend them.
If the goals of trade policies were put to a vote, these companies would be hugely
outnumbered. However, they can count on the strong support of the media in both the opinion
pages, and more importantly, the news pages. The issue is entirely framed in their favor, and
dissenting voices are as likely to be heard as in the People's Republic of China.
There is a lot at stake in preserving the myth that ordinary workers were hurt as just an
accidental byproduct of globalization. The story is that it just happens to be the case that
hundreds of millions of people in the developing world are willing to do the same work as our
manufacturing workers for a lot less money.
Yes, the loss of millions of manufacturing jobs is a sad story, but is just part of the
picture. There are also millions of smart ambitious people in the developing world who are
willing to do the same work as our doctors, dentists, lawyers and other professions for a lot
less money.
But the people who design trade policy have made sure that these people don't have the
opportunity to put the same downward pressure on our most highly paid workers, as did their
counterparts working in families. And, for what it's worth, the trade model works the same
when we're talking about doctors as manufacturing workers. Less pay for U.S. doctors means
lower cost health care, just as lower pay for textile workers means cheaper clothes.
The key point is that winners in the global economy, along with the big corporations, got
their good fortune because they rigged the process, not because of anything inherent in the
nature of globalization. (This is the point of my book Rigged: How the Rules of Globalization
and the Modern Economy Were Structured to Make the Rich Richer. ** )
On this basic point, the media have no more interest in truth than Donald Trump. Hence, we
can expect further media parroting about being "tough" on trade.
"... Still, even if Trump isn't making sense, will China give in to his demands? The short answer is, "What demands?" Trump mainly seems exercised by China's trade surplus with America, which has multiple causes and isn't really under the Chinese government's control. ..."
"... Others in his administration seem concerned by China's push into high-technology industries, which could indeed threaten U.S. dominance. But China is both an economic superpower and relatively poor compared with the U.S.; it's grossly unrealistic to imagine that such a country can be bullied into scaling back its technological ambitions ..."
"... Which brings us to the question of how much power the U.S. really has in this situation. ..."
"... So while Trump's tariffs certainly hurt the Chinese, Beijing is fairly well placed to counter their effects. China can pump up domestic spending with monetary and fiscal stimulus; it can boost its exports, to the world at large as well as to America, by letting the yuan fall. ..."
"... At the same time, China can inflict pain of its own. It can buy its soybeans elsewhere, hurting U.S. farmers. As we saw this week, even a mostly symbolic weakening of the yuan can send U.S. stocks plunging. ..."
"... And America's ability to counter these moves is hindered by a combination of technical and political factors. The Fed can cut rates, but not very much given how low they are already. We could do a fiscal stimulus, but having rammed through a plutocrat-friendly tax cut in 2017, Trump would have to make real concessions to Democrats to get anything more -- something he probably won't do. ..."
"... So Trump is in a much weaker position than he imagines, and my guess is that China's mini-devaluation of its currency was an attempt to educate him in that reality. But I very much doubt he has learned anything. His administration has been steadily hemorrhaging people who know anything about economics, and reports indicate that Trump isn't even listening to the band of ignoramuses he has left. ..."
China Tries to Teach Trump Economics
But he doesn't seem to be learning.
By Paul Krugman
If you want to understand the developing trade war with China, the first thing you need to
realize is that nothing Donald Trump is doing makes sense. His views on trade are incoherent.
His demands are incomprehensible. And he vastly overrates his ability to inflict damage on
China while underrating the damage China can do in return.
The second thing you need to realize is that China's response so far has been fairly
modest and measured, at least considering the situation. The U.S. has implemented or
announced tariffs on virtually everything China sells here, with average tariff rates not
seen in generations. The Chinese, by contrast, have yet to deploy anything like the full
range of tools at their disposal to offset Trump's actions and hurt his political base.
Why haven't the Chinese gone all out? It looks to me as if they're still trying to teach
Trump some economics. What they've been saying through their actions, in effect, is: "You
think you can bully us. But you can't. We, on the other hand, can ruin your farmers and crash
your stock market. Do you want to reconsider?"
There is, however, no indication that this message is getting through. Instead, every time
the Chinese pause and give Trump a chance to rethink, he takes it as vindication and pushes
even harder. What this suggests, in turn, is that sooner or later the warning shots will turn
into an all-out trade and currency war.
About Trump's views: His incoherence is on view almost every day, but one of his recent
tweets was a perfect illustration. Remember, Trump has been complaining nonstop about the
strength of the dollar, which he claims puts America at a competitive disadvantage. On Monday
he got the Treasury Department to declare China a currency manipulator, which was true seven
or eight years ago but isn't true now. Yet the very next day he wrote triumphantly that
"massive amounts of money from China and other parts of the world is pouring into the United
States," which he declared "a beautiful thing to see."
Um, what happens when "massive amounts of money" pour into your country? Your currency
rises, which is exactly what Trump is complaining about. And if lots of money were flooding
out of China, the yuan would be plunging, not experiencing the trivial (2 percent) decline
that Treasury condemned.
Oh well. I guess arithmetic is just a hoax perpetrated by the deep state.
Still, even if Trump isn't making sense, will China give in to his demands? The short
answer is, "What demands?" Trump mainly seems exercised by China's trade surplus with
America, which has multiple causes and isn't really under the Chinese government's
control.
Others in his administration seem concerned by China's push into high-technology
industries, which could indeed threaten U.S. dominance. But China is both an economic
superpower and relatively poor compared with the U.S.; it's grossly unrealistic to imagine
that such a country can be bullied into scaling back its technological ambitions .
Which brings us to the question of how much power the U.S. really has in this
situation.
America is, of course, a major market for Chinese goods, and China buys relatively little
in return, so the direct adverse effect of a tariff war is larger for the Chinese. But it's
important to have a sense of scale. China isn't like Mexico, which sends 80 percent of its
exports to the United States; the Chinese economy is less dependent on trade than smaller
nations, and less than a fifth of its exports come to America.
So while Trump's tariffs certainly hurt the Chinese, Beijing is fairly well placed to
counter their effects. China can pump up domestic spending with monetary and fiscal stimulus;
it can boost its exports, to the world at large as well as to America, by letting the yuan
fall.
At the same time, China can inflict pain of its own. It can buy its soybeans elsewhere,
hurting U.S. farmers. As we saw this week, even a mostly symbolic weakening of the yuan can
send U.S. stocks plunging.
And America's ability to counter these moves is hindered by a combination of technical and
political factors. The Fed can cut rates, but not very much given how low they are already.
We could do a fiscal stimulus, but having rammed through a plutocrat-friendly tax cut in
2017, Trump would have to make real concessions to Democrats to get anything more --
something he probably won't do.
What about a coordinated international response? That's unlikely, both because it's not
clear what Trump wants from China and because his general belligerence (not to mention his
racism) has left America with almost nobody willing to take its side in global disputes.
So Trump is in a much weaker position than he imagines, and my guess is that China's
mini-devaluation of its currency was an attempt to educate him in that reality. But I very
much doubt he has learned anything. His administration has been steadily hemorrhaging people
who know anything about economics, and reports indicate that Trump isn't even listening to
the band of ignoramuses he has left.
So this trade dispute will probably get much worse before it gets better.
""You think you [Trump] can bully us [Xi]. But you can't. We, on the other hand, can ruin
your farmers and crash your stock market. Do you want to reconsider?""
Krugman is putting his "liberal" thinking in to Xi's mind.
US farmers are the darling of the "liberal"? I suspect not so much unless to oppose
Trump.
To see the mechanism that China could crash the stock market requires some thinking.
How could China do such a thing? Tariffs on $100B (in a $19,000B economy) in US exports is
emotional to the exchanges. Dumping US debt would raise interest rates and make T Bills
attractive over stocks, which is not a bad thing. The "liberals" know a 'deplorable' 36000
Dow is a dream. Then what does China do with all those USD?
The issue is a lot of "liberals" do not want Trump to succeed in efforts to reverse the
MNC expulsion of labor from the US to developing countries.
I look forward to Trump asking the DNC select why he or she "wants Xi to win over labor in
the US?"
The underlying loser in the Trump scheme are the MNC's so will the DNC go all in for MNC's
at the expense of the worker?
Nostalgia for a past that never was; Part 1 review of Paul Collier's "The future of
capitalism"
Paul Collier's new book "The future of capitalism" is a very hard book to review. It is
short (215 pages) but it covers an enormous area, from social and economic interpretation of
the past seventy years in the West, to pleas for "ethical" companies, "ethical" families and
even an "ethical" world, to a set of proposals for reform in advanced economies.
The most uncharitable assessment would be to say that, at times, the book comes close (I
emphasize "close") to nationalism, "social eugenics", "family values" of the moral majority
kind, and conservativism in the literal sense of the word because it posits an idealized past
and exhorts us to return there. But one could also say that its diagnosis of the current ills
is accurate and remarkably clear-sighted. Its recommendations are often compelling,
sophisticated and yet common-sensical.
I have therefore decided to divide my review in two parts. In this part I will explain the
points, mostly methodological and historical, on which I disagree with Collier. In the second
part, I will discuss the diagnoses and recommendations on which I mostly agree.
Pragmatism. Collier positions himself as a "pragmatist" battling both (1) ideologues:
Utilitarians, Rawlsian (who are accused, somewhat strangely, of having introduced identity
politics) and Marxists; and (2) populists who have no ideology at all but simply play on
people's emotions. All three kinds of ideologies are wrong because they follow their script
which is inadequate for current problems while populists do not even care to make things
better but only to rule and have a good time. It is only a pragmatic approach that, according
to Collier, makes sense.
Pragmatism however is an ideology like any other. It is wrong to believe oneself exempt
from ideological traps if one claims to be a "pragmatist". Pragmatism collects whatever are
the ruling ideologies today and rearranges them: it provides an interpretative framework like
any other ideology. Pragmatists are, as Keynes said in a similar context "practical men, who
believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influences, [but] are usually the
slaves of some defunct economist [or ideologue; my addition]."
Adam Smith. The second building block of Collier book is based on his interpretation of
Adam Smith, which has become more popular recently and tries to "soften" the hard edge of the
Adam Smith of the "Wealth of Nations" (self-interest, profit, and power) by a more congenial
Smith from "The Theory of Moral Sentiments". This is an old debate that goes almost 200 years
back ("Die Adam Smith Frage").
There are, I think, if not two Smiths, then one Smith for two sets of circumstances: in
TMS, it is the Smith for our behavior with family, friends and community; in the WoN, it is
the Smith of economic life, our behavior as "economic agents". I discuss this in "Capitalism,
Alone". David Wootton in "Power, Pleasure and Profit" very persuasively makes the same point.
And even Collier says exactly the same thing towards the end of his book, but in the early
parts he argues that the Adam Smith of TMS applies to economics as well.
Now, for an economist only the Smith from the WoN matters. Economists do not claim (or
should not claim) to have particularly valuable insights regarding how people behave outside
of economics. So it is fully consistent for economists to use a model of Smith's homo
economicus who is pursuing monetary gains only, or more broadly, his own utility only. That
of course does not exclude, as Collier and some other writers (e.g., Peter Turchin) seem to
believe, cooperation with others. It is obvious that many of our monetary objectives are
better achieved through cooperation: I am better off cooperating with people at my university
than setting my own university. But whether I do one or the other, I am pursuing my own
selfish interest. I am not doing things for altruistic reasons -- which perhaps I might do in
my interactions with family or friends.
My point in "Capitalism, Alone" is that under hyper-commercialized globalization Smith's
economic sphere is rapidly expanding and "eating up" the sphere where the Smith of TMS
applies. Commodification "invades" family relations and our leisure time. Both Collier and I
agree on that. But while I think that this is an inherent feature of hyper-commercialized
globalization, Collier believes that the clock can be turned back to an "ethical world" which
existed in the past while somehow keeping globalization as it is now. This is an illusion and
leads me to Collier's nostalgia.
Social-democracy. In Collier's view of the Golden Age (1945-75), social-democracy that
brought it about did this for ethical reasons. In several places he repeats more of less this
breathtaking sentence "[Roosevelt] was elected because people recognized the New Deal was
ethical". He argues that the origin of social-democracy lies in a (nice) co-operative
movement, not that the reforms in capitalism after WW1 and WW2 were the product of a century
of often violent struggle of social democratic parties to improve workers' conditions. It is
not because ethical leaders decided suddenly to make capitalism "nicer" but because the two
world wars, the Bolshevik revolution, the growth of social-democratic and communist parties,
and their links with powerful trade unions, exacted the change of course from bourgeoisie
under the looming threat of social disorder and expropriation. So it is not through the
benevolence of the right that capitalism was transformed, but because the upper classes,
chastised by past experience, decided to follow their own enlightened self-interest: give up
some in order to preserve more. (For similar interpretations, see Samuel Moyn, Avner
Offer,)
This difference in the interpretations of history is important because Collier's view
applied to today basically calls for ethical rulers -- to somehow appear. This is why at the
end of the book he discusses how political leaders should be elected (not by party members or
primaries, but by the elected representatives of their parties). My interpretation implies
that unless there are strong social forces that would push back financial sector excesses,
tax evasion, and high inequality nothing will be changed. What matters is not ethics or
ethical leaders but group/class interest and relative power.
The facts. And finally the Arcadia of the trente glorieuses * when Collier holds that
moral giants strode the Earth, companies cared about workers, families were "full" and
"ethical", never really existed, at least not in the way it is described in the book. Yes,
like many others I have pointed out that the trente glorieuses were very good years for the
West both in terms of growth and surely in terms of narrowing of wealth and income
inequalities. But they were no Arcadia and in many respects they were much worse than the
present.
The period of Collier's "ethical family" in which "the husband was the head" when every
member cared for each other, and several generations lived together, was a hierarchical
patriarchy that even legally forbid any other types of family-formation. (I remember that in
my high school in Belgium, only fathers were allowed to sign off on pupils' grades or school
absences. Not mothers.)
In the USA, the Golden Age was the age of social mimicry and conservatism, widespread
racial discrimination, and gender inequality. When it comes to politics, it is often
forgotten that during the Golden Age, France was basically twice on the edge of a civil war:
during the Algerian war and in 1968. Spain, Portugal, and Greece were ruled by quasi-fascist
regimes. Terrorism of RAF and Brigate Rosse came in the 1970s. Finally, if these years were
so good and "ethical" why did we have the universal 1968 rebellion, from Paris to
Detroit?
That imagined world never was, and we are utterly unlikely to return to it; not only
because it never was but because the current word is entirely different. Collier overlooks
that the world of his youth to which he wants people to return was the world of enormous
income differences between the rich world and the Third World. It is for that reason that the
English working class could (as he writes) feel very proud and superior to the people in the
rest of the world. They cannot feel so proud and superior now because other nations are
catching up. Implicitly, regaining self-respect for the English working class requires a
return to such worldwide stratification of incomes.
The book is thus built on the quicksand of a world that did not exist, will not exist, and
on a methodology that I find wanting. 2020s will not be the imagined 1945, however loudly we
clamor for it. But this does not mean that the analyses of current problems and the
recommendations are wrong. Many of them are very good. So I will turn to them next.
How to create an ethical county, if not the world: Part 2 review of Paul Collier's "The
future of capitalism"
This is the second part of my review of Paul Collier's "The future of capitalism". The
first part is here. *
In this review of Collier's policy recommendations, I will break the discussion into three
parts, following Collier's own approach: how to make companies more ethical, families
stronger, and the world better.
Ethical firm. Collier argues that, in order for companies to be seen as ethical and to
offer their workforce meaningful jobs, companies should include workers in management, give
much more power to the middle-level management, and do profit-sharing. These are all
well-taken recommendations, and I believe, like Collier, that they would increase companies'
profitability in addition to providing "better" jobs. The question however is how many
companies nowadays can afford to provide such meaningful and (relatively) stable jobs because
of fast-evolving changes driven by globalization. Nevertheless the idea is correct.
Collier then moves to what may be the most intriguing recommendation in the book and that
goes beyond the usual "let's have higher and more progressive taxes". He looks at the big
divide between the successful global cities (like New York and London) and their left-behind
hinterlands. The success of metropolises comes from economies of scale, specialization, and
complementarity (gains of agglomeration). People can specialize because the demand for
specialized skills is high (the best tax accountants are located in New York not in small
dilapidated cities). Companies can enjoy economies of scale because the demand is high and
specialized workers benefit from complementarity in skills from other workers with whom they
are in close geographical and intellectual contact.
So who are the main winners from metropolises' success, asks Collier? People who own land
and housing (as housing prices skyrocket) and highly skilled professionals who, after paying
higher rents, still make more in global cities than elsewhere. Collier's suggestion then,
based on his work with Tony Venables, is to tax heavily these two groups of people, i.e., to
introduce supplemental taxes which would be geographical: tax housing and high income
individuals living in London.
How to help hinterland catch up? Use the money collected in London or New York to give
subsidies to large cluster-like companies (like Amazon) if they set they businesses in the
left-behind cities like Sheffield or Detroit. One can quibble with this idea but the logic of
the argument is, I think, quite compelling, and the taxation suggested by Collier has the
advantage of going beyond the indiscriminate increase in taxes for all. We are talking here
of targeted taxation and targeted subsidies. This is the lieu fort of Collier's book.
Ethical family. I am less enthusiastic about the suggestions in this area. Here Collier is
at his most conservative although that social conservatism is masked under the cover of
scientific studies that show that children living in "full" families with two heterosexual
parents are doing much better than children living with one parent only.
Collier almost implies that (say) mothers should stay in unloving or abusive relationships
so that there would be both parents present in the family. Such families should, according to
Collier, be given support and for all children public pre-K and K education should be free
(very reasonable). Collier also very persuasively describes manifold advantages that the
children of the rich receive, not only through inheritance but through intangible capital of
parental knowledge and connections. This type of social capital inheritance is not a
well-researched topic and I hope this changes since its importance in real life is
substantial.
Collier displays clear preference for "standard" families and even some "social eugenics"
as when he criticizes UK policy that provides free housing and since 1999 extra benefits for
single mothers to have encouraged "many women...to bear children who will not be raised
well".
The argument that parents should sacrifice themselves (regardless of the psychic cost) for
children is also dangerous. It leads us to a family formation of the 19th century when women
often lived in terrible marriages because of social pressure not to be seen as abandoning or
not caring for their children. This is neither a desirable nor a likely solution for today.
An ethical family should consider interests of all members equally, not subjugate the
happiness of some (mostly mothers) to that of others.
Ethical world. Collier has surprisingly little to say about the ethical world. His ethical
world is a world largely closed to new migration which Collier rejects based on a not
unreasonable view going back to Assar Lindbeck and George Borjas of cultural incompatibility
between the migrants and the natives. Interestingly, Collier does not quote either of these
two authors nor any others. (The book is directed at the general audience so the mentions of
other authors are extremely rare except when it comes to Collier himself and a few of his
co-authors).
It is slightly disconcerting that Collier who has spent more than three decades working on
Africa has almost nothing to say about how Africa and African migration fits into this
"ethical world". There are only two ways in which he addresses migration.
First, migrants or refugees should stay in countries that are geographically close to the
source countries: Venezuelans in Colombia, Syrians in Lebanon and Turkey, Afghanis in
Pakistan. Why the burden of migrants should be exclusively borne by the limitrophe countries
** that are often quite poor is never explained. Surely, an ethical world would require much
more from the rich.
Second, he argues that the West should help good companies invest in poor countries in
order to increase incomes there and reduce migration. But how is this to be achieved is never
explained. It is mentioned almost as an afterthought and is considered deserving of two
sentences only (in two different parts of the book). This is in contrast with a detailed
explanation, discussed above, of how governments should encourage and subsidize large
companies to relocate to second-tier cities. Could a similar scheme be designed for
investments in Africa? Nothing is said.
Further, where does it leave African migrants crisscrossing the Mediterranean as I write?
There are no geographically close countries where they could go (surely not to Libya) nor can
they wait for years in Mali for the Western companies to bring them jobs. Again, nothing is
said on that. It is not surprising that Collier is very supportive of Emmanuel Macron whose
anti-immigration policy is quite obvious, and of Danish Social Democrats that are in the
process of creating a kind of national social democracy with new laws that practically reduce
immigration to a trickle. Collier favors Fortress Europe although he does not say so
explicitly.
In keeping with his anti-immigration stance, Collier argues that migration is not an
integral part of globalization. Why –in principle– goods, services and one factor
of production (capital) should be allowed to move freely while another factor of production
(labor) is to remain stuck is not clear. Surely, the fact that trade is driven by comparative
advantage and migration by absolute is not the reason to be against migration. On exactly the
same grounds, one could be against movement of capital too.
In conclusion, I think that the recommendations regarding the "ethical firm" and
metropolis-hinterland divergence are spot on; the recommendations on "ethical family" are a
combination of very perceptive and sensible points, and a view of the family that at times
comes from a different age, and almost nothing is said about an "ethical world". This latter
is a big omission in the era of globalization, but perhaps Collier was solely interested in
how to improve nation-states.
** Territories situated on a border or frontier. In a broad sense, it means border
countries -- any group of neighbors of a given nation which border each other thus forming a
rim around that country.
"... This strategy is not popular with US corporations and will earn Trump some more opposition. Former Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) on Sunday announced he would mount a primary challenge to President Trump ..."
Trump has put US companies on alert that he might force them to withdraw from China, where
they have $256 billion invested. He says he is given this power by the 1977 law called the
International Emergency Economic Powers Act, or IEEPA.
The Republican Party has spent over a century warning against government involvement in
the private sector, but now their leader is doing it big time. Trump ordering companies
around about where they can invest is a form of fascism or rightwing national socialism. Left
socialism is about public sector economic activity for the good of people. National socialism
is the state usurping economic resources on behalf of a small corporate and high-official
elite.
Tara Golshan at Vox explained how Trump unilaterally raised China tariffs in the first
place by 25% (he is threatening to go to 30%):
"Trump's White House cited Section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962, a provision
that gives the secretary of commerce the authority to investigate and determine the impacts
of any import on the national security of the United States -- and the president the power to
adjust tariffs accordingly."
So one thing that is going on is that measures passed by Congress for limited and extreme
situations are being misused by presidents for everyday policy-making. . . here
This strategy is not popular with US corporations and will earn Trump some more
opposition. Former Rep. Joe Walsh (R-Ill.) on Sunday announced he would mount a primary
challenge to President Trump . . .
here
"... During his meeting with Johnson on Sunday at the G7 in France, the US president raised eyebrows when he responded in the affirmative to questions from reporters on whether he had any second thoughts about the tariff move. ..."
While one may accuse the US president of many things, having second thoughts is hardly one
of them: once Trump has decided on a course of action, he tends to follow through. Which is why
the global press gasped when a rare case of doubt emerged this morning during Trump's breakfast
meeting with the UK's Boris Johnson at the Biarritz G-7, when the US president acknowledged
having second thoughts about the escalating the trade war with China... only for his top
spokeswoman to later retract and say Trump meant he regretted not raising tariffs even
more.
During his meeting with Johnson on Sunday at the G7 in France, the US president raised
eyebrows when he responded in the affirmative to questions from reporters on whether he had any
second thoughts about the tariff move.
Every president of the USA for the past 50 years has cultivated US exports to China. You
want to just throw it away, only two or three years before the purchasing power of China
exceeds that of the USA???
China - 1.5 billion.
USA - 326 million
China growth rate 2018: 6.4%
USA growth rate 2018: 2.8% source
China now produces twice as many graduates a year as the US source
As of 2015, China had already taken global lead in manufacturing output:
source
China - $2,010 billion
USA - $1,867 billion
World market size, based on population:
source
China - 18.7%
USA - 4.3%
Greedy US corporations have been in bed with China robbing the US citizen with all those
job exports to China.
If things were produced in US, the corporations would have made less money, but the US
citizen would have been better off. The trade deficit which has been running for decades
wouldn't have been that much.
Anyone with a lick of commonsense knew Trump's detractors would be gunning for him during
his trip to Europe. Trump has not disappointed these people by continuing his effort to come
across as too clever for his own good. Trump gave these people more ammunition when he said
he has doubts about his actions.
During breakfast with the UK's Boris Johnson at the G-7 meeting in Biarritz, France Trump
acknowledged having second thoughts about the escalating the trade war with China. The
article below explores how this may cause Trump a great deal of grief.
Beijing just might be able to doom the president's chance of reelection. They can tune
tariffs to hurt Trump base.
Notable quotes:
"... China's tariff threats take aim at the heart of Trump's political support -- factories and farms across the Midwest and South at a time when the U.S. economy is showing signs of slowing down. Soybean prices sank to a two-week low ..."
"... The tariffs beginning in September include 10% on pork, beef, and chicken, and various other agricultural goods, while soybeans will have the extra 5% tariff on top of the existing 25%. Starting in December, wheat, sorghum, and cotton will also get a 10% tariff. ..."
Some of the countermeasures will take effect starting Sept. 1, while the rest will come into
effect from Dec. 15, according to the announcement Friday from the Finance
Ministry. This mirrors the timetable the U.S. has laid out for 10% tariffs on nearly $300
billion of Chinese shipments
An extra 5% tariff will be put on American soybeans and crude-oil imports starting next
month. The resumption of a suspended extra 25% duty on U.S. cars will resume Dec. 15, with
another 10% on top for some vehicles. With existing general duties on autos taken into account,
the total tariff charged on U.S. made cars would be as high as 50%.
China's tariff threats take aim at the heart of Trump's political support -- factories and
farms across the Midwest and South at a time when the U.S. economy is showing signs of slowing
down. Soybean prices sank to a two-week low
.... ... ...
The tariffs beginning in September include 10% on pork, beef, and chicken, and various other
agricultural goods, while soybeans will have the extra 5% tariff on top of the existing 25%.
Starting in December, wheat, sorghum, and cotton will also get a 10% tariff.
"... "The 2008 experience demonstrated that the U.S. dollar as the global reserve and main trade currency is dangerous for all who use it. Currently any hickup in the U.S. economy leads to large scale recessions elsewhere." ..."
"... It has also become a primary tool for the US to assert extraterritorial jurisdiction over the world to enforce extreme uses of sanctions, as in blowing up the Iran deal. Already the EU has explored ways to get around that to work with Iran. ..."
"... The over use of sanctions, and abuse of the US financial position in order to govern others, reinforces the desire to deal with fears that dependence on the dollar risks vulnerability to economic depression due to US irresponsibility. ..."
"... The US is creating a perfect storm for the dollar, with is exactly what it would take to make others undertake the expense and difficulty of replacing it as the world reserve currency and presumed standard of exchange. ..."
"... I just had a thought. The USSA has been doing it all wrong for all these decades. There are at least two responses the USSA could have applied to the obviously impending debacle of simply allowing the Chinese to thoroughly undermine its industrial system. The most obvious response would have been tariffs, which could be perceived as an aggressive policy, but certainly not as the outright aggression of sanctions. ..."
"... Or probably even much better, a 'negative sales tax' on USSA manufactured products, which could in no way be perceived as aggressive at all. Note that there is (I presume) a vast difference between simply subsidizing companies (since subsidies coud then flow directly into the pockets of the companies' capitalists) and providing the companies' customers with a 'negative tax' on USSA produced products (basically an instant rebate). This could effectively provide price parity for the goods produced for the two countries, and could maintain the viability of the USSA manufacturing system. ..."
"... The US ruling class cannot grow out of its desire to extend its rule to the rest of the planet. But humanity is not as malleable as the American people-with their dreams of sharing in the dividends when America (Great Again) (aka its ruling class) orders the rest of the world around and exploits everyone the way that it exploits the working people in the United States. ..."
"... Are you not aware that the Bank of Japan basically owns 70% of the Japanese stock market in the from of ETFs? ..."
"... While Europe and Japan are failing economically at least America is at war with the second biggest power on the planet, making drastic moves justified in the face of a national emergency. ..."
"... I imagine now that John Maynard Keynes'ghost, if it were observing our current global political and economic affairs, would be having a laugh. It was Keynes who suggested the notion of International trade using a common trading currency created purely for International trade purposes, in a system in which nations would not be allowed to build up continuous balance-of-payments surpluses or deficits over several years, but would be required to spend their surpluses on countries forced to go into deficit because of other countries' desires for annual surpluses, leading to trade policies or currency manipulations to achieve such a dubious goal. ..."
"... The real solution though is a different system with some global exchange medium that can not be manipulated by one country or a block of selfish countries. ..."
The U.S. is decoupling itself from China. The effects of that process hurt all global
economies. To avoid damage other countries have no choice but to decouple themselves from the
U.S.
Today's Washington Post front page leads with a highly misleading headline:
It was China, not Trump, which retaliated. Trump reacted to that with a tweet-storm and by
intensifying
the trade war he started . The piece under the misleading headline
even says that :
President Trump demanded U.S. companies stop doing business with China and announced he
would raise the rate of tariffs on Beijing Friday, capping one of the most extraordinary
days in the long-running U.S.-China trade war. ... The day began with Beijing's announcement that it would impose new tariffs on $75 billion
in goods, including reinstated levies on auto products, starting this fall. It came to a
close Friday afternoon with Trump tweeting that he would raise the rate of existing and
planned tariffs on China by 5 percentage points.
Beijing's tariff retaliation was delivered with strategic timing, hours before an
important address by Powell, and as Trump prepared to depart for the G-7 meeting in
Biarritz.
After Trump's move the stock markets had a sad. Trade wars are, at least in the short
term, bad for commerce. The U.S. and the global economy are still teetering along, but will
soon be in recession.
The Trump administration is fine with that. (As is Dilbert creator
Scott
Adams (vid).)
U.S. grand strategy is to prevent other powers from becoming equals to itself or to
even surpass it. China, with with a population four times larger than the U.S., is the
country ready to do just that. It already built itself into an economic powerhouse and it is
also steadily increasing its military might.
China is thus a U.S. 'enemy' even though Trump avoided, until yesterday, to use that
term.
Over the last 20+ years the U.S. imported more and more goods from China and elsewhere
and diminishes its own manufacturing capabilities. It is difficult to wage war against
another country when one depends on that country's production capacities . The U.S. must
first decouple itself from China before it can launch the real war. Trump's trade war with
China is intended to achieve that. As Peter Lee
wrote
when the trade negotiations with China failed:
The decoupling strategy of the US China hawks is proceeding as planned. And economic pain
is a feature, not a bug. ... Failure of trade negotiations was pretty much baked in, thanks to [Trump's trade
negotiator] Lightizer's maximalist demands.
And that was fine with the China hawks.
Because their ultimate goal was to decouple the US & PRC economies, weaken the PRC,
and make it more vulnerable to domestic destabilization and global rollback.
If decoupling shaved a few points off global GDP, hurt American businesses, or pushed
the world into recession, well that's the price o' freedom.
Or at least the cost of IndoPACOM being able to win the d*ck measuring contest in East
Asia, which is what this is really all about.
Trump does not want a new trade deal with China. He wants to decouple the U.S. economy
from the future enemy. Trade wars tend to hurt all involved economies. While the decoupling
process is ongoing the U.S. will likely suffer a recession.
Trump is afraid that a downturn in the U.S. could lower his re-election chances. That
is why he wants to use the Federal Reserve Bank to douse the economy with more money without
regard for the long term consequences. That is the reason why the first part of his tweet
storm yesterday was
directed at Fed chief Jay Powell:
In his order for U.S. companies to withdraw from China, some close to the administration
saw the president embracing the calls for an economic decoupling made by the hawks inside
his administration.
The evidence of the shift may have been most apparent in a 14-word tweet in which Trump
appeared to call Xi an "enemy."
"My only question is, who is our bigger enemy, Jay Powell or Chairman Xi?" he said in a
Tweet posted after Powell gave a speech in Jackson Hole that contained implicit criticism
of Trump's trade policies and their impact on the U.S. and global economies.
Jay Powell does not want to lower the Fed interest rate. He does not want to increase bond
buying, i.e. quantitative easing. Interest rates are already too low and to further decrease
them has its own danger. The last time the Fed ran a too-low interest rate policy it caused
the 2008 crash and a global depression.
Expect Trump to fire Powell should he not be willing to follow his command. The U.S. will
push up its markets no matter what.
From Powell's perspective there is an additional danger in lowering U.S. interest
rates. When the U.S. runs insane economic and monetary policies U.S. allies will also want
decouple themselves - not from China but from the U.S. The 2008 experience demonstrated that
the U.S. dollar as the global reserve and main trade currency is dangerous for all who use
it. Currently any hickup in the U.S. economy leads to large scale recessions
elsewhere.
That is why even long term U.S. ally Britain warns of such danger and
looks for a way
out :
Bank of England Governor Mark Carney took aim at the U.S. dollar's "destabilising" role
in the world economy on Friday and said central banks might need to join together to create
their own replacement reserve currency.
The dollar's dominance of the global financial system increased the risks of a liquidity
trap of ultra-low interest rates and weak growth, Carney told central bankers from around
the world gathered in Jackson Hole, Wyoming, in the United States. ... Carney warned that very low equilibrium interest rates had in the past coincided with wars,
financial crises and abrupt changes in the banking system. ... China's yuan represented the most likely candidate to become a reserve currency to match
the dollar, but it still had a long way to go before it was ready.
The best solution would be a diversified multi-polar financial system, something that
could be provided by technology, Carney said.
Carney speaks of a "new Synthetic Hegemonic Currency (SHC)" which, in a purely
electronic form, could be created by a contract between the central banks of most or all
countries. It would replace the dollar as the main trade currency and lower the risk for
other economies to get infected by U.S. sicknesses (and manipulations).
Carney did not elaborate further but is an interesting concept. The devil will be, as
always, in the details. Will one be able to pay ones taxes in that currency? How will the
value of each sovereign currency in relation to SHC be determined?
That the U.S. dollar is used as a global reserve currency under the Bretton Woods
system is, in the words of the former French Minister of Finance Valéry Giscard
d'Estaing, an "exorbitant privilege". It if wants to keep that privilege it will have to go
back to sane economic and monetary policies. Otherwise the global economy will have no choice
but to decouple from it.
Posted by b on August 24, 2019 at 19:22 UTC |
Permalink
"The 2008 experience demonstrated that the U.S. dollar as the global reserve
and main trade currency is dangerous for all who use it. Currently any hickup in the U.S.
economy leads to large scale recessions elsewhere."
It has also become a primary tool for the US to assert extraterritorial jurisdiction over
the world to enforce extreme uses of sanctions, as in blowing up the Iran deal. Already the
EU has explored ways to get around that to work with Iran.
The over use of sanctions, and abuse of the US financial position in order to govern
others, reinforces the desire to deal with fears that dependence on the dollar risks
vulnerability to economic depression due to US irresponsibility.
The US is creating a perfect storm for the dollar, with is exactly what it would take to
make others undertake the expense and difficulty of replacing it as the world reserve
currency and presumed standard of exchange.
No one currency is quite as good now, but one could be improved, or a basket approach
could be used. In the ancient world, they used such a nominal currency as a standard by which
to value real currencies. We could again.
Trump does not want a new trade deal with China. He wants to decouple the U.S. economy
from the future enemy.
That may well be what is going on here. Something between total insanity and managed
insanity. The next president will unravel all of this in a year or so of effort. That is what
is so damaging. No business can plan on what is next. No policy is long term.
This is pure Trumpian logic unhinged. Hit them twice as hard as they hit you. I would not
dare to guess who is winding him up and pointing him in this direction. Trump has had one of
his busiest weeks yet.
I see Elisabeth Warren's crowd sizes are getting very large. I will feel better when no
one shows up to a Trump rally. China has time to wait this out and the ability to raise some
chaos on their own to help undermine Trump.
Sorry guys, it was the realization that the Empire had driven Russia into China's arms
that sparked the 'get tough' attitude on China.
The Empire HAD TO isolate China but their horrendous treatment of Russia provided an
opportunity for China to escape the coming 'smack down' by joining with Russia to challenge
Western global domination.
As usual, it is us 'little people that will suffer for the mistakes of our elites. And
elite propaganda means that most will suffer in silence, not realizing what really
happened.
It should be clear by now that elite adventurism is a choice that is not subject to
democratic controls. The sheeple will sleepwalk into WWIII.
Silver lining? Maybe a multi-lateral world saves us from the the more terrible dystopia of
a unilateral world.
I just had a thought. The USSA has been doing it all wrong for all these decades. There are
at least two responses the USSA could have applied to the obviously impending debacle of
simply allowing the Chinese to thoroughly undermine its industrial system. The most obvious
response would have been tariffs, which could be perceived as an aggressive policy, but
certainly not as the outright aggression of sanctions.
Or probably even much better, a 'negative sales tax' on USSA manufactured products, which
could in no way be perceived as aggressive at all. Note that there is (I presume) a vast
difference between simply subsidizing companies (since subsidies coud then flow directly into
the pockets of the companies' capitalists) and providing the companies' customers with a
'negative tax' on USSA produced products (basically an instant rebate). This could
effectively provide price parity for the goods produced for the two countries, and could
maintain the viability of the USSA manufacturing system.
But... no, we didn't do anything like that. Our Harvard trained economics geniuses hatched
the 'far superior' strategy of 'quantitative easing'. They simply eased all the money out of
the system and into the absurdly deep pockets of the oligarchs, supposedly in order to 'save
the system'. What a masterful strategy! So the options are all used up, and theres no sane
way forward. Great job.
So here's my plan. First, of course, we 'take care of' the lawyers. Well... no. First we
we bulldoze Harvard. Then we institute the mother of all class action lawsuits, the 99% as
plaintiffs and the 1% as defendants, and we clean them out (they will surely run off to
China, but good riddance). We will be left with all their fake money, but at least we can try
to start over.
From the article linked above...Just another model of political technology,....and of
civilization....
Titled 'Green is gold: the strategy and actions to China´s ecological civilization',
the plan that was analyzed during the UNEA assembly explains, in its beginning, its
starting point and destination: "Enjoying a beautiful house, a blue sky, a green land and
clean water is the dream of any Chinese citizen and, therefore, the center of the Chinese
dream (...) To achieve this vision, the government has decided to highlight the concept of
eco-civilization and incorporate it into every aspect of the economy, politics, culture and
social development of the country."
Definitely, a different political technology from that of Bannon...
Dianxi Xiaoge's YouTube channel is contemporary political technology at its finest.
Recommended viewing for all future world leaders.
Can one really get rid of one without just getting a new master? Contributor@4
Why not? Progress is not inevitable but it is possible.
The US ruling class cannot grow out of its desire to extend its rule to the rest of the
planet. But humanity is not as malleable as the American people-with their dreams of sharing
in the dividends when America (Great Again) (aka its ruling class) orders the rest of the
world around and exploits everyone the way that it exploits the working people in the United
States.
Somehow the profits of Empire never quite trickle down to the people who do the work
and man the armies.
Elsewhere, however the dream of ruling the planet either never occurred or was grown out of.
And people would be very happy to live good lives and make the earth a better place for
future generations.
Spot on in the first part of article about the inevitable new Cold War between China and
America and the serious fallout from the breakup of close economic ties. But not so good on
the second half wherein America central bankers are acting "insane"
while the rest of the developed world looks on in horror. Are you forgetting most of the
interest rates in Europe are now negative?
Are you not aware that the Bank of Japan basically owns 70% of the Japanese stock market in
the from of ETFs? America is way behind the curve when it comes to complete surrender to
"market forces." Trump wants Powell to play catchup now that it's game on with China. While
Europe and Japan are failing economically at least America is at war with the second biggest
power on the planet, making drastic moves justified in the face of a national emergency.
China is a bigger threat to America than Russia ever was because their economic model has
been so successful compared to the U.S. This is made more so because we no longer have a
government per se, only competing economic forces, while the Chinese have a government that
runs everything. If they lose this war, they still have a system. If we lose this war, we
lose everything.
I imagine now that John Maynard Keynes'ghost, if it were observing our current global
political and economic affairs, would be having a laugh. It was Keynes who suggested the
notion of International trade using a common trading currency created purely for
International trade purposes, in a system in which nations would not be allowed to build up
continuous balance-of-payments surpluses or deficits over several years, but would be
required to spend their surpluses on countries forced to go into deficit because of other
countries' desires for annual surpluses, leading to trade policies or currency manipulations
to achieve such a dubious goal.
The EU would be looking very different as a result, without a southern zone of debtor
nations with unstable economies and high unemployment, and a northern zone of smug nations
with full employment whose social welfare programs depend on an army of unemployed southerner
immigrants willing to work for peanuts.
When an American claims China has been behaving unfairly, what they really mean is that the
Chinese played America's rigged game and ended up outsmarting the dealer.
Why would others want to de-couple from US? What difference it would make to UK or other
EU vassals to serve FED/petro-dollar or to serve CCP/petro-yuan? Can one really get rid of
one without just getting a new master?
Posted by: Contributor | Aug 24 2019 20:02 utc | 4
The US$ is overvalued because there is, as it is the global reserve currency, a higher
demand for it than otherwise justifiable. In consequence U.S. companies buy up companies in
UK and Europe with an overvalued dollar. When the Fed lowers the price for US$ loans it
increases that effect. The Fed also creates bubbles, see the mortgage crisis, and the
currently overvalued stock markets, that have effects on foreign countries.
Said differently: The U.S. abuses is 'exorbitant privilege'. The hope is that China would
be less inclined to do so.
The real solution though is a different system with some global exchange medium that can
not be manipulated by one country or a block of selfish countries.
Here is an
interesting article entitled "The Dialectic of Globalization," that raises several important
questions pertaining to the phenomenon of globalism from the end of colonialism to the height
of "transnationalism" with the end of the cold war.
I can just about agree with its conclusions and provide my own opinion as to the end of
the "dialectic of globalism," that Trump seems to have, whether wittingly or not, ushered
into its next phase.
International neoliberalism needs vast amounts of regulating, but I do not believe that
Supranational governing agencies will be able to do this fairly and in the light of day. The
only other option then is to reassert state-controlled notions of legality which is what vast
proportions of the west seems to be clamoring for as can be seen with the
Trump-phenomenon.
Starting on
October 1st, the
250 BILLION
DOLLARS of goods
and products from
China, currently
being taxed at
25%, will be taxed
at 30%.
Additionally, the
remaining 300
BILLION DOLLARS of
goods and products
from China, that
was being taxed
from September 1st
at 10%, will now
be taxed at 15%.
From the same flaw the western MSM must suffer: did the NYT really expected China would
just treat Trump like a child, wait for him to lose the 2020 election and suddenly make
amends with the USA?
Did it really think this trade war was just a bad taste joke? Did it really think China
would just cave in in order to "defend globalisation"?
Do they really think of America as some kind of transcendental, abstract idea, and not a
concrete entity made of real human beings?
China announces tit for tat tariffs as yuan sinks to new low against the dollar.
Also sinking is Trump's popularity among US voters. AP has him at 36% approval versus 62%
disapproval. Remarkably, Trump's highest mark of 46% approval is for his handling of the
economy.
A no deal Brexit which Trump supports is just the thing to set off a recession in the EU
which spreads to Asia and the US.
What will his approval rating be then?
donkeytale , Aug 23 2019 13:43 utc |
86vk , Aug
23 2019 13:47 utc |
87
Wrong configuration from the last post (#85). I politely ask the administer to delete it.
The plan to retaliate against President Trump's tariffs suggests that neither side in the
trade war is prepared to back down.
I doubted this theory for a very long time, but now I'm beginning to believe it: Americans
really don't think they are responsible for the politicians they elect. They expect the rest
of the world to interpret any wrongdoings of their country as individual flaws of random
politicians. They expect the rest of the world to swallow the abuses by their POTUS under the
idea that they will elect another one the next election cycle. They expect the rest of the
world to be suportive, loyal and patient with their contry forever.
From the same flaw the western MSM must suffer: did the NYT really expected China would
just treat Trump like a child, wait for him to lose the 2020 election and suddenly make
amends with the USA? Did it really think this trade war was just a bad taste joke? Did it
really think China would just cave in in order to "defend globalisation"? Do they really
think of America as some kind of transcendental, abstract idea, and not a concrete entity
made of real human beings? Are they really that dense?
"The Democrats could up their game by taking a deeper look into this issue." you mean the CIA democrats like Mark Warner? the
US has nothing to offer the world except war, which is why the people of the US must destroy this country. there is 1000% bipartisan
agreement on the war drive against both china & russia. both parties spend their days yelling at each other about who is the most
commie, like Moscow Mitch or Comrade Nancy, b/c they are unified in their war drive. as they are on anything else that matters.
this country exists to wage war, as the platform for projection of power, against competitors. nothing else. the illusion that
any of the operators w/in the system, any of them at all, are doing anything but crafting a persona in relation to power for self-aggrandizement,
not challenging power in the slightest, is not helpful.
b, what makes you think the Democrats are not in on the scam?
Also, just like the US funds NGOs in other countries, China too spends hugely and has bought many influential lobbyists and
think-tanks as well as media personalities and politicians in the US. Not very different than Israel lobbyists through AIPAC and
the massive Israel First big money. China influence operations in the US is likely significantly larger than US influence operations
in China since China is a closed CCP controlled system.
b wrote
"
The Democrats could up their game by taking a deeper look into this issue.
"
I agree with jb at comment #1
Yes there are "good" Democrats which are very much in the minority. The rest D/R are acolytes for the God of Mammon finance/war
based social order of the West.
Yes, we are in a very strange WWIII with lots of spinning plates and propaganda action and shedding of blood mostly where the
Western public does not "see" it
Excellent work b! Funding what on the surface appears to be a propaganda op aimed at another nation becomes a form of campaign
finance for a president's reelection campaign! I wonder how many such funds went to similar work on previous occasions?
It seems that at some point in time those within the Outlaw US Empire deemed it unimportant that other nations learn the funding
for numerous NGOs seeking to subvert them are overtly financed by the USG and are thus not NGOs at all but CIA appendages; and
that despite the overtness, the USG still claims those organizations to be legitimate NGOs.
I find it worthy in an ironic manner that the USA will soon be eclipsed by the nation it might have become had it not sought
to be a global empire. In fact, it's the very product of those Open Door policy advocates that will soon become the bane of their
descendants who opted for a financialized Free Lunch economy for themselves instead of a massively robust, resilient industrial/commercial
economy for all Americans.
Falun Gong is kinda like Scientology crossed with Amway. Get rich quick while simultaneously healing your goiters. In its best
days it was a terrible scam. Now it is just a blunt instrument that the US State Department uses to try and beat China with.
The Epoch Times' Jeff Carlson has been in the thick of uncovering the broad Democratic Party coup (in league with transnational
intelligence assets) against the Trump Presidency. Thus b's depiction here of the Dems potentially acting in the role of white
knight subverts mountains of evidence. As for Falun Gong's potential affiliations with the CIA and NED that's another quite plausible
storyline altogether.
Funny thing, after watching a Vesti News video on youtube I saw a video ad for the Epoch Times. It had a young white millennial
saying a bunch of propaganda drivel about the evil communist Chinese with regards to the Hong Kong protests.
"... "The sentiment out in farm country is getting grimmer by the day," said John Heisdorffer, the chairman of the American Soybean Association. "Our patience is waning, our finances are suffering and the stress from months of living with the consequences of these tariffs is mounting. ..."
"... The Republican senator Chuck Grassley, who represents Iowa, a state heavily reliant on agriculture, has called for a quick resolution to the dispute. "Americans understand the need to hold China accountable, but they also need to know that the administration understands the economic pain they would feel in a prolonged trade war," Grassley said in a statement. ..."
American farmers are likely to feel the pain first. Soybean exports to China collapsed last year when the trade war began, and
agricultural exports will be hit harder when, or if, the new tariffs are imposed. Farmers are also suffering from extensive flooding
that has delayed planting.
"The sentiment out in farm country is getting grimmer by the day," said John Heisdorffer, the chairman of the American Soybean
Association. "Our patience is waning, our finances are suffering and the stress from months of living with the consequences of these
tariffs is mounting."
The new round of tariffs will hit other parts of the US food industry, with beans, lentils, honey, flour, corn and oats all on
the list of goods that will be taxed.
... ... ...
The Republican senator Chuck Grassley, who represents Iowa, a state heavily reliant on agriculture, has called for a quick
resolution to the dispute. "Americans understand the need to hold China accountable, but they also need to know that the administration
understands the economic pain they would feel in a prolonged trade war," Grassley said in a statement.
Just days after Trump for the first time linked the ongoing Hong Kong protests with his
assessment of the US-China trade war, Beijing has issued an ultimatum to the White House: the
United States should not link trade negotiations with China to the Hong Kong protests,
denouncing such a move as a miscalculation.
In a short commentary published by Communist Party mouthpiece People's Daily late on Monday,
the author said that events in Hong Kong were the internal affairs of China, and linking them
with trade negotiations was a "dirty" aim.
"Making a fuss about Hong Kong will not be helpful to economic and trade negotiations
between China and the US," the commentary said. " They would be naive in thinking China would
make concessions if they played the Hong Kong card " the oped cautioned.
Chinese diplomatic observers also said Beijing considered the worsening situation in Hong
Kong a sovereignty issue and would be highly unlikely to cave to Washington's pressure.
The remarks followed a statement by US Vice-President Mike Pence on Monday which reiterated
President Donald Trump's demand to tie the largely stalled trade talks with Hong Kong's
deepening crisis, a day after hundreds of thousands of people marched peacefully in defiance of
repeated intimidation from Beijing. In an address at the Detroit Economic Club on Monday, Pence
said the Trump administration would continue to urge Beijing to resolve differences with the
protesters peacefully and warned that it would be harder for Washington to make a trade deal
with Beijing if there was violence in the former British territory. Separately, Mike Pompeo
said that China should allow Hong Kong protesters the freedom to express themselves, in what
China saw as clear interference in its own internal matters.
The Chinese article countered by saying that the top priority for Hong Kong was to stop
violence and restore order, adding that US politicians should not send the wrong message to
people creating chaos in the city. "In the face of political intimidation, we not only dare to
say no, but also take countermeasures," it warned.
Global Times, a tabloid controlled by the flagship state-run newspaper People's Daily, also
warned in an editorial on Monday that American political and public opinion elites should not
harbour the illusion they could influence China's decisions on Hong Kong.
"Because of the trade war, the US has lost the ability to impose additional pressure on
China," it said.
"The US should stop its meaningless threat of linking the China-US trade talks with the Hong
Kong problem. Beijing did not expect to quickly reach a trade deal with Washington. More
Chinese people are prepared that China and the US may not reach a deal for a long time."
Chinese analysts noted Trump appeared to have hardened his stance on Hong Kong in the past
week or so, under growing pressure from US lawmakers and extensive media coverage of the
increasingly violent protests. Indeed, it was only a month ago when we reported that "
Trump Abandoned Support For Hong Kong Protests To Revive Trade Talks With Beijing ." Now
that trade war is once again front and center, with Trump using it as leverage for further Fed
rate cuts, the US president is once again refocusing his attention on Hong Kong.
As the
SCMP writes , Trump initially focused on making a deal with China ahead of his 2020
re-election bid and adopted a hands-off approach by characterizing the protests as "riots"
which were a matter for China to handle. Over the past few days, he suggested Chinese President
Xi Jinping should resolve the situation by meeting with protest leaders and warned that any
violence in the handling of the Hong Kong crisis would exacerbate difficulties for attempts to
bring an early end to the trade war.
"Trump's about-face on Hong Kong, from being neutral to piling pressure on Beijing, is
largely due to domestic political pressure ahead of the presidential elections," said Shi
Yinhong, an international relations expert at Renmin University and an adviser to the State
Council which is China's cabinet.
" But the Hong Kong issue concerns China's sovereignty and the government's ability to
maintain stability, which in Beijing's view is of superior priority . China cannot afford to
make much compromise and will do everything to fend off interventions from abroad, in spite of
all the risks and ramifications," he said.
Despite the soured mood between China and the US over their spiralling trade war – as
well as escalating tensions over Huawei, Taiwan and other geopolitical rifts – both sides
were planning further trade talks in the coming 10 days, according to White House chief
economic adviser Larry Kudlow on Sunday.
Any progress would be virtually impossible with analysts cautioning that the US attempt to
"play the Hong Kong card" would further complicate the trade talks.
Meanwhile, in the latest significant escalation in diplomatic tensions, China responded
angrily to Washington's decision on a US$8 billion sale of F-16 fighter jets to Taiwan and
Trump's warning against Huawei citing national security threats.
"When a long list of old problems between the two countries remains unsolved, the US side
is now ramping up the pressure on Hong Kong," said Shen Dingli, a professor of US studies at
Fudan University. "China has so far refused to make concessions in the absence of adequate
mutual respect and trust and I don't think we'll have much room to compromise on Hong Kong or
other issues. We'll have to wait and see what the US would do next," he said.
Shi also said none of the flashpoints in the bilateral ties – from Hong Kong, Taiwan,
to the South China Sea and the denuclearisation of North Korea – had any easy solution in
sight, with both sides showing little willingness to cooperate and accommodate the other's
interests. He said the increasingly hardline, confrontational approach on China by Trump
– who faced mounting pressure in his bid for re-election, especially amid signs of a
looming global economic recession – would only make a trade deal increasingly
unattainable.
"Even if there were no Hong Kong crisis, could the US and China reach a trade deal? Even if
Beijing caved into Washington's pressure on Hong Kong, would it make it easier for them to
bridge their glaring differences in the trade talks and cut a deal?"
Of course not, and since Trump is far more interested in keeping trade war simmering and on
the verge of a substantial escalation if only to keep the Fed on its toes and ready for far
more aggressive rate cuts, and even "some quantitative easing", that's precisely what the US
president wants.
Trump's claim that China is paying for the tariffs is completely false and basically serves
to redirect income from his poor supporters to his wealthy supporters.
Not only that, the policy will have the consequence of further isolating the United States,
says Michael Hudson.
"Trump Is Delaying Tariffs on China for Holiday Shopping Season"
by Shira Feder...08.13.19...11:04AM ET
"The Trump administration announced Tuesday that tariffs set to be imposed Sept. 1 on
Chinese consumer products like electronics, sneakers, and video game consoles will not go
into effect until Dec. 15."...
US to Delay Some China Tariffs Until Stores Stock
Up for Holiday Shoppers https://nyti.ms/2H50NMv
NYT - Ana Swanson - August 13
The Trump administration on Tuesday narrowed the list of Chinese products it plans to
impose new tariffs on as of Sept. 1, delaying levies on cellphones, laptop computers, toys
and other consumer goods until after stores stock up for the back-to-school and holiday
shopping seasons. Stocks soared on the news.
The move, which pushed a new 10 percent tariff on some goods until Dec. 15 and spared
others entirely, came as President Trump faces mounting pressure from businesses and consumer
groups over the harm they say the continuing trade war between the United States and China is
doing.
Mr. Trump's earlier tariffs on Chinese imports were carefully crafted to hit businesses in
ways that everyday Americans would mostly not notice. But his announcement this month of the
10 percent tariff on $300 billion of Chinese goods meant consumers would soon feel the trade
war's sting more directly.
On Tuesday, Mr. Trump acknowledged as much.
"We're doing this for the Christmas season," he told reporters around noon. "Just in case
some of the tariffs would have an impact on U.S. customers." ...
... Mr. Trump's comments about the tariffs' impact on consumers followed the United States
trade representative's office announcement that while the new tariffs would take effect as
Mr. Trump had threatened, some notable items would not immediately be subject to them.
Consumer electronics, video game consoles, some toys, computer monitors and some footwear
and clothing items were among the items the trade representative's office said would not be
hit with tariffs until retailers had time to stockpile what they needed for their busiest
time of year.
The administration also said some products were being removed from the tariff list
altogether "based on health, safety, national security and other factors." A spokesman for
the trade representative's office said the products being excluded from the tariffs included
car seats, shipping containers, cranes, certain fish and Bibles and other religious
literature.
The S&P 500 climbed nearly 2 percent after the announcement, lifted partly by stocks
of retailers and computer chip producers that have been sensitive to indications that trade
tensions were getting either better or worse.
Best Buy, which gets a many of the products it sells from China, was among the
best-performing stocks in the S&P 500, up more than 8 percent in morning trading. The
Nasdaq composite index rose more than 2 percent. ...
OK, I'm having a very nerdy moment. Trying to understand why US-China bilateral trade
imbalance is so large. NOT because it's important, but just because it's kind of a puzzle; I
guess it's my inner @Brad_Setser 1/
6:39 AM - 10 Aug 2019
So last year US goods imports from China were $539.5 billion, US goods exports $120.3
billion. That's 4.5 to 1. Why so much asymmetry? I think 4 reasons: Hong Kong,
macroeconomics, value-added, and oil 2/
Hong Kong: effectively part of the Chinese economy, and the US runs a large surplus - $37
b in exports, only $6 b in imports. Basically a lot of US goods appear to enter China via HK
(something similar in Europe, where US exports to Germany go via Belgium/Netherlands) 3/
Adding HK reduces the export imbalance to "only" 3.5 to 1. Now macro: the US runs overall
trade deficit, with imports 1.5 times exports. China runs overall surplus, with imports only
0.8 exports. On some sort of gravity-ish story, this suggests ratio "should" be around 2
4/
Now add China's role as "great assembler", with value-added in exports really coming from
elsewhere; famous case of iPhone. Much less true than it used to be, but still means that
Chinese surplus is partly optical illusion 5/
Lastly, China imports a lot of oil, which means other things equal needs to run a surplus
on everything else. Used to be true of US, but with fracking we're now almost self-sufficient
in hydrocarbons (but not exporting to China) This adds a further reason for bilateral 6/
Someone with more time and patience should try to do the full accounting, but I think the
US-China bilateral can mainly be explained by "natural causes"; doesn't have much to do with
either country's trade policy 7/
I guess that Krugman is just a natural law kind of guy wherein IP protectionism and arbitrage
seeking cross border capital flows in an exorbitantly privileged global reserve currency are
just natural phenomenon like meteor showers and rain.
"... "While there were measures that could have been chosen with larger direct effects on supply chains, the announcements from Beijing represent a direct shot at the White House and seem designed for maximum political impact," Krueger said. " We expect a quick (and possibly intemperate) response from the White House, and consequently expect a more rapid escalation of trade tensions." ..."
"... In a mid-day note, Krueger added that "the next stop on the currency manipulation road is probably off the map." Krueger expects Trump's "drumbeat on currency" will get louder, with the potential for the president to use a "charge of currency manipulation to justify some combination of (more) tariffs, investment restrictions and export controls." ..."
"... Instructing state-owned Chinese firms to halt U.S. crop purchases triggered "the obligatory flight-to-quality," which pushed 10-year yields to 1.74%, with two-year yields keeping pace. That was "an impressive move that suggests August will not experience the traditional summer doldrums. Who needs vacation anyway?" ..."
"... Bank investors' eyes were "glued to the yield curve last week," with Trump's tariff tweet on Thursday, Graseck wrote in a note. They're now asking about Morgan Stanley's net interest margin (NIM), outlook. ..."
Analysts continued to warn about the dangers of an escalating trade war on Monday, as
China moved to strike back at the U.S., hitting U.S. stocks and boosting Treasuries.
Semiconductors, with direct exposure to trade, and banks stocks, which are sensitive to
interest rates, were among the decliners. The biggest U.S. banks slid, with the KBW Bank
Index dropping as much as 4.1% to the lowest since June 4. Bank of America Corp. led index
decliners, with a drop of 5.5%, the most since Dec. 4, while Citigroup Inc. shed more than 4%
and JPMorgan Chase & Co. slipped 3.8%.
Micron Technology Inc. fell 6.2% while Texas Instruments Inc. lost 4.4% and Intel Corp.
was down 4%. Apple Inc. dropped 5.6%, the most since May 13. Shares in Chinese tech giants
Alibaba Group Holding and JD.com Inc. fell near two month lows in U.S. Trading.
Agriculture equipment makers Deere & Co. and AGCO Corp. tumbled as China suspended
imports of U.S. agricultural products. The escalating trade tensions are also a major risk
for the U.S. automotive industry, which has a significant exposure to the country. According
to UBS's Global Wealth Management Chief Investment Officer Mark Haefele, the latest spat
raises the possibility that "tariffs could also be placed on auto imports."
President Donald Trump tweeted about China and the Fed on Monday morning, saying: "China
dropped the price of their currency to an almost a historic low. It's called 'currency
manipulation.' Are you listening Federal Reserve? This is a major violation which will
greatly weaken China over time!"
Here's a sample of some of the latest commentary:
Cowen, Chris Krueger
Krueger called China's retaliation "massive," adding that "on a scale of 1-10, it's an 11."
He cited the Chinese government calling on state buyers to halt U.S. agricultural purchases,
while there's "increased anecdotal evidence that the Chinese government is tightening its
overview of foreign firms."
"While there were measures that could have been chosen with larger direct effects on
supply chains, the announcements from Beijing represent a direct shot at the White House and
seem designed for maximum political impact," Krueger said. " We expect a quick (and possibly
intemperate) response from the White House, and consequently expect a more rapid escalation
of trade tensions."
"There now will be increased expectations that the Fed will cut again in September to
offset the drag caused by this escalation in the trade war," he added. "Such moves will only
be a partial, lagged offset to the recessionary headwinds a cycle of retaliation would
cause."
In a mid-day note, Krueger added that "the next stop on the currency manipulation road is
probably off the map." Krueger expects Trump's "drumbeat on currency" will get louder, with
the potential for the president to use a "charge of currency manipulation to justify some
combination of (more) tariffs, investment restrictions and export controls."
BMO, Ian Lyngen
"The wait is over for those wondering how Beijing would respond to Trump's recent tariff
announcement," BMO said. "The result: the yuan was allowed to depreciate well beyond
7.0."
Instructing state-owned Chinese firms to halt U.S. crop purchases triggered "the
obligatory flight-to-quality," which pushed 10-year yields to 1.74%, with two-year yields
keeping pace. That was "an impressive move that suggests August will not experience the
traditional summer doldrums. Who needs vacation anyway?"
"The most significant unknown at this moment," Lyngen added, "is how much further the yuan
will be allowed to fall given that it's already the weakest since 2008."
Morgan Stanley, Betsy Graseck (bank analyst)
Bank investors' eyes were "glued to the yield curve last week," with Trump's tariff tweet on
Thursday, Graseck wrote in a note. They're now asking about Morgan Stanley's net interest
margin (NIM), outlook.
Graseck didn't change her NIM assumptions -- yet. "We bake one additional cut of 25 basis
points in 2019 in-line with our economist, and bake in the 10-year at 1.75% by mid 2020," she
wrote. She'll update NIM and earnings per share estimates "if it looks like these trade
tariffs are going through as September approaches."
Morgan Stanley, Michael Zezas (policy strategist)
"The dynamics of U.S.-China negotiation and macro conditions mean the next round of tariffs
will likely be enacted, and investors are likely to behave as if further escalation will
follow in 2019 until markets price in impacts," Zezas wrote. "This supports our core view of
weaker growth and skews the Fed dovish."
Zezas sees incentives for the U.S. to escalate quickly. If the administration "understands
the Fed's trade policy reaction function, then it may also perceive that a more rapid
escalation could deliver one or more of three beneficial points ahead of the 2020 election:
1) A quicker, potentially more aggressive Fed stimulus response that could help the economy
heading into the election; 2) More time to re-frame the potential economic downside; and 3) A
major concession by China (not our base case, but it is, of course, a possibility)."
Veda, Henrietta Treyz
"The U.S. and China are moving into one of their most aggressive phases yet in the year-plus
long trade war and we fully expect things to escalate from here," Treyz wrote in a note.
Treyz added that China's ability to quickly adjust their currency is an advantage they
have over the U.S. that "goes to the heart of the issue for the Trump administration." The
administration may view China's communist regime as a "systemic advantage" versus "free
markets and democracy" in the U.S., as the Chinese can "subsidize domestic industry, quickly,
enact lower tax rates and provide stimulus."
Furthermore, her conversations with Republicans point to the belief that "China's economy
is on the brink of collapse," she said, with turmoil in Hong Kong "considered evidence of an
organic domestic uprising that many believe the Chinese government cannot contain."
Republicans may also believe Trump will "galvanize" his base behind him, while attracting
"anti-trade and union Democrats in the Rust Belt as he takes on the mantle of a war time
president going into 2020 by engaging in this trade war." ...
On Monday, China announced new tariffs on $60 billion of U.S. exports, and the United
States threatened new tariffs on up to $300 billion of Chinese goods. These actions were
cited as the principle reason for a decline of more than 600 points in the Dow Jones
industrial average, or about 2.4 percent in broader measures of the stock market. With the
total value of U.S. stocks around $30 trillion, this decline represents more than $700
billion in lost wealth.
This was not an isolated event. Again and again in the past year, markets have gyrated in
response to the state of trade negotiations between the United States and China.
The market sensitivity to threats and counter-threats in the trade war is quite
remarkable. Monday's announcement by the Chinese, for example, would be expected to raise
China's tariffs by about $10 billion. Much of this will show up as higher prices for Chinese
importers, and some of it will be avoided by diverting exports of goods such as liquid
natural gas to other markets, so the impact on U.S. corporate profits will be far less than
$10 billion. Meanwhile, U.S. tariffs are likely to raise corporate profits as higher import
costs push some business to domestic producers.
There is the further consideration that reasonable market participants should not have
entirely discounted the possibility of tariff increases Monday and that there surely remains
some chance a trade deal will be reached. So, in fact, the market should not even have moved
in full proportion to the change in corporate profitability associated with new tariffs.
There is a revealing puzzle here. Events whose direct impact on corporate profits is a few
billion dollars seem to be driving market fluctuations that change the total value of
corporations by hundreds of billions of dollars. To be sure, there would be many ways of
refining my calculation of the profit impact to recognize various feedbacks, and certainly
the imposition of tariffs increases uncertainty, which in general depresses markets. But with
any plausible calculation of the direct impact of tariff changes on profitability or
uncertainty about profitability, it is not possible to justify the kinds of changes in market
value we observed Monday or on many other days when there was news about the status of the
U.S.-China trade negotiations.
Part of the answer to the puzzle, I suspect, lies in markets' tendency to sometimes
overreact to news, especially in areas where they do not have long experience. This idea is
supported by the tendency illustrated by the market's Tuesday rally, which took place without
any particularly encouraging U.S.-China developments.
A larger part of the answer probably lies in the idea that the current trade conflict is a
possible prelude to a far larger conflict between the two nations with the largest economies
and greatest power for as far as can be foreseen. When it appears less likely that a conflict
over well-defined and ultimately not-that-difficult commercial issues can be resolved,
rational observers conclude that it is also less likely the United States and China can
manage issues ranging from 5G wireless technology to North Korea, from the future of Taiwan
to global climate change, and from the management of globalization to the security
architecture of the Pacific region.
A world where relations between the United States and China are largely conflictual could
involve a breakdown of global supply chains, a splinternet (as separate, noninteroperable
internets compete around the world), greatly increased defense expenditures and conceivably
even military conflict. All of this would be catastrophic for living standards and would also
have huge adverse effects on the value of global companies.
It is, I suspect, the greater risk of catastrophic medium-run outcomes, rather than the
proximate impact of trade conflicts, that is driving the outsize market reactions to trade
negotiation news.
This carries with it an important lesson for both sides: It is risky to turn the pursuit
of even vital national objectives into an existential crusade. Rather, even when nations have
objectives that are in conflict, it is important to seek compromise, to avoid inflammatory
rhetoric and to confine rather than enlarge the areas where demands are being made.
Establishing credibility that promises will be kept and surprises will be avoided is as or
more important with adversaries as with friends.
As the Trump administration carries on the trade negotiations, and as the presidential
campaign heats up, Americans will do well to remember that there is no greater threat to the
success of our national enterprise over the next quarter-century than mismanagement of the
relationship with China. It is not just possible but essential to be strong and resolute
without being imprudent and provocative.
As has long been expected, the White House is preparing to release a new rule on Wednesday barring
government agencies from buying equipment or doing any kind of business with Chinese telecoms giant
Huawei - ratcheting up tensions between the world's two largest economies at an already precarious
time for the global economy.
The Trump administration is expected to release a rule Wednesday afternoon that bans agencies
from directly purchasing telecom, video surveillance equipment or services from Huawei.
The prohibition was mandated by Congress as part of a broader defense bill signed into law last
year.
"The administration has a strong commitment to defending our nation from foreign
adversaries, and will fully comply with Congress on the implementation of the prohibition of
Chinese telecom and video surveillance equipment, including Huawei equipment,"
said
Jacob Wood, a spokesman for the Office of Management and Budget.
Per CNBC, the new rule is expected to take effect a week from Wednesday, and it applies not only
to Huawei, but also to a list of other telecom companies that have drawn security concerns, such as
ZTE and Hikvision.
The official said contractors will be able to seek waivers from individual federal agencies if
they believe their business with any of the targeted companies should be exempt from the rule.
Moreover, the new rule will also set a deadline of August 2020 for a broader ban
on
federal contractors doing business with Huawei and other firms.
The law passed by Congress is separate from the Trump Administration's own efforts to keep
Huawei in check.
The Commerce Department instigated the tensions between the US and China after it placed Huawei
on a blacklist that effectively bans the company from buying goods or doing any kind of business
with Huawei. A 90-day grace period that kept Huawei off the blacklist temporarily is now almost
over. And President Trump has apparently walked back his promised, made at the G-20 Summit in
Osaka, to ease the pressure on Huawei.
However, US chipmakers and tech firms can request waivers, and the CEOs of Google, Qualcomm,
Micron, Intel and others met with President Donald Trump at the White House last month and urged
the administration to issue those decisions quickly.
In an interview on CNBC, Huawei CSO Andy Purdy defended the company's track record, arguing that
European leaders in the UK and Germany had told their counterparts in the US that they had found no
evidence that Huawei was a security threat.
"We have tested the products of all vendors to international standards so that there's
trust through verification,"
Purdy said.
All Chinese government agencies
will be prohibited from buying CISCO and other American
telecommunications products. Furthermore, contractors dealing with
Chinese government agencies will also be so prohibited from buying
American telecom products.
America - population 329 million. Economic growth rate: 2.8%
China - population 1.4 billion. Economic growth rate: 6.5%
source:
Wikipedia
China is rapidly industrializing, and has the largest
manufacturing base in the world. The USA is already a mature
industrial economy, and since NAFTA has offshored most of its
manufacturing base. The USA leads the world in the design,
manufacture and export of weapons, but relies on coercive
political relationships (such as NATO) rather than the "free
market" to sell its overpriced and line of products to captive
satellite countries. China is rapidly expanding in the weapons
manufacturing sphere, as is Russia, and offer increasingly
competitive products at lower prices, and with fewer political
strings attached.
Something to think about before breastbeating and cheering
ourselves on.
Trump is getting the **** kicked out of him on CNBC and every
Financial media on the internet. When China dug in, that was the
end of the Trump bluff. For the first time, the absurd articles
about China losing are gone and now the new reality is that China
is going to squeeze the life out of Trump.
Huawei is just
another of Trump's wayward policies of getting Canadian poodles to
kidnap Huawei's founder's daughter. Nice dirty **** Trump. Women
already hate Trump this ices that cake.
Last week Huawei overtook Apple as the second largest smart
phone maker. Huawei announced it no longer had any dependence on
US manufacturers for 5G, another body blow to the blowhard.
Dozens of certifying agencies have no studied Huawei products
and have found zero instances of spyware or any instance of this
hardware being used for spying. In short, Trump and the NSA and
CIA look like a bunch of assholes. This will only accelerate
Huawei's 5G rollout.
Trump is being **** canned in every direction. The great part
of Trump von hitler's personality is that he knows his 10% Sept
Tariffs were essentially the end of his presidency, but is too
arrogant to reverse course. Instead, he is screaming at the Fed
for more loose money to support his bad policies. And he wants
more Farmer WELFARE. That dog don't hunt!
China is not going to roll over over for Trump. The financial
media is now tearing Trump a new ******* every hour. Markets are
not responding to Trump plunge team efforts. They continue to sell
off.
Where's the endgame they ask? This is the same deal as Trump
closing down the gov for nothing. Trumptards cheered as the orange
idiot painted himself in the corner and accomplished nothing. Not
one inch of wall has been constructed since Trump took office.
Trump floats on a raft of ********. Meanwhile Trump has a 20 year
history of hiring Illegals for Trump Organization. Total Fraud and
self dealer.
The GOP is now climbing the walls. Today Trump Screamed at the
Fed to reduce rates emergently and then said it had nothing to do
with China. Astonishing.
When China put an end to US Ag purchases effective immediately
they were basically saying they were tired of Trump's ********.
The farmer associations are turning on Trump round the clock.
Where is Trump? He's hiding out. But of course this has NOTHING to
do with China.
But here is Trump once again playing the phony national
Security card with Huawei when a dozen independent organizations
have published reports and cleared Huawei of the Trump
Administration's phony security claims.
Huawei Honor smartphones and tablets are really good. The top
models are even better than iPhones.
There were some Chinese
smartphones at Best Buy the last time I checked.
But I just bought the 128Gb Lenovo Zuk for $280 from Banggoog a
couple years ago when it was on sale. It's a little problematic to
update Android, but it works perfectly anyway. There is a forum
for Lenovo phones, though, with all answers.
Poland's state security agency arrested Huawei sales
director Wang Weijing and a Polish national over spying.
Dongfan Chung The 74-year-old former Boeing Co. engineer was
convicted in July of six counts of economic espionage and
other federal charges for keeping 300,000 pages of sensitive
papers in his home
Chi Mak He copied and sent sensitive documents on U.S.
Navy ships, submarines and weapons to China by courier.
Don't waste my time. A 20 second google search shows you
have no point, but the one on the top of your head.
Thus, Given the Chinese government's record on espionage,
"a good-faith assertion from Andy is not enough."
"In Huawei's
carrier business
, H1 sales revenue
reached CNY146.5 billion, with steady growth in production and
shipment of equipment for wireless networks, optical
transmission, data communications, IT, and related product
domains. To date, Huawei has secured 50 commercial 5G contracts
and has shipped more than 150,000 base stations to markets
around the world.
In Huawei's
enterprise business
, H1 sales revenue was
CNY31.6 billion. Huawei continues to enhance its ICT portfolio
across multiple domains, including cloud, artificial
intelligence, campus networks, data centers, Internet of
Things, and intelligent computing. It remains a trusted
supplier for government and utility customers, as well as
customers in commercial sectors like finance, transportation,
energy, and automobile.
In Huawei's
consumer business
, H1 sales revenue hit
CNY220.8 billion. Huawei's smartphone shipments (including
Honor phones) reached 118 million units, up
24% YoY
. The
company also saw rapid growth in its shipments of tablets, PCs,
and wearables. Huawei is beginning to scale its device
ecosystem to deliver a more seamless intelligent experience
across all major user scenarios. To date, the Huawei Mobile
Services ecosystem has more than 800,000 registered developers,
and 500 million users worldwide.
"Revenue grew fast up through May," said Liang. "Given the
foundation we laid in the first half of the year, we continue
to see growth even after we were added to the entity list.
That's not to say we don't have difficulties ahead. We do, and
they may affect the pace of our growth in the short term."
He added, "But we will stay the course. We are fully
confident in what the future holds, and we will continue
investing as planned – including a total of CNY120 billion in
R&D this year. We'll get through these challenges, and we're
confident that Huawei will enter a new stage of growth after
the worst of this is behind us."
WHAT A DUMB ****!: Thanks!!! That makes me 3 times
smarter than you because Huawei subcontractors do sell
Huawei products in the USA. You are an ignorant Asian
that should go back to his village and the one room
dirt floor hut... LOL
I'd be the first to say that I don't know everything about this
telecom but I will say this seems like a reasonable decision on
it's face for the US government not to put in Chinese
telecommunications equipment. Of course China is going to not like
it because with Hillary she just gave them direct access to damn
near anything through her email server.
First, Trump coerced the Fed into lowering interest rates which made US Dollars cheaper to
buy then he increased domestic taxation 10% though increasing the tariff on selected Chinese
goods. China then blocks the importation of all US foodstuffs and lowers the price of the
Yuan an amount equal to the tariff increase--and the US treasury and Trump have the gall to
call China the currency manipulator! NO, as usual with the Outlaw US Empire, it's accusations
are psychological projection of what itself does. Hudson discusses it
here . US financial markets have finally awakened to Trump's moves and have fallen 5%
over the last three trading days, with more likely to follow. Hudson on Trump:
"It's all a diversion so that people won't look at what's really happening, only at what
Trump is saying. But as people find that they have to pay higher prices, I don't think
they'll believe Trump. I think he's lost all credibility. That's why the stock market's
collapsing. They're aghast. They think that even Trump can't get away with this big a lie
when it's so obviously false."
As I commented last Friday on the AP article my local paper ran about the tariff hike, it
finally told the truth about who'll pay--US Consumers or China: US Consumers! AP, All
Propaganda, tore a gapping hole into Trump's narrative--but will people believe a media
outlet that's lied so often?
Trump can't win his global trade war. China won't capitulate; it's economy and society are
100x healthier than the Outlaw US Empire's and are resilient where the USA can only claim to
have been once upon a time. Why that is has been explained before. The transcript of this
interview's poor, but the topic covers the
answer by showing how Canada's economy became a victim of the same predators as the
USA's.
We know what happened, how and why. What we don't know how to do is reverse the situation
politically. Hudson compares the dire situation to that of Rome:
"So they obviously, the left-wingers such as Bernie Sanders, want to run for president as
a kind of educational campaign to make their policy clear to the people, but they know that
there's no way in which the ruling class will let them win.
"It's been very clear, if they did win, they would be assassinated very quickly. I've been
told that by presidential candidates. The threat is, you'll never be president, we have ways
of keeping you out, and should you succeed, we will do to you what the Romans did to every
advocate of democracy century after century, assassination."
It seems the best those of us residing within the Outlaw US Empire can hope for is that
Trump's policies will decimate US financial institutions worse than what occurred in 2008.
Hudson's perspective:
"I don't see any popular movement yet. You can very easily see why collapse is
inevitable....
"There's no way of knowing when there will be a break in the chain of payment. Usually
it's a bankruptcy of a big company, very often by fraud, as the 2008 crisis was bank mortgage
fraud. You don't know when people will fight back. Often, surprisingly, they only fight back
when things are getting better. But things still have a way to go to get much worse in
Canada, much worse in the United States, so I don't see any possibility of reform within the
next 4 to 8 years."
However, all that is about to change, because as Bank of America team of economists writes,
Trump's latest tariff announcement from last Thursday, when the president shockingly unveiled
10% tariffs on $300BN in Chinese imports starting September 1, "is a major escalation." The
reason for this is that past measures had mostly avoided consumer goods. By contrast, the
threatened tariffs would cover $120bn of consumer goods, out of $300bn in total, and since BofA
expects the tariffs to be implemented, either on schedule or later this year, the period of
dormant trade war inflation is about to end with a bang, not a whimper.
... ... ...
Was Trump's announcement a negotiating tactic?
For the past year, one of the points of
biggest contention among economists and traders is that despite what is now a 1+ year trade war
with China, inflation due to higher tariffs has been strangely missing, with some claiming that
the goods targeted in previous tariff rounds were either not "consumer" enough, or simply had
more affordable substitutes from other, non-Chinese supply chains, allowing US consumer to
avoid having higher prices passed upon them.
However, all that is about to change, because as Bank of America team of economists writes,
Trump's latest tariff announcement from last Thursday, when the president shockingly unveiled
10% tariffs on $300BN in Chinese imports starting September 1, "is a major escalation." The
reason for this is that past measures had mostly avoided consumer goods. By contrast, the
threatened tariffs would cover $120bn of consumer goods, out of $300bn in total, and since BofA
expects the tariffs to be implemented, either on schedule or later this year, the period of
dormant trade war inflation is about to end with a bang, not a whimper.
"... As the U.S. administration is ready to impose a 10 percent tariff on the remaining 300 billion U.S. dollars of Chinese imports, its sincerity in reaching a mutually beneficial trade deal with Beijing that can accommodate each other's major concerns has gone bust. It seems that in the eyes of Washington's China hawks, trade talks are no more than a formality with which to rip China off. ..."
"... While the White House is boasting about taxing China until a trade deal is reached, it should keep in mind that China will only accept a win-win agreement on the basis of mutual respect and equal treatment. ..."
"... Beijing's position has been consistent and clear: China does not want a trade war, but it is not afraid of one and will fight one if necessary. ..."
"... It is therefore hoped that Washington should drop its fantasy to bring Beijing down to its knees with its same and old tricks of maximun pressure. If it truly wants a deal, then they will need to show some real sincerity first. ..."
Despite calling the just-concluded China-U.S. trade talks in
Shanghai "constructive" and hoping for more "positive dialogue," the White House on Thursday
announced plans to impose extra tariffs on Chinese imports from Sept. 1.
Washington's unilateral escalation of trade disputes is a serious breach of trust after the
two sides reached in June consensus to restart trade talks on the basis of equality and mutual
respect.
Apart from undermining the momentum of the newly resumed China-U.S. trade talks, the U.S.
flip-flopping again exemplifies Washington's untrustworthiness in striking a deal and its
disturbing propensity for bullying.
The U.S. administration should bear in mind that its bullying and tariff threat, which has
not worked in the past, will not work this time.
For over a year, the U.S.-initiated trade disputes with China have bogged down not just
economic growth of the two countries but that of the whole world. Meanwhile, an increasingly
capricious Washington is harming the current world order with more uncertainties.
As the U.S. administration is ready to impose a 10 percent tariff on the remaining 300
billion U.S. dollars of Chinese imports, its sincerity in reaching a mutually beneficial trade
deal with Beijing that can accommodate each other's major concerns has gone bust. It seems that
in the eyes of Washington's China hawks, trade talks are no more than a formality with which to
rip China off.
Also, the new twist in China-U.S. trade talks shows that some Washington politicians are
trying to play tough against China on trade matters and gain cheap political points as the new
cycle of U.S. presidential election is looming.
Unlike previous rounds of taxing Chinese imports, the U.S. administration this time is
targeting a wide swath of consumer goods, and therefore, is "using American families as a
hostage" in its trade negotiations, according to Matt Priest, president of the Footwear
Distributors and Retailers of America.
While the White House is boasting about taxing China until a trade deal is reached, it
should keep in mind that China will only accept a win-win agreement on the basis of mutual
respect and equal treatment.
Beijing's position has been consistent and clear: China does not want a trade war, but it is
not afraid of one and will fight one if necessary.
In response to Washington's tariff assaults since March 2018, China has had to take forceful
counter measures. This instance will be no exception.
Still, Beijing remains committed to handling its trade problems with Washington as long as
the settlement is based on mutual respect and equality, and conform to China's core interests.
China, which still sees a steady economic growth and boasts enormous potential for further
development, will always find a way to withstand any pressure if there no deal is reached.
It is therefore hoped that Washington should drop its fantasy to bring Beijing down to its
knees with its same and old tricks of maximun pressure. If it truly wants a deal, then they
will need to show some real sincerity first.
he war of words between the world's top superpowers is getting more heated by the hour.
China's new ambassador to the United Nations, Zhang Jun, said on Friday that if the United
States wanted to fight China on trade, "then we will fight" and warned that Beijing was
prepared to take countermeasures over new U.S. tariffs, Reuters reports.
"China's position is very clear that if U.S. wishes to talk, then we will talk, if they want
to fight, then we will fight," he told reporters. Calling Trump latest tariff announcement an
"irrational, irresponsible act", Jun said that China "definitely will take whatever necessary
countermeasures to protect our fundamental right, and we also urge the United States to come
back to the right track in finding the right solution through the right way." The ambassador
also took a stab at the disintegration of good relations between the US and North Korea (with
Beijing's blessing no doubt), saying that "you cannot simply ask DPRK to do as much as possible
while you maintain the sanctions against DPRK, that definitely is not helpful" Yun said siding
the the Kim regime. It was more than obvious who the "you" he referred to was.
Pouring more salt on the sound, the Chinese diplomat said North Korea should be encourage,
and "we think at an appropriate time there should be action taken to ease the sanctions",
explicitly taking Pyongyang's side in the ongoing diplomatic saga between Kim and Trump.
When asked if China's trade relations with the United States could harm cooperation between
the countries on dealing with North Korea, Zhang said it would be difficult to predict. He
added: "It will be hard to imagine that on the one hand you are seeking the cooperation from
your partner, and on the other hand you are hurting the interests of your partner."
As North Korea's ally and neighbor, China's role in agreeing to and enforcing international
sanctions on the country over its nuclear and ballistic missile programs has been crucial.
However, it is what he said last that was most notable, as it touched on what will likely be
the next big geopolitical swan, namely Hong Kong. To wit, Jun said that while Beijing is
willing to cooperate with UN member states, it will never allow interference in "internal
affairs" such as the controversial regions of Xinjiang and Tibet, and - last but not least -
Hong Kong.
And in the latest warning to the defiant financial capital of the Pacific Rim, Jun virtually
warned that a Chinese incursion is now just a matter of time, he said that Hong Kong protests
are "really turning out to be chaotic and violent and we should no longer allow them to
continue this reprehensible behavior."
President Donald Trump's threat Thursday to put 10% tariffs on the remaining $300 billion of Chinese imports that aren't subject
to his existing levies
sent markets tumbling from Asia to Europe and in the U.S. on Friday. The new tax would hit American consumers, and businesses
are going to face even more
supply disruptions . China has already vowed to retaliate if Trump follows through.
Bloomberg Economics ' initial estimate of the
additional costs of U.S. tariffs and Chinese retaliation sees both economies taking a 0.2% hit to GDP by 2021.
Meanwhile, a simmering trade fight between Japan and South Korea
is boiling over , putting the health of two Asian export powers at stake. In Europe, concerns are mounting for a
hard U.K. exit from the European Union.
The week ended with fresh numbers out of Washington that show
U.S. trade actually declined during the first
six months of the year as exports flattened out.
The global smartphone bust is currently underway
(has been for some time) - but
there's a new, surprising trend that could highlight one reason why the Trump administration has
waged economic war against China.
First, let's start with the global smartphone shipment data
from the
International Data
Corporation
(IDC) Worldwide Quarterly Mobile Phone Tracker.
This new data details how worldwide smartphone shipments fell 2.3% in 2Q19 YoY. It also states
that smartphone manufacturers shipped 333.2 million phones in 2Q19, which was up 6.5% QoQ.
An escalating trade war between the US and China contributed to sharp declines in shipments in
both countries over the last year. However, the declines weren't nearly as severe as expected in
China over 1H19 versus 1H18, suggesting that three years of a smartphone bust in Asia could be
nearing a recovery phase. Asia/Pacific (excluding Japan and China) maintained solid momentum in 2Q
YoY, with shipments up 3% in the quarter fueled by Southeast Asia markets.
The surprising trend IDC detected is that Huawei surpassed Apple in 2Q19, making it the
first time in seven years that Samsung and Apple weren't the top smartphones manufactures in the
world.
Now it seems that a South Korea company [Samsung] and a Chinese company [Huawei] are the world
leaders in smartphone shipments, something that has irritated the Trump administration.
Samsung ranked No.1 with 75.5 million shipments in 2Q19, a 5.5% YoY increase. Huawei was No.2
with 58.7 million shipments in 2Q19, a 8.3% YoY jump. Apple was No.3 with 33.8 million shipments in
2Q19, a -18.2% YoY plunge.
1) Huawei announces a .6%
decline in shipments worldwide over the Q1 numbers.
2) Huawei announces an all-time high in domestic
operations that now take up 62% of its sales.
What do these two numbers hide?
That Huawei's shipments to the international market must have
suffered a considerable decline.
That the rise in sales in low-value Chinese phones doesn't
begin to offset the large drop in high-value developed world sales
except on a purely nominal numerical basis of numbers of phones
sold. The money isn't in the phones. It's in the plans. In fact,
China pioneered the idea of giving the phones away for free and
then making it all back on the gated connection plans.
But there's no way that one Chinese plan equals one western
plan in profitability back to the company, so buffing up the
domestic numbers at the expense of the cash cow numbers overseas
is ultimately not a good business strategy.
Plus of course Huawei can report any number it wants inside
China and nobody has any way of testing its veracity. They could
have shipped 20,000,000 phones to distributors on consignment and
then marked it up as sales.
It's still high-end, per se. But the price premium is no
longer justified because other companies have commoditized the
high-end features.
Frankly, the company was doomed the moment
Jobs died and the reins were turned over to Cook - an
accountant by training, who clearly has no futurist vision or
marketing skill whatsoever.
Jobs might have been a puffed up peacock, but he was a
master of creating the Reality Distortion Field.
There is one big problem that no one is talking about. The cell
phone market is over saturated! Practically everyone has got a
cell phone these days. It's like the auto industry. There has
been an over production 10 billion automobiles in the world for
7.2 billion people, of which half really can't afford to buy, much
less drive, or even have a place to park it. I have seen people
with 3 and 4 cell phones, but you only have 2 ears. How are more
cell phones going to help you? Even women don't multitask that
well.
The only thing that would make sales better on cell
phones is if you could combine the computing power of a Cray
computer into a roll-up tablet. Or, maybe a brain implant would
be even better.
Tim Cook: "When you step back and consider
Wearables and Services together two areas where we have
strategically invested in last several years, they now approach
the size of a Fortune 50 company."
Just as investors thought it was safe to buy-the f**king-dip after Powell's plunge,
President Trump steals the jam out of their donut by announcing new China tariffs...
"... on September 1st, putting a small additional Tariff of 10% on the remaining 300
Billion Dollars of goods and products coming from China into our Country "
In a series of tweets, Trump laid out the state of the China trade deal... in a word -
terrible...
Our representatives have just returned from China where they had constructive talks having
to do with a future Trade Deal. We thought we had a deal with China three months ago, but
sadly, China decided to re-negotiate the deal prior to signing. More recently, China agreed
to...
...buy agricultural product from the U.S. in large quantities, but did not do so.
Additionally, my friend President Xi said that he would stop the sale of Fentanyl to the
United States – this never happened, and many Americans continue to die! Trade talks
are continuing, and...
...during the talks the U.S. will start, on September 1st, putting a small additional
Tariff of 10% on the remaining 300 Billion Dollars of goods and products coming from China
into our Country. This does not include the 250 Billion Dollars already Tariffed at
25%...
...We look forward to continuing our positive dialogue with China on a comprehensive Trade
Deal, and feel that the future between our two countries will be a very bright one!
"... Mr. Trump's anger was fueled, in part, by the fact that China has not begun buying large amounts of American farm products, which the president promised farmers would happen after a June meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. ..."
"... Mr. Trump took credit for China's weakening economy, saying the tariffs he's placed on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods have put enormous pressure on the country, costing it jobs and prompting companies to leave. ..."
"... American and Chinese negotiators finished talks on Wednesday with little progress toward ending a trade war that has shaken the world's economic confidence and rattled markets. ..."
"... Instead, both sides appear to be settling in for a lengthy economic conflict. ..."
"... Senior Chinese officials who gathered at an economic meeting on Tuesday run by China's top leader, Xi Jinping, stressed that the country had to rely on domestic demand to manage "new risks and challenges" and ward off what they described as "downward pressure on the economy," according to the Chinese state news media. China could turn "a crisis into an opportunity," the report added. ..."
"... A lengthy trade war presents China's leaders with some difficult options. China is enduring an economic slowdown that has been made worse by the trade tensions. Beijing has responded by ratcheting up spending on infrastructure and other big-ticket projects, a reliable growth strategy that nevertheless could worsen the country's debt problems and do little to solve economic imbalances that could hinder its long-term prospects. ..."
"... At a daily news briefing on Wednesday, Hua Chunying, a spokeswoman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, said that "only if the U.S. shows sufficient integrity and sincerity, and conducts trade talks with the spirit of equality, mutual respect, mutual understanding and mutual accommodation, can the trade talks make progress." ... ..."
"... the trade pressure by the United States on China has from the beginning been about undermining Chinese development. The US point has always been to stop Chinese scientific and technological advance but the Chinese have always understood and that is just not ever going to happen. ..."
"... Accept United States restrictions on Chinese investments in sensitive technologies without retaliating. ..."
"... Open up its services and agricultural sectors to full American competition. ..."
President Trump took credit for weakening
China's economy and downplayed the likelihood
of a trade deal before the 2020 election.
His comments came as his top negotiators were sitting
down to dinner with their counterparts in Shanghai.
Trump Goads China as Trade Talks
Resume https://nyti.ms/32X4vBj
NYT - Ana Swanson and Jeanna Smialek - July 30
WASHINGTON -- President Trump lashed out at China on Tuesday morning as trade talks
between the two nations resumed, taking credit for weakening China's economy and downplaying
the likelihood of a deal before the 2020 election.
The president's comments, in posts on Twitter and remarks to the press, came just as his
top negotiators were sitting down to dinner with their counterparts at the Fairmont Peace
Hotel in Shanghai. While both sides are trying to get trade talks back on track, Mr. Trump's
angry words underscored the diminishing prospects for a transformative trade deal anytime
soon and the extent to which the bilateral relationship has not unfolded in the way that Mr.
Trump expected.
"I think the biggest problem to a trade deal is China would love to wait and just hope,"
the president said. "They hope -- it's not going to happen, I hope, but they would just love
if I got defeated so they could deal with somebody like Elizabeth Warren or Sleepy Joe Biden
or any of these people, because then they'd be allowed and able to continue to rip off our
country like they've been doing for the last 30 years."
Mr. Trump's anger was fueled, in part, by the fact that China has not begun buying
large amounts of American farm products, which the president promised farmers would happen
after a June meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping. Mr. Trump emerged from that
meeting in Osaka, Japan, saying he had agreed to postpone tariffs on an additional $300
billion of Chinese products and allow American firms to resume sales of nonsensitive goods to
the Chinese telecom firm Huawei. In return, Mr. Trump said China would immediately start
buying American agricultural goods, touting it as a big win for farmers.
But no such purchases have happened, and, in the weeks since, Chinese officials disputed
that they had agreed to buy more farm products as a condition of the talks. On Sunday,
Chinese state media reported that "millions of tons" of American soybeans had been shipped to
China. But Mr. Trump on Tuesday said no such purchases had materialized.
China "was supposed to start buying our agricultural product now -- no signs that they are
doing so," Mr. Trump tweeted. "That is the problem with China, they just don't come
through."
His comments on Tuesday appeared to be an effort to give his negotiators more leverage and
to pressure China into making concessions in talks this week. Mr. Trump took credit for
China's weakening economy, saying the tariffs he's placed on $250 billion worth of Chinese
goods have put enormous pressure on the country, costing it jobs and prompting companies to
leave.
But he seemed to veer between goading China to quickly accede to America's demands and
suggesting the country could get a better deal if it waits and a Democrat wins the 2020
presidential election. ...
US-China Trade Talks End With No Deal
in Sight https://nyti.ms/2GE3LHt
NYT - Alexandra Stevenson - July 31
American and Chinese negotiators finished talks on Wednesday with little progress toward ending a trade war that has
shaken the world's economic confidence and rattled markets.
Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Robert E. Lighthizer, the Trump administration's top
trade negotiator, were seen leaving trade talks on Wednesday, the Chinese state news media
said.
Both sides "conducted frank, efficient and constructive in-depth exchanges on major issues
of common interest in the economic and trade field," said a statement late in the day that
was released by CCTV, China's state broadcaster.
Another round of high-level talks will take place in the United States in September, CCTV
reported.
The Trump administration had not yet released its own statement.
The meeting marked the first formal resumption of talks after negotiations fell apart
almost three months ago, with each side pointing fingers at the other for derailing a deal.
They agreed to try again after meeting last month on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit
meeting in Osaka, Japan.
Instead, both sides appear to be settling in for a lengthy economic conflict.
Senior Chinese officials who gathered at an economic meeting on Tuesday run by China's top
leader, Xi Jinping, stressed that the country had to rely on domestic demand to manage "new
risks and challenges" and ward off what they described as "downward pressure on the economy,"
according to the Chinese state news media. China could turn "a crisis into an opportunity,"
the report added.
A lengthy trade war presents China's leaders with some difficult options. China is
enduring an economic slowdown that has been made worse by the trade tensions. Beijing has
responded by ratcheting up spending on infrastructure and other big-ticket projects, a
reliable growth strategy that nevertheless could worsen the country's debt problems and do
little to solve economic imbalances that could hinder its long-term prospects.
Should China reach a quick deal, on the other hand, the country's leaders risk looking
weak in the face of foreign powers, undermining the Communist Party's historical claim to
rule.
At a daily news briefing on Wednesday, Hua Chunying, a spokeswoman for the Chinese Foreign
Ministry, said that "only if the U.S. shows sufficient integrity and sincerity, and conducts
trade talks with the spirit of equality, mutual respect, mutual understanding and mutual
accommodation, can the trade talks make progress." ...
As I have repeatedly documented on Economist's View, the trade pressure by the United States
on China has from the beginning been about undermining Chinese development. The US point has
always been to stop Chinese scientific and technological advance but the Chinese have always
understood and that is just not ever going to happen.
Trump is asking China to redo just about everything with its economy
By Heather Long - Washington Post
The Trump administration has finally presented the Chinese government with a clear list of
trade demands. It's long and intense (there are eight sections), and President Trump isn't
just asking Chinese President Xi Jinping for a few modifications. He's asking Xi to
completely change his plans to turn the Chinese economy into a tech powerhouse.
The demands include the following:
• China will cut the $336 billion U.S.-China trade deficit by at least $200 billion
by 2020, a 60 percent reduction.
• China will stop subsidizing tech companies.
• China will cease stealing U.S. intellectual property.
• China will cut its tariffs on U.S. goods by 2020.
• China will not retaliate against the United States (including against U.S.
farmers).
• The Chinese government will open China to more U.S. investment.
U.S.-China Trade Talks End With Strong Demands, but Few Signs of a Deal
By Keith Bradsher
BEIJING -- The extensive list of United States trade demands was unexpectedly sweeping,
and showed that the Trump administration has no intention of backing down despite Beijing's
assertive stance in the last few days. "The list reads like the terms for a surrender rather
than a basis for negotiation," said Eswar Prasad, an economics professor at Cornell
University.
Here are the highlights of the demands:
China must
■ Cut its trade surplus by $100 billion in the 12 months starting in June, and by
another $100 billion in the following 12 months.
■ Halt all subsidies to advanced manufacturing industries in its so-called Made In
China 2025 program. The program covers 10 sectors, including aircraft manufacturing, electric
cars, robotics, computer microchips and artificial intelligence.
■ Accept that the United States may restrict imports from the industries under Made
in China 2025.
■ Take "immediate, verifiable steps" to halt cyberespionage into commercial networks
in the United States.
■ Strengthen intellectual property protections.
■ Accept United States restrictions on Chinese investments in sensitive technologies
without retaliating.
■ Cut its tariffs, which currently average 10 percent, to the same level as in the
United States, where they average 3.5 percent for all "noncritical sectors."
■ Open up its services and agricultural sectors to full American competition.
The United States also stipulated that the two sides should meet every quarter to review
progress.
"... If you believe the US media if they just removed Putin, Russia would go back to being a good little puppet state just like under Yeltins. Which is a shockingly naïve way to look at international relations. ..."
"... It is not just Chinese but Asian in general. Watch several seasons of the Japanese cartoon "Gundam" and get back to me about who the good guys are and who the bad guys are in it. ..."
"... People always suffer when they allow corrupt sociopaths to gain power. That is as true today as it was in Germany in 1930's and 40's. ..."
"... According to news reports since the moron in charge announced that he had signed an executive order 'blacklisting' Huawei, those lovely humans at Google are denying Huawei phones access to gmail and playstore. The android operating system is open source and still available to Huawei. ..."
"... Doubtless FB and M$ will follow suit. Getting rid of all the nasty stuff that spies on users 24/7/365 now means that Huawei phones have all the advantages with none of the disadvantages. ..."
"... In Games of Thrones, the good characters are regularly disembowled, choked and drowned to death. Or turn evil. The evil characters grow in power and menace and rarely perish. The overwhelming message is that all people and all power are evil. There is no good in the world or what good there is will be quickly stomped out. Resistance is useless. ..."
"... The main message is really that resistance is futile . If the powers that be can condition the contemporary (and naturally idealistic) Western youth to accept that hypothesis, any threat to their depredations and financial tyranny is rendered impotent. If resistance is futile, said youth will simply have to accept how things are and try to stay out of the way of tyrannical kings, rapacious queens, brutal captains of the guards and wanton dragons. I.e. sit down and shut up while HRC, John Bolton, John Brennan and James Clapper ruin the planet. ..."
"... In the US 33% supported unilateral action, 70% of congress voted for the unilateral military action ..."
"... Thomas Jefferson said: "I tremble for my countrymen because I know God is just..." ..."
"... "The powerful do what they can and the weak suffer what they must." ..."
"... The movies Hollywood produced are often telling psychological conflicts as the central story. Each character has a certain fixed attitude and the interacting of the characters create the story. It does not matter if the setting is in antic times or in the far future. In the end there are always the bad and the good guy slamming it out in a fistfight. ..."
"... The historic Chinese drama which I currently favor are based on sociological storytelling. As they develop the stories form their characters. Their attitudes change over time because the developing exterior circumstances push them into certain directions. Good becomes bad and again good. The persons change because they must, not because the are genetically defined. I find these kind of movies more interesting. ..."
"... The take away quote "Wang also reiterated the principled stand against the "long-arm jurisdiction" imposed by the United States." Empire is having its hand slapped back in Venezuela, Iran, Syria, ??? ..."
"... I see empire as a war junkie and they are starting to twitch in withdrawals which is dangerous but a necessary stage. Trumps latest tweets show that level of energy. The spinning plates of empire are not wowing the crowds like before.....what is plan Z? ..."
"... My own view is that, as with everything the US has done lately, it already lost the war before it even stepped into battle in the theater. ..."
"... Strangest thing of all that the US itself would do the forcing out of itself from the world's trust. ..."
"... As I've written previously, the political philosophers of the nascent USA thought they would have a Natural Aristocracy ( here and here ) somewhat based on a meritocratic system instead of the Old World's Inherited Aristocracy based on blood relations and closed to anyone not within a very small circle. Yet it was still an Aristocracy with all it inherent evils, and it is that vast assortment of evils the US citizenry has yet to overcome in its supposed--idealized--quest for self-government. ..."
"... If you are interested in watching a film with a sociological approach to telling a story and you are close to a cinema, Mike Leigh's "Peterloo" just started screening last Thursday in Australia. The film is an exploration of British society during the Regency period (in the early 19th century), the class attitudes and opinions prevalent then, and the conditions and events that led to 60,000 - 100,000 labouring class people gathering at St Peter's Field in Manchester in August 1819, and how it was viciously broken up by cavalry and foot soldiers acting on orders of the aristocracy. ..."
"... The culture I am immersed in (USA) is heavily weighted toward the dramatic and two dimensional. Simply put, mass perspective engineering is geared to over simplify and reinforce these views with media imprinting via hollywood, madison ave. etc. The lenses through which impressions from the "outside world" pass through engineered to give the desired results rather than expand consciousness or engender critical thinking. In short, we are breeding for weakness and gullibility. ..."
"... If it is Hollywood, then you can be certain the intention is to manipulate the younger generation to supporting and idolising their permanent wars. On the face of it, that indeed appears to be the case. ..."
" Why The Takedown Of Heinz-Christian Strache Will Strengthen The Right | Main May 19, 2019 The story in the
American Conservative is very weak: that "the Americans" have already won the war is just
due to the built-in superiority: the "land of the free" against "communist dictatorship"
(so everybody knows who has to win). Or, a variation, "free market" against "state-owned".
A typical statement of that article: "China views commercial relations with other
countries as an extension of the political conflict between Western democracies and itself
-- that is, an extension of war." -- a very defining element of the "American" character,
to project the own aggression onto others.
There was another opinion-piece somewhere, can't find it anymore, where the author
argued that hopefully that "trade-war" will do really good for the Chinese economy --
forget about the US, and develop the home market.
As I believe that the sanctions are a great gift to Russia, I also believe that this
"trade-war" is a (potential) great gift to China.
That was an interesting article on psychological vs sociological storytelling and it makes
a good companion piece when thinking about how the US media personalizes US geo-political
conflicts with the heads of rival state (Putin, Xi, Castro, Kim Jong-un, Khomeini,
Gaddafi).
If you believe the US media if they just removed Putin, Russia would go back to
being a good little puppet state just like under Yeltins. Which is a shockingly naïve
way to look at international relations. States have permanent interests and any competent
head of State will always represent those interests to the best of their ability. True, you
could overthrow the government and replace every senior government figure with a compliant
puppet (which the US always tries to do), but the permanent interests that arise from the
inhabitants of the State will always rise up and (re)assert themselves. When the State
leadership is bribed or threatened into ignoring or acting against these needs it
ultimately creates a failed State.
Even the US media seems to subconsciously understand this, when they talk of "overly
ambitious US goals of remaking societies", however, they never make the logical next step
of investigating why these States do not wish to be remade as per the US imagined ideal,
what the interests of these actually are and how diplomacy can resolve conflicts.
According
to the US media everything boils down to the US = good, anyone who disagrees with our
policies = bad and diplomacy is just a measure of how vulgar our threats are during talks.
I'm specifically thinking of the US Ambassador to Russia, John Huntsman's boast of a US
aircraft carrier in the Mediterranean as being 100,000 tons of diplomacy to Russia - of all
the ridiculous and stupid things to says to Russia when supposedly trying to "ease"
tensions (I still can't believe Huntsmen, former Ambassador to China under Obama, is
regarded a "serious" professional ambassador within the State departments when compared to
all the celebrity ambassadorships the US President for fundraiser).
It is not just Chinese but Asian in general. Watch several seasons of the Japanese
cartoon "Gundam" and get back to me about who the good guys are and who the bad guys
are in it.
The whole notion that the "good guys" and the "bad guys" are set in stone
is antithetical to any worldview founded in Buddhism/Confucianism, or influenced by the
same. Can you imagine western children's programming teaching ambiguity between good and
evil? That which is which depends upon the observer's perspective? This is the sort of
concept that few western people get exposed to until graduate level ethics and philosophy
courses.
Or maybe not. I have never seen a single episode of "Game of Thrones" and maybe
that delves into ethical complexities that typical western mass media avoids. I wouldn't
know. What I do know is that this moral and ethical complexity is something that most Asian
children are introduced to before they hit their teens.
Trump just tweeted "If Iran wants to fight, that will be the official end of Iran. Never
threaten the United States again!". Needless to say, more ridiculousness, Trump is pretty
close to plagiarizing himself with his prior comments regarding North Korean "North Korean
Leader Kim Jong Un just stated that the "Nuclear Button is on his desk at all times." Will
someone from his depleted and food starved regime please inform him that I too have a
Nuclear Button, but it is a much bigger & more powerful one than his, and my Button
works!". I think Trump is getting desperate now waiting by the phone for the Iranians to
call him. Trump is certainly still smarting after the failed Venezuela coup and wants to
avoid a second embarrassing defeat, however I doubt the Iranians will care that much about
his latest threat by tweet.
GOT was jarring this season. In the penultimate episode, a dragon wreaks havoc on a western
capital city, brutally murdering most of its inhabitants.
It is impossible not to make the correlation of the dragon as China and kings landing
(The city) as Washington d.c.
From this one can glean that they were attempting to show the ascendancy of China and
the utter destruction of the U.S. With shades of gray thrown about as to if the people of
the city deserved to be burned alive and as to whether the dragon and its rider, China,
have become what they originally set out to vanquish. The old Nietzsche maxim...those who
fight with monsters...
It was indeed unsettling because there are no moral winners. It is well realised for
this reason but poorly written and produced in other aspects as noted above by other
posters.
"First published From Parameters, Summer 1997, pp. 4-14: US Army War College: "There will
be no peace. At any given moment for the rest of our lifetimes, there will be multiple
conflicts in mutating forms around the globe. Violent conflict will dominate the
headlines, but cultural and economic struggles will be steadier and ultimately more
decisive. The de facto role of the US armed forces will be to keep the world safe for our
economy and open to our cultural assault. To those ends, we will do a fair amount of
killing."
"Excerpts From Pentagon's Plan: 'Prevent the Re-Emergence of a New Rival':
"Our first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival, either on the
territory of the former Soviet Union or elsewhere, that poses a threat on the order of
that posed formerly by the Soviet Union.
This is a dominant consideration underlying the new regional defense strategy and
requires that we endeavor to prevent any hostile power from dominating a region whose
resources would, under consolidated control, be sufficient to generate global power.
These regions include Western Europe, East Asia, the territory of the former Soviet
Union, and Southwest Asia.
There are three additional aspects to this objective: First, the U.S. must show the
leadership necessary to establish and protect a new order that holds the promise of
convincing potential competitors that they need not aspire to a greater role or pursue a
more aggressive posture to protect their legitimate interests.
Second, in the non-defense areas, we must account sufficiently for the interests of the
advanced industrial nations to discourage them from challenging our leadership or seeking
to overturn the established political and economic order. Finally, we must maintain the
mechanisms for deterring potential competitors from even aspiring to a larger regional or
global role. An effective reconstitution capability is important here, since it implies
that a potential rival could not hope to quickly or easily gain a predominant military
position in the world."
... access to vital raw materials, primarily Persian Gulf oil"
GOT is an allegory that explores the nature of power. If you see China's destruction of
Washington it says more about you than the show. Firebombing of Dresden might be a more apt
analogy.
People always suffer when they allow corrupt sociopaths to gain power. That is as true
today as it was in Germany in 1930's and 40's.
The complaints about poor writing are just fan sadness at unexpected horrors that
actually make sense for the show. Loose ends created by these horrors will likely be
resolved in the last episode tonight.
WJ @13 thanks for the link, I am eternally hopeful that this particular thread gets pulled
on until it unravels.
One of my distinct memories of the immediate aftermath of 9/11 (I lived in NYC at the
time), was the trumpeting of the Post and other tabloids about 'the Dancing Arabs,' which
obviously fanned the flames of hatred towards the designated villains. Once it was revealed
that they were actually Israelis, then crickets until the whole thing was shoved down the
memory hole.
I'm going out today to buy a couple of Huawei 'phones'.
According to news reports since the moron in charge announced that he had signed an
executive order 'blacklisting' Huawei, those lovely humans at Google are denying Huawei
phones access to gmail and playstore. The android operating system is open source and still
available to Huawei.
Doubtless FB and M$ will follow suit. Getting rid of all the nasty stuff that spies on
users 24/7/365 now means that Huawei phones have all the advantages with none of the
disadvantages.
They put their own chips in newer models and I have no doubt will find enough bright
sparks to take over apps integration meaning that this divergence point will become a boon
not a hurdle. Even better a Huawei costs 60% of a comparable korean model and half the
price of the fbi backdoored american shit.
I really like thinking expressed by an un-named english politician in a Henry Jackson
Society report: ""Huawei has long been accused of espionage" – a claim repeatedly
denied by the firm – and notes that "while there are no definitely proven cases", a
precautionary principle should be adopted."
All politicians are crooks and liars, everybody says so, lets lock em all up right now,
no need for evidence or trial or any of that due process nonsense, the precautionary
principle should apply.
I have never seen a single episode of "Game of Thrones" and maybe that delves into
ethical complexities that typical western mass media avoids. I wouldn't know.
Having suffered through four seasons of Game of Thrones, after a degree in philology and
literature, I'd be happy to share my impressions with you. In Games of Thrones, the good
characters are regularly disembowled, choked and drowned to death. Or turn evil. The evil
characters grow in power and menace and rarely perish. The overwhelming message is that all
people and all power are evil. There is no good in the world or what good there is will be
quickly stomped out. Resistance is useless.
The main message is really that resistance is futile . If the powers that be can
condition the contemporary (and naturally idealistic) Western youth to accept that
hypothesis, any threat to their depredations and financial tyranny is rendered impotent. If
resistance is futile, said youth will simply have to accept how things are and try to stay
out of the way of tyrannical kings, rapacious queens, brutal captains of the guards and
wanton dragons. I.e. sit down and shut up while HRC, John Bolton, John Brennan and James
Clapper ruin the planet.
Despite impressive production values, excellent acting (for the most part) and majestic
locations, Game of Thrones is truly the most evil large scale creative work I've ever seen.
On a philosophical level, Game of Thrones has no redeeming features. At best an
impressionable mind might come away with a hedonist mindset, i.e. the traditional salve of
weak spirits, carpe diem .
PS. There's some very good comments at the tail end of the
Takedown of Heinz-Christian Strache including one of my own covering in some depth the
Austrian political background to this event. Worth revisiting if you only saw the early
comments.
Using populations per country from '03 we get the following conclusions:
of the 36 countries outside the US we get 33% of the world population where
less than 8% supported unilateral military action by American and her allies
and 57% supported under no circumstances
this list excludes 42 additional countries with another 40% of world population who have
had their governments overthrown or attempted to be overthrown by the US since WWII
In the US 33% supported unilateral action, 70% of congress voted for the unilateral
military action
Being that the invasion was illegal and unpopular, the Bush admin invented a 'coalition
of the willing to give the appearance of support.
The Trump admin needed to create a similar type of facade for the Venezuelan coup. Such
things are needed specifically because the move is so unpopular and illegal.
I suppose that is a valid theory. But as the viewer we know the motivations of Dany and
why in some small regard the people in King's Landing deserve a little roughing up.
Thomas Jefferson said: "I tremble for my countrymen because I know God is just..."
The difference here is that we judge Assad even though we don't see what he is truly
doing.
Here we see what Dany has done, mass slaughter, and think to ourselves...we kinda had it
coming.
Concerning your take on GoT: Isn't this really the thesis of Thucydides through and
through reflected in GoT almost to a T?
"The powerful do what they can and the weak suffer what they must." GoT is not disturbing to be nihilistic and shocking. It is holding up a mirror to
history. But the quality of the show has declined since they have come to the end of the road in
adapting the source material. The show has overtaken the books.
The take away quote
"
As of the end of March, overseas investors bought a net of 1.77 trillion yuan (about 260.3
billion U.S. dollars) of bonds at the country's interbank bond market, up 31 percent from a
year earlier, and held 5.4 trillion yuan of yuan-denominated financial assets, up 19
percent year on year, according to the central bank.
"
What us peasants don't know is the extent to which China will let foreign investment
influence their socialistic ways. That said, China is the new empire, private or public is
yet to be determined but guess where all the "smart" money in the world is going? The money
movements are a giant sucking sound that will leave America under the global economic
bus.
Or not and China maintains its socialistic ways including projecting them around the
world.
The movies Hollywood produced are often telling psychological conflicts as the central
story. Each character has a certain fixed attitude and the interacting of the characters
create the story. It does not matter if the setting is in antic times or in the far
future. In the end there are always the bad and the good guy slamming it out in a
fistfight.
The historic Chinese drama which I currently favor are based on sociological
storytelling. As they develop the stories form their characters. Their attitudes change
over time because the developing exterior circumstances push them into certain
directions. Good becomes bad and again good. The persons change because they must, not
because the are genetically defined. I find these kind of movies more interesting.
That's the difference between materialism (marxism) and idealism (kantism, hegelianism
and noekantism). Besides, an idealist tv series helps selling more merch and doing more
sequels, hence the capitalist preference for idealism.
The take away quote
"Wang also reiterated the principled stand against the "long-arm jurisdiction" imposed by
the United States."
Empire is having its hand slapped back in Venezuela, Iran, Syria, ???
Where are they going to get their war on?
I see empire as a war junkie and they are starting to twitch in withdrawals which is
dangerous but a necessary stage. Trumps latest tweets show that level of energy. The
spinning plates of empire are not wowing the crowds like before.....what is plan Z?
Hot tip, GOT is just a movie. Please, no more psychological insights.
What fans really need, is some REAL WORLD justice, something that's noticeably missing
in today's world.
I agree that the American Conservative article was weak - as b obviously thought. It has
the US trade war against China completely wrong. I side with b in his hunch that China will
win. My own view is that, as with everything the US has done lately, it already lost the
war before it even stepped into battle in the theater.
And let's counter the author's point, in the weak article, that China needs the US trade
surplus more than the US needs the imports from China. The author says that China has no
way to substitute for exports to the US. There's abundant recent analysis on this, showing
the relatively small part of China's economy that hinges on this trade, but here's a good
Sputnik interview that illustrates how easily China can simply absorb goods into its own
domestic market:
"...we have our colossal domestic market, which has no competitors throughout the world.
Our consumer and innovation markets provide us with a large number of advantages and
room, giving China an opportunity to make a manoeuvre. Therefore, their blockage gives
China a chance to become even stronger. We must express our appreciation to our mentor,
Trump, for this, for this lesson and for forcing China to figure out how to withstand the
threats on its own."
The US used to be an important nation to do business with - commercial, diplomatic,
military. But as it has become "agreement incapable", nations are forced to replace it.
This takes a little time and readjustment, but then the change is permanent.
Strangest thing of all that the US itself would do the forcing out of itself from the
world's trust.
Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman discussed regional developments, including efforts to
strengthen security and stability, in a phone call with U.S. Secretary of State Mike
Pompeo, the Saudi Media Ministry tweeted on Sunday.
"We want peace and stability in the region but we will not sit on our hands in light
of the continuing Iranian attack," Jubeir said. "The ball is in Iran's court and it is up
to Iran to determine what its fate will be."
He said the crew of an Iranian oil tanker that had been towed to Saudi Arabia early
this month after a request for help due to engine trouble were still in the kingdom
receiving the "necessary care". The crew are 24 Iranians and two Bangladeshis .
Is this a veiled threat on the lives of these crew members?
Re@ 51 James, well Sputniknews is reporting that the Saudi's claim that the Houthis are
planning to attack 300 critical infrastructure facilities in Saudi Arabia and the United
Arab Emirates in the coming weeks so that might be the instigating event your concerned
about
Thanks for your kudos! As I've written previously, the political philosophers of the
nascent USA thought they would have a Natural Aristocracy ( here and
here ) somewhat based on a meritocratic system instead of the Old World's Inherited
Aristocracy based on blood relations and closed to anyone not within a very small circle.
Yet it was still an Aristocracy with all it inherent evils, and it is that vast assortment
of evils the US citizenry has yet to overcome in its supposed--idealized--quest for
self-government.
Recall that George Washington was deemed safe to become the first
president because he could be trusted not to proclaim himself king --something often
forgotten by students of US History.
I've often lamented on the nature of the 1787 Constitution because it allows any POTUS
to become a king with almost zero hindrances on the power wielded. Sure, compared with
other systems of government at the time, the USA's was revolutionary, but only down to the
waist to borrow a phrase from Gilbert & Sullivan. Madison's theory, IMO, was--other
than being Aristocratic--okay until his most important check/balance was removed--that of
the "dueling oval office" where the losing POTUS candidate was awarded the
Vice-Presidency--imagine Hillary Clinton as Veep with Trump in the driver seat! IMO,
the
12th Amendment fatally wounded Madison's construction of a government that arrived at
great decisions based on a consensus of genuine national interests instead of partisanship.
Arguing that action is the great fault that must be corrected doesn't get much play
nowadays. Indeed, it's very difficult to debate Constitutional Reform given the engineered
political climate since the current situation suits the Ruling Oligarchy just fine.
I hope everyone had an opportunity to click the link I provided to the series of
paintings known as The Course of Empire . ICYMI, here it is again .
Please note which Empire's being copied and compare that with the predominant architectural
theme in the Outlaw US Empire's Imperium. Creditors ruled and eventually destroyed that
Empire. That's one historical lesson that's totally omitted from the historiography of the
USA.
By and large, we know what and where the problems are. The fundamental question is, will
we ever get the opportunity to fix them?
Their disadvantage is that they have to import energy. So they need export if they do
not wish to run a trade deficit.
They do not necessarily need the US for this though if they can trade in Yuan.
b, it is generally fund raising time during this time for some publishers (i.e.
counterpunch etc) and I would like to send you something as well. Can you please post the
payment information. Thanks.
If you are interested in watching a film with a sociological approach to telling a story
and you are close to a cinema, Mike Leigh's "Peterloo" just started screening last Thursday
in Australia. The film is an exploration of British society during the Regency period (in
the early 19th century), the class attitudes and opinions prevalent then, and the
conditions and events that led to 60,000 - 100,000 labouring class people gathering at St
Peter's Field in Manchester in August 1819, and how it was viciously broken up by cavalry
and foot soldiers acting on orders of the aristocracy.
The film is at least 150 minutes long and is a highly immersive experience. There is not
much plot in the Hollywood sense of the term. I believe reviews have been mixed with most
film critics complaining about the film being too long and boring. But if you are prepared
to watch a film that uses a sociological approach to telling a narrative, then you'll agree
with me that the film actually isn't long enough.
Very interesting studies and the ideas that they might spawn. The near parallels of the
micro and macro as well as the flow patterns.
The culture I am immersed in (USA) is heavily weighted toward the dramatic and two
dimensional. Simply put, mass perspective engineering is geared to over simplify and
reinforce these views with media imprinting via hollywood, madison ave. etc. The lenses
through which impressions from the "outside world" pass through engineered to give the
desired results rather than expand consciousness or engender critical thinking. In short,
we are breeding for weakness and gullibility.
In regard to large scale dynamics resembling the physics of things like the laws of
thermodynamics, I am wondering if phenomena like those alluded to above might be engulfed
and influenced by these kinds of natural patterns. So for example: Looking past the drama
of sanctions, trade wars, and good guys vs. bad guys, wont the large scale movements caused
by these things begin to move according to a kind of physics?
I keep wondering what the result of this latest round of economic warfare will lead to.
If the USA continues to sanction, embargo and blockade (at the behest of banking cartels?)
will this not cause a mass exodus from dollar reserves, SWIFT, BIS and the like? I hear all
sorts of opinions, bushels of dis-info and I'm mostly at a loss as to what to think. We are
clearly nearing the end of the Bretton-Woods era so a reset is in order. The USA is a mere
6% of the world population and some would say at the end of it's due date as far an being
an "international influencer".
So if they and their EU poodles go ahead and sanction every nation who refuses to bend
the knee what's stopping these nations from simply bypassing these decrees and going about
their business? I get the sense that this is already happening quietly. Russia, China and
various partner nations are creating alternatives in many forms, be they interweb servers,
financial networks, OBOR, SCO and more I have never heard of.
Perhaps the ratcheting up of tensions could also be swept up in the turbulence of
thermodynamics? If sanctions become embargoes and then blockades, what happens to the
"compressions ratios in the Straits of Hormuz?
Well, I've come across a few advertisements, but I always thought it was some kind of
children's video game. I cannot imagine why anyone other than a socially stunted and
mis-developed American or Americanised adolescent could want to watch such infantile
deranged garbage.
If it is Hollywood, then you can be certain the intention is to manipulate the younger
generation to supporting and idolising their permanent wars. On the face of it, that indeed
appears to be the case.
Assuming the decoupling would take place, that could be easily perceived as "strategic
blackmail" imposed by the Trump administration. Yet what the Trump administration wants is not
exactly what the US establishment wants – as shown by an
open letter to Trump signed by scores of academics, foreign policy experts and business
leaders who are worried that "decoupling" China from the global economy – as if
Washington could actually pull off such an impossibility – would generate massive
blowback.
What may actually happen in terms of a US-China "decoupling" is what Beijing is already,
actively working on: extending trade partnerships with the EU and across the Global South.
And that will lead, according to Li, to the Chinese leadership offering deeper and wider
market access to its partners. This will soon be the case with the EU, as discussed in Brussels
in the spring.
Sun Jie, a researcher at the Institute of World Economics and Politics at the Chinese
Academy of Social Sciences, said that deepening partnerships with the Association of Southeast
Asian Nations (Asean) will be essential in case a decoupling is in the cards.
For his part Liu Qing, an economics professor at Renmin University, stressed the need for
top international relations management, dealing with everyone from Europe to the Global South,
to prevent their companies from replacing Chinese companies in selected global supply
chains.
And Wang Xiaosong, an economics professor at Renmin University, emphasized that a concerted
Chinese strategic approach in dealing with Washington is absolutely paramount.
All about
Belt and Road
A few optimists among Western
intellectuals would rather characterize what is going on as a vibrant debate between proponents
of "restraint" and "offshore balancing" and proponents of "liberal hegemony". In fact, it's
actually a firefight.
Among the Western intellectuals singled out by the puzzled Frankenstein guy, it is virtually
impossible to find another voice of reason to match Martin Jacques , now a senior fellow
at Cambridge University. When China Rules the World , his hefty tome published 10 years ago,
still leaps out of an editorial wasteland of almost uniformly dull publications by so-called
Western "experts" on China.
Jacques has understood that now it's all about the New Silk Roads, or Belt and Road
Initiative:
"BRI has the potential to offer another kind of world, another set of values, another set
of imperatives, another way of organizing, another set of institutions, another set of
relationships."
Belt and Road, adds Jacques, "offers an alternative to the existing international order. The
present international order was designed by and still essentially privileges the rich world,
which represents only 15% of the world's population. BRI, on the other hand, is addressing at
least two-thirds of the world's population. This is extraordinarily important for this moment
in history."
"... When tariffs went up from 0 to 10% on some product categories last year, many suppliers agreed to absorb half that amount (5%) in exchange for larger orders. The logic was as follows: higher orders lead to better deals with component suppliers and to higher production efficiencies, which means lower costs. ..."
"... Do you ship American wood for processing in China and re-exporting to the US? You might have issues getting that material into China as smoothly as before. And then, the US Customs office might give you a hard time when you bring the goods in, too! ..."
"... Who knows what non-monetary barriers the Chinese will erect. One can count on their creativity ..."
"... Several US companies asked our company to look for assembly plants in Vietnam and, in those cases where we found some options, they were much more expensive than China. There is a reason why China's share of hard goods production in Asia has kept growing in recent years -- competition is often non-existent. ..."
"... Now, with China's products suddenly much more expensive, what are these competing countries going to do? Won't they take advantage of it and push wages further up, at least for the export manufacturing sector? ..."
"... Mexico should be the clear winner of this trade war. They are next to the US, their labor cost is comparable to that of China, and many American companies have long had extensive operations there. ..."
Based on
allthe
articles I have read about the current geopolitical situation, I am not optimistic about
the affect of the US-China trade war on American importers. Dan Harris, who wrote "
the US-China Cold War start now, " announced that a "mega-storm" might be coming, and he
may be right.
Now, if things turn out as bad as predicted, and if tariffs apply on more goods imported
from China to the US -- and at higher rates -- what does it mean for US importers?
What
will the damage from the US-China trade war look like?
These are my thoughts about who or what is going to be hit hard by the ongoing 'trade
war:'
1. Small importers will be hit much harder than larger ones
If you work with very large Chinese manufacturers, many of them have already started to set
up operations outside of mainland China, for the simple reason that most of their customers
have been pushing for that.
They are in Vietnam, Malaysia, etc. And this is true in most industries -- from apparel to
electronics.
Do they still have to import most of their components from China? It depends on their
footprints. As I wrote before :
You set up a mammoth plant and you don't want your high-value component suppliers to be
more than 1 hour away from you, for just-in-time inventory replenishment? They can be
requested to set up a new manufacturing facility next to you.
2. A higher total cost of goods purchased from China
This one is obvious. If you have orders already in production, they will cost you more than
expected.
The RMB might slide quite a bit, and that might alleviate the total cost. I hope you have
followed my advice and started paying your suppliers in RMB , to benefit
from it automatically.
Beijing might also give other forms of subsidies to their exporters. They might be quite
visible (e.g. a higher VAT rebate) or totally 'under the table'.
3. Difficult
negotiations with Chinese suppliers
Can you say the tariffs are Beijing's fault, and so your suppliers should absorb the
tariffs? That's not going to work.
When tariffs went up from 0 to 10% on some product categories last year, many suppliers
agreed to absorb half that amount (5%) in exchange for larger orders. The logic was as follows:
higher orders lead to better deals with component suppliers and to higher production
efficiencies, which means lower costs.
When tariffs go from 10% to 35%, what else can US buyers give their counter-parties?
Payments in advance? Lower quality standards? I don't believe that.
4. Difficulties at
several levels in the supply chain
Do you ship American wood for processing in China and re-exporting to the US? You might have
issues getting that material into China as smoothly as before. And then, the US Customs office
might give you a hard time when you bring the goods in, too!
Who knows what non-monetary barriers the Chinese will erect. One can count on their
creativity
5. Short-term non-elasticity of alternative sources
There are a finite number of Vietnamese export-ready manufacturers that can make your
orders. And, chances are, their capacity is already full. If you haven't prepared this move for
months (or years), other US companies have. The early bird gets the worm
Same thing with Thailand, Indonesia, India, and so on, with the exception of apparel and
(maybe) footwear.
Several US companies asked our company
to look for assembly plants in Vietnam and, in those cases where we found some options, they
were much more expensive than China. There is a reason why China's share of
hard goods production in Asia has kept growing in recent years -- competition is often
non-existent.
6. Faster cost increases in other low-cost Asian countries
Now, with China's products suddenly much more expensive, what are these competing countries
going to do? Won't they take advantage of it and push wages further up, at least for the export
manufacturing sector?
There could be some 'silver linings' due to the trade war
It is not all bad news though. We may see these benefits caused by China and the USA
slugging it out too:
7. Many opportunities for Mexico
Mexico should be the clear winner of this trade war. They are next to the US, their labor
cost is comparable to that of China, and many American companies have long had extensive
operations there.
8. Rapid consolidation in the Chinese manufacturing sector
The fittest will survive. Many uncompetitive manufacturers and traders will fold. Consolidation
will accelerate. I often look at what happened in Japan and South Korea . Each of these countries
developed very fast and, when the going got tough, the export manufacturing sector got
devastated. Only the most competitive survived.
9. Relaxed enforcement of anti-pollution
regulations in China?
I'd bet that, if the tariffs hit hard, far fewer operations will get closed for
environmental reasons. Preserving employment and social peace will prevail.
A while ago we discussed the obfuscation of classical economics in order to elevate the Junk
Economics of Randian Neoliberalism. And with Trump's Trade War and the 2020 election cycle's
start, I think it wise to revisit what's proven to be a timeless Michael Hudson essay from
2010, "America's
China Bashing: A Compendium of Junk Economics" , which provided the ground work for the
subsequent book he published on the topic.
The following excerpt remains the underlying issue prompting Trump's Trade War with
China:
"The cover story is that foreign exchange controls and purchases of U.S. securities keep
the renminbi's exchange rate low, artificially spurring its exports. The reality, of
course, is that these controls protect China from U.S. banks creating free 'keyboard
credit' to buy out Chinese companies to buy out Chinese companies or load down its economy
with loans to be paid off in renminbi whose value will rise against the deficit-ridden
dollar. It's the Wall Street arbitrage opportunity of the century that banks are
pressing for, not the welfare of American workers ."
As the years between have shown, the Chinese aren't fools and probably know more about
economics than their politicized US counterparts, Trump especially included.
@ William Gruff with the dh-mtl update about "control" during the early part of last
century....I agree and thanks
@ karlof1 with the Michael Hudson link.....I put a comment up last night with a quote from
Xinhuanet
"
BEIJING, June 30 (Xinhua) -- China on Sunday rolled out revised negative lists for foreign
investment market access, introducing greater opening-up and allowing foreign investors to
run majority-share-controlling or wholly-owned businesses in more sectors.
"
It makes me worry about how much of "China" will be allowed to be bought/controlled by the
private finance folk. I have been wondering about this since 2008 when the US started running
the "printing presses" bigly enough to double the deficit in less than 10 years.....I didn't
get any of those trillions, did you? At some point I expect there to be a meeting of global
"big wigs" who say they own this or that and wonder how that meeting will turn out relative
to Bretton Woods.
I still see China throwing out a faux lifeline to the private finance folk that will be
reeled in after the transition to a China led world.....want to make it look like the Koch
brothers and Soros with their new peace tank are leading the parade.....
"... Mr. Lidow is among the semiconductor executives in the United States who have become concerned that the trade war with China -- particularly the Trump administration's ban on selling chips to some prominent Chinese customers -- won't just squeeze current revenue. He fears that recent events have convinced Chinese companies that American component makers can no longer be seen as dependable partners and are permanently shifting away from them. ..."
"... In May, President Trump ordered American companies on national-security grounds to stop selling components to companies like Huawei , China's big maker of mobile phones and networking equipment. And the administration placed five other Chinese entities on the same blacklist this month, including the computer maker Sugon and three subsidiaries. ..."
"... China has responded by saying it would put together its own "unreliable entities list," including many American tech companies. ..."
"... "The U.S. is in danger of becoming the vendor of last resort for China," said Walden Rhines, chief executive emeritus of Mentor, a unit of Siemens that sells software for designing chips ..."
SAN FRANCISCO -- Alex Lidow has sold semiconductors in China for decades, starting at a
company, called International Rectifier, that his father and grandfather founded in the Los
Angeles area in 1947.
Now Mr. Lidow runs Efficient Power Conversion, which makes chips that manage electrical
power in cars and other products. Efficient Power has a strong foothold in China, but has
lately run into resistance from customers there that he traces to moves in Washington.
Mr. Lidow is among the semiconductor executives in the United States who have become
concerned that the trade war with China -- particularly the Trump administration's ban on
selling chips to some prominent Chinese customers -- won't just squeeze current revenue. He
fears that recent events have convinced Chinese companies that American component makers can no
longer be seen as dependable partners and are permanently shifting away from them.
"In my 40 years in this business, I've had friends in China that viewed me as a trusted
supplier," Mr. Lidow said. "They can't now." His experience is part of the fallout affecting the American chip industry, one of the tech
sectors hardest hit by the tit-for-tat between the United States and China over trade and
national security.
In May, President Trump ordered American companies on national-security grounds to
stop selling
components to companies like Huawei , China's big maker of mobile phones and networking
equipment. And the administration placed
five other Chinese entities on the same blacklist this month, including the computer maker
Sugon and three subsidiaries.
Even if a new trade deal eases tensions -- Mr. Trump is set to meet with President Xi
Jinping of China in Osaka, Japan, on Saturday -- American chip executives and others said
lasting damage had already been done. They said Chinese officials and companies would step up
efforts to design and make more chips domestically. And Chinese customers seem likely to turn
to vendors from countries like Japan, South Korea and Taiwan if no homegrown chips are
available.
"The U.S. is in danger of becoming the vendor of last resort for China," said Walden
Rhines, chief executive emeritus of Mentor, a unit of Siemens that sells software for designing
chips
Already, big American chip makers have taken a financial hit from the China bans. Micron Technology, which sells two of the
most widely used varieties of memory chips, disclosed Tuesday that the Huawei ban had lowered sales in its most recent quarter
by nearly $200 million. Huawei is Micron’s largest customer, accounting for around 13 percent of its revenue.
"... "The problem, is that China knows time is short for the President and subsequently there is 'no rush' to conclude a 'trade deal' for several reasons: ..."
"... The pressure is on the Trump Administration to conclude a "deal," not on China. Trump needs a deal done before the 2020 election cycle AND he needs the markets and economy to be strong. ..."
"... corporate profits continued to come under pressure. As noted previously, corporate profits have declined over the last two quarters and are at the same level as in 2014 with the stock market higher by almost 60%. ..."
"... But, if you think China is going to acquiesce any time soon to Trump's demands, you haven't been paying attention. China has launched a national call in their press to unify support behind China's refusal to give into Trump's demands. To wit: ..."
"... "Lying behind the trade feud is America's intention to stifle China's development. The U.S. wants to be a permanent leader in the world, and there is no way for China to avoid the 'storm' through compromise. ..."
By agreeing to continue talks without imposing more tariffs on China, China gains ample
running room to continue to adjust for current tariffs to lessen their impact. More
importantly, Trump gave up a major bargaining chip – Huawei.
"One of the things I will allow, however, is -- a lot of people are surprised we send and
we sell to Huawei a tremendous amount of product that goes into a lot of the various things
that they make -- and I said that that's OK, that we will keep selling that product."
No, a lot of people weren't surprised, just Trump as there has been pressure applied by U.S.
technology firms to lift the ban on Huawei. While he may have appeased his corporate campaign
donors for now, Trump gave up one of the more important "pain points" on China's economy.
This gives China much needed room to run.
Let's review what
we said a couple of months ago as to why their will ultimately be no deal.
"The problem, is that China knows time is short for the President and subsequently there
is 'no rush' to conclude a 'trade deal' for several reasons:
China is playing a very long game. Short-term economic pain can be met with
ever-increasing levels of government stimulus. The U.S. has no such mechanism currently,
but explains why both Trump and Vice-President Pence have been suggesting the Fed restarts
QE and cuts rates by 1%. (Update: Trump
says the U.S. should have Mario Draghi at the helm of U.S. monetary policy.)
The pressure is on the Trump Administration to conclude a "deal," not on China. Trump
needs a deal done before the 2020 election cycle AND he needs the markets and economy to be
strong. If the markets and economy weaken because of tariffs, which are a tax on domestic
consumers and corporate profits, as they did in 2018, the risk off electoral losses rise.
China knows this and are willing to 'wait it out' to get a better deal.
As I have stated before, China is not going to jeopardize its 50 to 100-year economic
growth plan on a current President who will be out of office within the next 5-years at
most. It is unlikely, the next President will take the same hard line approach on China
that President Trump has, so agreeing to something that is unlikely to be supported in the
future is unlikely. It is also why many parts of the trade deal already negotiated don't
take effect until after Trump is out of office when those agreements are unlikely to be
enforced.
In the meantime, as noted in #3 above, corporate profits continued to come under pressure.
As noted previously, corporate profits have declined over the last two quarters and are at the
same level as in 2014 with the stock market higher by almost 60%.
... ... ...
But, if you think China is going to acquiesce any time soon to Trump's demands, you haven't
been paying attention. China has launched a national call in their press to
unify support behind China's refusal to give into Trump's demands. To wit:
"Lying behind the trade feud is America's intention to stifle China's development. The
U.S. wants to be a permanent leader in the world, and there is no way for China to avoid the
'storm' through compromise.
History proves that compromise only leads to further dilemmas. During previous trade
tensions between the U.S. and Japan, Japan made concessions. As a result, its political
stability and economic development were adversely affected, with structural reform being
suspended and hi-tech companies being severely damaged.
China, with a population of 1.4 billion, is the world's largest manufacturing base.
Industrial upgrading and hi-tech innovation are crucial to China's economic development.
China needs to leave more resources to its descendants by protecting the environment, and
reaping the dividends of further opening-up. These are the core interests of China, and it
will never give them up.
The only way for a country to win a war is through development, not compromise. To achieve
development, China will open its door wider to the world and fight to the end."
These are Xi Jinping's mandates, dictated directly from his party, for the meeting with the
United States president in Osaka.
The only possible outcome for Trump was exactly what happened. Nothing. Just an agreement to
talk more.
"If your enemy is secure at all points, be prepared for him. If he is in superior
strength, evade him. I f your opponent is temperamental, seek to irritate him. Pretend to be
weak, that he may grow arrogant. If he is taking his ease, give him no rest. If his forces
are united, separate them. If sovereign and subject are in accord, put division between them.
Attack him where he is unprepared, appear where you are not expected. "
China has been attacking the "rust-belt" states, which are crucial to Trump's 2020
re-election, states with specifically targeted tariffs. As noted by
MarketWatch:
"China has lashed back with tariffs on $110 billion in American goods, focusing on
agricultural products in a direct and painful shot at Trump supporters in the U.S. farm
belt."
While Trump is operating from a view that was a ghost-written, former best-seller, in the
U.S. popular press, Xi is operating from a centuries-old blueprint for victory in battle.
China clearly won this round, and the pressure is now squarely on Trump to get a deal done
before the 2020 election.
"... This story of lost American leadership and production is not unique. In fact, the destruction of America's once vibrant military and commercial industrial capacity in many sectors has become the single biggest unacknowledged threat to our national security. Because of public policies focused on finance instead of production, the United States increasingly cannot produce or maintain vital systems upon which our economy, our military, and our allies rely. Huawei is just a particularly prominent example. ..."
"... Higher budgets would seem to make sense. According to the 2018 National Defense Strategy, the United States is shifting away from armed conflicts in the Middle East to "great power" competition with China and Russia, which have technological parity in many areas with the United States. As part of his case for higher budgets, Mattis told Congress that "our military remains capable, but our competitive edge has eroded in every domain of warfare -- air, land, sea, space, and cyber." ..."
"... And yet, the U.S. military budget, even at stalled levels, is still larger than the next nine countries' budgets combined. So there's a second natural follow-up question: is the defense budget the primary reason our military advantage is slipping away, or is it something deeper? ..."
"... The loss of manufacturing capacity has been devastating for American research capacity. "Innovation doesn't just hover above the Great Plains," Mottl said. "It is built on steady incremental changes and knowledge learned out of basic manufacturing." Telecommunications equipment is dual use, meaning it can be used for both commercial and military purposes. The loss of an industrial base in telecom equipment meant that the American national security apparatus lost military capacity. ..."
"... "The middle-class Americans who did the manufacturing work, all that capability, machine tools, knowledge, it just became worthless, driven by the stock price," he said. "The national ability to produce is a national treasure. If you can't produce you won't consume, and you can't defend yourself." ..."
"... In the commercial sector, rebuilding the industrial base will require an aggressive national mobilization strategy. This means aggressive investment by government to rebuild manufacturing capacity, selective tariffs to protect against Chinese or foreign predation, regulation to stop financial predation by Wall Street, and anti-monopoly enforcement to block the exploitation of market power. ..."
Wall Street's short-term incentives have decimated our defense industrial base and
undermined our national security.
Early this year, U.S. authorities filed criminal
charges -- including bank fraud, obstruction of justice, and theft of technology -- against the
largest maker of telecommunications equipment in the world, a Chinese giant named Huawei.
Chinese dominance in telecom equipment has created a crisis among Western espionage agencies,
who, fearful of Chinese spying, are attempting to prevent the spread of Huawei equipment
worldwide, especially
in the critical 5G next-generation mobile networking space.
In response to the campaign to block the purchase of Huawei equipment, the company has
engaged in a public relations offensive. The company's CEO, Ren Zhengfei, portrayed Western
fears as an advertisement for its products, which are, he said, "so good that the U.S.
government is scared." There's little question the Chinese government is interested in using
equipment to spy. What is surprising is Zhengfei is right about the products. Huawei, a
relatively new company in the telecom equipment space, has amassed top market share because its
equipment -- espionage vulnerabilities aside -- is the best value on the market.
In historical terms, this is a shocking turnaround. Americans invented the telephone
business and until recently dominated production and research. But in the last 20 years, every
single American producer of key telecommunication equipment sectors is gone. Today, only two
European makers -- Ericsson and Nokia -- are left to compete with Huawei and another Chinese
competitor, ZTE.
This story of lost American leadership and production is not unique. In fact, the
destruction of America's once vibrant military and commercial industrial capacity in many
sectors has become the single biggest unacknowledged threat to our national security. Because
of public policies focused on finance instead of production, the United States increasingly
cannot produce or maintain vital systems upon which our economy, our military, and our allies
rely. Huawei is just a particularly prominent example.
When national security specialists consider preparedness, they usually think in terms of the
amount of money spent on the Pentagon. One of President Donald Trump's key campaign promises
was to aggressively raise the military budget, which he, along with Congress, started doing in
2017. The reaction was instant. "I'm heartened that Congress recognizes the sobering effect of
budgetary uncertainty on America's military and on the men and women who provide for our
nation's defense," then-defense secretary Jim Mattis said. Budgets have gone up every year
since.
Higher budgets would seem to make sense. According to the 2018 National Defense
Strategy, the United States is shifting away from armed conflicts in the Middle East to "great
power" competition with China and Russia, which have technological parity in many areas with
the United States. As part of his case for higher budgets, Mattis told Congress that "our
military remains capable, but our competitive edge has eroded in every domain of warfare --
air, land, sea, space, and cyber."
In some cases, our competitive edge has not just been eroded, but is at risk of being -- or
already is -- surpassed. The Chinese surge in 5G telecom equipment, which has dual civilian and
military uses, is one example. China is making key investments in artificial
intelligence, another area of competition. They even seem to be able to mount a rail gun on a naval ship ,
an important next generation weapons technology that the U.S. Navy has yet to incorporate.
And yet, the U.S. military budget, even at stalled levels, is still larger than the next
nine countries' budgets combined. So there's a second natural follow-up question: is the
defense budget the primary reason our military advantage is slipping away, or is it something
deeper?
The story of Huawei, and many others, suggests the latter.
♦♦♦
For over a century, America led the world in producing telecommunications equipment. The
American telecom industry, according to Zach Mottl of Atlas Tool Works, a subcontractor in the
industry, used to be a "crown jewel of American manufacturing." Mottl's company had been a
manufacturing supplier to AT&T and its Bell Labs from the early 1900s until the early
2000s. "The radar system was invented here. The transistor came out of Bell Labs. The laser. I
mean all of these high-tech inventions that have both commercial and military applications were
funded out of the research," Mottl told TAC . More than just the sexy inventions, there
was a domestic industrial sector which could make the equipment. Now, in a strategic coup for
our adversaries, that capability is gone.
Yet it wasn't one of those adversaries that killed our telecommunications capacity, but one
of our own institutions, Wall Street, and its pressure on executives to make decisions designed
to impress financial markets, rather than for the long-term health of their companies. In 1996,
AT&T spun off Bell Labs into a telecom equipment company, Lucent Technologies, to take
advantage of investors' appetite for an independent player selling high-tech telecom gear after
Congress deregulated the telecommuncations space. At the time, it was the biggest initial
public offering in history, and became the foundation of a relationship with financial markets
that led to its eventual collapse.
The focus on stock price at Lucent was systematic. The stock price was posted daily to
encourage everyone to focus on the company's relationship with short-term oriented financial
markets. All employees got a small number of "Founder's Grant Share Options," with executives
offered much larger slugs of stock to solidify the connection. When Richard McGinn became CEO
in 1997, he focused on financial markets.
Lucent began to buy up companies. According to two scholars , "The perceived
need to compete for acquisitions became a 'strategic' justification for keeping stock prices
high. This in turn demanded meeting or exceeding quarterly revenue and earnings targets,
objectives with which Lucent top executives, led by the hard-driving McGinn, became
obsessed."
Lucent got even more aggressive. McGinn's subordinate, an executive named Carly Fiorina,
juiced returns with a strategy based on lending money to risky startups who would then turn
around and buy Lucent equipment. Fiorina collected $65
million in compensation as the stock soared. And then, when the dot-com boom turned to
bust, the company, beset by accounting scandals designed to impress shareholders and the
financial markets, embarked on massive layoffs. CEO McGinn was among those laid off, but with a
$12.5 million severance package -- royal compensation for taking one of America's strategic
industrial assets down the road toward total destruction.
In the early 2000s, the telecom equipment market began to recover from the recession.
Lucent's new strategy, as Mottl put it, was to seek "margin" by offshoring production to China,
continuing layoffs of American workers and hiring abroad. At first, it was the simpler parts of
the telecom equipment, the boxes and assembly, but soon contract manufacturers in China were
making virtually all of it. American telecom capacity would never return.
Lucent didn't recover its former position. Chinese entrants, subsidized heavily by the
Chinese state and using Western technology, underpriced
Western companies. American policymakers, unconcerned with industrial capacity, allowed Chinese
companies to capture market share despite the predatory subsidies and stolen technology. In
2006, French telecom equipment maker Alcatel bought Lucent, signifying the end of American
control of Bell Labs. Today, Huawei, with state backing, dominates the market.
The erosion of much of the American industrial and defense industrial base proceeded like
Lucent. First, in the 1980s and 1990s, Wall Street financiers focused on short-term profits,
market power, and executive pay-outs over core competencies like research and production, often
rolling an industry up into a monopoly producer. Then, in the 2000s, they offshored production
to the lowest cost producer. This finance-centric approach opened the door to the Chinese
government's ability to strategically pick off industrial capacity by subsidizing its
producers. Hand over cash to Wall Street, and China could get the American crown jewels.
The loss of manufacturing capacity has been devastating for American research capacity.
"Innovation doesn't just hover above the Great Plains," Mottl said. "It is built on steady
incremental changes and knowledge learned out of basic manufacturing." Telecommunications
equipment is dual use, meaning it can be used for both commercial and military purposes. The
loss of an industrial base in telecom equipment meant that the American national security
apparatus lost military capacity.
This loss goes well beyond telecom equipment. Talking to small manufacturers and
distributors who operate in the guts of our industrial systems offers a perspective on the
danger of this process of financial predation and offshoring. Bill Hickey, who headed his
family's metal distributor, processor, and fabricator, has been watching the collapse for
decades. Hickey sells to "everyone who uses steel," from truck, car, and agricultural equipment
manufacturers to stadiums and the military.
Hickey, like many manufacturers, has watched the rise of China with alarm for decades.
"Everyone's upset about the China 2025 plan," he told TAC , referencing the current
Chinese plan causing alarm among national security thinkers in Washington. "Well there was a
China 2020 plan, 2016 plan, 2012 plan." The United States has, for instance, lost much of its
fasteners and casting industries, which are key inputs to virtually every industrial product.
It has lost much of its capacity in grain oriented flat-rolled electrical steel, a specialized
metal required for highly efficient electrical motors. Aluminum that goes into American
aircraft carriers now often comes from China.
Hickey told a story of how the United States is even losing its submarine fleet. He had a
conversation with an admiral in charge of the U.S. sub fleet at the commissioning of the USS
Illinois , a Virginia-class attack submarine, who complained that the United States was
retiring three worn-out boats a year, but could only build one and a half in that time. The
Trump military budget has boosted funding to build two a year, but the United States no longer
has the capacity to do high quality castings to build any more than that. The supply chain that
could support such surge production should be in the commercial world, but it has been
offshored to China. "You can't run a really high-end casting business on making three
submarines a year," Hickey said. "You just can't do it." This shift happened because Wall
Street, or "the LBO (leveraged buy-out) guys" as Hickey put it, bought up manufacturing
facilities in the 1990s and moved them to China.
"The middle-class Americans who did the manufacturing work, all that capability, machine
tools, knowledge, it just became worthless, driven by the stock price," he said. "The national
ability to produce is a national treasure. If you can't produce you won't consume, and you
can't defend yourself."
The Loss of the Defense Industrial Base
But it's not just the dual-use commercial manufacturing base that is collapsing. Our policy
empowering Wall Street and offshoring has also damaged the more specialized defense base, which
directly produces weaponry and equipment for the military.
How pervasive is the loss of such capacity? In September 2018, the Department of Defense
released findings of its analysis into its supply chain. The results highlighted how fragile
our ability to supply our own military has become.
The report listed dozens of militarily significant items and inputs with only one or two
domestic producers, or even none at all. Many production facilities are owned by companies that
are financially vulnerable and at high risk of being shut down. Some of the risk comes from
limited production capability. Mortar tubes, for example, are made on just one production line,
and some Marine aircraft parts are made by just one company -- one which recently filed for
bankruptcy.
At risk is everything from chaff to flares to high voltage cable, fittings for ships,
valves, key inputs for satellites and missiles, and even material for tents. As Americans no
longer work in key industrial fields, the engineering and production skills evaporate as the
legacy workforce retires.
Even more unsettling is the reliance on foreign, and often adversarial, manufacturing and
supplies. The report found that "China is the single or sole supplier for a number of specialty
chemicals used in munitions and missiles . A sudden and catastrophic loss of supply would
disrupt DoD missile, satellite, space launch, and other defense manufacturing programs. In many
cases, there are no substitutes readily available." Other examples of foreign reliance included
circuit boards, night vision systems, batteries, and space sensors.
The story here is similar. When Wall Street targeted the commercial industrial base in the
1990s, the same financial trends shifted the defense industry. Well before any of the more
recent conflicts, financial pressure led to a change in focus for many in the defense industry
-- from technological engineering to balance sheet engineering. The result is that some of the
biggest names in the industry have never created any defense product. Instead of innovating new
technology to support our national security, they innovate new ways of creating monopolies to
take advantage of it.
A good example is a company called TransDigm. While TransDigm presents itself as a designer
and producer of aerospace products, it can more accurately be described as a designer of
monopolies. TransDigm began as a private equity firm, a type of investment business, in 1993.
Its mission, per
its earnings call , is to give "private equity-like returns" to shareholders, returns that
are much higher than the stock market or other standard investment vehicles.
It achieves these returns for its shareholders by buying up companies that are sole or
single-source suppliers of obscure airplane parts that the government needs, and then
increasing prices by as
much as eight times the original amount . If the government balks at paying, TransDigm has
no qualms daring the military to risk its mission and its crew by not buying the parts. The
military, held hostage, often pays the ransom. TransDigm's gross profit margins using this
model to gouge the U.S. government are a robust 54.5 percent. To put that into perspective,
Boeing and Lockheed's profit margins are listed at 13.6 percent and 10.91 percent. In many
ways, TransDigm is like the pharmaceutical company run by Martin Shkreli, which bought rare
treatments and then price gouged those who could not do without the product. Earlier this year,
TransDigm
recently bought the remaining supplier of chaff and one of two suppliers of flares,
products identified in the Defense Department's supply chain fragility report.
Yet, Trandigm's stock price thrives because Wall Street loves monopolies, regardless of who
they are taking advantage of. Take this
analysis from TheStreet from March 2019, published after the latest Inspector General
report and directly citing many of the concerning facts from the report as pure positives for
the investor:
The company is now the sole supplier for 80% of the end markets it serves. And 90% of the
items in the supply chain are proprietary to TransDigm. In other words, the company is
operating a monopoly for parts needed to operate aircraft that will typically be in service for
30 years . Managers are uniquely motivated to increase shareholder value and they have an
enviable record, with shares up 2,503% since 2009.
Fleecing the Defense Department is big business. Its executive chairman W. Nicholas Howley,
skewered by Democrats and Republicans alike in a May 2019 House Oversight hearing for making up
to 4,000 percent excess profit on some parts and stealing from the American taxpayer, received
total compensation of over $64
million in 2013 , the fifth most among all CEOs, and
over $13 million in 2018 , making him one
of the most highly compensated CEOs no one has ever heard of . Shortly after May's hearing,
the company agreed to voluntarily return $16 million in overcharges to the Pentagon, but the
share price is at near record highs.
L3 Technologies, created in 1997, has taken a different, but also damaging, approach to
monopolizing Defense Department contracts. Originally, it sought to become "the Home Depot of
the defense industry" by going on an acquisition binge, according
to its former CEO Frank Lanza. Today, L3 uses its size, its connections within the government,
and its willingness to offer federal employees good-paying jobs at L3, to muscle out
competitors and win contracts, even if the competitor has
more innovative and better priced products . This practice attracted the ire of two
Republican congressmen from North Carolina, Ted Budd and the late Walter Jones, who found
in 2017 that L3 succeeds, in part, due to "blatant corruption and obvious disregard of American
foreign interest in the name of personal economic profit."
Like TransDigm, this isn't L3's first brush with trouble. It was
temporarily suspended from U.S. government contracting for using "extremely sensitive and
classified information" from a government system to help its international business interests.
It was the subject of a scathing Senate Armed Services Committee investigation
for
failing to notify the Defense Department that it supplied faulty Chinese counterfeit parts
for some of its aircraft displays. And it agreed to pay a
$25.6 million settlement to the U.S. government for knowingly providing defective weapon
sights for years to soldiers serving in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Yet, also like TransDigm, L3 has thrived despite its troubles. When the company was granted
an open-ended contract to update the Air Force's electronics jamming airplane in 2017,
Lieutenant General Arnold Bunch
outlined the Air Force's logic at a House Armed Services Subcommittee meeting. L3, he said,
is the only company that can do the job. "They have all the tooling, they have all the existing
knowledge, and they have the modeling and all the information to do that work," he said.
In other words, because L3 has a monopoly, there was no one else to pick. The system -- a
system designed by the financial industry that rewards monopoly and consolidation at the
expense of innovation and national security -- essentially made the pick for him. It is no
wonder our military capacities are ebbing, despite the large budget outlays -- the money isn't
going to defense.
♦♦♦
In fact, in some ways, our own defense budgets are being used against us when potential
adversaries use Wall Street to take control of our own Pentagon-developed technologies.
There's no better example than China's takeover of the rare earth metal industry, which is
key to both defense and electronics. The issue has frequently made the front page during the
recent trade war, but the seldom-discussed background to our dependence on China for rare
earths is that, just like with telecom equipment, the United States used to be the world leader
in the industry until the financial sector shipped the whole thing to China.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the Defense Department invested in the development of a
technology to use what are known as rare-earth magnets. The investment was so successful that
General Motors engineers, using Pentagon grants, succeeded in creating a
rare earth magnet that is now essential for nearly every high-tech piece of military equipment
in the U.S. inventory, from smart bombs and fighter jets to lasers and communications devices.
The benefit of DARPA's investment wasn't restricted to the military. The magnets make cell
phones and modern commercial electronics possible.
China recognized the value of these magnets early on. Chinese Premier Deng Xiaoping
famously said in 1992 that "The Middle East has oil, China has rare earth," to underscore
the importance of a rare earth strategy he adopted for China. Part of that strategy was to take
control of the industry by manipulating the motivations of Wall Street.
Wall Street's outsized control over defense contracting and industry means that every place
a foreign adversary can insert itself into American financial institutions, it can insert
itself into our defense industry.
At an Armed Services Committee hearing in 2018, Representative Carol Shea-Porter talked
about how constant the conflict between financial concentration and patriotism had been in her
six years on the committee. She recounted a CEO once telling her, in response to her concern
about the outsourcing of defense industry parts, that he "[has] to answer to stockholders."
Who are these stockholders that CEOs are so compelled to answer to? Oftentimes, China.
Jennifer M.
Harris , an expert in global markets with experience at the U.S. State Department and the
U.S. National Intelligence Council, researched a recent
explosion of Chinese strategic investment in American technology companies. She found that
China has systematically targeted U.S. greenfield investments, "technology goods (especially
semiconductors), R&D networks, and advanced manufacturing."
The trend accelerated, until the recent flare-up of tensions between the United States and
China. "China's foreign direct investment (FDI) stock in the U.S.
increased some 800% between 2009 and 2015," she wrote. Then, from 2015 to 2017, "Chinese
FDI in the U.S. climbed nearly four-fold, reaching roughly $45.6 billion in 2016 , up from just
$12.8 billion in 2014."
This investment runs right through Wall Street, the key lobbying group trying to ratchet
down Trump's tough negotiating posture with the Chinese. Rather than showing concern about the
increasing influence of a foreign power in our commerce and industry, Wall Street banks have
repeatedly followed Archie Cox down the path of easy returns.
In 2016, J.P. Morgan Chase agreed to pay a
$264 million bribery settlement to the U.S. government for creating a program, called "Sons
and Daughters," to gain access to Chinese money by selectively hiring the unqualified offspring
of high-ranking Communist Party officials and other Chinese elites. Several other banks are
under investigation for similar practices, including Citigroup and Goldman Sachs, who, not
coincidentally,
hired the son of China's commerce minister. It appears to have worked out for them. In
2017, Goldman Sachs
partnered with the Chinese government's sovereign wealth fund to invest $5 billion Chinese
government dollars in American industry.
In short, China is becoming a significant shareholder in U.S. industries, and is selectively
targeting those with strategic implications. Congresswoman Shea-Porter's discovery that defense
industry CEOs aren't able to worry about national security because they "[have] to answer to
shareholders" was disturbing enough. But the fact that it potentially translates as CEOs not
being able to worry about national security because they have to answer to the Chinese should
elevate the issue to the top of our national security discussion. This nexus of China, Wall
Street, and our defense industrial base may be the answer to why our military advantage is
ebbing. Even when American ingenuity can thrive, too often the fruits go to the Chinese.
In short, the financial industry, with its emphasis on short-term profit and
monopoly , and its willingness to ignore national security for profit, has warped our very
ability to defend ourselves.
How Did We Get Here?
Believe it or not, America has been here before. In the 1920s and 1930s, the American
defense industrial base was being similarly manipulated by domestic financiers for their own
purposes, retarding innovation and damaging the nation's ability to defend itself. And American
military readiness was ebbing in the midst of an increasingly dangerous world full of rising
autocracies.
Today it might be artificial intelligence or drones, but in the 1930s the key military
technology was the airplane. And as with much digital technology today, while Americans
invented the airplane, many of the fruits went elsewhere. The reason was similar to the problem
of Wall Street today. The American aerospace industry in the 1930s was undermined by fights
among bankers over who got to profit from associated patent rights.
In 1935, Brigadier General William Mitchell told Congress that the United States didn't have
a single plane that could go against a "first-class power." "It is a disgraceful situation and
is due," he said, "for one thing, to this pool of patents." The lack of aerospace capacity
reflected a broader industrial problem. Monopolists refused to invest in factories to produce
enough steel, aluminum, and magnesium for adequate military readiness, for fear of losing
control over prices.
New Dealers investigated, and by the time war broke out, the Roosevelt administration was in
the midst of a sustained anti-monopoly campaign. The Nazi war machine, like China today, gave
added impetus to the problem of monopoly in key technology-heavy industries. In 1941, an
assistant attorney general for the antitrust division, Norman Littell, gave a speech to the
Indiana State Bar Association about what he called "The German Invasion of American
Business."
The Nazis, he argued, used legal techniques, like patent laws, stock ownership, dummy
corporations, and cartel arrangements, to extend their power into the United States. "The
distinction between bombing a vital plant out of existence from an airplane and preventing that
plant from coming into existence in the first place [through cartel arrangements]," he said,
"is largely a difference in the amount of noise involved."
Nazis used their American subsidiary corporations to spy on U.S. industrial capacity and
steal technology, such as walkie-talkies, intertank and ground-air radio communication systems,
and shortwave sets developed by the U.S. Army and Navy. They used patents or cartel
arrangements to restrict the production of stainless steel, tungsten-carbide, and fuel
injection equipment. According to the U.S. military after the war, I.G. Farben, the Nazi
chemical monopoly, had influence over American production of "synthetic gas and oils,
dyestuffs, explosives, synthetic rubber ('Buna'), menthol, cellophane, and other products," and
sought to keep the United States "entirely dependent" on Germany for certain types of
electrical equipment.
The Nazis took advantage of an industrial system that was, like the current one, organized
along short-term objectives. But seeing the danger, New Dealers attacked the power of
financiers through direct financing of factories, excess profits taxes, and the breaking of the
power of the Rockefeller, Dupont, and Mellon empires through bank regulation and antitrust
suits. They separated the makers of airplanes from airlines, a sort of Glass Steagall for
aerospace. During the war itself, antitrust chief Thurman Arnold, and those he influenced,
sought to end international cartels and loosen patent rules in part because they allowed
control over American industry by the Nazis.
After the war, the link between global cartels and national security vulnerabilities was a
key driver of American trade and military strategy. America pursued globalization, but with two
differences from the form we have today. First, strategists sought to prevent the recurrence of
global cartels and monopolies. Second, they sought to become industrially intertwined with
allies, not rivals. While multinational corporations stretched across the West, they did not
locate production or technology development in Moscow or among strategic rivals, as we do today
in China.
Domestically, anti-profiteering institutions and rules protected against corruption,
especially important when the defense budget comprised a large chunk of overall American
research and development. The Defense Department's procurement agency -- the Defense Logistics
Agency -- was enormously powerful and oversaw procurement and supply challenges. The Pentagon
had the power to force suppliers of sole source products -- contractors that had monopolies --
to reveal cost information to the government. The financial health of defense contractors
mattered, but so did value to the taxpayer, a skilled defense industrial workforce, and the
ability to deliver quality products to aid in national defense.
A fragmented base of contractors and subcontractors ensured redundancy and competition, and
a powerful federal apparatus with thousands of employees with expertise in pricing and
negotiation kept prices reasonable. The Defense Department could even take ownership of
specialized tooling rights to create competition in monopolistic markets with specialized spare
part needs -- which is precisely where TransDigm specializes. This authority and expertise had
been carefully cultivated over decades to provide the material necessary to equip American
soldiers for World War II, the Korean and Vietnam wars, and the first Gulf war.
In the 1980s, while Ronald Reagan allowed Wall Street free rein elsewhere in the economy, he
mostly kept Wall Street from going after the defense base. But scholars began debating whether
it made sense to have such a large and expensive negotiating apparatus to deal with
contractors, or if a more "cooperative" approach should be taken. Business consultants
argued that the Pentagon could save money if it would simply be "a better customer, by
being less adversarial and more trusting" of defense contractors.
With the end of the Cold War, these arguments found new resonance. Bill Clinton took the
philosophical change that Reagan had pushed on the civilian economy, and moved it into the
defense base. In 1993, Defense Department official William Perry gathered CEOs of top defense
contractors and told them that they would have to merge into larger entities because of reduced
Cold War spending. "Consolidate or evaporate," he said at what became known as "The Last
Supper" in military lore. Former secretary of the Navy John Lehman noted, "industry leaders
took the warning to heart." They reduced the number of prime contractors from 16 to six;
subcontractor mergers quadrupled from 1990 to 1998. They also loosened rules on sole source --
i.e. monopoly -- contracts, and slashed the Defense Logistics Agency, resulting in thousands of
employees with deep knowledge of defense contracting leaving the public sector.
Contractors increasingly dictated procurement rules. The Clinton administration approved
laws changing procurement, which, as the Los Angeles Times put it, got rid of the
government's traditional goals of ensuring "fair competition and low prices." They reversed
what the New Dealers had done to insulate American military power from financiers.
The administration also pushed Congress to allow foreign imports into
American weapons through waivers of the Buy America Act, and demanded procurement officers stop
asking for cost data. Mass offshoring took place, and businesses could increase prices
radically.
This environment attracted private-equity shops, and swaths of the defense industry shifted
their focus from aerospace engineering to balance sheet engineering. From 1993 to 2000, despite
dramatic declines in Cold War military spending and declines in the number of workers in the
defense industrial base and within the military, defense stocks outperformed the S&P.
Today, the American defense establishment quietly finds itself in the same predicament it
did in the 1930s. Despite spending large amounts of money on weapons systems, it often gets
substandard equipment. It is dependent for key sources of supply on business arrangements with
potentially hostile powers. The problem is so big, so toxic, and so difficult that few
lawmakers even want to take it on. But the increasingly obvious danger of Chinese power means
we can no longer ignore it.
The Fix
Fortunately, this is fixable. Huawei's predatory pricing success has shown policymakers all
over the world what happens when we don't protect our vital industrial capacity. Last year,
Congress strengthened the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, the committee
that reviews foreign investment and mergers. The Trump tariffs have begun forcing a
long-overdue conversation across the globe about Chinese steel and aluminum overcapacity, and
Democrats like Representative Dan Lipinski are focused on reconstituting domestic manufacturing
ability.
Within the defense base itself, every example -- from TransDigm to L3 to Chinese
infiltration of American business -- has drawn the attention of members of Congress.
Representatives Ted Budd and Paul Cook are Republicans and Representatives Jackie Speier and Ro
Khanna are Democrats. They are not alone. Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren and
Representative Tim Ryan have joined Khanna's demand for a TransDigm investigation.
Moreover, focus on production is bipartisan. One of the most ardent opponents of
consolidation in the 1990s is current presidential candidate Bernie Sanders, who in 1996
passed an amendment to block Pentagon subsidies for defense mergers, or what he called "Payoffs
for Layoffs." On the other end of the spectrum, Trump has refocused national security and trade
officials on the importance of domestic manufacturing.
Defense officials have also become acutely aware of the problem. In a 2015 briefing at the
Pentagon, in response to questions about Lockheed's acquisition of Sikorsky, then secretary of
defense Ash Carter
emphasized the importance of not having "excessive consolidation," including so-called
vertical integration, in the defense industry because it is "[not] good for the defense
marketplace, and therefore, for the taxpayer and warfighter in the long run." Carter's
acquisition chief, Frank Kendall,
also noted the "significant policy concerns" posed by the "continuing march toward greater
consolidation in the defense industry at the prime contractor level" and the effect it has on
innovation.
American policymakers in the 1990s lost the ability to recognize the value of production
capacity. Today, many of the problems highlighted here are still seen in isolation, perhaps as
instances of corruption or reduced capacity. But the problems -- diminished innovation,
marginal quality, higher prices, less redundancy, dependence on overseas supply chains, a lack
of defense industry competition, and reduced investment in research and development -- are not
independent. They are the result of the financialization of industry and of monopoly. It's time
for a new strategic posture, one that puts a premium not just on spending the right amount on
military budgets, but also on ensuring that financial actors don't capture what we do spend. We
must begin once again to recognize that private industrial capacity is a vital national
security asset that we can no longer allow Wall Street to pillage. By seeing the problem in its
totality, we can attack the power of finance within the commercial and defense base and restore
our national security capacity once again.
There are many levers we can use to reorder our national priorities. The Defense Department,
along with its new higher budgets, should have more authority to promote competition, break up
defense conglomerates, restrict excess defense contractor profits, empower contracting officers
to get cost information, and block private equity takeovers of suppliers. Congress could
reinstate the authority of the Defense Department to simply take ownership of specialized
tooling rights to create competition in monopolistic markets with specialized spare part needs,
a power it once had.
In the commercial sector, rebuilding the industrial base will require an aggressive
national mobilization strategy. This means aggressive investment by government to rebuild
manufacturing capacity, selective tariffs to protect against Chinese or foreign predation,
regulation to stop financial predation by Wall Street, and anti-monopoly enforcement to block
the exploitation of market power.
Policymakers must recognize that industrial capacity is a public good and short-term actors
on Wall Street have become a serious national security vulnerability. While private businesses
are essential to our common defense, the public sector must once again structure how we
organize our national defense and protect our defense industrial base from predatory finance.
For several decades, Wall Street has been organizing not just the financing of defense
contractors, but the capabilities of our very defense posture. That experiment has been a
failure. It is time to wake up, before it's too late.
Matt Stoller is a fellow at the Open Markets Institute. His book, Goliath: The
100-Year War Between Monopoly Power and Democracy, is due out this fall from Simon &
Schuster. Lucas Kunce spent 12 years in the United States Marine Corps, and is a veteran of the
Iraq and Afghanistan wars. The views presented are those of the authors and do not necessarily
represent the views of the Department of Defense or its components. This article was supported
by the Ewing Marion Kauffman Foundation. The contents of this publication are solely the
responsibility of the authors.
Sobering read. However, it is likely that only a major war will spur legislators and
administrators into action. Until then Wall Street will reign and the US administrations will
keep threatening countries with sanctions if they buy equipment that prevents the US to
conduct an easy bombing campaign on them.
I've heard similar stories about the imminent collapse of the Russian Defense sector, they
can't make their own parts, they lack diversity of suppliers, there is a huge brain drain, no
customers (somewhat true since we practice extortion).
I'm not dismissing the author, actually quite the opposite and I am agreeing with you. The
secret ingredient is an actual sense of danger. The Russians are terrified, we pretend to be
terrified but know it's all threat inflation. If we had honest people in Congress proposing
targeted budgets for real needs rather than 'freedom of navigation' when we know it's power
projection then the fear of God might return to our habits. The author brought up the 20/30's
I bet WW2 gave us that fear again.
Dude, your government stopped being able to do anything this complicated somewhere around
1995. Your infrastructure is in shambles and diabetics are dying because of an insulin
monopoly that forces them to ration medication. The rope remark resembles you.
This is the longest litany about demise of American prowess in technology that I've ever read
in TAC so far. The story of destruction of Bell Labs, described in details by Matt Stoller is
very accurate: I have been eyewitness to it from 1983 and up to its gruesome end. Carly
Fiorina, one of the runners for President in 2016, delivered American icon coup-the-grace.
She even justified her claim on presidency on business experience: destruction of another
icon of American high-tech – Hewlett-Packard. Alas, there is the most fundamental
reason for the current situation in the 21-st century USA, was formulated 100+ years ago by
Vladimir Lenin: "For profit capitalists will be eager to sell us rope, with which we'll
hung them" .
Would anybody protest today that profit IS the Nature of capitalism ? And
more: those who substitute Reality with their wet dreams might be cured by watching
Democratic 2020 debates.
Great piece. There are lots of good articles here but not that many that tell something I
really didn't already know. Great perspective on the whole China issue. Amazing how sick our
financialized economy really is when you look under the hood.
This is excellent information. Hope folks on the Hill are reading this.
The Wall Street and finance industry depend on US military, long-term this is a disaster, but
they care only for short-term profits. Whoever thought that principles of free market apply
internationally, where other goverments are free to influence "free trade" in any way they
wish, while US goverment will do nothing is an idiot.
Large part of it is probably diversification and it does not affect the US exporters as they
also can diversify.
Notable quotes:
"... The bottom line is Trump and his misfit Cabinet didn't thoroughly think through all of the likely negative ramifications of "Making America Great Again" !! He impulsively makes decisions and when then fail - as they do often do - he blames others or creates diversionary chaos to change the subject. Trump's a fxxxxing overweight, repulsive imbecile, and the farmers are going to let him have it in 2020.....along with millions who rolled the dice him in 2016 but he crapped out on all of them..... ..."
"... What is happening to US cars in China? I know the market has taken a dump there, but are US cars losing market share as well? Are Chinese consumers shunning goods from US manufacturers? ..."
published new data Monday that shows
agricultural imports from the US have fallen, as Chinese buyers shift supply chains out of the
US to other countries because of the deepening trade war.
In the first five months of 2019, imports of agricultural products from the US crashed 55.3%
YoY . Much of decline was due to a 70.6% YoY decline of soybeans in the same period.
Chinese importers went to Brazil, Argentina, and ASEN countries (Thailand, Indonesia,
Malaysia, Singapore, Philippines, Vietnam, Brunei, Myanmar (Burma), Cambodia, and Laos). Data
showed imports from the EU, Australia, and Canada also jumped in the first five months as
Chinese buyers ditched American products.
The bottom line is Trump and his misfit Cabinet didn't thoroughly think through all of
the likely negative ramifications of "Making America Great Again" !! He impulsively makes
decisions and when then fail - as they do often do - he blames others or creates diversionary
chaos to change the subject. Trump's a fxxxxing overweight, repulsive imbecile, and the
farmers are going to let him have it in 2020.....along with millions who rolled the dice him
in 2016 but he crapped out on all of them.....
C'mon man, it's not a Trump thing, it's been the whole American policy since Ronald
Reagan. Trump didn't start the fire, he's just half-assing things the best he can.
We cannot withstand another year in which our most important foreign market continues to
slip away and soybean prices are 20 to 25%, or even more, below pre-tariff levels," said
John Heisdorffer, chairman of the American Soybean Association, in a statement published on
May 13.
Or.........what? You should've voted for Clinton and you'll vote for Bernie/Biden/Warren?
Come on man, spit it out. Or what?
What is happening to US cars in China? I know the market has taken a dump there, but are
US cars losing market share as well? Are Chinese consumers shunning goods from US
manufacturers?
From a report: Ren's downbeat assessment that the ban will hit revenue
by $30 billion , the first time Huawei has quantified the impact of the U.S. action, comes
as a surprise after weeks of defiant comments from company executives who maintained Huawei was
technologically self-sufficient. [...]
Huawei had not expected that U.S. determination to "crack" the company would be "so
strong and so pervasive," Ren said, speaking at the company's Shenzhen headquarters on
Monday.
Two U.S. tech experts, George Gilder and Nicholas Negroponte, also joined the session.
"We did not expect they would attack us on so many aspects," Ren said, adding he expects a
revival in business in 2021.
The article is a typical neoliberal analysys and as such is junk. But might be useful for the reference of key neoliberal
arguments against tariffs.
Notable quotes:
"... Production dislocation is particularly likely under a tit-for-tat tariff escalation, in which multiple countries raise tariffs at the same time. All else equal, higher tariffs give firms an incentive to consolidate their global supply networks into fewer countries, border crossings, and (thus) vulnerabilities. ..."
"... A noteworthy irony, given President Trump's stated goal to bring jobs back to US shores, is that the administration has imposed new tariffs disproportionately on imported intermediate goods (Bown and Zhang 2019) -- the very inputs that are necessary for US manufacturers to produce and sell their products competitively in the US and global markets. ..."
"... Higher tariffs on intermediate goods – together with increased uncertainty over the future of US tariff policy more generally 4 – run the risk of inducing firms to shift their current production patterns away from the US and into 'factory Asia' or 'factory Europe'. ..."
"... Early evidence suggests that even in the very short run, the current trade war is taking a toll on US firms and consumers. ..."
"... How, ultimately, will firms shift, consolidate, and potentially balkanise their production to mitigate the costs of tit-for-tat tariffs and the uncertainty of future trade wars? The consequences of this trade war may be slow to unfold and long lasting once they do. ..."
"... I found this statement interesting: "If rising tariffs (or even just the threat of a trade war) causes firms to change how and where products are made in the world, this additional production dislocation will carry additional efficiency, job, profit, and welfare losses. " Note that only losses are noted, while the possible beneficiaries, such as workers or manufacturers in other countries who may see new jobs or demand created in response to tariffs are not mentioned. ..."
"... Interesting. Mostly because it is another example of the convoluted extent we are willing to go to maintain a neoliberal trading world, assuring an economy that operates, at least in part, on profits created by a wide variety of externalizations. Tariffs aren't earmarked for specific domestic expenses, like cleaning up the pollution where it occurred – because if the blue jeans wholesaler here paid an import tariff, collected here, that money would get spent in the wrong country and pollution would expand exponentially in the country of the cheapest, dirtiest manufacture. ..."
"... For tariffs to actually smooth out all the problems with globalism they would have to be globalized too. ..."
"... It needs to be properly recycled back to mitigate the harm neoliberal trade has caused. Or we could just chuck all the nonsense and get serious about labor and the environment. ..."
"... Richard Koo has discovered the assumption economists used when they said free trade would be a net positive for any nation. Trade must be balanced, but the US runs a large trade deficit. The negative effects over a long period of time have brought Trump to power. Richard Koo wants to ensure the current system is maintained and hopes the successful developed Eastern nations will band together to help the US that has been shooting itself in the foot for four decades. ..."
"... "There's class warfare, all right, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making war, and we're winning." Warren Buffet, 25 May 2005 That's all very well Warren, but how is the US doing against China? Who cares, I'm making loads of money. Oh dear. ..."
"... In a world of Global Value Chains -- tariffs alone are blunt weapons that do damage in occult directions. Unaccompanied by some kind of industrial and commercial policies they wreck random harm and confer unintended advantages. ..."
"... But the flaws in wanton tariff policy make no argument favorable to maintaining Global Value Chains. They are crabbing-growth tumors which kill off smaller local industries and threaten global collapse as the "innovations in communications and transportation technologies" they depend upon wither in this age of Peak Oil. ..."
"... Global Value Chains are one of many frailties built-in to our global civilization -- built from multiple thin lines riddled along their long reaches with single points of failure -- radial spider webs without cross-webbing -- held together by the brittle Neoliberal policies of Corporate Persons. ..."
By Emily Blanchard,
Associate Professor, Tuck School of Business, Dartmouth College. Originally published at
VoxEU
The nature of global commerce has changed dramatically over the past 40 years, with the
meteoric rise of global value chain trade. This column, taken from a recent Vox eBook, builds
on insights from recent research to identify three critical dimensions of global value chain
trade that promise to make today's trade wars more economically costly and more politically
complex than previous trade wars.
Editor's note: This column first appeared as a chapter in the Vox eBook "Trade War: The
Clash of Economic Systems Endangering Global Prosperity", available to download free here
.
The nature of global commerce has changed dramatically over the past 40 years, with the
meteoric rise of global value chain (GVC) trade. 1 Simply put, countries and
companies make goods differently today than in the past. In the 21st century, products are
'made in the world', as firms combine raw materials, inputs, labour, and ideas – the many
slivers of value that ultimately make up a final product – each sourced from around the
world according to specific cost-benefit tradeoffs for every component part of the value chain.
This phenomenon has been made possible by innovations in communications and transportation
technologies, together with institutional and market reforms that have allowed scores of
countries to join (or rejoin) the global economic landscape. GVC trade – measured as a
dramatic rise in the trade in value-added sub-components relative to gross trade – is the
quantifiable manifestation of this 'made in the world' global production revolution.
In turn, the rise of GVC trade has reshaped the economic consequences and political contours
of trade protection. While trade wars have always been disruptive, they are particularly
expensive and divisive in the GVC era.
This chapter builds on insights from recent research to identify three critical dimensions
of GVC trade that promise to make today's trade wars more economically costly and more
politically complex than previous trade wars. Along the way, the discussion highlights
distinctive aspects of the current, 2018-2019 trade actions that could carry additional,
unintentional costs for the US economy.
The first point is obvious but important: GVCs amplify the effects of tariffs. Because
tariffs are (typically) applied to the gross value of a good when it crosses the border, rather
than just the 'new' value added, every border crossing increases the total tariff bill
associated with production.
For example, suppose that a pair of blue jeans is made in three stages: first, raw cotton is
grown in country A and exported to country B; then country B processes the cotton into denim
fabric, which is exported to country C; finally, country C cuts, sews, and finishes the jeans
to be sold, ultimately, in country A. If each country imposes a uniform 10% tariff on all
imports, a tariff will be paid three times during the production process, with escalating costs
as the gross value of trade increases from raw cotton, to the cotton fabric, to the finished
product. Had the jeans been produced start to finish in country C, the tariff would be paid
just once (when the final product is shipped to the consumer in country A), and the total cost
of production, inclusive of tariffs, would be lower.
The implication is immediate: the costs of higher tariffs in a trade war will be greater
(potentially many times greater) in a trading system with GVC trade than in an otherwise
equivalent world without it. The corollary (discussed further below) is that higher tariffs in
general, and trade wars in particular, may induce firms to shorten or otherwise reshape their
global supply chains. 2
The second point concerns not the total cost of a trade war, but the distribution of that
cost across different stakeholders. Fundamentally, GVC linkages mean that the burden of tariffs
falls differently among consumers, workers, and firms involved throughout the value chain. As
explained below, some of the costs of trade protection may ultimately be borne by upstream
producers in the country imposing the tariff, 3 while some of the producer-side
benefits from trade protection enjoyed by local import-competing firms may be passed along to
foreign interests.
The same example of blue jean production serves to illustrate. Suppose now that country A
increases its tariff on all products (including blue jeans) to 25%. If country A's consumers
constitute a sufficient share of global demand for blue jeans, then an increase in country A's
tariff may drive down the export price received by the producers of jeans in country C. (That
is, the incidence of the tariff will be shared by consumers in country A, who pay higher
prices, and producers in country C, who receive lower prices, with the government of country A
collecting the difference as tariff revenue.) By the same logic, if country C's jeans producers
are an important source of global demand for denim fabric, producers of jeans in country C may
be able to pass on some of the fall in their revenue to producers of fabric in country B, who
would then receive a lower export price. In turn, if country B is a sufficiently important
market for country A's raw cotton, the price of cotton in country A may also fall. Thus,
ultimately, the costs of country A's tariffs on imported blue jeans will be shared between
country A's consumers and all of the producers of value added embedded in the imported blue
jeans, including, potentially, the producers of raw cotton in country A.
Meanwhile, if country A had a local producer of blue jeans competing head-to-head with
imports from country C, that producer would gain from the additional protection afforded by the
25% tariff. But if that local producer was owned by a foreign interest, or sourced its inputs
from abroad, part of the benefit of that trade protection would be passed up the value chain,
outside of country A. Thus, GVC linkages mean that country A may see its tariff protection
eroded, even as it must internalise more of the costs of its tariff hike (Blanchard et al.
2016).
The extent to which producers in each country bear the costs of the tariff depend on a host
of factors, including market power, bargaining relationships, input customisation, and trade
volumes. Whatever the details, the broad implication is the same: GVC trade means that the
costs and benefits of higher tariffs – and by extension, trade wars – may extend
well beyond the immediate 'intentional' targets to include countries and companies around the
world, including the very country that imposed the new protection at the outset.
The third point recognises that GVCs are themselves determined by market forces. Because GVC
structure is the result of strategic sourcing and foreign investment decisions of globally
engaged firms, tariffs may have large, long-lasting, and unanticipated consequences for the
pattern of global production. If rising tariffs (or even just the threat of a trade war) causes
firms to change how and where products are made in the world, this additional production
dislocation will carry additional efficiency, job, profit, and welfare losses. Moreover, given
the complex calculus faced by firms responding to changes in the global economic landscape,
there is good reason to believe that global firms may not respond the way the importing country
wants or expects.
Production dislocation is particularly likely under a tit-for-tat tariff escalation, in
which multiple countries raise tariffs at the same time. All else equal, higher tariffs give
firms an incentive to consolidate their global supply networks into fewer countries, border
crossings, and (thus) vulnerabilities. But where firms choose to consolidate that production
depends on a host of factors, including proximity not only to expected consumers but also to
raw material, critical input suppliers, local economic regulations, policy certainty, access to
skilled and low-cost labour, and more. To the extent that some of the 2018-2019 tariffs are
intended to induce producers to 're-shore' production in the US, they may have unintended
consequences if firms instead balkanise their production networks somewhere else. "America
first" could backfire.
A noteworthy irony, given President Trump's stated goal to bring jobs back to US shores, is
that the administration has imposed new tariffs disproportionately on imported intermediate
goods (Bown and Zhang 2019) -- the very inputs that are necessary for US manufacturers to
produce and sell their products competitively in the US and global markets. If the intent is to
induce US manufacturers to 're-shore' production to the US (or to dissuade US firms from moving
final assembly/downstream production overseas), lower tariffs on imported intermediate goods
would be in order. Higher tariffs on intermediate goods – together with increased
uncertainty over the future of US tariff policy more generally 4 – run the
risk of inducing firms to shift their current production patterns away from the US and into
'factory Asia' or 'factory Europe'.
Global firms seem to appreciate the importance of these GVC linkages and what they mean for
the potential escalating and unanticipated costs of trade wars. The US Chamber of Commerce has
been a relentless advocate for a quick and amicable resolution of the 2018-2019 trade
frictions. At the same time, the United Steelworkers union, which represents nearly one million
US worker-members in manufacturing, metals, forestry and beyond – industries that employ
workers up and down the value chain across myriad traded products – has been an outspoken
critic of renegotiating NAFTA in general, and the US steel and aluminum tariffs against Canada
in particular. Perhaps most notably, until recently, many governments had been implementing
policies consistent with a sophisticated understanding of the relationship between GVCs and
trade policy. According to several studies, the contours of GVC linkages and firms' global
sourcing operations were reflected in trade policy before the 2018-2019 trade war, not least in
the US. 5
Early evidence suggests that even in the very short run, the current trade war is taking a
toll on US firms and consumers.6 The key question in the months and years to come
is how, if these tariffs continue, they will begin to feed back through global value chains at
the expense of firms and workers in the US, China, and around the world.
How, ultimately, will
firms shift, consolidate, and potentially balkanise their production to mitigate the costs of
tit-for-tat tariffs and the uncertainty of future trade wars? The consequences of this trade
war may be slow to unfold and long lasting once they do.
Bill Brown at TRNN has been suggesting that the really big companies, the TBTF companies,
are persuading a coterie of economists to repudiate competition amongst themselves and
instead promote bigness as the perfection of commerce and industry, an East India Company
result.
With guaranteed government support such companies can take what they want and dictate
policy to the world.
Yes. the evolutionary argument.
"it's just natural "
corporations as god's creatures, evolving according to divine plan into supranational
egregores.
and they've even built a sort of supranational pseudogovernment to fill up the void, so any
democratic superstructures can't get erected.
(wto,etc)
I think it's telling that the loudest voices for hypercompetition are themselves terrified of
having to compete not least in the realm of ideas.
As far as the article, what stuck with me is "policy uncertainty": perhaps these creatures
are coming around to the same apparent place as many(most?) nations that the usa cannot be
trusted to stick to a promise or a plan for very long.
if so, that's an interesting phenomenon.
During the Reagan Years fears of Japan's Cartels were used to fashion arguments for
fighting fire-with-fire in global trade. US Cartels would meet Japan's Cartels in the world
marketplace. Smaller businesses were strangled in both countries.
I found this statement interesting: "If rising tariffs (or even just the threat of a trade war) causes firms to change how and
where products are made in the world, this additional production dislocation will carry
additional efficiency, job, profit, and welfare losses. " Note that only losses are noted, while the possible beneficiaries, such as workers or
manufacturers in other countries who may see new jobs or demand created in response to
tariffs are not mentioned.
It is as if we are in the best of all possible worlds, for everyone in the world, and any
economic cost caused by a tariff is only negative.
Assuming that CO2 production is roughly proportional to economic output, the tariffs, if
tariffs do drop world wide economic output, or create local USA manufacturing, it might be a
"good thing" environmentally.
The tariffs might also let Americans know how tied to a fragile global supply chain the
USA now is.
Maybe we will see the new Donald Trump recast as an unintentional environmentalist.
If ALL the costs were included in GVC, then they would be much higher, costs such as CO2
emissions, environmental degradation, air pollution, poverty caused by inadequate salaries
for workers, etc.
Interesting. Mostly because it is another example of the convoluted extent we are willing
to go to maintain a neoliberal trading world, assuring an economy that operates, at least in
part, on profits created by a wide variety of externalizations. Tariffs aren't earmarked for
specific domestic expenses, like cleaning up the pollution where it occurred – because
if the blue jeans wholesaler here paid an import tariff, collected here, that money would get
spent in the wrong country and pollution would expand exponentially in the country of the
cheapest, dirtiest manufacture.
For tariffs to actually smooth out all the problems with
globalism they would have to be globalized too. The reason they are not is probably because
that money gets used for grift and graft. It would be more interesting to see the Global
Tariff Chain, the GTC, and learn where the money goes and how it is spent.
It needs to be
properly recycled back to mitigate the harm neoliberal trade has caused. Or we could just
chuck all the nonsense and get serious about labor and the environment.
Richard Koo has discovered the assumption economists used when they said free trade would
be a net positive for any nation. Trade must be balanced, but the US runs a large trade deficit. The negative effects over a
long period of time have brought Trump to power. Richard Koo wants to ensure the current system is maintained and hopes the successful
developed Eastern nations will band together to help the US that has been shooting itself in
the foot for four decades.
According to Robert Rubin, we saved money by accruing such a huge trade deficit. Because
we did not expend any of our resources, we merely took a free ride on the appreciating
dollar.
And for those 4 decades the dollar was so strong it couldn't be stopped. The logic of
the one percent.
There could be some truth to it except for the devastation it caused by a
race-to-the-bottom in 3rd world exporting countries, and to a lesser extent here. Even China,
the most successful of them all, has a serious environmental deficit. It's gonna be difficult
going forward in this modern, technological age for any country to have a natural advantage
and therefore benefit from the simple act of exporting their lucky "surplus". Those days are
long gone.
And no amount of tweaking GVC stats will make any difference. It's all 6s now. And
arbitrage.
Don't tell Trump.
US firms importing back into the US is where most of the trade deficit comes from.
If only the US was more competitive.
How did things go so wrong for the US?
China was the big winner from an open, globalised world, it went from almost nothing to
become a global superpower.
Maximising profit is all about reducing costs.
China had coal fired power stations to provide cheap energy.
China had a low cost of living so employers could pay low wages.
China had low taxes and a minimal welfare state.
China also had lax regulations reducing environmental and health and safety costs.
China had all the advantages in an open, globalised world.
The US just couldn't compete and it's firms off-shored to China where they could make a
decent profit.
Mexico wasn't bad either.
Things look different at the national level.
The US was immersed in the cult of individualism and didn't think about the big picture.
"There's class warfare, all right, but it's my class, the rich class, that's making
war, and we're winning." Warren Buffet, 25 May 2005
That's all very well Warren, but how is the US doing against China?
Who cares, I'm making loads of money.
Oh dear.
In a world of Global Value Chains -- tariffs alone are blunt weapons that do damage in
occult directions. Unaccompanied by some kind of industrial and commercial policies they
wreck random harm and confer unintended advantages.
But the flaws in wanton tariff policy
make no argument favorable to maintaining Global Value Chains. They are crabbing-growth
tumors which kill off smaller local industries and threaten global collapse as the
"innovations in communications and transportation technologies" they depend upon wither in
this age of Peak Oil.
Global Value Chains are one of many frailties built-in to our global
civilization -- built from multiple thin lines riddled along their long reaches with single
points of failure -- radial spider webs without cross-webbing -- held together by the brittle
Neoliberal policies of Corporate Persons.
It was neoliberalism that moved production to China and created condition for the Chinese own companies to compete. Now Trump
goes against neoliberal dogma. So it is not accidental that he was under attack and Russiagate was launched to ensure his resignation.
Notable quotes:
"... in an editorial in the state-run People's Daily, Beijing has warned that China has "the strength and patience to withstand the trade war, and will fight to the end if the U.S. administration persists." ..."
"... China's controversial telecom giant, Huawei, filed a civil lawsuit against the US Commerce Department over the mishandling of telecommunications equipment seized by American officials, demanding its release. ..."
"... However, the equipment was not shipped back to China. It was "purportedly" seized en route and is currently sitting in Alaska, as US officials wanted to investigate whether the shipment required a special license . Such requests are usually processed within 45 days, but nearly two years have already passed since then. ..."
"... "The equipment, to the best of HT USA's knowledge, remains in a bureaucratic limbo in an Alaskan warehouse," Huawei said in its lawsuit, which was filed on Friday in federal court in Washington. ..."
"... Huawei contends that the equipment did not require a license because it did not fall into a controlled category and because it was made outside the United States and was being returned to the same country from which it came. ..."
"... The lawsuit comes amid a bitter row between two world's largest economies, and Washington's crackdown on Huawei. In May, the Trump administration added Huawei to the entity list, barring it from buying needed U.S. parts and components without U.S. government approval. The US alleges that Huawei could be spying for the Chinese government, a claim which the company has repeatedly denied. ..."
"... Of course, Huawei is not the only Chinese tech company that the White House decided to put on its trade blacklist. On Friday, five Chinese organizations – supercomputer maker Sugon, three its affiliates, and the Wuxi Jiangnan Institute of Computing Technology – were added to entity list on the grounds that their activities are allegedly contrary to US national security and foreign policy interests. ..."
"... don't expect a breakthrough: as Goldman's trade deal odds index found last week... the probability of a breakthrough between the two nations is roughly one in five. ..."
It's the weekend, which means the trade war between the US and China moved to the front page of the local propaganda media (in both
the US and China). And while Trump has yet to slam Beijing, focusing this morning on the all time high in the market instead, China
has been busy and in an editorial in the state-run People's Daily, Beijing has warned that China has "the strength and patience
to withstand the trade war, and will fight to the end if the U.S. administration persists."
Echoing what China's notorious twitter mouthpiece Hu Xijin said yesterday, the editorial said that just days ahead of the much
anticipated G-20 summit in Osaka where Trump and Xi are set to meet, " the U.S. must drop all tariffs imposed on China if it wants
to negotiate on trade, and only an equal dialogue can resolve the issue and lead to a win-win", according to Bloomberg.
The communist party's official paper also said the US had failed to take into account the interests of its own people, and they
are paying higher costs due to the trade dispute. "Wielding a big stick of tariffs" also disregards the condition of the U.S. economy
and the international economic order, according to the editorial.
Beijing's official warning to the US ended as follows: if the U.S. chooses to talk, "then it must show some good faith, take account
of key concerns from both sides and cancel all tariffs."
And just to prove that China isn't a paper tiger whose threats will be confined to the local newspapers,
Reuters reported that overnight China's controversial telecom giant, Huawei, filed a civil lawsuit against the US Commerce
Department over the mishandling of telecommunications equipment seized by American officials, demanding its release.
In an almost absurd reversal, the company whose entire existence can be traced to stealing and reverse-engineering foreign technology
and
trampling over corporate ethics , the complaint alleges that the US government took possession of hardware, including an ethernet
switch and computer server, which was transported from China to an independent laboratory in California for testing and certification
back in 2017.
However, the equipment was not shipped back to China. It was "purportedly" seized en route and is currently sitting in Alaska,
as US officials wanted to investigate whether the shipment required a special license . Such requests are usually processed within
45 days, but nearly two years have already passed since then.
"The equipment, to the best of HT USA's knowledge, remains in a bureaucratic limbo in an Alaskan warehouse," Huawei said in
its lawsuit, which was filed on Friday in federal court in Washington.
Huawei contends that the equipment did not require a license because it did not fall into a controlled category and because
it was made outside the United States and was being returned to the same country from which it came.
The company is not seeking any financial compensation and is not challenging the seizure itself, but is sending a message to Washington,
saying "post-seizure failures to act are unlawful", in effect charging the Trump admin with doing precisely what it, itself has been
accused of. Huawei wants to force the Commerce Department to decide whether an export license is really necessary and, if not, release
the withheld equipment.
The lawsuit comes amid a bitter row between two world's largest economies, and Washington's crackdown on Huawei. In May, the Trump
administration added Huawei to the entity list, barring it from buying needed U.S. parts and components without U.S. government approval.
The US alleges that Huawei could be spying for the Chinese government, a claim which the company has repeatedly denied.
Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou, daughter of the company's founder, has been detained in Canada since December on a U.S. warrant. She
is fighting extradition on charges that she misled global banks about Huawei's relationship with a company operating in Iran.
Of course, Huawei is not the only Chinese tech company that the White House decided to put on its trade blacklist. On Friday,
five Chinese organizations – supercomputer maker Sugon, three its affiliates, and the Wuxi Jiangnan Institute of Computing Technology
– were added to entity list on the grounds that their activities are allegedly contrary to US national security and foreign policy
interests.
The fresh US blacklisting comes ahead of crucial talks between US President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Osaka,
Japan, which are intended to ease tensions between the two sides. Still, don't expect a breakthrough: as
Goldman's
trade deal odds index found last week... the probability of a breakthrough between the two nations is roughly one in five.
A letter from over 600 US companies businesses in support of President Trump's tariffs on
approximately $300 billion of Chinese imports was scheduled to be submitted on Friday before
the Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR), according to the Daily
Caller , which reviewed the document.
It is the intention of Coalition for a Prosperous America (CPA), Chief Economist, Jeff
Ferry to present the letter Friday morning during his testimony to the USTR. This letter
pushes back on the letter last week that asks Trump to stop the tariffs on China. Those
signers were mostly big-box retailers who manufacture their products in China.
This all comes as President Donald Trump said that he is considering slapping China with
more tariffs if Chinese President Xi Jinping does not meet with him during the G-20 summit in
late June. Since, the warning, the two have agreed to meet. However, Trump said if Xi does
not attend the event, he will immediately impose new
tariffs on $300 billion in
Chinese imports ,
including a number of consumer products. - Daily
Caller
In May, Trump raised tariffs on around $200 billion of Chinese goods from 10% to
25%. Three days later, China slapped around $60 billion in US goods with reciprocal tariffs.
"The global integration project with China, through liberalized trade, has failed. The
Communist Party of China has used its access to U.S. consumer and capital markets for a
predatory economic strategy to grow its state-owned enterprises, finance its military build up,
imprison its citizens in modern day concentration camps and challenge America's geopolitical
power," according to Coalition for a Prosperous America CEO Michael Stumo.
"Our American companies and workers have been weakened by this failed experiment. We want it
to stop," he added.
The Automotive Parts Remanufacturing Association (APRA) president, Joe Kripli. said, "for
years now the Chinese 'knock-off' of starters and alternators that have been entering the
country at ridiculously low cost and have been hurting the small [U.S.] remanufacturer that
is located in every state and has been in our communities since WWII. - Daily
Caller
"Fitzgerald USA is one of the few Made in America truck conglomerates. We recently started a
U.S. truck parts business as the trucking industry increasingly moves its operations to China.
America needs a strong manufacturing economy for jobs and national security. We support
President Trump and his use of tariffs on China," said Fitzgerald USA Director of Government
Relations, Jon Toomey.
Guess who didn't sign the letter? Apple - which is desperately trying to lobby the Trump
administration to ease the tariffs - arguing this week in front of the USTR that "U.S. tariffs
on Apple's products would result in a reduction of Apple's U.S. economic contribution," and
"weigh on Apple's global competitiveness
Cheap easy credit in USA has made us all debtors. The cheap money has been used to
purchase lots of cheap chinese **** from the large global publicly traded companies. The big
box stores partnered with American brands to move operations overseas and make **** real
cheap and sell those well known household brand names back to unsuspecting consumers.....to
the very people they have put out of a job. THIS is the largest redistribution of wealth in
the history of the planet. Free money, low paying jobs and cheap ****. As far as I am
concerned, if china steals a company's technology, cry me a ******* river. They deserve
it.
The super-capitalists as usual screw everybody else - the honest manufacturers, labour -
while destroying the fabric of society in their insane pursuit of profits for themselves and
their confreres.
Did Amazon also sign the petition? What about Facebook ,Google? I want to see the big
MNC's signing the letter. Let me see the country before profit there.
The key dynamic is low energy costs, cheap land, low corporate taxes and low shipping
costs to the market.
All four of those are in the US.
Factories will be built where the demand is located and there is and will be no longer any
advantage to produce products overseas.
Plants that used to take 1000 workers to run now take just 50 or less.
Automation would have impacted the work force in the US in 10 years but thanks to minimum
wage hikes it is happening right now and will grow exponentially in 2 years.
Why is it that folks put the blame on China? Our corporations are the ones that looked for
manufacturers that could make their product for less than American workers could.
Watch older episodes of Shark Tank and they all said time and time again that they have
contacts in China and could have the product made for peanuts....... That's how our
corporations make money.
Why don't we boycott Apple? We can't because it's in everyone's retirement portfolio one
way or another.
If the US was such a "free market" powerhouse, why not heed your own values instead of
doing protectionism? Answer: another myth destroyed that America is all about "free markets".
Add that to the mythology about being pro-dumbocracy, freedumb and all for international
"law".
(nytimes.com)
70
restricting China's access to American technology and stoking already high tensions as
President Trump and President Xi Jinping of China prepare to meet in Japan next week. From a
report: The Commerce Department announced that it would add four Chinese companies and one
Chinese institute to an "entity list," saying they posed risks to
American national security or foreign policy interests [Editor's note: the link may be
paywalled;
alternative source ] . The move essentially bars the entities, which include one of China's
leading supercomputer makers, Sugon, and a number of its subsidiaries set up to design
microchips, from buying American technology and components without a waiver from the United
States government.
The move could all but cripple these Chinese businesses, which rely on American chips and
other technology to manufacture advanced electronics. Those added to the entity list also
include Higon, Chengdu Haiguang Integrated Circuit, Chengdu Haiguang Microelectronics
Technology, and Wuxi Jiangnan Institute of Computing Technology, which lead China's development
of high performance computing, some of which is used in military applications like simulating
nuclear explosions, the Commerce Department said. Each of the aforementioned companies does
businesses under a variety of other names.
Blocking Chinese access to any particular technology just gives them an incentive to pour
massive resources into developing their own versions. They've learned that US companies are
not reliable suppliers. Same as many former allies have learned that being an ally of the US
is a double edged sword.
Cuts in sales to China by US companies means less money for US companies to invest in
developing advanced products. Don't be surprised if by 2030 China will be the sole supplier
of the worlds best, most advanced technology. Just look at what happened to the robotics
industry. Or better yet, go back to the previous century, when the US decided to unload their
steel mills to China at a huge discount to China to invest in financial instruments, then
whined like crazy that China was able to make steel cheaper because their new-to-them steel
mills had less debt to fund per to. Of steel produced.
If China had had to buy new steel mills, the cost of production per ton would have been
higher. But no, trading pieces of paper or bits in bank accounts was easier.
The Chinese hi-tech companies should thank the US for clearing out American products from
the
biggest market [datenna.com], so they can eventually enter the lucrative cycles of being
able to sell primitive products and re-invest the proceeds to create more advanced products,
without having to compete with the most advanced American products upfront, and in a few
short year they will produce more advanced ones.
Oh, don't the US know that Chinese supercomputers already cleared out of American chips
[wikipedia.org] and achieve top performance long time ago?
Dell Technologies Inc
., HP Inc. , Intel Corp. and Microsoft Corp. are joining forces to oppose
President Donald Trump's proposed tariffs on laptop computers and tablets among $300 billion in
Chinese goods targeted for duties.
The companies submitted joint comments opposing the tariff escalation, saying it would hurt
consumer products and industry, while failing to address China's trade practices. The tariffs
are poised to hit during the peak holiday and back-to-school sales period, they said.
"The tariffs will harm U.S. technology leaders, hindering their ability to innovate and
compete in a global marketplace," the companies said in comments posted online.
Dell, HP, and Microsoft said they account for about half of the notebooks and detachable
tablets sold in the U.S. Prices for laptops and tablets will increase by at least 19% -- about
$120 for the average retail price of a laptop -- if the proposed tariffs are implemented,
according to a
study released this week by the Consumer Technology Association .
The companies said they spent a collective $35 billion on research and development in 2018
alone, and tariff costs would divert resources from innovation while providing "a windfall" to
manufacturers based outside the U.S. that are less dependent on American sales.
The Trump administration is considering public comments on the proposed duties and
hearing testimony from more than 300 U.S. companies and trade groups through June 25. The
tariffs could be imposed after a rebuttal period ends July 2.
The U.S. and China said their presidents
will meet in Japan next week to relaunch trade talks after a month-long stalemate.
Clyde Schechter says:
June 17, 2019 at 11:55 pm "The long term consequences of our trade sanctions are not yet
clear. One possibility will be the break up of the world into two main trading blocs as China,
Russia and Europe work to set up a trading system not dependent upon the dollar. "
Yes, this is the crux of it. China, Russia, and Europe are each too small to independently
defy the stranglehold that the US exerts over the world financial system. But if they can
overcome their past hostilities and work together, they will finally be able to rise off their
knees as sovereign nations, not US vassals. For their sakes, I hope they can and will.
But if they succeed, it will spell huge problems for the US. If the dollar is no longer the
world's reserve currency and the sole currency of petro-commerce, the US will find that there
actually is a limit to how deeply it can go into debt. And what on earth will we do when we
actually have to start paying our bills?
"... The facts of the US economy and politics show clearly the correctness of the analysis in China that any expectation of 'mercy' from the Trump administration will in reality lead to heightened attacks by the US. ..."
"... The medium-term trajectory of the US economy [is] to slow down during 2019 and 2020 – which is necessarily a negative factor for President Trump's chances of re-election in 2020 and which interacts with the adverse effects of US tariff policy on US consumers such as price rises and falls in prices to farmers. ..."
"... Trump administration already acknowledges in practice that its policies will be a US 'lose', that is they will inflict pain on the US economy, and it is merely attempting to ensure that the 'lose' for China is bigger than the 'lose' for the US. ..."
"... Bloomberg and others calculate that the losses in a full year of the trade war would be $600 billion. ..."
"... In addition to these tariff effects the Trump administration US is equally concerned about the consequences of consumer boycotts, or restrictions, on US companies which would be equivalent to those it has carried out against Huawei. ..."
"... 'Beijing has scope for retaliation. Levers at its disposal include blocking access to its market -- a move that Goldman Sachs analysts estimate could reduce Apple's earnings per share by nearly 30 per cent.' ..."
"... These specific examples clearly illustrate that in practice, despite its claims to the contrary, the Trump administration starts from the framework that its policies will inflict pain on the US economy, but that it will be able to limit this loss. China's route to success is therefore to inflict pain on the US economy to a point that is unacceptable for Trump in seeking re-election. ..."
"... 'If Trump wants to slow China's ascent as a superpower, a trade war might be an effective way to do it. If the harm to the US is modest and the costs for China are severe and lasting, Trump might conclude that the former are acceptable losses.' On this logic: 'Geopolitical primacy, not maximum prosperity for Americans' was 'the president's true objective.' ..."
"... Forces in China claiming that the Trump administrations attacks will be stopped by 'appeasement', or by appeals for mercy, are presenting the reverse of the truth – such policies will lead to the Trump administration becoming more aggressive. This flows inevitably from the fact that the Trump administration's policy is not to seek a 'win-win' for the US but to create a 'lose-lose' with the aim that the 'lose' in terms of economic pain for the US should be 'modest'. This logic of the Trump administration's position means that any weakening of China's position, any alleviation of the pain inflicted on the US, will lead to the Trump administration becoming more aggressive, not less. ..."
"... it is also clear that Trump's measure of what is bearable is not the interests of the US people, but whether it affects the President's chances of re-election. In summary, only if the economic pain suffered by the US is sufficiently severe that it endangers Trump's re-election chances will the Trump administration desist from its attacks on China. ..."
"... When the 'lose' or 'pain' in US financial markets is not great the Trump administration proceeds to attack China. When, on the contrary, China's reaction increases pain in US financial markets Trump acts more reasonably. That is, whenever the Trump administration feels in a stronger position it increases its attacks on China, whenever the Trump administration feels weaker due to the pain in US financial markets it acts more reasonably to China. ..."
"... But once the Trump administration embarked on the course of a lose-lose confrontation then such a struggle can only be won by China relying on its own strength. Sufficient pain must be inflicted on the Trump administration that it decides it is better to abandon the lose-lose. And the criteria by which it will judge whether the pain in the 'lose-lose' is bearable is the effect on its chances of re-election. ..."
'At least two other organizations have more power over [US financial] markets
than the White House. They are the US Federal Reserve and the Chinese Communist
Party. Trump does not directly control either of them.'
This brutal analysis is particularly significant as it is by one of the most
senior and accurate Western specialists on financial markets –
John Authers
, Senior Bloomberg Editor for Markets and former Chief Markets
Commentator for the
Financial Times
. It encapsulates the interaction of
economic and political problems facing President Trump. As will be seen it also
summarises the relative strengths of China and the US in the 'trade war',
dictates the US administration's tactics in attacking China, and determines the
policies which will prevent the Trump administration carrying out its attempt to
block China achieving its development goals.
Analysis of these real facts of US financial markets and policy strongly
confirms the assessment emphasised by China's President Xi Jinping in his recent
speech
in
Yudu County, the place being highly symbolic as it was the starting point for
China's famous Long March, that China has to rely on its own strength in
resisting this attempt by the US administration to prevent China achieving
prosperity and national rejuvenation.
While the situation of China itself in the trade/economic war is naturally the
most important issue there are of course two sides involved in this conflict –
the other aspect of the situation is within the US. Analysis of this, which forms
the subject of this article, shows clearly why the Trump administration refuses
to accept 'win-win' relations with China and what is the inevitable outcome of
this administration's 'lose-lose' logic. Such analysis in turn shows that
frequent comparisons made in China to the Long March of 1934-35, or to Mao
Zedong's famous
essay
'On Protracted War', are not simply rhetorical metaphors, or references
to the historical traditions of the Communist Party of China (CPC), but provide
an accurate framework to understand the situation.
The Trump administration made a very serious miscalculation in launching the
'trade war' with China. It believed that either, or both, the leadership of China
would submit to the Trump administrations threats or the Chinese population would
not be prepared for a serious struggle with the US. Both calculations have proved
entirely wrong. China's leadership did not surrender to but hit back against the
US attacks. Furthermore anyone who follows China's domestic discussion, on what
is now by far the world's largest internet community, knows that this line was
strongly supported by the Chinese population.
The difference to the historical comparisons now frequently used in China, of
course, is that this is an economic war and not a military one. Therefore, the
weapons are different, and it is necessary to analyse what are the pressure
points on the US, and what armaments are most powerful for China. In turn this
examination of the situation in the US economy fully confirms the analyses made
of the situation in China and the reaction of different social layers to the
present conflict with the US.
Trends in China and the US
Examining the Chinese side of the 'trade war' Wang Wen has presented an
excellent
analysis
of the reaction of different social strata in China to the Trump
administration's economic aggression. Its analysis can be noted:
'
The vast
majority of ordinary people are highly supportive of the state's policy of
counter-bullying in the United States, and the current fear of the US exists
mainly in some social elites.'
But it is particularly striking that this analysis of trends within China,
made by a Chinese citizen, is fully confirmed from another 'external' angle –
that of the situation in the US and the forces operating on the Trump
administration. The facts of the US economy and politics show clearly the
correctness of the analysis in China that any expectation of 'mercy' from the
Trump administration will in reality lead to heightened attacks by the US.
Trump's economic policy is determined by the coming US Presidential electio. The starting point of any analysis of the situation in the US is that
President Trump is already entirely aware of the most important date he faces – 3
November 2020, the next US Presidential election. Securing re-election is his
paramount goal and this therefore determines the shaping of the Trump
administration's policies. Three time frames are crucial for this.
The impact of events in financial markets, which can occur in a very short
time frame – in some cases minutes/hours and almost invariably having a strong
impact over a period of days to months.
The medium-term trajectory of the US economy [is] to slow down during 2019 and
2020 – which is necessarily a negative factor for President Trump's chances of
re-election in 2020 and which interacts with the adverse effects of US tariff
policy on US consumers such as price rises and falls in prices to farmers.
Attempts to slow China's economy in the medium/longer term, through forcing
or persuading it to abandon its socialist path of development.
All three time frames however confirm a fundamental reality – that while
China's relations with most countries, and indeed with some previous US
presidents, can be most successful based on 'win-win' this will not occur with
the Trump administration.
This is due to the fact that the Trump administration
already acknowledges in practice that its policies will be a US 'lose', that is
they will inflict pain on the US economy, and it is merely attempting to ensure
that the 'lose' for China is bigger than the 'lose' for the US.
The Trump administration's 'lose-lose' analysis
An illustration on a small scale of the Trump administration's understanding
of the need to attempt to limit the extent of economic pain on the US is its
recent announcement of $16 billion of subsidies to US farmers – the bill for
which will be financed by other US taxpayers as is increasingly understood in the
United States. As
CNN
noted: 'Just as Mexico was supposed to pay for the wall, but isn't, now
China is supposed to pay for President Donald Trump's plan to bail out US
farmers. Neither statement is true, of course.'
Affecting wider sections of the US population, calculations by the Western
economics company Oxford Economics, which has no connection with China, found:
'Chinese manufacturing lowered prices in the United States for consumer goods,
dampening inflation and putting more money in American wallets trade with China
saved these families up to $850 that year.' Regarding the overall impact on the
global economy, including the adverse effect on US allies,
Bloomberg
and others calculate that the losses in a full year of the trade
war would be $600 billion.
In addition to these tariff effects the Trump administration US is equally
concerned about the consequences of consumer boycotts, or restrictions, on US
companies which would be equivalent to those it has carried out against Huawei.
The
Financial Times
noted for example that the immediate goal of the US sanctions
against Huawei are not simply or primarily to stop the supply of chips and
software but to destroy the consumer market for Huawei's products in the West –
where customers want guaranteed access to Google dependent products: 'Google's
decision this week to stop selling its Android operating system to Huawei for new
handsets makes little difference in China, where Huawei should be able to
convince buyers to switch to its operating system, now under development.
But
customers are more wedded to Android in international markets. Independent
analyst Richard Windsor estimates it will lose all those sales.' But the
Financial Times simultaneously noted that consumer retaliation against China
would have a devastating financial effect on Apple, one of the US's core and most
valuable companies: 'Beijing has scope for retaliation. Levers at its disposal
include blocking access to its market -- a move that Goldman Sachs analysts
estimate could reduce Apple's earnings per share by nearly 30 per cent.'
These specific examples clearly illustrate that in practice, despite its
claims to the contrary, the Trump administration starts from the framework that
its policies will inflict pain on the US economy, but that it will be able to
limit this loss. China's route to success is therefore to inflict pain on the US
economy to a point that is unacceptable for Trump in seeking re-election.
US financial markets
A decisive reason that such pain for the US is possible is that while the sums
noted in relation to US consumers, farmers, and allies above sound large the
Trump administration can in fact deal with amounts such as $16 billion to
farmers. But even such sums as the $600 billion loss for the global economy are
small compared to potential impacts on the size of US financial markets. The loss
of $600 billion in a year for the global economy is less than the amount that can
be lost in US financial markets in a single day, while a loss of $16 billion can
occur in seconds.
Due to the sheer scale of US financial markets the Trump
administration does not remotely have the resources to control the more than
$30,000 billion US share market or the $16,000 billion US Treasury bond market.
Pain inflicted on the US in such financial markets is therefore on a scale which
is destabilising to the Trump administration.
Examination of all three time frames operating on the Trump administration
considered above would require three separate analyses or an inordinately long
article. Therefore, due to their sheer scale, this article examines only the
first, most short term, but extremely powerful of these issues – the impact of
the trade war on US financial markets.
The real situation facing US presidents
John Authers' blunt comment cited at the beginning of this article, reveals
accurately the real domestic economic situation of a US President – which is very
different to the frequent perception in China. Unlike China, under the US
governmental system the President has little direct control over the most
powerful levers of the economy – there is no large state owned economic sector
which can be instructed by the President to increase its activity, the Federal
budget is decided by the Congress not by the President, and interest rates are
controlled by the Federal Reserve which under US law cannot be instructed by the
President.
The new factor in the trade war which Authers drew attention to, which is also
outside the US President's control, is China itself. The facts amply confirm that
the impact of China's statements and actions on US financial markets is now very
large – as will be demonstrated.
Larry Summers, former US Treasury Secretary,
clearly spelt out this numerically in a
commentary
for the Washington Post: 'On Monday [13 May], China announced new
tariffs on $60 billion of US exports, and the United States threatened new
tariffs on up to $300 billion of Chinese goods. These actions were cited as the
principal reason for a decline of more than 600 points in the Dow Jones
industrial average, or about 2.4 percent in broader measures of the stock market.
With the total value of US stocks around $30 trillion, this decline represents
more than $700 billion in lost wealth.'
This $700 billion loss to US shareholders directly resulted from China's
response to President Trump's announcement he was raising US tariffs against
China from 10% to 25%. To illustrate this direct impact Authers' accurately noted
the difference on US share markets between the week following Trump's
announcement of raising tariffs against China, during which there was no
announcement of a precise Chinese response, and the US financial markets'
reaction when China announced its counter tariffs: 'It's fair to say that Wall
Street did not anticipate China's retaliation to US tariffs. Last week, the
negative reaction to President Donald Trump's announcement of new tariffs on
China was oddly muted. On Monday, after China's response was announced just
before the market opened, the S&P 500 fell by more than it had done in the entire
previous week.'
Authers similarly noted the increasing skill of China's response and its
impact on US markets: 'The problem is that China knows how to respond. China
knows it can attack the presidential weak spot by acting in a way that damages
the Dow. Hence, it not only retaliated with tariffs of its own, but announced
them just as the New York market was about to open, at night in China, for
maximum effect.'
As already noted, the $700 billion loss in a single day on US share markets
was larger than the projected loss to the world economy for an entire year due to
the trade war – and over 40 times the $16 billion bill for Trump's subsidies to
US farmers. But even this sum is small compared to losses on US financial markets
that can occur due to others of China's economic actions. As
Authers
noted: 'In the last five years, the event that scared the US market
the most, by a wide margin, was the surprise Chinese yuan devaluation in 2015.'
The impact of this RMB devaluation was clear. Between 10 August and 24 August
2015, only 14 days, the RMB's exchange rate fell by 3.0%. The US S&P500 tracked
the RMB down falling by 11.2% by 25 August. In terms of current valuations of US
share markets this was equivalent to a loss of $3.8 trillion – more than six
times the total projected loss to the global economy of the trade war in a year,
or over 200 times Trump's subsidies to farmers.
The real aim of Trump's policy
This identification of the degree of pain which can be inflicted by China on
US financial markets, and on the US economy, is crucial because Trump's tariff
policies cannot, indeed are not intended to, improve the situation of the US
itself. Bloomberg columnist
Noah Smith
summarised the Trump administration's real aim very accurately
under the self-explanatory headline 'The Grim Logic of Trump's Trade War With
China – Maximizing American prosperity probably isn't the goal.' Apart from
comprador apologists for the US within China, noted by Wang Wen, this logic of
Trump's policy is by now well understood in China. But, nevertheless, it is worth
quoting this Bloomberg analysis at length as it summarises very accurately from a
US perspective the logic of the Trump administration:
'The trade war has cost to the US. Economists have shown that the actual burden
of tariffs has fallen mostly on American consumers -- in other words, the prices
consumers pay for imported goods has risen And higher prices on capital goods
and intermediate goods is raising expenses for US manufacturers, making them less
competitive. Meanwhile, Chinese retaliation has hurt US farmers
'So with losses mounting, it looked like there was little reason to continue
the trade war. Yet Trump is doubling down. Why?
'If Trump wants to slow China's ascent as a superpower, a trade war might be
an effective way to do it. If the harm to the US is modest and the costs for
China are severe and lasting, Trump might conclude that the former are acceptable
losses.' On this logic: 'Geopolitical primacy, not maximum prosperity for
Americans' was 'the president's true objective.'
In other words, as was already shown in the case of farm subsidies, the Trump
administration quite accurately does not believe that tariffs and other forms of
economic aggression against China aid US economic prosperity – on the contrary
they cause economic pain. But it decides to inflict this pain on US citizens and
companies in order to pursue neo-con policies trying to block China's prosperity
and national rejuvenation. But this policy requires that 'the harm to the US is
modest.' The problem is that the more tariffs are imposed , and above all if
China retaliates, the greater the pain not only for US financial markets but for
US consumers – that is US voters. As Authers noted: 'Meanwhile, the US can still
impose more tariffs, but the goods it has chosen to attack have been largely
invisible to consumers. Any further tariffs will take it into consumer products
where price rises will be visible and painful, and might even, again, act as a
spur to raise [interest] rates.' The effect on US financial markets, as already
noted, can be far more severe than the direct effect of the tariffs.
Why win-win will not work with the Trump administration
Understanding the Trump's administrations real aim shows not only why its goal
is not to improve the economic position of the US economy or US citizens but
simultaneously makes clear why its policies will not be stopped by appeals to
reason or 'win-win'. Forces in China claiming that the Trump administrations
attacks will be stopped by 'appeasement', or by appeals for mercy, are presenting
the reverse of the truth – such policies will lead to the Trump administration
becoming more aggressive. This flows inevitably from the fact that the Trump
administration's policy is not to seek a 'win-win' for the US but to create a
'lose-lose' with the aim that the 'lose' in terms of economic pain for the US
should be 'modest'. This logic of the Trump administration's position means that
any weakening of China's position, any alleviation of the pain inflicted on the
US, will lead to the Trump administration becoming more aggressive, not less.
This makes clear while most countries seek a 'win-win' with China, and can
therefore rightly be approached on this basis, and indeed this forms the basis of
China's foreign policy, this will not work with the Trump administration because
it is not seeking a 'win' – it is merely seeking that the 'lose' for the US it
knows will occur should not be sufficiently large to threaten Trump's
re-election.
It follows from this situation that the only thing that will deter the Trump
administration, and force it off its path of attacks on China, is if the 'lose'
for the US is bigger than it had anticipated – that is if the economic pain is
too large to be bearable from the point of view of the interests of the Trump
administration. From what has already been analysed, it is also clear that
Trump's measure of what is bearable is not the interests of the US people, but
whether it affects the President's chances of re-election. In summary, only if
the economic pain suffered by the US is sufficiently severe that it endangers
Trump's re-election chances will the Trump administration desist from its attacks
on China.
The only 'win' which the Trump administration takes into account is,
therefore, if the 'lose/pain' of the confrontation with China is seen as
endangering Trump's re-election chances and the 'win' is then simply the
lessening of that pain to a point where it is no longer seen as endangering
Trump's election campaign.
Confirmation of the forces acting on the Trump administration
This situation of the Trump administration which flows from its 'lose-lose'
logic is fully confirmed even in the extremely short term by the chronology of
President Trump's own personal responses to events in US financial markets in
announcing the increase in tariffs against China from 10% to 25%.
On 5 May Trump announced on
twitter
the raising of tariffs against China from 10% to 25%, there was no
immediate announced countermeasure by China, and the S&P 500 US share index
fell by only 0.5% on the following day.
In contrast on 13 May China announced counter tariffs and the S&P 500 fell
by 2.4% in a single day – costing US shareholders $700 billion as Larry
Summers noted.
For the rest of the following week the Trump administration attempted to
claim that trade talks would be resuming, and that Treasury Secretary Mnuchin
would probably be visiting Beijing in the near future – the S&P500 recovered
by 1.7%.
Having achieved this recovery in US financial markets President Trump then
initiated a new attack on China by requiring US companies to have permission
from the US government to sell components and software to Huawei.
China then responded to this strongly on 23 May. As the
Wall Street Journal
noted: ' The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 286
points Thursday after a Chinese official said the US should "adjust its wrong
actions" if it would like to continue negotiations. The losses pulled the Dow
industrials into the red for the week, continuing a dismal stretch as it
hurtled toward its fifth straight weekly loss -- which would be its longest such
losing streak since 2011. '
In response to this fall on US financial markets President Trump then
immediately softened his rhetoric by
announcing
at a press conference that there was a 'good possibility' that
trade negotiations with China would get back on track and that issues with
Huawei might be settled in that deal.
The short term pattern was therefore extremely clear. When there was no
reaction from China, US financial markets did not fall, and Trump continued his
aggression against China. When, on the contrary, China responded strongly, US
financial markets fell and Trump attempted to present a picture he was lessening
his attack on China.
In addition to these short-term movements analysed above the same process over
a longer term also explains the dynamic of the 'hardening' and 'softening' of the
Trump administration's positions in the course of its negotiations with China.
During 2018, when the US economy was experiencing economic strengthening,
during a normal upswing of a business cycle, and with a strong share market,
Trump acted aggressively to China – launching the first set of anti-China
tariffs and threatening to expand them to a wider range of goods and increase
their rate to 25%.
Then in late 2018 the US economy began to slow, the Federal Reserve was
raising interest rates, and the US share market fell. In response to this, at
the beginning of 2019, Trump 'softened' his position – postponing the raising
of US tariffs against China from 10% to 25%.
When the US economy appeared to recover in the first quarter of 2019, with
the Federal Reserve suspending increases in interest rates, and the share
market rose, Trump then announced new aggressive actions against China by
raising tariffs from 10% to 25%.
This therefore clearly reflects the 'lose-lose' framework in which the Trump
administration operates. When the 'lose' or 'pain' in US financial markets is not
great the Trump administration proceeds to attack China. When, on the contrary,
China's reaction increases pain in US financial markets Trump acts more
reasonably. That is, whenever the Trump administration feels in a stronger
position it increases its attacks on China, whenever the Trump administration
feels weaker due to the pain in US financial markets it acts more reasonably to
China.
What is the Trump administration's bottom line?
While the above clearly shows why the Trump administration will not respond to
a 'win-win' framework, but only to economic pain, to avoid any misunderstanding
it should be made clear that it does not lead to the conclusion that the US and
China are locked in a 'war to the death'. All the evidence is that President
Trump is less interested in the long-term interests of the US than most
Presidents. The precise economic pain which is unacceptable to his administration
is that which would lead to endangering his re-election in 2020.
A relevant comparison which helps understand this dynamic is that is to a real
war, not just a trade one, which the US lost – the Vietnam war. Vietnam's tactics
in this were skilful in that political impacts guided military goals. The two
largest Vietnamese offensives of the war, the Tet Offensive in 1968 and the
Easter Offensive in 1972, were launched in US presidential election years.
Neither resulted in US military defeat but the political damage done to US
presidents ensured Vietnam's victory – Johnson was forced to abandon as hopeless
any attempt to run for re-election as president after Tet, and Nixon was so
convinced that his position as president would be threatened by the war that he
started a progressive US military withdrawal after 1968 and decided on a total US
withdrawal of US forces after the 1972 Easter Offensive.
In short, the 'bottom
line' for Vietnam's victory against the US was not total military defeat of the
US, which was never achieved, but inflicting such pain on US presidents that to
safeguard their own position they were forced to withdraw. The military struggle
in Vietnam was the means by which the decisive political victory in the US was
achieved.
But the precondition for that US political defeat was the military struggle in
Vietnam. If Vietnam had ceased inflicting pain on the US, both economic in terms
of the gigantic cost of the war and in terms of losses of American forces, then
the US instead of withdrawing would have increased its attacks on Vietnam. This
can be clearly seen in the opposite case in which the US achieved a great victory
– the destruction of the USSR. Gorbachev attempted to appease the US and beg for
mercy. The US did not lessen but increased its attacks as a result – culminating
in the catastrophic disintegration of the USSR itself, characterised by Putin as
'the greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the [20th] century'.
After this
tremendous defeat of Russia this again did not lead to a lessening but to further
intensification of attacks on Russia by the US – incorporating almost all of
Eastern Europe and large parts of the former USSR into NATO and launching of
attacks on Russia's position in its strategically decisive neighbour of Ukraine.
The strategic conclusion of the present US attacks on China fully confirms the
speech by Xi Jinping
emphasising
that the most important thing is to rely on ourselves. China has not been seeking
a confrontation with the US, a lose-lose. On the contrary China has been seeking
a win-win. But once the Trump administration embarked on the course of a
lose-lose confrontation then such a struggle can only be won by China relying on
its own strength. Sufficient pain must be inflicted on the Trump administration
that it decides it is better to abandon the lose-lose. And the criteria by which
it will judge whether the pain in the 'lose-lose' is bearable is the effect on
its chances of re-election.
Fortunately, the present struggle is an economic war and not a real war. The
'small arms' in that economic war are not rifles and revolvers but tariffs
against farmers and the subsidies these require, its medium weapons are consumer
boycotts, its heavy artillery are such issues as the impact on US financial
markets analysed above. It is a measure of the gigantic historical progress made
by China since 1949 under the People's Republic that it now only has to deal with
economic attacks by the Trump administration – for a century before that China
had to deal with actual military invasions.
The sacrifices made by the heroes of the Long March were far greater than
anything the people of China face today in the economic attacks by the Trump
administration. But the comparisons made by Xi Jinping to the Long March are
entirely apposite and not at all merely references to the CPC's historical
tradition.
The Kuomintang's Fifth Encirclement Campaign, the origin of Long March, was
designed by the KMT to destroy and annihilate the forces opposing it – why it is
also called the 'Fifth Extermination Campaign'. It was purposeless to have
attempted to appease or beg for mercy from the KMT, which was determined to
destroy the forces which later created the New China. Any appeasement, or appeal
for mercy, would have been met by the KMT crushing and massacring the forces they
opposed. Only resistance to the KMT created the possibility to later create the
People's Republic of China and lay the basis for China's national rejuvenation.
Similarly, the Trump administration is determined to block China's national
rejuvenation. As already shown, there is no point to attempt to appease it or beg
for mercy from it, this will merely lead to it becoming more aggressive. The
ultimate aim of the neo-cons at present directing the Trump administration's
policies is to block China's national rejuvenation and the final way to ensure
that is to ensure that that China should suffer the same historical catastrophe
as the USSR under Gorbachev.
Who is the 'elite' of Chinese society?
Analysis in China shows it is ordinary people who have understood the
aggressive actions of the Trump regime and supported the firm positions against
this taken by President Xi Jinping and other CPC leaders.
It is some parts of the 'social elite' which have entirely misunderstood the
situation and believed that appeasement and appeals for mercy would lead to the
Trump administration lessening its attack on China. The latter forces are the
exact opposite of an 'intellectual elite' – because to be an intellectual elite
means to see the situation accurately and, as seen, they are entirely in error.
It is the ordinary people of China who have shown they are the 'intellectual
elite' in accurately understanding the Trump administration and supporting the
positions taken by the CPC leadership. Those who wrongly analysed the situation
may or may not be a social elite but they are an intellectual 'non-elite' – those
who fail to see the situation accurately and have naïve illusions.
Conclusion
The analysis of the situation of the US economy and financial markets
therefore fully confirms the analysis made by others of the situation in China.
It shows why the Trump administration cannot be dealt with on the basis of
'win-win' but only on the basis of China's strength and through ensuring that the
Trump administration suffers severely in the 'lose-lose' path it has
unfortunately chosen. Only after the US administration has found that it suffers
pain from its present path will it be possible to return to a 'win-win' framework
between China and the US.
* * * The Chinese version of this article appeared at
Guancha.cn
.
President Donald Trump has announced that he will decide whether or not to add another $300
billion in tariffs on imports from China, in addition to the $200 billion he has already
imposed, and that he will do so in the two weeks following the G20 summit in Osaka. Trump's
"Art of the Deal" pressure tactics are familiar. He wants to try to make China give even
greater concessions, perhaps following a frosty meeting between the two leaders on the
sidelines of the G20, or perhaps no meeting at all.
China, however, is in no mood to make concessions.
Behind Trump's impulsiveness can be glimpsed a profound shift in U.S. trade policy, and in
US diplomacy, which has transformed the nature of international relations, with particularly
disturbing implications in the case of U.S.-China ties.
Donald Trump, acting on the advice of U.S. trade representative Robert Lighthizer and
Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin, is making demands of China -- or for that matter
Mexico, Germany, or France -- in a unilateral manner. He has attempted to immediately implement
tariffs and other forms of punishment (such as bans for reasons of national security in the
case of Huawei phones) without any institutional consultative process.
The U.S. constitution has a "commerce clause" that clearly assigns to Congress the power "to regulate
commerce with foreign
Nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian Tribes." Since 2002, the trade
promotion authority (an upgraded version of the fast-track authority established in 1974) gives
the president the right to negotiate trade agreements that Congress can vote for or against,
but cannot amend.
Over the last 20 years, fast-tracking has become the center of trade policy to a degree that
undermines the balance of powers and the constitution.
Although the executive's usurpation of trade authority has a long history, only now is the
president making such a transparent move to exclude the legislature -- not to mention economic
experts, let alone citizens -- from the formulation of trade policy. That means that a handful
of people can make decisions that impact every aspect of the U.S. economy.
Newspapers rarely mention the role of Congress in trade negotiations with China. It's almost
as if the various congressional committees involved in formulating trade policy have no role in
this process.
Equally striking is the absence from the policy debate of multilateral institutions that
address trade issues according to common practices and international law. For instance, the
World Trade Organization was established in 1993 with an explicit mandate to address trade and
tariff issues. The WTO and its trade experts once played a central role in U.S. trade
discussions -- when U.S. policy ostensibly conformed to established global norms, and
Washington even set new models for the world to follow.
Trump's unilateral demands of China make it crystal clear that Trump, and Trump alone, is
empowered to decide trade policy. What institutions and mechanisms remain to assure that the
president's authority in trade negotiations will not be abused and that trade is conducted with
the long-term interests of the country in mind?
But it goes further than that. Now Trump is demanding "detailed and enforceable commitments"
from China as a condition for a trade deal, suggesting that the United States alone determines
whether or not China is conforming with the agreement. Such an approach makes sense in
Washington these days. After all, the U.S. Commerce Department
imposed an export ban on the Chinese telecommunications company ZTE last year because it
did not pay fines for violating U.S. sanctions against sales to North Korea and Iran. In other
words, the United States thinks it can unilaterally set sanctions and punish violators without
any consultation with multilateral institutions.
This step goes beyond what the Chinese can tolerate.
"China is not a criminal. Nor is it making any mistakes. Why does the US want to supervise
us?" remarked Professor Wang Yiwei of Renmin University of China in a
recent interview , "If there's a supervision team to oversee the implementation, just like
what happened to ZTE, it is definitely directed at sovereignty and can't be accepted."
These "enforceable commitments" are offensive to China for a reason. This approach to trade
seems little different from the sanctions regimes that the United States put in place against
Iraq before its military invasion, or against Iran as part of an increasing military buildup
that could end in a military conflict. Moreover, the increased U.S. military drills off the
Chinese coast has given the trade negotiations process a negative spin.
The recent comments about the political protests in Hong Kong by secretary of state Mike
Pompeo suggest that those tariffs could quickly become sanctions -- which require even less
adherence to international norms.
And then, in the midst of all that tension, the U.S. military released an
Indo-Pacific Stategy Paper that refers to Taiwan as a "country," the first time the United
States has done so officially in 40 years. The agreement between the United States and the
People's Republic of China, after the normalization of diplomatic relations, required that the
United States not recognize Taiwan as a country, and the People's Republic of China has stated
explicitly that military action was an option in the case of U.S. interference in the Taiwan
question.
The combination of these actions threatens to erase all established norms between the two
nations.
The United States is now considering ending agricultural exports to China, and China is
considering cutting off the sales of rare earth elements to the United States. The latter are
essential for the guidance systems and for sensors in missiles and advance fighter planes. A
F-35 Fighter, for instance, requires 920 pounds of rare earth elements like neodymium iron
boron magnets and samarium cobalt magnets,
according to the Asia Times .
The risk of a rapid acceleration in tensions is no longer theoretical. Remember: the U.S.
decision to end the sale of scrap metal and copper to Japan in 1940, followed by the oil
embargo on August 1, 1941, transformed a trade war into a real war.
Trade should remain separate from security concerns. Moreover, it should not be the
plaything of a small number of men in the White House. The United States and China need to open
a broad dialogue on common concerns, from climate change and rapid technological evolution to
the growing concentration of wealth globally. That dialogue should rely more on citizen-led
dialogues and scholar-led conferences in order to move beyond the narrow negotiation process
that has brought the two countries to the brink of war.
le"> Tariffs raise the cost of goods. Higher generate the opportunities for alternative
sources as well as incentivize domestic production. Never forget that the higher price of
domestic production is offset by the reduction in the costs associated with domestic
unemployment. The reduction of wealth leaving the nation is a primary goal and responsibility
of the federal government. As is maintaining a secure border and civil and economic well
being of it's citizens.
Enjoyed that report. It's refreshing to see a seemingly non-biased examination of Chinese
Economic and Geopolitical relationships. Enjoying the improved air in quality Beijing.
For Donald Trump, tariffs are a substitute for diplomacy, just as harassment in his
personal life is a substitute for normal human interaction
Trump has two tools at his disposal as president. The first is his mouth: the
insults and threats that he issues verbally or by Twitter.
The second is the tariff. Trump has imposed trade restrictions left and right,
on allies and adversaries, for economic and political reasons, as part of a long-term offensive and out of
short-term pique.
If Trump could use tariffs even more indiscriminately, no doubt he would. He
would delight in slapping trade penalties on the Democratic Party, on Robert Mueller, on the mainstream media, on
all the women who have accused him of harassment, even on the First Lady for
slapping away his hand
at the airport in
Tel Aviv.
Trump the man
favored the legal suit
as his attack of
first resort; Trump the president has discovered the tariff.
With his penchant for naming names, Trump
calls himself
"Tariff Man," as if
boasting of a new superhero power. It's all-too-reminiscent of the cult film
Mystery Men
where the superpowers
are either invisible or risible (Ben Stiller's character, Mr. Furious, for instance, gets really
really
angry).
Trump uses tariffs like a bad cook uses salt. It covers up his lack of
preparation, the poor quality of his ingredients, the blandness of his imagination. It's the only spice in his
spice rack.
The latest over-salted dish to come out of the White House kitchen is the
president's threat to impose a 5 percent tariff on all Mexican goods on June 10. The threat has nothing to do with
what Mexico has done economically (that's a different set of threatened tariffs). Rather, it's all about
immigration. This time, Trump
will keep inflating
the cost of Mexican
goods "until such time as illegal migrants coming through Mexico, and into our Country, STOP." The tariffs will,
supposedly, rise 5 percent every month until they reach 25 percent in October.
Trump promised as a candidate that Mexico would pay for the wall he wanted to
construct along the southern border. Now, it seems, Mexico will pay for the lack of a wall as well.
The escalation is quite clear. What Mexico has to do to avoid these tariffs is
not.
"So, there's no specific target, there's no specific percent, but things have to
get better," Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney
told Fox News Sunday
. "They have to get
dramatically better and they have to get better quickly."
Such is the usual Sunday morning quarterbacking that happens with White House
officials as they scramble to explain the inexplicable to a baffled news media.
Although they remain in the dark about what's expected of them, Mexican leaders
have warned
that they will apply
counter-tariffs if necessary and that the United States will suffer economically from such a tariff war.
These are not idle threats. Mexico is the third largest U.S. trading partner.
Even congressional Republicans, desperate to avoid this spat, are talking about trying to block the tariffs. Trump
has called them
"foolish" to do so. He
plans to move forward anyway.
Full Spectrum Offensive
Mexico is only the latest country to feel the wrath of Tariff Man.
In 2018, Trump
used Section 201
of the Trade Act to
impose tariffs on solar cells and washing machines, targeting primarily East Asian countries. Shortly thereafter,
he upped his game by assessing a 25 percent tariff on all steel imports, with Canada, Mexico, and the EU getting
hit the hardest.
China, however, has borne the brunt of Trump's animosity. In early May, the
Trump administration announced a surge in tariffs from 10 percent to 25 percent on $200 billion worth of Chinese
goods. He has also threatened to apply tariffs to the remaining $325 billion worth of Chinese goods entering the
country.
The escalation tactics don't seem to have done much to improve the prospects of
a trade deal between the two countries. China has naturally countered with its own tariffs.
When Trump lashed out against countries competing against the U.S. steel
industry, one of the major exceptions was Australia. That probably won't last long. Just before his Mexico
decision, the president was planning on imposing a tariff on Australian aluminum as well. His advisors
managed to dissuade him
, at least
temporarily.
Canada and Mexico, meanwhile, continue to get a pass on the steel tariffs as
long as the two countries sign a replacement deal for NAFTA. But Trump's latest move against Mexico may
throw that pending agreement
into
jeopardy.
Push Back
The threat and even the reality of retaliatory tariffs seem to have little
effect on Trump. He likes such geopolitical games of chicken. Congressional opposition only whets his appetite for
more confrontation, for he holds even his Republican allies in contempt.
He disregards the more level-headed advice of economic mandarins -- as well as
seven former ambassadors
to Mexico --
because he relishes flouting conventional wisdom in favor of his own unconventional stupidity. If farmers in swing
states protest that the markets for their soybeans have dried up, Trump will just authorize
another massive government purchase
of
their product -- and suddenly prisoners all over America will be surprised by tofu and edamame on their cafeteria
menus.
Republican voters
overwhelmingly support
Trump's trade
policies -- and the president really doesn't care a fig about anyone else.
The only pushback that might have some influence with Trump might be the
business community. The auto sector
is forecasting
billions of dollars in
costs associated with the Mexico tariffs. The Chamber of Commerce, which has come up with a more precise
annual price tag
for U.S. consumers of
$17.3 billion for a tariff level of 5 percent, is
considering
a legal challenge.
If the stock market goes into bearish hibernation, then the president is out of
luck.
Tweeted
Ian Shepherdson, the chief
economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, "he's going to have to blink on tariffs, because the market can't live with
this level of crazy."
Shepherdson is wrong. The market has lived with this kind of crazy for more than
two years. And there are plenty of people who see profit in precisely the kind of volatility that Trump has
brought to financial markets.
When Trump went on a fundraising tour of New York recently, some big-name
financiers leapt at the opportunity to fete the president. Howard Lutnick, the head of Cantor Fitzgerald,
predicted
in 2017 that Trump would
provide a big bump for the world of finance (and, therefore, his own bottom line). Last month, as a reward for
that bump, Lutnick
invited
Trump to his triplex penthouse in
Manhattan and raised over $5 million toward his reelection.
That's the kind of crazy that the market is entirely comfortable with.
Misunderstanding Trade
Tariffs make sense for certain countries.
For instance, East Asian countries used tariffs very successfully to protect
their infant industries -- steel, shipbuilding, information technology -- against the overwhelming market advantages
of more advanced economies. Those tariffs raised the price of imports and encouraged consumers to buy domestic.
Tariffs can be part of a smart industrial policy of picking potential economic winners.
Tariffs can also protect a way of life -- Japanese rice culture, Mexican tortilla
makers, Vermont dairy farmers. Without some kind of trade protection, cheaper goods from outside will completely
overwhelm domestic producers and destroy long-standing traditions. Of course, there are other methods of
preserving such traditions, from government price supports to geographical designations (think: champagne).
Trump's tariffs have nothing to do with either of these aims. U.S. steel is not
an infant industry in need of protection. Trump doesn't care about protecting traditional lifestyles. He has
neither a progressive industrial policy of picking winners and losers in the economy nor a conservative approach
to ensuring the integrity of communities.
For Donald Trump, tariffs are a substitute for diplomacy, just as harassment
in his personal life is a substitute for normal human interaction. Tariff Man can think of only one way of dealing
with other countries: grabbing them by their trade policies until they squeal.
He believes, mistakenly, that trade is zero-sum (if they lose, American
wins). He also labors under the misconception that the U.S. Treasury somehow grows fat with the proceeds of
tariffs (it doesn't). He is as ignorant of the relations among nations as he is of the relations among people.
Tariff Man's superpower is even more ridiculous than that of Mr. Furious. It's
worse than impotent. It's self-defeating. Let's hope that principle applies ultimately to the 2020 elections as
well.
Share this:
"... Trump's declaration of economic war against China is like everything he does - impulsive, ill-considered, ill-prepared, and without any coherent strategy or series of tactics to achieve that strategy. ..."
"... NOTE - I am not pro-China, but anti-stupid, anti-disorganized, and anti-clueless, which is how everything gets done in the Trump WH, especially since his "economic advisors" really do not know anything about economics. ..."
Last month, "Avengers: Endgame" became the highest-grossing American film in the history of
China. It was a seminal moment, suggesting the partnership between China and Hollywood, which over the years has
moved in fits and starts, was finally firing on all cylinders. But the $614 million that Disney-Marvel booked may
turn out to be an outlier.
As the United States ups the stakes in a trade war, there are growing signs that China is quietly
retaliating against the U.S. entertainment business.
Beijing is now constricting Hollywood's ability to peddle its product in the country, say four
people who conduct business in China or closely monitor its relations with Hollywood.
"I don't want to use the words 'total freeze,' but it's real," said John Penotti, the producer of
"Crazy Rich Asians" and head of SK Global who specializes in Asian productions. "They're not saying it officially,
but the industry is operating as if it's close to a total shutdown."
In contrast to many countries, distribution in China requires government approval, and according
to these sources, the Chinese government is unlikely to offer distribution slots to more than a small handful of
movies. The latest Spider-Man, Secret Life of Pets and Toy Story movies appear likely to get the nod, but most other
summer and even fall hopefuls face being locked out of the world's second-largest film market.
Hollywood relies on China to power its foreign box office, which in turn powers its film revenue,
and the standoff reflects how much of a conundrum China represents for Hollywood.
The availability of so many overseas ticket-buyers at a time of intense entertainment competition
at home has been a boon for U.S. studios. But at the same time, the mercurial ways of Chinese regulators and the ways
that market penetration is subject to geopolitical crosswinds also make the nation a vexing place for studios to do
business.
If the trade war wears on and the market remains cut off, it could result in a reduction of the
budgets of studio movies, since it's Chinese yuan that make them possible.
"I think this poses a dire situation for Hollywood," said Aynne Kokas, a professor at the
University of Virginia and author of "Hollywood Made In China," about the complicated relationship between the two
entities. "There definitely will be a trickle-back effect. It's a very dangerous financial position to be reliant on
Chinese box office to recoup profits."
The Chinese market has become a place of increasing importance to the American movie business.
As the country has rapidly built theaters -- it now has more than 65,000 screens, a dozenfold increase compared to a
decade ago -- it has become a cash cow for American studios.
Three of Hollywood's top five movies at the worldwide
box office last year -- "Avengers: Infinity War," "Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom" and "Aquaman" -- each collected more
than a quarter of their overseas dollars in China.
Other movies owe the country even more of their success. The underwater adventure "The Meg"
notched 40 percent of its foreign total in China, while Steven Spielberg's gamer-themed hit "Ready Player One"
approached 50 percent. China could become the biggest film market as soon as 2020,
according to
PricewaterhouseCoopers.
But to keep the dollars flowing, studios need those distribution slots. And that's where matters
get dicey.
China officially has a quota allowing in several dozen Hollywood movies per year -- 38 in
2019, 35 the year before. Those numbers are up by more than 20 percent in the past five years.
The Film Bureau and its China Film Group division determine what movies are given a distribution
slot. But with blackout periods, 11th-hour allowances and other unpredictable factors, even those who study the
market say it can be impossible to parse what makes the cut. And lately, with the trade war raging, few movies are.
Vanamali, 6 hours ago
As they say, "Everything is fair in love and war" - the Chinese are using whatever means they have at their disposal
Trump is using Tariffs to hurt the Chinese economy and business and the Chinese of course are going to retaliate with
whatever weapon they have
But gotta love the Trumptards "logic" - "They need our exports, without them they will starve, there will be rioting in
the streets" and "We are doing them a big favor by importing their products, if we shut off our market, their companies
will collapse, massive unemployment, there will be rioting in the streets" Bizarre "logic"
jayster, 12 hours ago (Edited)
Trump's declaration of economic war against China is like everything he does - impulsive, ill-considered, ill-prepared,
and without any coherent strategy or series of tactics to achieve that strategy.
China will defend its interests and retaliate as necessary, especially as they know Trump is an absolute moron.
NOTE - I am not pro-China, but anti-stupid, anti-disorganized, and anti-clueless, which is how everything gets done in the
Trump WH, especially since his "economic advisors" really do not know anything about economics.
ES175GC 12 hours ago
Trump is such a vengeful, hating person that it wouldn't surprise me at all that he deliberately wants to hurt all those
Hollywood liberals who despise him so much. "When I get hit, I hit back 10 times harder" is a famous Trump saying.
He operates on a juvenile level, as we all know, like a spoiled whining brat who has to get even with anyone who slights him.
It makes perfect sense that Trump will do everything he can to destroy Hollywood's business with China.
buhaobob, 12 hours ago
I agree except your premise that Trump would do this deliberately would require that Trump have a plan, and he has
demonstrated that his attention span is about the same as that of the average goldfish.
Zop1066, 15 hours ago (Edited)
We certainly do not need Chinese government influence in Hollywood or in any US media, period. Several films recently have
shied away from any even marginally critical reference to China for fear of losing Chinese box office receipts or Chinese
investment.
And the Chinese investors have not even tried to hide that they do indeed influence film scripts to suit the Chinese
government. Enough of that. Best they keep their money and invest perhaps in even harsher great wall internet controls,
internment camps, and super creepy internal population controls.
That'll sure keep the cinema in China boring and nonthreatening. Certainly wouldn't want anyone there to think for themselves
and question their government, no siree.
"... Threats are cheap, but Mr. Trump can't really follow through without turning farmers, Wall Street and the stock market, Walmart and much of the IT sector against him at election time if his tariffs on China increase the cost of living and doing business. His diplomatic threat is really that the US will cut its own economic throat, imposing sanctions on its own importers and investors if China does not acquiesce. ..."
"... China has a great sweetener that I think President Xi Jinping should offer: It can nominate Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. We know that he wants what his predecessor Barack Obama got. And doesn't he deserve it more? After all, he is helping to bring Eurasia together, driving China and Russia into an alliance with neighboring counties, reaching out to Europe. ..."
President Trump has threatened China's President Xi that if they don't meet and talk at the
upcoming G20 meetings in Japan, June 29-30, the United States will not soften its tariff war
and economic sanctions against Chinese exports and technology.
Some meeting between Chinese and U.S. leaders will indeed take place, but it cannot be
anything like a real negotiation. Such meetings normally are planned in advance, by specialized
officials working together to prepare an agreement to be announced by their heads of state. No
such preparation has taken place, or can take place. Mr. Trump doesn't delegate authority.
He opens negotiations with a threat. That costs nothing, and you never know (or at least, he
never knows) whether he can get a freebee. His threat is that the U.S. can hurt its adversary
unless that country agrees to abide by America's wish-list. But in this case the list is so
unrealistic that the media are embarrassed to talk about it. The US is making impossible
demands for economic surrender – that no country could accept. What appears on the
surface to be only a trade war is really a full-fledged Cold War 2.0.
America's wish list: other countries' neoliberal subservience
At stake is whether China will agree to do what Russia did in the 1990s: put a Yeltsin-like
puppet of neoliberal planners in place to shift control of its economy from its government to
the U.S. financial sector and its planners. So the fight really is over what kind of planning
China and the rest of the world should have: by governments to raise prosperity, or by the
financial sector to extract revenue and impose austerity.
U.S. diplomacy aims to make other countries dependent on its agricultural exports, its oil
(or oil in countries that U.S. majors and allies control), information and military technology.
This trade dependency will enable U.S. strategists to impose sanctions that would deprive
economies of basic food, energy, communications and replacement parts if they resist U.S.
demands.
The objective is to gain financial control of global resources and make trade "partners" pay
interest, licensing fees and high prices for products in which the United States enjoys
monopoly pricing "rights" for intellectual property. A trade war thus aims to make other
countries dependent on U.S.-controlled food, oil, banking and finance, or high-technology goods
whose disruption will cause austerity and suffering until the trade "partner" surrenders.
China's willingness to give Trump a "win"
Threats are cheap, but Mr. Trump can't really follow through without turning farmers, Wall
Street and the stock market, Walmart and much of the IT sector against him at election time if
his tariffs on China increase the cost of living and doing business. His diplomatic threat is
really that the US will cut its own economic throat, imposing sanctions on its own importers
and investors if China does not acquiesce.
It is easy to see what China's answer will be. It will stand aside and let the US
self-destruct. Its negotiators are quite happy to "offer" whatever China has planned to do
anyway, and let Trump brag that this is a "concession" he has won.
China has a great sweetener that I think President Xi Jinping should offer: It can nominate
Donald Trump for the Nobel Peace Prize. We know that he wants what his predecessor Barack Obama
got. And doesn't he deserve it more? After all, he is helping to bring Eurasia together,
driving China and Russia into an alliance with neighboring counties, reaching out to
Europe.
Trump may be too narcissistic to realize the irony here. Catalyzing Asian and European trade
independence, financial independence, food independence and IT independence from the threat of
U.S. sanctions will leave the U.S. isolated in the emerging multilateralism.
America's wish for a neoliberal Chinese Yeltsin (and another Russian Yeltsin for that
matter)
A good diplomat does not make demands to which the only answer can be "No." There is no way
that China will dismantle its mixed economy and turn it over to U.S. and other global
investors. It is no secret that the United States achieved world industrial supremacy in the
late 19 th and early 20 th century by heavy public-sector subsidy of
education, roads, communication and other basic infrastructure. Today's privatized,
financialized and "Thatcherized" economies are high-cost and inefficient.
Yet U.S. officials persist in their dream of promoting some neoliberal Chinese leader or
"free market" party to wreak the damage that Yeltsin and his American advisors wrought on
Russia. The U.S. idea of a "win-win" agreement is one in which China will be "permitted" to
grow as long as it agrees to become a U.S. financial and trade satellite, not an independent
competitor.
Trump's trade tantrum is that other countries are simply following the same economic
strategy that once made America great, but which neoliberals have destroyed here and in much of
Europe. U.S. negotiators are unwilling to acknowledge that the United States has lost its
competitive industrial advantage and become a high-cost rentier economy. Its GDP is
"empty," consisting mainly of the Finance, Insurance and Real Estate (FIRE) rents, profits and
capital gains while the nation's infrastructure decays and its labor is reduced to a prat-time
"gig" economy. Under these conditions the effect of trade threats can only be to speed up the
drive by other countries to become economically self-reliant.
The crux of the "trade" dispute is never discussed: the Chinese refusal to allow the
international financial services sector to penetrate the Chinese economy and operate freely.
Get it? The Chinese won't let the Jews in to loot the place and the Jews are pissed.
Trumpstein, the cryto Jew, has promised his sponsors to rectify the situation. The Chinese
witnessed what happened when Yeltsin allowed the IMF to parachute Jeffrey Sachs and his Jew
Boys into Russia in 1991 Jews looted the place mercilessly, calling it democracy and
capitalism, and Russia is still recovering. The Chinese have a bright future, as long as they
keep the Jews out.
I agree.
I am afraid spokes person Trump and those he is speaking for have it wrong. They believe
external trade is interfering with the La-Zi-Faire fat cat monopoly powered corporations the
CPI (congress, president and Israeli governance represent.
Few western companies can compete because only monopoly endowed Global corporations are
allowed or licensed to compete. Individual ability, the creative mind of the lone rangers
with highly disruptive inventions and ideas, are not allowed access to the knowledge or money
to play. Making people pay for sleazy operating systems when better ones are free, allowing
big corporations to hack the data of everyone, and on and on.
Even when a person finds a way to play and actually produces a product or concept, the
financial condition of the inventor is so weak or the barriers to promote his product is so
strong that as soon as the idea or product is patented or copyrighted it somehow absorbed
into one of the monopoly powered giants; in other words, competition is only allowed if the
competitor gives the profits to one of the monopoly powered giants. China should be
complaining, at least their competitors can produce, in the USA governed America unlicensed
competition is denied.
Copyright, patents, standardized testing and licensing every breath have terminated
competition in America.
America still competes with Americans as long as the business does not compete with the
global corporations.
The problem Trump thinks he can solve, is not sourced in India, China, Iran, Russia, or
any other nation. The problem is at home, in government policy, laws that turn capitalistic
competition into monopolistic fat-cat wealth storing private domain havens. Education by
degree and license by examination and standardization of performance are used to restrict
competition. Education, is a bureaucracy and no matter its efficiency; a degree cannot
provide competitive performance. The USA governance over America has served only the interest
of monopoly endowed corporations and their oligarch owners and investors. Trump is trying to
overcome foreign competition, by threat and blocking maneuvers, to deny foreigners the fruits
of their competitive successes I do not believe he can be successful. Already the Russian and
Chinese have developed a new currency and banking system to circumvent the Trump block. Work
around-s are in progress everywhere.. Soon even the USA will not be allowed to compete I
fear.
It is not a matter of where the competition comes from, its that the monopoly powers have
used the behavior enforcing rule making capacity of the USA to deny native American
creativity; creativity that America needs to be competitive. USA policy continues to be to
enrich a few by channeling and encapsulating all effort within the confines of the monopoly
holders instead of encouraging every back yard to be a new competitor. It will be many years
before Americans will be able to compete..
What Trump is now demanding reminds me of the brutally efficient system that Trump grew up
in: New York City business. (Author Tom Wolfe has a great line in his book The Bonfire Of The
Vanities that the strange, unrelenting background droning sound one hears in NYC is that of
"people constantly braying for money").
New York City real estate in particular is an area of business that is so brutally
competitive, unscrupulous , and backstabbing that it is best described as war under another
name. It is a business arena where a close friend one day can turn into a staunch enemy the
next. Trust is rare.
New York real estate, in fact, brings to mind the old saying about sausage making: You
would never eat it if you saw it being made. Yet deals are made. In fact, a lot of them. This
is the milieu Trump comes from.
Trump isn't one of those more genteel, old-time American negotiators of prior years the
author of this article speaks fondly of. These are the very same people who so readily agreed
to disasters like NAFTA or allowed, for instance, Or allowed Japan to levy two hundred
percent duties on things like American made Harley Davidson motorcycles while the USA was
pressured (or bribed) to apply few if any comparable duties on Japanese motorcycles or
automobiles (or virtually anything else Japan sold in the USA). These toothless. genteel
types also stood back for decades and allowed Japan to use red tape (like obscure safety
regulations for instance) to make it almost impossibly difficult to sell American products
like automobiles in Japan.
These very same US negotiators, politicians, and bureaucrats have more recently stood back
and allowed China to absolutely devastate American manufacturing.
Screw China, It's now payback time. The Chinese are shaking in their boots because the
previously hoodwinked and comatose Americans are finally waking up. No more wimpy Obama or
Bush looking out for our interests. It is now Truly Scary Trump instead.
Wait until the negotiations are concluded to see if they are successful. The sausage that
comes out of them might be very appealing for the first time in many, many decades.
" His diplomatic threat is really that the US will cut its own economic throat, imposing
sanctions on its own importers and investors if China does not acquiesce "
I get that the US financial system is up to no good with their positions on China but the
criticisms Trump made of China are correct. They have lots of tariffs on finished goods from
the US. They require technology transfer to do business there. Their government and industry
are tied at the hip and they are manipulating their currency. All these things are true and
if we keep trading with them with the same terms we have been we would lose ALL our
industrial infrastructure. Now we hear over and over how we can't build anything but the
Chinese went from being dirt farmers to the largest industrial power in a fairly short period
of time. Could we not do the same at least for our own countries market? Certainly global
trade destruction between countries is not a good thing but we'd be fools to keep on as we
are now. At some point when you dig a hole you have to stop to get yourself out.
I don't think we have a choice if we wish to continue to be an industrialized country. All
those that say China will do fine without us are not taking into account how all the other
countries who are being handled the exact same way as we are, are going to handle China's
trade with them. Will they keep allowing China to have large tariffs on their products while
they Chinese ship whatever they wish into theirs? I'm not so sure they will. If the US starts
refusing the Chinese free entry without reciprocal trade then I can easily see others
following our lead.
We should have stopped this many years ago but as bad as the situation is now it will only
get worse if we don't act.
Let them remove their tariffs. We should take every single anti-trade act and tariff they
have on us, weigh them on China and "then" negotiate. If they don't wish to it's their
country they can do what they please and so can we.
"The crux of the "trade" dispute is never discussed: the Chinese refusal to allow the
international financial services sector to penetrate the Chinese economy and operate freely.
Get it? "
Absolutely. Like inviting a handful of worms into your apple -- economy hollowed out in an
eye blink.
However, there is another side to this "trade dispute" coin.
FIRE want to economicly destroy China. The neocon', MIC, security sector wants to destroy
China's 2025 plan to become high-tech world leaders. 5G, AI, semi conductors etc are some of
the areas that China's public/private sectors are voraciously pushing. Hence, the
(wonderfully "free market") US attacks on Heiwai.
These short term US gambles are more than likely to pay off by the medium-long term
undermining of US hegemony via Eurasian integration led by China & Russia.
And all the time we are left wondering whether the US will choose the "Samson Option" rather
than accept reduced status. (Insane with power lust, the US can't even accept "first among
equals")
The US is making impossible demands for economic surrender – that no country could
accept. What appears on the surface to be only a trade war is really a full-fledged Cold
War 2.0
.
Typical mobster protection racket threats. Now the US has moved from waging military wars
on behalf of their Jewish owners to aggressively push their neoliberal economic warfare for
them. The facade for promoting democracy and human rights is no longer required.
And to call attempts at starving the population and murdering children by denying them
essential medicines as has happened in Iraq and now is going on in Iran and Venezuela, a Cold
War 2.0 is a gross understatement. It is a flagrant act of war. America is launching a war of
attrition on the world and who better to spearhead that war than an idiot manipulated by
Zionist Jews? The fact that many countries remain silent is testament to their surrender. But
China may prove to be a different proposition.
"the United States achieved world industrial supremacy in the late 19th and early 20th
century" That is a myth. The US may have had the highest GDP because it was the leader in
manufacturing, as China is now, but Europe and in particular Germany was far ahead of the US
in technology and science. If you compare China to the US today the situation is very similar
to comparing the US to Germany before 1939. Germany was far ahead of the US in the number of
Nobel Prizes received thru 1945 and very few of the Americans that did receive the Nobel
Prize were native born. The US received a few Nobel Prizes starting in the 1940's because
some recent European immigrants that became US citizens received it for work they had done in
Europe. The three biggest technological breakthroughs of WW II were the jet, the rocket and
the atomic bomb. Germany invented the jet, built the first modern rockets and the German
scientist Otto Hahn split the atom in 1939 (for which he received the Nobel Prize in 1944)
kicking off the USA's atomic bomb project and Germany's limited attempt. The people that
eventually achieved success in the US were almost all recent European immigrants (Bethe,
Teller, etc.), many being Jewish.
I basically agree with the rest of the article. I believe Trump's tactics make sense. The
problem is it's too late. The US economy can't be fixed by anyone. The US has 22 trillion
dollars in debt and will never be able to pay it back. The dollar is going to take a deep
dive within the next few years and it will lose its status as the reserve currency. I believe
this based upon what people like Peter Schiff, Paul Craig Roberts, David Stockman and Ron
Paul say.
I think the two biggest events of the last 75 years were WW II, completely changing the
countries that run the world and the emergence of a backwards and dirt poor China to become
an economic powerhouse and I think they will get stronger.
The US is making impossible demands for economic surrender – that no country could
accept.
Yes country. If the world was one big free trade area, it there were no bloks or even no
countries in the sense we understand them then the population of the would be wealthier, on
average. But countries are not primarily economic units, even if one can look at them as
such.
Nation states exist and have the emergent quality that they to survive against other
nation states and the best way to do that is to gain extra power relative to other states, or
at least maintain their position. Why would America agree to terms of trade that do not
maintain its position relative to China.
U.S. negotiators are unwilling to acknowledge that the United States has lost its
competitive industrial advantage
There is no absolute standards by which such an advantage could be judged. The terms of
trade that are finally settled on will be a compromise and reflect the interests of both, and
the total balance of forces between the two.
The combination of both nations will make it extremely difficult for Washington to impose
its hegemonic agenda without serious repercussions as two of the world's leading military
forces seek to increase the level of co-operation between their nations.
Trump's Trade Tariff Theatre 2018 results:
Country/Trade Balance/2018 vs. 2017
Mexico: trade DEFICIT -$81.5 billion; up 14.9% from 2017;
Canada: trade DEFICIT -$19.8 billion; up 15.8% from 2017;
China: trade DEFICIT -$375.6 billion; up 11.6% from 2017;
South Korea: trade DEFICIT -$17.9 billion; down 22.4% from 2017;
Japan: trade DEFICIT -$67.7 billion; down 1.8% from 2017
Germany: trade DEFICIT -$68.3 billion; up 7.2% from 2017;
France: trade DEFICIT -$16.2 billion; up 5.8% from 2017;
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia: trade DEFICIT -$10.5 billion; up 313.3% from 2017;
Russia: trade DEFICIT -$14.1 billion; up 40.9% from 2017;
Asia: trade DEFICIT -$622.2 billion; up 8.8% from 2017;
Europe: trade DEFICIT -$202.4 billion; up 16.6% from 2017;
World: trade DEFICIT -$795.7 billion; up 10.4% from 2017
To all of the "free traders", the media ,and academia ,i have this simple question:
why i cant purchase a Toyota work van(the best and must popular of the world),neither here in
the USA nor abroad and bring it in?
how come that even in Cuba there are more of those Toyota work van than here in all
continental USA.
In 25 year i has to purchase more than 6 work vans,and like Penelope i have been waiting for
the Toyota ,and still waiting.
They ,the free traders,did not has allowed not even one.
The problem with the zio/US is the control of the US by the zionists and this control is
derived via the zionist privately owned FED and IRS that they got installed in 1913 and then
came the debt and wars and the hijacking of the foreign policy by the satanic zionists and
the US gov was started on a down hill slide pushed started by the zionists!
The trade policy of the zio/US has turned Russia into the largest grain exporter in the
world and turned Russia into an agriculture miracle , this can be shown by watch videos of
Russian agriculture on youtube. Germany is also in Russia building cars and other industrial
products for Russia thus bypassing the zio/US trade sanctions and last but not least Russia
is trading in non dollars in trade with more and more countries such as China thus
effectively rendering the dollar non and void in international trade.
So the people of the zio/US can thank their zionist masters for the demise of America and
true to form the zionist parasites are killing their American host
Join Mike Maloney as he examines the latest moves in the US/China trade war, and visits
some compelling arguments from the Foundation for Economic Education.
The "Chinese dragon" of the last two decades may be faltering but it is still hailed by
many as an economic miracle. Far from a great advance for Chinese workers, however, it is the
direct result of a consolidation of power in the hands of a small clique of powerful
families, families that have actively collaborated with Western financial oligarchs.
"Threats are cheap, but Mr. Trump can't really follow through without turning farmers, Wall
Street and the stock market, Walmart and much of the IT sector against him at election time
if his tariffs on China increase the cost of living and doing business. "
Tariffs are taxes and both governments like collecting taxes.
Farmers. Farmers sell a commodity so if they cannot sell to China one result is they will
sell to other customers while China buys more from other producers.
Cost of living. DC does not care. There is a solid inflation lobby in the fed that
supports increasing the cost of living.
"Walmart and much of the IT sector against him." I am not buying it.
Well, more accurate to say that Germany and Britain invented the jet engine independently
of each other. Just as they both invented radar independently of each other as well.
As it is, the post-war jet engine was based primarily on the British design of Frank
Whittle, though some of the German ideas were also later incorporated.
Huawei Technologies Co Ltd has told Verizon Communications Inc that
the U.S. carrier should pay licensing fees for more than 230 of the Chinese telecoms equipment
maker's patents and in aggregate is seeking more than $1 billion, a person briefed on the
matter said on Wednesday.
Verizon should pay to "solve the patent licensing issue," a Huawei intellectual property
licensing executive wrote in February, the Wall Street Journal reported earlier. The patents
cover network equipment for more than 20 of the company's vendors including major U.S. tech
firms but those vendors would indemnify Verizon, the person said. Some of those firms have been
approached directly by Huawei, the person said.
The patents in question range from core network equipment, wireline infrastructure to
internet-of-things technology, the Journal reported. The licensing fees for the more than 230
patents sought is more than $1 billion, the person said.
Huawei has been battling the U.S. government for more than a year. National security experts
worry that "back doors" in routers, switches and other Huawei equipment could allow China to
spy on U.S. communications. Huawei has denied that it would help China spy.
Companies involved, including Verizon have notified the U.S. government and the dispute
comes amid a growing feud between China and the United States. The licensing fee demand may be
more about the geopolitical battle between China and the United States rather than a demand for
patent fees.
Huawei and Verizon representatives met in New York last week to discuss some of the patents
at issue and whether Verizon is using equipment from other companies that could infringe on
Huawei patents.
Verizon spokesman Rich Young declined to comment "regarding this specific issue because it's
a potential legal matter."
However, Young said, "These issues are larger than just Verizon. Given the broader
geopolitical context, any issue involving Huawei has implications for our entire industry and
also raise national and international concerns."
Huawei and U.S. wireless carriers T-Mobile US Inc and AT&T Inc did not respond to
Reuters' requests for comment. Sprint Corp declined to comment.
The United States last month put Huawei on a blacklist that barred it from doing business
with U.S. companies on security grounds without government approval, prompting some global tech
firms to cut ties with the world's largest telecoms equipment maker.
Washington is also seeking the extradition of Huawei Chief Financial Executive Meng Wanzhou
from Canada after her arrest in Vancouver last December on a U.S. warrant.
China has since upped the pressure on Canada, halting Canadian canola imports and in May
suspended the permits of two major pork producers.
(Reporting by Arjun Panchadar in Bengaluru and David Shepardson in Washington; Editing by
Anil D'Silva, Sriraj Kalluvila and Sandra Maler)
On June 4th the Chinese government issued a travel alert for Chinese tourists thinking of
visiting the United States, a day after it issued a similar advisory to Chinese students
thinking of studying in the US over concerns for their safety and security.
Chinese in the US are reporting harassment and interrogations by US immigration authorities
and many now have the impression they are not welcome in the US.
The Global Times , speaking on behalf of the government stated:
The Chinese people find it difficult to accept the fact that they are being taken as
thieves. The US boasts too much superiority and has been indulged by the world. Due to its
short history, it lacks understanding of and respect for the rules of countries and laws of
the market.
The Americans of the early generations accumulated prosperity and prestige for the US,
while the current US administration behaves like a wastrel generation by ruining the world's
respect for the US."
... ... ...
The situation has become so tense that the Global Times on June 6,th in an op ed by Wei
Jianguo, said:
China is able to withstand US maximum pressure, due to the country's economic resilience,
and Chinese people's resolute determination. Suffering from a century of humiliation, the
Chinese nation has been accustomed to such pressure, as shown in the War of Resistance
against Japanese Aggression, as well as the Korean War or the War to Resist US Aggression and
Aid Korea. The unity of Chinese people is a vital reason for the country's fundamental
victory in history."
The Peoples' Daily stated, "America is the enemy of the world."
Trump is not a thinker, and never was. He is an impulsive narcissist. So the question is
whether the USA committed a blunder by unleashing open trade war with China, the war which now
extent the Cold War 2 to another nation (cementing emerging alliance between Russia and China
which is a death sentence to the USA global hegemony) and where the USA faces very resilient and
inventive opponent. And they will lose even if they win.
I actually am amazed by the level of reclines and arrogance the USA democratic is such topic.
I do not see multiyear preparation, mobilization of engineering talent and resources that is
needed for successfully procuring such a war. It looks like completely impulsive decision
partially based on the attempt to get some additional concessions from China. That attempt which
spectacularly failed and fueled very dangerous for the USA a wave of Chinese nationalists within
mainland china.
The key issue here is that is current stage of neoliberal decine the USA can't rely on
loyalty of its own key players and citizets ("greed is good" is the motto of neoliberalism; plus
Chinese have probably a very good access to Taiwan high technology industry, the access which is
impossible to cut). Such a low level loyalty previously existed just before the USA collapse,
when the CIA was able to tranfere to the West a mid level cipher officer from KGB headquarters (
Sheymov defected to
the United States in May 1980) and recruit at least one general (Kalugin). Actually KGB was at
the center and the main driving force of neoliberal counterrevolution in Russia (Trojan Horse so
to speak), as under Andropov they switch sides. So they were naturally allied with CIA at this
point
the point is that it does not take too much efforts for foreign intelligence agency now to
recruit the US citizens as the collapse of neoliberal ideology creates fertile ground for such an
efforts, much like the collapse of Bolsheviks ideology did for the USA. Some can just volunteer
appalled by the actions of neoliberal empire. In this sense cases of Manning and Snowen should
serve the US administration a stern warning sign that it is a very dangerous to rock the boat if
the country experience a collapse of imperial ideology (Neoliberalism). In this case the trade
war might be more difficult then they think.
China has more people and produce per year more engineers in STEM. So the USA does not hoild
allthe cards. it it has some advantages over the USA in the long term. Also the current
technologies are pretty established and "innovation" is often is limited to shriking the silicon
die and adding more core for CPUs.
Actually Intel CPUs have a horrible really outdated CISC instruction set and there might be
chance to use different instruction set with better overall chanracteristics. Only the billions
that Intel get from sales allow it to outpace the rivals. Failed stqrtup Transmeta, for exampel,
in late 1990th tried to emulate it via RISK. If throwing out emulation layer speeds up things
twice or more, why not to use this path giving enough man power, money and level of animosity
toward the USA?
The mechanism would "prevent and resolve national security risks", Xinhua said. Details
would be released soon, it added.
The announcement comes amid a souring of relations with the US after the most recent round
of trade negotiations ended without a deal in May.
Since then, the Trump administration has blacklisted Chinese telecommunications equipment
maker Huawei, while China has threatened to punish foreign companies that cut off ties with
Huawei by listing them as "unreliable".
The new Chinese regulations could prove similar to US export controls on strategic
technologies. Those controls -- covering military equipment, some encryption technologies, and
some dual-use products -- have long irked China. Chinese negotiators have often claimed that
their trade surplus could be trimmed if the US would relax controls on high-tech goods.
The mechanism will be developed by the National Reform and Development Commission under the
guidelines of China's national security law ,
passed in 2015, Xinhua said.
"This is a major step to improve [China's system] and also a move to counter the US
crackdown," tweeted Hu Xijin, editor-in-chief of the Global Times, a nationalist tabloid that
is sometimes used to float ideas that are not official policy. "Once taking effect, some
technology exports to the US will be subject to the control." Last month, the NDRC implied it
would block exports of rare earths , a material
with many strategic applications. After the trade talks broke down in May, Chinese president Xi
Jinping visited a manufacturer of rare earths magnets, used in electric vehicles and other new
technology applications, as a reminder that China holds some trump cards of its own.
READ Massages and free fish help east Europe tackle labour shortages
Rare earth are used in smartphones, lasers, instrument panels, wind turbines and MRI
machines and more than 90 per cent of hybrid and electric cars.
"... Now, each of the two superpowers appears to be crafting new economic weapons to aim at the other. What was once a fraught, but deeply enmeshed, trade relationship is threatening to break apart almost entirely, raising the specter of a new geopolitical reality in which the world's two superpowers would compete for economic influence and try to freeze each other out of key technologies and resources. - New York Times ..."
"... "This is now extremely delicate [time] because the Trump administration, through its brinkmanship tactics, has destabilized the entire relationship, commercial and otherwise," according to China expert Scott Kennedy - senior adviser at the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies who studies Chinese economic policy. ..."
Beijing put big tech on notice last week, threatening 'dire
consequences' if companies such as Microsoft, Dell and Samsung comply with the Trump
administration's ban on sales of key American technology to Chinese companies, according to the
New York
Times . Any companies which cooperate with the new policy ' could face permanent
consequences ,' according to the Times. Chinese authorities also suggested using DC lobbyists
to resist the government's moves.
China - which is already
ditching Microsoft Windows for military applications - held a flurry of meetings on Tuesday
and Wednesday after tech firms for discussions amid the backdrop of Beijing's planned blacklist
of blacklisting
of US firms on an "unreliable entities list."
Also participating in meetings were semiconductor companies Arm of Britain and SK Hynix of
South Korea, according to the report, which cites a KPMG estimate that around 60% of all
semiconductors sold are connected to China's supply chain, so maybe by that new computer sooner
than later.
The breakneck unraveling of the world's most important trade relationship has left
companies and governments around the world scrambling . While the dispute had already been
nettlesome for Chinese-U.S. relations, the sudden ban on Huawei last month caught many by
surprise , raising the stakes by striking at the heart of China's long-term technological
ambitions.
Now, each of the two superpowers appears to be crafting new economic
weapons to aim at the other. What was once a fraught, but deeply enmeshed, trade relationship
is threatening to break apart almost entirely, raising the specter of a new geopolitical
reality in which the world's two superpowers would compete for economic influence and try to
freeze each other out of key technologies and resources. - New York
Times
"This is now extremely delicate [time] because the Trump administration,
through its brinkmanship tactics, has destabilized the entire relationship, commercial and
otherwise," according to China expert Scott Kennedy - senior adviser at the Washington-based
Center for Strategic and International Studies who studies Chinese economic policy.
More broadly, the warnings also seemed to be an attempt to forestall a fast breakup of the
sophisticated supply chains that connect China's economy to the rest of the world .
Production of a vast array of electronic components and chemicals, along with the assembly of
electronic products , makes the country a cornerstone of the operations of many of the
world's largest multinational companies. - New York
Times
"The Chinese government has regularly resorted to jawboning multinationals to try to keep
them in line when there are disputes between China and others that could lead these companies
to reduce their business in China."
For example, in 2015 Xi dropped by Seattle before heading to meet with President Obama.
While there, he had a chat with Amazon executives and Chinese tech executive in order to woo
them on the prospect of future business, while the Obama administration was reportedly trying
to push back against China's anticompetitive trade practices .
That said, China is far less likely to succeed this time around , according to Kennedy, who
says that " American companies aren't going to violate American laws, especially in such a
high-profile context where their actions are scrutinized."
"The companies are between a rock and a hard place, but that hard place will win out."
Three Chinese government bodies are involved in the recent discussions; the National
Development and Reform Commission (China's central economic planning agency), the Ministry of
Commerce and the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. The Times posits that the
fact that the three are all involved suggests the meetings came from the top-down in an attempt
to rally support for Huawei - which was not specifically named.
" There is a strong perception in Beijing that the U.S. government is intent on blunting
China's technology rise , and that if this process is not slowed or stopped, the future of
China's entire digital economy is at risk," said Eurasia Group head of geotechnology, Paul
Triolo, adding "Mr. Xi and the party will be seen as unable to defend China's economic future"
it Huawei's 5G rollout is derailed by the Trump administration.
As the trade relationship between the United States and China has broken down, fears have
risen in China that major companies will seek to move production elsewhere to avoid
longer-term risks . In the meetings this week, Chinese officials explicitly warned companies
that any move to pull production from China that seemed to go beyond standard diversification
for security purposes could lead to punishment , according to the two people. - New York
Times
"China Threatens 'Dire Consequences' If Tech Giants Comply With Trump Ban"
"And US Threatens Jail If They Don't"
Love it love it love it. Reminds me of the great line from Pride & Prejudice, "You're
mother will never speak to you again if you marry him, and I (your father) will never speak
to you again if you don't."
In R&D spending, China ranks 2nd place after US. China has over 8M new grads each
year. Do you really believe stealing can make a country great. The trade war is about
suppressing a new rising power of technology and economy.
There's a whole lot more to what China is up to than buying and selling. They've been
working on how to rule the whole earth for 5000 years and the CCP thinks maybe now is the
time. Here's a brief history of Chinese power games. They play for keeps. https://www.newenglishreview.org/custpage.cfm?frm=189701&sec_id=189701
China's fightback strategy is simple: Force non-us corporations to abandon us-sourced
technologies, and, hence, non-us corporations will not be bound by US laws, and, hence, won't
subject to us blackmail laws.
The strategy already worked. ARM's founder said it will have to abandon US-sourced
technology ( eventually abandon US-located headquarters) to keep the Chinese market, and, so
other non-us corporations, such as Europe, Japanese, or Korean based corporations will have
to follow. They have no other feasible choices.
In short, the world is divided into two groups: US group and non-us group. Congratulations
to Trump: He has succeeded in isolating US from the world.
First step is to encourage, urge and force non-us corporations to make the choice using
the gigantic china market.
Second step is to drive out us corporations at the time when there is alternative for
US-made parts. Whenever US corporation is not the sole supplier, then China will declare that
any product containing that part will be forbidden in the Chinese market. And, to make the
situation even worse for US-sourced technology, any parts produced by non-us corporations
using US-sourced technology will not be allowed in the Chinese market.
This is the reverse of the entity list.
In this game, one that has a bigger market prevails. China just happened to have 1.4
billion consumers while US has less than 0.4 billion. China wins. By poisoning American
sourced technology, China will succeed in isolating US corporations.
You seem to be confused. ARM created a separate joint venture in China called ARM mini
China that will license existing tech to China as a way to circumvent US rules. However, this
creates a Chinese ARM license separate from the rest of the world. So it is China that is
actually separated from further innovation outside of China.
The Roman Emperor Caligula is best known for appointing his horse to one of the vacant
consulships. Given the current quality of professional politicians on offer in the western
world, he does not seem as crazy as he once was thought to be.
But he is also known for something else-- the phrase "Oderint dum Metuant" -- which is
Latin for "Let them hate (us), so long as they fear (us)."
Not my favorite motto but I'll take it over "Here's my wallet. Don't you like me now?"
"... The US has decided that China can't be allowed to become a technological power any more than it is now. It's fine if all they do is make T-shirts, and low-tech crap, but anything more advanced then a digital alarm clock can not be allowed. ..."
"... Anytime you weaponize something (the dollar), countermeasures will be invented to neutralize that weapon........only a matter of time. ..."
"... We're so balls deep in debt la la land now that having a conversation about wealth creation via production feels a lot like making balloon animals while wearing a clown suit. ..."
"... Much More Than a Trade War ..."
"... it signals the implosion of America's tinsel, derivative-based economy ..."
"... the high dive of the middle class into serfdom ..."
"... Politicians here in the US are desperate for me to believe it is all China's fault. Not the lying, stealing politicians and MBAs that have stolen my future but China. I am not buying it. Even if China has stolen America's wealth, who let them? Who helped and got rich? That's right, US politicians and MBAs. ..."
"... The only reason why this is a trade war in the first place, is because we're attempting to undo the shitty deals signed by Bill Clinton. Let this be a lesson: Don't sign shitty deals. No matter how much they donate to your campaign. ..."
"... Asking this of a politician is like asking a leech to stop living off blood. ..."
I watch Fox News Sunday and today all of the usual suspects were blaming Trump for
everything under the sun--including committing crimes and needing to be put in jail. It bears
repeating that they said the same things about Reagan and his trade wars--which benefited
Americans immensely.
Trump will win unless the Dems can get rid of him. China is a paper tiger and always has
been.
They are a totalitarian communist state and as such are a sworn enemy of the US and its
historic peoples. They must be taken down and that is not hyperbole--they never should have
been allowed to trade with the civilized world in the first place without first shutting down
the Kims in Norkland and dismantling their communist state.
Russia would have been more in
order in 1992 than China. ******* Clintons.
(Those companies and organizations which have contributed to and/or financed the creation
of the Chinese Communist Party's ultra-Orwellian system for command and control: Social
Credit System.)
Microsoft, Cisco, Apple, Yahoo, Narus
Rockefeller Foundation, MIT, Princeton University, University of Texas System,
Northwestern University, Oregon State Treasury, et al.
Recommended Reading:
The People's Republic of the Disappeared --- by Michael Caster
Bullets and Opium --- by Liao Yiwu
The People's Republic of Amnesia --- by Louisa Lim
Recommended Viewing:
In the Name of Confucius --- DVD (Jia Kongzi, Zhi Ming)
Free China - Free China --- DVD (Zi You Zhongguo)
The Sun Behind the Clouds [Tibet's Struggle for Freedom] --- DVD
Is it so hard to understand that the chinks KNOW that the yuan is trash and that's why
both the CB and the public are stacking gold. They're preparing for what comes next.
According to Jim Willie, that will be an Asian gold trade note as proposed by the PM of
Malaysia.
"China and its citizens would greatly benefit from eliminating barriers."
It's too bad they never did this, but now it no longer matters. The US has decided that
China can't be allowed to become a technological power any more than it is now. It's fine if
all they do is make T-shirts, and low-tech crap, but anything more advanced then a digital
alarm clock can not be allowed.
China would do best to forget about the US and hope that it can make due with it's
domestic market. With 1.3 billion people this seems like it should be possible.
They need dollars to buy US goods and services. They also need them to buy oil from
Saudis. They have dollar based loans that require payment in dollars.
"The United States has discovered the Achilles heel of China. The same one Japan had in
the 80s when it seemed that it was going to invade the world. Its dependence on the US dollar
to maintain its large domestic imbalances, a very fragile house of cards of excess capacity,
real estate bubble and unproductive spending."
Oh, yeah. .......we just "figured" that one out. It's not like we haven't used that scheme
on.......well, EVERYONE. Even our own citizens are slaves to a debt dollar system. It is all
we got left......well that and the A-bomb. But at the same time, it is our biggest weakness
because if we can't get the world to expand dollar debt, 5 hen we will have to do it
ourselves. Hence the, "China is not the largest holder of US bonds in the world, not even
close. It's the
US . In fact, China has already reduced part of its holdings in US bonds and yields fell
."
We are the largest holder of our own debt.....and can print up what we need to buy what is
necessary to drive yields down. But at some point it will be like playing monopoly with
yourself......a zero sum game. Anytime you weaponize something (the dollar), countermeasures
will be invented to neutralize that weapon........only a matter of time.
Indeed. Anyone pushing that narrative is part of the totalitarian regime or is dumb as a
bag of hammers. Either way, they lose all credibility in my opinion.
The author has never been to China to know anything about it, much less write about it,
and he knows even less about the trade relationships of the two countries.
For instance, He says: " China has a trade deficit with most of its other partners"....
WRONG!!!! It is the U.S. who has the deficits with other countries, not China! China
has a manufacturing economy, not a consumer economy, so the trade balance is in its favor, as
manufacturing economies are in demand and have very little deficit.
And the author also reveals his biases about China by saying: "China's Achilles heel has
been to try to be a reserve currency whilst maintaining capital controls and increasing state
intervention...." What do you think the U.S. Federal Reserve does, if it is not the very same
thing? Weren't they the ones who sets interest rates, control the rates of inflation,
dictating the supply of money, and doing economic bailouts to the banks in 2008 and 2009 with
our money?
Secondly, he is just regurgitating the same old propaganda already put out about China,
and really doesn't provide anything new. Why can't ZH find better writers to publish than
this?
You are correct. China usually runs surpluses. But not with everyone.
In 2018, China posted a trade surplus of USD 351.76 billion, the lowest since 2013, as
exports increased 9.9 percent, its strongest performance in seven years, while imports were
up 15.8 percent. The biggest trade surpluses were recorded with Hong Kong, the US, the
Netherlands, India, the UK, Vietnam, Singapore and Indonesia. China recorded trade deficits
with Taiwan, South Korea, Australia, Germany, Brazil and South Africa.
"China's Achilles heel has been to try to be a reserve currency whilst maintaining
capital controls and increasing state intervention...."
This is impossible. One cannot institute strong capital controls and have a reserve
currency at the same time. China knows this and has never tried to become the reserve
currency.
yeah, they said they'd work on "migration" into their country, and try to do something
about those staged caravans..but what they didn't do is say they'd stop their citizens from
invading the US like they have been doing for decades, and they didn't say they'd secure
their side of the border between the US and Mexico. So, how is the border more secure
exactly? Oh, and they didn't say they'd pay for a wall.
These same games go on, round and round, between both parties, with people twisting
everything, including nothing burgers and actual defeats into some kind of bizarre "winning"
********, to avoid legitimate criticism of their idol in the White House. Trumpets and
Obamabots are peas in a pod in more ways than they realize, but watch out, you'll get an eye
jab if you walk between them, with all the fingers pointing.
Winning, like alcohol, is addictive. Sometimes you find yourself all out of booze, so you
find yourself taking swigs of Aqua Velva. Lots of Aqua Velva heads around here.
Same old script: China bad. China steals. China need to shape up or else. USA good. USA too soft on China. USA will be great again when China surrenders to US
slavery. Think that about sums up these articles.
I agree. The "investor" class. And by that i do not mean all investors, just the non
productive LEECHES at the top playing games with fake "financial instruments"
They are non producers. They are lampreys. Same as on the bottom. I have absolutely no
problem with rich people. I am blessed to hang with many self made millionaires who are all
about designing / manufacturing unique products sold all over the world. They produce wealth
and a product, not by skimming.
We're so balls deep in debt la la land now that having a conversation about wealth
creation via production feels a lot like making balloon animals while wearing a clown
suit.
But.... it actually works. There will ALWAYS be a market for well engineered quality
products . ALWAYS.
Don't chase that race to the bottom. That is what was sold to the Us
Consooooooooooooooooooooooooooomer (**** I hate that name, I am not a consumer) for the last
thirty year. They bought the ****, they own it. **** em, let 'em choke on the icrapple and
other swarf.
Ha.
I am not balls deep in debt. My total life debt so far is $800. USA incorporated... THEY
have debt. That is not my debt.
Politicians here in the US are desperate for me to believe it is all China's fault. Not
the lying, stealing politicians and MBAs that have stolen my future but China. I am not buying it. Even if China has stolen America's wealth, who let them? Who helped and got rich? That's
right, US politicians and MBAs.
Yes, we have Democrat and Republican pols at the federal level spending this country into
decline by trillions, and financing it all with inflation, which is why we're paying higher
prices for virtually everything now, than we've ever paid.
The only reason why this is a trade war in the first place, is because we're attempting to
undo the shitty deals signed by Bill Clinton. Let this be a lesson: Don't sign shitty deals.
No matter how much they donate to your campaign.
BEIJING, June 9 (Xinhua) -- For years, non-U.S. transnational firms, vying to carve a niche
in the global market with cutting-edge technologies or products, often find themselves fronting
an opponent far more powerful and brutal than any commercial rival they have ever contested
with -- the U.S. government.
Many foreign entities, whose business may seem irrelevant to the United States, have been
forced by Washington with threats of sanctions to comply with U.S. domestic laws and
regulations.
"After so many years fancying itself as the champion of the Rule of Law, the U.S. seems to
be making headway in forging a world under the rule of law," said Zhou Qing'an, an analyst of
international relations at China's Tsinghua University. "Only it's the American law of the
jungle."
WEAPONIZED JURISDICTIONAL SYSTEM
In recent years, the U.S. government has slapped sanctions on and posed threats to an
increasing array of foreign entities under the pretext of infringements of its tailor-made
rules and regulations concerning anticorruption, taxation, investment and arms exports,
crafting a long-range weapon with its jurisdictional system, the very foundations undergirding
a country's authority.
Citing Cuba as an example of the U.S. jurisdictional overreach, Mauricio Santoro, head of
the Department of International Relations at the State University of Rio de Janeiro, said that
for many times, the United States has enacted new laws and regulations to justify its
punishments on foreign companies having commercial contacts with Cuba, a country that has long
been taken as a thorn in the flesh by Washington.
In the latest round of sanctions against the Caribbean country, Washington activated Title
III of the Helms-Burton Act, which put companies operating on properties confiscated by the
Cuban government at risk of being sued in U.S. courts.
It's not just the entities from countries deemed by the United States as rivals or
competitors that were exposed to the arbitrary abuse of Washington's jurisdictional power.
Firms of its allied countries which refuse to yield to the U.S. supremacy can also find
themselves under fire of such an overstretched jurisdictional "weapon."
In 2014, the U.S. Department of Justice fined Alstom, a French power and transportation
conglomerate, 772 million U.S. dollars, alleging the French company has broken America's
Foreign Corrupt Practices Act, which eventually led to the partial acquisition of Alstom by
General Electric, its arch rival in the United States.
Last month, the U.S. Commerce Department put Huawei, a Chinese company that has taken the
lead in 5G technology, and its affiliates on a blacklist that requires the federal government
approval for any sale and transfer of U.S. technologies to the Chinese firm.
Up to now, the United States is still lobbying other countries to exclude Huawei from 5G
networks construction over groundless accusations of spying.
"What is the most effective way to win a losing race? You change the rules and draw a foul
on your competitors, rude but effective," Zhou explained with a metaphor. "That is exactly what
the United States is doing to its competitors, even allies."
UNABASHED INTERNATIONAL DARWINIST
For decades, the United States has been touting itself as the flag-bearer of "freedom,
equality, justice and humanity," but in recent words and deeds, the Washington government is
exposing itself as an international Darwinist who sees the world as a jungle where the powerful
preys on the vulnerable.
By overstretching its jurisdiction and applying unilateral sanctions, the United States is
challenging the sovereignty of other countries, said Philippe Bonnecarrere, a French senator,
denouncing the U.S. extraterritorial jurisdiction as power logic.
Echoing the senator's words, Swaran Singh, professor at School of International Studies in
Jawaharlal Nehru University, noted that extending jurisdiction of U.S. domestic laws beyond its
border "has no legal standing whatsoever."
"It's only its position of power in international system that has allowed the United States
to arbitrarily impose its domestic laws abroad while rejecting several other universally
recognized international laws and norms," said the professor.
However, it is also the "universally recognized international laws and norms," which the
United States once paid, even sacrificed so much to build several decades ago and now is
turning its back on, that helped the country build its advantages over other countries.
Thanks to economic globalization, large European firms all have capital from different
countries, including the United States, and due to Washington's threat of sanctions, they have
to comply with American rules, said Bonnecarrere.
Even though an international Darwinist's obsession with the jungle law can not be changed
overnight, if the past is any prologue, "the obsession with power relations," as the French
senator put it, "is mortifying."
BACKLASHES FROM ALL AROUND
In a world where multilateralism and win-win cooperation are still the mainstream of the
times, an international Darwinist with zero-sum mentalities like the United States is bound to
face backlashes from within and outside the country.
David S. Cohen, a former deputy director of the CIA and former undersecretary of U.S.
Treasury Department, warned in an article published in April that the U.S. sanctions will not
only weaken countries being punished, but "breed resentment and alienate would-be international
partners."
"In the long run, it works against U.S. foreign policy interests and threatens the American
economy," said the article.
As the world's biggest economy, the United States enjoys "an outsize role in business
transactions around the world." The U.S. extraterrestrial jurisdiction, a typical prelude to
economic sanctions, would certainly cast a bigger shadow over the whole world.
Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) Christine Lagarde said earlier
this week that the existing and potential tariff hikes resulted from the U.S.-initiated trade
tensions with China could reduce global gross domestic product (GDP) by 0.5 percent in
2020.
Earlier this year, The Economist sounded a warning in an article for Washington. "Far from
expressing geopolitical might, America's legal overreach would then end up diminishing American
power," it said.
(Xinhua reporters Tang Ji and Ying Qiang in Paris, Hu Xiaoming in New Delhi, Zhou Xingzhu in
Brasilia contributed to the story.)
"... Across-the-board rivalry with China is becoming an organising principle of US economic, foreign and security policies. ..."
"... An effort to halt China's economic and technological rise is almost certain to fail. Worse, it will foment deep hostility in the Chinese people. In the long run, the demands of an increasingly prosperous and well-educated people for control over their lives might still win out. But that is far less likely if China's natural rise is threatened. ..."
"... The tragedy in what is now happening is that the administration is simultaneously launching a conflict between the two powers, attacking its allies and destroying the institutions of the postwar US-led order. ..."
The disappearance of the Soviet Union left a big hole. The "war on terror" was an inadequate replacement. But China ticks all boxes.
For the US, it can be the ideological, military and economic enemy many need. Here at last is a worthwhile opponent. That was the
main conclusion I drew from this year's Bilderberg meetings.
Across-the-board
rivalry with China is becoming
an organising principle of US economic, foreign and security policies.
Whether it is Donald Trump's organizing principle is less important. The US president has the gut instincts of a nationalist and
protectionist. Others provide both framework and details. The aim is US domination. The means is control over China, or separation
from China.
Anybody who believes a rules-based multilateral order, our globalised economy, or even harmonious international relations, are
likely to survive this conflict is deluded. The astonishing
white paper on the
trade conflict
, published on Sunday by China, is proof. The -- to me, depressing -- fact is that on many points Chinese positions are right.
The US focus on
bilateral imbalances is economically illiterate. The view that theft of intellectual property has caused huge damage to the US
is
questionable . The proposition that China has grossly violated its commitments under its 2001 accession agreement to the World
Trade Organization is hugely exaggerated.
Accusing China of cheating is hypocritical when almost all trade policy actions taken by the Trump administration are in breach
of WTO rules, a fact implicitly conceded by its determination
to destroy the
dispute settlement system .
A dispute over the terms of market opening or protection of intellectual property might be settled with careful negotiation. Such
a settlement might even help China, since it would lighten the heavy hand of the state and promote market-oriented reform.
But the issues are now too vexed for such a resolution. This is partly because of the bitter breakdown in negotiation. It is still
more because the US debate is increasingly over whether integration with China's state-led economy is desirable. The fear over Huawei
focuses on national security and technological autonomy.
[Neo]liberal commerce is increasingly seen as "trading with the enemy".
A framing of relations with China as one of zero-sum conflict is emerging. Recent remarks by Kiron Skinner, the US state department's
policy planning director (a job once held by cold war strategist George Kennan) are revealing. Rivalry with Beijing,
she suggested at a
forum organised
by New America , is "a fight with a really different civilisation and a different ideology, and the United States hasn't had
that before".
She added that this would be "the first time that we will have a great power competitor that is not Caucasian". The war with Japan
is forgotten.
But the big point is her framing of this as a civilizational and racial war and so as an insoluble conflict. This cannot be accidental.
She is also still in her job. Others present the conflict as one over ideology and power.
Those emphasising the former point to President Xi Jinping's Marxist rhetoric and the reinforced role of the
Communist party . Those emphasising the latter point to China's rising economic might. Both perspectives suggest perpetual conflict.
This is the most important geopolitical development of our era. Not least, it will increasingly force everybody else to take sides
or fight hard for neutrality. But it is not only important. It is dangerous. It risks turning a manageable, albeit vexed, relationship
into all-embracing conflict, for no good reason. China's ideology is not a threat to liberal democracy in the way the Soviet Union's
was. Rightwing demagogues are far more dangerous.
An effort to halt China's economic and technological rise is almost certain to fail. Worse, it will foment deep hostility in the
Chinese people. In the long run, the demands of an increasingly prosperous and well-educated people for control over their lives
might still win out. But that is far less likely if China's natural rise is threatened.
Moreover, the rise of China is not an important cause of western malaise. That reflects far more the indifference and incompetence
of domestic elites. What is seen as theft of intellectual property reflects, in large part, the inevitable attempt of a rising economy
to master the technologies of the day. Above all, an attempt to preserve the domination of 4 per cent of humanity over the rest is
illegitimate.
This certainly does not mean accepting everything China does or says. On the contrary, the best way for the west to deal with
China is to insist on the abiding values of freedom, democracy, rules-based multilateralism and global co-operation. These ideas
made many around the globe supporters of the US in the past.
They still captivate many Chinese people today. It is quite possible to uphold these ideas, indeed insist upon them far more strongly,
while co-operating with a rising China where that is essential, as over protecting the natural environment, commerce and peace.
A blend of competition with co-operation is the right way forward. Such an approach to managing China's rise must include co-operating
closely with like-minded allies and treating China with respect.
The tragedy in what is now happening is that the administration is simultaneously launching a conflict between the two powers,
attacking its allies and destroying the institutions of the postwar US-led order.
Today's attack on China is the wrong war, fought in the wrong way, on the wrong terrain. Alas, this is where we now are.
This is end of the classic neoliberal globalization and the start of isolation of the USA
from China and forming an alternative, led by China trading block, unless the deal is reached.
WTO rules were the door openers, which allowed Google and Facebook pollute millions of
smartphones outside the USA. By rejecting them the USA start the process of self-isolation. Now
local government who were afraid to act might want to get even and you can get a stronger
backlash then anticipated.
The only factor here is that while the USA citizens are afraid of their own government
snooping more then snooping by Chinese's government, the same is true to many foreign countries
too. Citizens of those countries move to Gmail because they care less about the USA snooping then
the snooping of their local government by the local webmail providers. This is a widespread
illusion. They should use foreign based ISP for that.
Removal of Facebook is actually a big plus which increases attractiveness of Huawei phones.
But truth be told the value of smartphone is exaggerated. Combination of a tablet and basic flip
flop phone works even better. The same but to lesser extent is true with Google spying
applications, especially Gmail. Only complete idiot uses Gmail as Web client, as Gmail is the
central point of collection of data for both Google and the US government (actually all "Five
eyes" goverments). It is like giving keys for you home or apartment to them. Not the Microsoft is
much better. Using your own Internet Service Provider (ISO) is the best option in the current
environment. It also allows more effectively to combat spam. Unless you want to be a bug under
microscope -- no Google on you your phone is a good, sound policy
Notable quotes:
"... These actions add to the potential fallout for American companies to reckon with. US tech enterprises will lose out on sales to Huawei ..."
"... Restrictions could boomerang back on Google and Facebook, which count on their apps being widely installed around the world to collect data and sell advertising against. And then there's the potential for damaging retaliation by China, which could blacklist important US companies like Apple that do business there. ..."
"... And if the crackdown lasts (an important if -- some expect the Huawei restrictions to be lifted should a trade deal be reached) and the Chinese telecom comes out intact, it could emerge even stronger, having been forced to develop new technology in-house. If the American blacklist fails to strangle Huawei, it could come out stronger and more innovative than it was before. ..."
The US crackdown on Huawei was bound to have unintended consequences. Some of them are
starting to come to the surface.
The Trump administration is looking to shut out the Chinese telecom company from selling its
technology in the US, as well as banning American firms from selling products to the company.
Now Google, which banned Huawei from updates of its ubiquitous Android operating system, is
warning that the restriction could become a national security issue, according to the
Financial Times
(paywall). That's because Huawei, the world's No. 2 handset maker, will likely move quickly to
develop its own parallel version of Android, which could have more software bugs and be more
susceptible to hacking.
That's just one of many potential consequences as the US clampdown ripples through
everything from semiconductor supplies to ambitions for self-driving cars. The American
government blacklisted Huawei for long-simmering
espionage concerns after trade talks between the world's two largest economies broke down.
The Trump administration has since given companies a 90-day window to adjust to the new
restrictions.
In the meantime, chipmakers including Qualcomm, Intel, and Xilinx are reportedly
halting sales of technology (paywall) to Huawei. The embattled Chinese company has
responded by stockpiling chips and components and ramping up its development of
alternatives.
Facebook, which has more than 2 billion users around the world, will no longer allow its app
to come preinstalled on Huawei phones,
according to Reuters . Huawei phone buyers can still download the app from the Google Play
store for now, but that option will go away if Google's relationship with the Chinese company
is severed.
These actions add to the potential fallout for American companies to reckon with. US tech
enterprises will lose out on sales to Huawei, and the ban could also slow the implementation of
new technologies around the world. The rollout of self-driving cars, for instance, may get a
boost from 5G gear, and Huawei appears to be the only supplier that can provide reliable 5G kit
widely and at low cost. Restrictions could boomerang back on Google and Facebook, which
count on their apps being widely
installed around the world to collect data and sell advertising against. And then there's
the potential for
damaging retaliation by China, which could blacklist important US companies like Apple that
do business there.
And if the crackdown lasts (an important if -- some expect the Huawei restrictions to be
lifted should a trade deal be reached) and the Chinese telecom comes out intact, it could
emerge even stronger, having been forced to develop new technology in-house. If the American
blacklist fails to strangle Huawei, it could come out stronger and more innovative than it was
before.
In a series of provocative actions, the United States is making clear it is prepared to
fight a war to block Beijing's rise as an economic and geostrategic competitor.
The "cold war" between the United States and China took a major step toward becoming a "hot"
war over the weekend at the annual Shangri-La defense summit in Singapore. The Financial
Times, not known for hyperbole, wrote that "The growing dispute between the US and China on
trade and technology is increasing the risk of military conflict or outright war."
At the summit, representatives of the Pacific nations that would be caught in the crossfire
of such a conflict warned of the imminent possibility of a new Pacific war.
"Our greatest fear, therefore, is the possibility of sleepwalking into another international
conflict like World War One," said Philippines Defense Minister Delfin Lorenzana. "With the
untethering of our networks of economic interdependence comes growing risk of confrontation
that could lead to war."
US officials used the summit to continue their efforts to encircle China militarily and
strangle it economically, with acting US Defense Secretary Patrick Shanahan declaring China to
be "the greatest long-term threat to the vital interests of states across this region."
Just days earlier, Vice President Mike Pence, addressing the graduating class at West Point,
predicted war in the Pacific, in Europe and in the Americas within the graduates'
lifetimes.
"It is a virtual certainty that you will fight on a battlefield for America at some point in
your life Some of you will join the fight on the Korean Peninsula and in the Indo-Pacific,
where North Korea continues to threaten the peace, and an increasingly militarized China
challenges our presence in the region. Some of you will join the fight in Europe, where an
aggressive Russia seeks to redraw international boundaries by force. And some of you may even
be called upon to serve in this hemisphere.
"And when that day comes, I know you will move to the sound of the guns and do your duty,
and you will fight, and you will win."
The United States' actions are extraordinarily reckless and provocative. Seeing a challenge
to its dominance, it is seeking to use every tool at its disposal, including military force, to
compel China's submission to its will. The United States is simultaneously escalating conflicts
around the world -- including its regime change operation in Venezuela and its dispatch of
additional troops to the Middle East to "counter" Iran -- to shore up its flagging global
hegemony through military means.
Chinese Defense Secretary Wei Fenghe responded to the US threats with militarist bluster of
his own, saying, "Should anybody risk crossing the bottom line, the [People's Liberation Army]
will resolutely take action and defeat all enemies." He warned the United States against
encouraging Taiwanese separatism, declaring, "If anyone dares to split Taiwan from China, the
Chinese military has no choice but to fight at all costs."
The divisions between the United States and China are centered on the Chinese state
initiative called "Made in China 2025." The plan envisions a substantial expansion of Chinese
industry into high-value-added and high-technology manufacturing, areas traditionally dominated
by the United States and its allies.
In recent decades, Chinese companies have made substantial developments in the
high-technology sector, including robotics, mobile phones and IT infrastructure. This
development was expressed most directly in the growth of Huawei, the Chinese mobile phone and
telecommunications firm, which was on track to become the world's leading smartphone maker by
the end of the year.
Last month, the United States moved to effectively destroy Huawei as a global competitor to
Apple and Samsung by banning US companies from selling it software and components. Google
locked the company out of the Android operating system and associated services, while Broadcom
and Qualcomm announced they would no longer sell the company chips it needs to continue
production.
The move enjoys broad bipartisan support beyond the Trump White House. There is an emerging
consensus within the American ruling class that China must be prevented from becoming a global
technological, and thus military, peer of the United States.
The growth of US-China tensions has overshadowed the 30th anniversary of the Tiananmen
Square massacre. At the summit, Wei defended the bloody crackdown against the 1989 protests by
workers and students, declaring the protests were "political turmoil that the central
government needed to quell, which was the correct policy."
He continued, "Due to this, China has enjoyed stability, and if you visit China you can
understand that part of history."
But three decades of "stability" -- the effective transformation of China into a gigantic
sweatshop for American and world capitalism -- have come at a tremendous cost. China is not an
imperialist country. It remains dependent on foreign corporate investment and finance. Now, it
is once again in the crosshairs of a nuclear-armed United States determined to go to any
lengths to secure its global hegemony.
In the immediate aftermath of the Tiananmen Square massacre, the International Committee of
the Fourth International wrote, "The repression in China is being carried out in the direct
interests of the imperialists. In attacking the Chinese workers, the bureaucracy is acting as
their agent, seeking to restore 'labor discipline' and to repress the mass opposition of the
working class to the policies of capitalist restoration and the rampant exploitation and social
inequality which it has engendered."
While publicly condemning the massacre, the first Bush administration secretly made clear to
the Chinese government that the event was an "internal affair" and affirmed the value of the
Sino-American relationship "to the vital interests of both countries."
The ICFI statement continued, "Imperialism gloats over the broken bodies of the Chinese
workers, seeking to exploit them for the purpose of crude anticommunist propaganda, while at
the same time calculating that the brutal state repression will translate into higher rates of
exploitation and even greater profits from the tens of billions of dollars worth of direct
investment and joint ventures already operating on Chinese soil."
This is precisely what happened. Following Deng Xiaoping's Southern Tour of 1992, in which
he encouraged Chinese entrepreneurs to "get rich," US investment in China ballooned, leading to
a profit bonanza for American corporations, along with the fantastic enrichment of the upper
echelons of the Chinese Communist Party, through the exploitation of the Chinese working
class.
The arguments by leading Chinese figures that an accommodation and partnership with US
imperialism would offer a peaceful road toward China's national development have proven to be a
pipe dream.
If Chinese officials accept US demands, it will be a massive blow to the Chinese economy,
causing mass unemployment and engendering protests and political turmoil. But to stand up to
the United States means, sooner or later, to fight a war between nuclear powers, in which
millions dead on both sides would be an optimistic scenario.
Thirty years after the Tiananmen Square massacre, all the arguments that the laws of
imperialism identified by Lenin after the outbreak of World War I had been superseded by
globalization and technological development have proven false. The capitalist system, riven by
a new scramble for a re-division of the world, is hurtling toward a new world war.
The only thing standing between humanity and this catastrophe is the international working
class. It is urgently necessary for the workers of China, the United States and the whole world
to unify their struggles in a common fight against the capitalist system, which is the root
cause of imperialist war. This means building sections of the International Committee of the
Fourth International in China and all over the world as the vanguard of a working class
movement against imperialist war.
The US trade war against China, which started just over a year ago, has now escalated to a
full-scale economic confrontation backed by the military might of American imperialism.
The rapid acceleration of the US drive against China and its increasingly bellicose
character was underscored in a major speech delivered by the acting US Defense Secretary
Patrick Shanahan on the weekend.
Over the past month, the US has hiked tariffs on hundreds of billions of dollars worth of
Chinese goods, threatened the imposition of new imposts on all Chinese imports and virtually
black banned the telecoms giant Huawei from the supply of US-made components in an attempt to
cripple its global operations.
Speaking at the annual Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore, organised by the International
Institute for Strategic Studies, which included participants from China, Shanahan delivered a
40-minute blast against Beijing in which he emphasised US readiness to use military power to
secure its interests.
The speech coincided with the release of an Indo-Pacific Strategy Report by the US Defense
Department accusing China of seeking "Indo-Pacific hegemony in the near-term and, ultimately
global pre-eminence in the long-term."
The report called China a "revisionist" power that sought to undermine the international
system from within, attempting to exploit its benefits while eroding the values and principles
of the "rules-based order" -- the standard reference to US dominance.
While claiming that the US "does not seek conflict," Shanahan said "we know that having the
capability to win wars is the best way to deter them." The US had already committed $125
billion for "operational readiness and sustainment" for the next financial year and is
preparing to allocate an additional $104 billion for research and development of emerging
technologies.
"This finding will boost the depth and capacity of our armed forces, and also help expand
our training -- including with allies and partners -- to improve mission readiness critical to
meeting this region's challenges" he said.
The read out of his remarks provided by the Defense Department said the Indo-Pacific was
"our priority theatre." The US Pacific Command had four times more assigned forces than in any
other area, with more than 370,000 service members devoted to the region.
The US had "more than 2000 aircraft, providing the ability to project power across the vast
distances of this region" together with "more than 200 ships and submarines to ensure freedom
of navigation."
The integrated character of the US offensive -- on the economic, diplomatic, political and
military fronts -- was emphasised in remarks clearly directed against China.
"[Some] actors undermine the system by using indirect, incremental actions and rhetorical
devices to exploit others economically and diplomatically, and coerce them militarily. They
destabilise the region, seeking to reorder its vibrant and diverse communities towards their
exclusive advantage."
This characterisation most closely fits the actions of the United States, extending over
decades -- from the dropping of two atomic bombs on Japan in the dying days of World War Two,
the launching of the Korean War in 1950 in which an estimated 2.5 million people lost and the
Vietnam War in which killed more than three million.
US intervention has not been confined to military action. In the wake of the Asian financial
crisis of 1997-98, the International Monetary Fund, at the direction of Washington, imposed an
economic "restructuring" program across the region which plunged it into a crisis, equivalent
in scope and depth to the Great Depression of the 1930s.
The enduring image of that intervention is the photograph of IMF managing director Michel
Camdessus standing over seated Indonesian president Suharto as he signed a so-called IMF
bailout program to impose what was known as the "Washington consensus."
Economic devastation resulted in Indonesia and across the region as "structural adjustment"
was imposed. Indonesian real wages feel by 30 percent, the incidence of poverty doubled and
more than 20 million workers were made jobless. Unemployment rates in South Korea and Malaysia
tripled.
In the years since then, the IMF policies -- directed by the US Treasury Department -- have
been branded as a "mistake." They were anything but. The economic firestorm was a consciously
directed operation.
At that point the US feared its economic supremacy in the region was being threatened by
Japan. When the crisis broke in July 1997, with the devaluation of the Thai baht, setting off
currency devaluations and a financial crisis across Southeast Asia, Tokyo intervened with a
proposal to set up a $100 billion Asian Monetary Fund in order to safeguard its economic
interests in the region.
This was forcefully rejected at a September 1997 meeting of the IMF and G7 in Hong Kong.
Faced with the prospect of a conflict with the US, Japan withdrew its proposal, opening the way
for the imposition of Washington's "restructuring" demands, based on the breaking up of the
economic and financial ties between the countries of the region and Japan.
However, the Asian crisis was to bring about a major economic shift in which China was to
become the major global manufacturing centre. Following Deng Xiaoping's southern tour in 1992,
foreign capital flowed into the country, secure in the knowledge that, as the Tiananmen Square
Massacre of June 1989 and the far broader suppression of the working class in all the major
industrial centres had demonstrated, the regime would act as the guarantor of its profit
interests.
By the end of the 1990s, China had become integrated into the global circuit of capital and
on that basis its entry into the World Trade Organisation (WTO) was backed by the Clinton
administration. After China's admission into the WTO in 2001, the flow of global capital
increased as the regime committed itself to further market opening.
The policy of the US was grounded on the premise that collaboration with China would be
encouraged so long as it remained a producer and assembler of consumer goods, boosting the
profits of US and other corporations that used it as a base for their manufacturing operations.
A new term was coined to describe this collaboration "Chimerica."
However, the eruption of the global financial crisis in 2008, centred in the US financial
system, marked another major turning point, with far-reaching consequences in China as more
than 23 million workers lost their jobs. Fearful of an eruption in the working class, the
Chinse regime undertook a massive stimulus program, spending more than $500 billion and opening
up credit for the provision of vast infrastructure projects.
This policy, based on a rapid expansion of credit, could not continue indefinitely and under
President Xi Jinping a new turn was initiated. In order to maintain economic growth and prevent
a crisis that would call into question the legitimacy of the regime, a new policy had to be
initiated.
This was the origin of the "Made in China 2025" plan in which China would move up the value
chain, not only producing cheap consumer goods and relying on infrastructure spending but also
moving into the development of high-tech manufacturing in areas such as telecommunications,
health and pharmaceutical products and artificial intelligence.
This, however, is regarded by the US as an existential threat to its global economic and
military dominance, which, as the latest strategic report by the Defense Department and the
speech by Shanahan has underscored, it is determined to crush by all means necessary including
war.
"... The short-term impact on China could be smaller than previously expected. Factories that sold only to the United States have developed new markets over the past year. Even if those factories stop exporting to the U.S., they will not go bankrupt immediately. It helps that the service sector is experiencing a labor shortage and could absorb some slack. For example, in China a delivery man sometimes makes more than an average office worker. ..."
"... Shipments to the United States and shipping prices have dropped since the new tariffs were announced. ..."
"... Researchers at the New York Fed have determined that the new round of tariffs on Chinese products will cost the typical American household an additional $831 per year. ..."
"... "China has been slaughtering USA" It is American corporations not China. ..."
"... “The Communist Party didn’t fight Japan,” said the sprightly 97-year-old, who once served as a translator with the storied Flying Tigers aviation brigade. “They made up a whole bunch of stories afterward, but it was all fabricated.” ..."
...The main takeaway from our notes below: The Chinese are buckling up for a long ride.
Beijing is preparing for a protracted standoff. The leadership has concluded that the
intention of U.S. negotiators is not just to resolve trade imbalances but also prevent China
from moving up the value chain, a key long-term objective for the Chinese.
Tariffs on the remaining $300 billion of Chinese products would hurt China, but the
United States would also feel the pain. Profit margins for consumer goods manufacturers
average less than 5 percent. U.S. importers would either have to pay the tariffs, charge
their customers more, or find suppliers elsewhere.
The short-term impact on China could be smaller than previously expected. Factories
that sold only to the United States have developed new markets over the past year. Even if
those factories stop exporting to the U.S., they will not go bankrupt immediately. It helps
that the service sector is experiencing a labor shortage and could absorb some slack. For
example, in China a delivery man sometimes makes more than an average office
worker.
Huawei will not be a part of any negotiations. Beijing thinks that Huawei is more of a
political issue and would be targeted whether or not they make concessions on trade.
... ... ...
There has been a significant shift in the way that Beijing manages nationalist sentiment
inside China. Until May the government had been trying to contain hawkish views on the
U.S.-China relationship, but now they are just letting it grow. (See
Now China's Got Its Own Anti-U.S. Trade War Song .) Not only does this demonstrate that
Beijing does not expect any short-term solution, because the negative sentiment will make it
difficult for President Xi to make concessions, it also allows China to harden its diplomatic
position given popular domestic sentiment.
As for whether the Chinese are front-loading shipments to the United States to avoid
pending tariffs, port data and local analysts indicate this has not yet happened.
Shipments to the United States and shipping prices have dropped since the new tariffs
were announced. The pending tariffs could cause some front loading, but it would be hard
to beat the latest round of tariffs because they were imposed a few days after the
announcement. Only products shipped before the new tariffs' effective date are exempt.
The consequences of a protracted trade war are manifold. The economic impact includes a drag
on economic growth, import price inflation which will allow U.S. domestic and other foreign
policy makers to raise prices, and the knock-on effects to other trading partners as the
shuffle begins to find new sources and markets for different products. Researchers at the
New York Fed have determined that the new round of tariffs on Chinese products will cost the
typical American household an additional $831 per year. Trade barriers between the world's
economic superpowers will slow global growth and put political pressure on all affected
governments, stoking increasing nationalism and protectionism overseas while increasing
inflation and reducing living standards at home.
The investment implications of a protracted trade war are still playing out. We have seen
how sensitive markets have been to the trade news, with a strong risk-off bias resulting from
adverse developments in the fourth quarter. While volatility will continue, there is no
indication that the Chinese will attempt to liquidate their large holdings of U.S. Treasury
securities. To do so would only drive down the value of the dollar, which would run counter to
Beijing's desire for a weaker yuan. There is also no imminent change to monetary policy from
the Federal Reserve as a result of trade saber-rattling, but if the financial markets begin to
spiral out of control because of tariffs, then we could see a repeat of 1998, when the Fed
eased as a result of the Asian financial crisis. With neither side apparently willing to step
back from the brink, investors should be discounting a higher probability for a drawn-out
fight.
... ... ...
The conclusions are obvious. Unless the current trajectory is quickly changed, the Chinese
are digging in for a long fight. The cost to the United States will be high; the cost to the
Chinese will be higher. The only question is who will endure and be the most innovative in this
battle of wills. As I have written before in "No One Wins a Trade War," the short-term costs
are likely to outweigh the long-term benefits regardless of who "wins."
Comments
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1. Guggenheim Partners is based in Chicago and represent Obama's point of view
2. Apr 4, 2018 Scott Minerd predicted at 50% plunge in the stock market
3. Once again Scott predicting a 50% drop in the market in 2020
4. April 29, 2019 Scott predicted a rate hike by the Fed
The Long march is a propaganda piece hoping people will invest more in their bond mutual
funds. Scott should spend a lot less time on TV and more time in the office.
The longer this trade war goes on the more and more unstable the Chinese economy will
become. Because the current tariffs on China are small peanuts to the remaining $200+ billion
which will shut down their electronics industry.
Agreed with the second point, that they are finding new markets and shifting production
line to new place. A new leather goods factory just opened in Cambodia, majority owner is a
Chinese friend, rest is a Cambodian business group. His products are in every major markets,
and third party label for our brand names. Business as usual for him, he can’t close
his China shops because he lives there.
You don’t get the point. We are printing worthless paper to exchange the actual
products, such as computers, furniture and machines. We don’t “eat” money,
we consume products. To an extent that we can maintain dominance is to innovate and turn into
“affordable” products domestically and overseas.
Now all the foreigners including
not white anglo saxon protestant waking up and will circumvent dollars/sterlings,
that’s bad trend. Germany and Russian would be pleased.
Umm.. If you want to gauge the effect of the Chino - Mericah Trade Tariff Circus, then it
doesn't get real until Trump goes after the mid-point trans shipment points....all those
mutually accessible ports of call that have equal access to both party's...Geeezzze, is
everyone working for CNN, Clown News Network......Trump and Friends are just going to set up
different ways to ship goods into and out of the Merikah.... it's that simple!!!!!
The LAST man brave enough to publish anything critical of Chicoms throws in the towel. Not
worth the prison terms, the violence, the relentless state attacks on journalists and their
families. Totalitarian cuks with their asshat trolls. Glad Trump will starve them out with
tariffs. Be happy never to trade with China until their people throw out the commie murderous
imperialists - let them do business with their like-minded asshat buddies in Moscow -
Staged arrest with planted drugs, beaten upon arrest, protesters immediately arrested
(even though they protested one at a time to avoid the law making group protests illegal -
the mark of every totalitarian regime). THIS is your brave PUTIN. Cannot allow any TRUTH
about his corrupt kleptostate, lest Russians finally have ENOUGH of the rape and thievery
that pillages their national assets and resources for the oligarchs' gain, with their lips on
Putin's sphincter as he gives them a reach around.
Tell me again how GREAT China and Russia are, and how the USA sucks. We don't arrest and
kill our journalists. In fact, they are allowed to stage absurd, fact-free assaults on the
ruling party without end.
I'll take freedom over tyranny every time.
Proud-Christian-White-American-Man , 1 hour ago
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Laugher NYC: Best post of the afternoon! This is the type of post that makes Zero Hedge
comments worth reading.
Proud-Christian-White-American-Man , 1 hour ago
link
"As I have written before in “
No One Wins a Trade War ,” the short-term costs are likely to outweigh the
long-term benefits regardless of who “wins.""
Translation: The US should give up fighting the trade war and go back to losing the
trade war. Americans don't want to withstand short term pain , so just give up and surrender
to the Chinese communist government.
Reality Check: If the US stays the course then the following will happen:
New factories will open up to replace the Chinese suppliers.
More US workers will be employed with rising wages.
The US will reopen critical industries like rare earths making the US much more
militarily secure.
Existential menaces like Fentanyl exported from China will be drastically
reduced.
"New Long March" Cross Rubicon─Save/Lose. The CCP Didn’t Fight Imperial Japan; the KMT Did. While the KMT military defended China against Japan during WWII, the CCP built up strength
for the civil war.
This was not by accident but by design. The CCP had a choice: it could have prioritized
defending the country against Japan during the war, or it could have prioritized seizing
control of China from those who did fight the Japanese. It chose the latter. Meanwhile, by
choosing to actually try to defend China against Japan during the war, the Nationalists
handed the country to the CCP afterwards.
Which is why Xi and the CCP’s decision to create a national observance day to honor
its defense of China during the second Sino-Japanese War represents the height of hypocrisy.
It’s one thing to try to suppress all information exposing the Party’s failings,
which killed millions of Chinese, while demanding Japan take a correct view of history (which
Tokyo should do). It’s another thing altogether to falsely claim credit for one of the
defining moments of your country’s modern history. And it’s really something
unprecedented to create a national holiday to honor your Party for doing something it
consciously avoided; namely, putting China’s defense over the CCP itself.
Classy.
✅ China gives little credit — and less help — to Kuomintang vets who
fought in WWII
“The Communist Party didn’t fight Japan,” said the sprightly
97-year-old, who once served as a translator with the storied Flying Tigers aviation brigade.
“They made up a whole bunch of stories afterward, but it was all
fabricated.”
Most independent historians agree that it was the forces of the Kuomintang, led by
Mao’s archrival, Chiang Kai-shek, that led the anti-Japanese struggle and suffered the
vast majority of casualties.
Following the war’s end, the exhausted and divided Kuomintang were defeated by
the communist s in a renewed civil war and fled to Taiwan, cementing Mao’s claim to
having defeated imperialism, unified the country and overthrown the old feudal order.
“This joint victory over the external enemy and the internal one, including the
landlord class, is a fundamental component of (the party’s) founding myth,” said
Harvard University China scholar Anthony Saich.
Proud-Christian-White-American-Man , 1 hour ago
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B-Bond: Interesting history background. The commies have always been the cowards waiting
to pounce on an exhausted opponent. Same formula in Russia 1917. The Czar exhausted his
soldiers in WWI which opened the door for Lenin to cowardly sneak in on a sealed train
courtesy the German government. That treachery only got the Germans a very temporary victory
in the Treaty of Brest Litovsk for a few months. Post war, the commies came close to
overthrowing the new Weimar republic. That's what happens when you make deals with a Godless
murderous cult based on hate and envy called communism.
So, if I understand this correctly one globalist stooge contacted a bunch of other
globalist stooges and asked them to confirm his pre-conceived talking points.
Big surprise, they were happy to do so. As usual, they blather about no winners in a trade
war-- then launch into an explanation of how badly the US consumer will lose and how
beneficial this will ultimately be to China. That sure sounds like an apportionment of trade
war winners and losers if you ask me.
What emerges is a picture of cynical beneficiaries of the current global order trying to
frighten the Americans into giving up by harping upon the costs, yet trying to assuage their
national pride by suggesting that giving up will actually be scored as a draw, which is the
best result they can ever hope for due to the fact that there are no winners and losers in a
trade war.
Yet it is China who is comparing this event to the Long March -- not a time of glory but
of acknowledgement of crushing defeat and gigantic sacrifice to set the table for a future
triumph. They seem to understand that they could lose this war if they are not fanatically
dedicated to victory. They sure as **** aren't telling their people that nobody wins a trade
war. Wonder why this dichotomy exists?
Well, Scott Guggenheim can tell you. It's because HE LOSES if Trump wins. Him and his
profitable Chinese pals. They'd all have to go out and find a new gig rather than keep
sucking off their current comfy one.
Creative destruction starts with knocking **** down and it is high time and beyond that we
knocked this **** down. Even if it puts Scott and his buddies on the unemployment line.
Proud-Christian-White-American-Man , 1 hour ago
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Cheap Chinese Crap:" So, if I understand this correctly one globalist stooge contacted a
bunch of other globalist stooges and asked them to confirm his pre-conceived talking
points." Good cogent analysis of Scott Guggenheim's real motivation. it's the old WIFFM mentality.
What's In It For Me. If Scott is such a cheerleader for the Chinese, then it might be time for him to move to
China and 'enjoy' his social credit score.
It's not about who wins but about who looses. Chinese are used to hardship, not the Americans. Even if the pain is greater
for Chinese, it will be political suicide in the USA for their administration to pursue this policy....
A centrally planned, in huge debt, social credit focused country like China, will NOT
survive the long term damage. They have one billion plebes to feed and keep happy. Think T Square.
The business of China is business. The business of the US is war. China is better situated to endure a long fight. They've made themselves self sufficient,
have ambitious economic plans with the Belt and Road initiative, and are sitting on a
mountain of gold. The US depends on an economic hegemony that is dwindling and doesn't think long term. The US empire is in a managed decline
The Chinese can manufacture anything. The US can't say that. Their agricultural technology is second to none and their energy sector is advancing by
leaps and bounds. They are innovative, the US has lost it's innovative curiosity. Too many
public education mouth breathers staring at their TVs and phones to be bothered with
thinking. Just the way the state like it.
Chinese investment in Africa is solving their raw materials and energy issues, hence the
Belt and Road initiative. People think that building roads and ghost cities in the African
desert is a bad idea, but they know the desert is greening and are thinking long term. The
US, on the other hand, sends troops.
"Their agricultural technology is second to none..." Stop reading there.
China can not come close to feeding itself, and its agritech is decades behind the US. TFP
ranking, growth..by any measure, China's ag sector, while it has improved, is far behind the
US.
Population growth and the "growing middle class" has also reversed the growth in ag
acreage, while fewer young Chinese are going in to farming. Even with the most optimistic
growth projections from CHINA itself, it won't reach even 75% of its needs domestically by
2030, far less if growth continues to slow.
If China pisses off enough of the world, it will once again starve. That's one way to
control population growth.
Why are all these Democrats and RINOs siding with China instead of Americas?
Simple. It's because like China -- Joe Biden, Sen. Mitch McConnell, Rep. Justin Amash, the
U.S. Chamber of Commerce, etc., etc., they have all been bought off with Chinese money.
The dumb American Political Sellouts have been bought with U.S. dollars. Now how dumb is that, when the Thief that is buying your favor, plucks it out of your
right pocket to hand you the loot.
"Why are all these Democrats and RINOs siding with China instead of Americas?"
It's simple. They are not Nationalistic. They are complete Globalist sell outs . In their
book, USA comes LAST. Anything that weakens mom and pop USA makes them stronger.
Click bait investment firm with Chinese investments that are not going well, so he wants
your support. This should be an add off the the side not a FEATURE Tylers.
This is a GOOD thing. We have lost our manufacturing to China (and Asia) to benefit Wall
street and the globalist and the Rich. There is no solution except to have these tariffs.
With our government taxes and structure there is no way we can have 1 or 2 dollar wages. It
might take an adjustment, but we MUST stop this cheap stuff from coming in. Sad but
True>
Good luck pinning your hopes on Trump for bringing jobs back lol. Why would you want those
jobs back anyway, I thought you had a ton more job openings than needed?
Please, this is not a trade war, this is a trade reset, it is needed to make MAGA. China is dependent on foreign trade to be successful. Well over 40% of their economy is dependent on exporting.
Trump knows the central bank economy is on a path to total destruction. He knows that soon
we will have a global reset. Anything he can do to weaken China now will ensure they continue
to be weak at the time of the reset. By diverting the USA supply chain away from China by
bringing it back to the USA or getting new suppliers from other nations he is helping to
ensure a better position for the USA at the time of the reset.
Yes, this is no trade war, it is a trade reset...people are being filled with propaganda
like the wording "trade war" even though the truth is right there in front of them...it is a
big puzzle, just need to find the pieces and they then fit like a glove (not OJ'S glove) and
you have the real truth...
Only 18% of Chinese GDP is export. Of this, only 18% goes to the U.S. So less than 4% of
Chinese GDP is export to the U.S. The fact that you could not set such records straight makes
the rest of your post pointless.
Researchers at the New York Fed have determined that the new round of tariffs on Chinese
products will cost the typical American household an additional $831 per year.
Why is it these so called experts never say what doing nothing HAS cost the American
household...like lost jobs?
Correct, NOT doing this has cost Americans billions in lost earnings / revenue over the
last 30 years. They certainly don't want to factor THAT wet mess into the equation.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo doubled down on vilification of Сhinese telecoms giant Huawei as "an
instrument of government" suggesting that the company was a national security threat by acting as an
agent for Beijing.
Like his boss, President Trump, and many others in Washington, Pompeo seems blind to an alternative
glaring reality. The US government is the consummate instrument of American corporations. Its
congenital service to corporate profit-making is the real national security risk to American citizens
and a global security threat for all people of the world due to the wars that Washington unswervingly
pursues on behalf of US corporate interests.
The irony could not be richer. President Trump has
banned Huawei from US markets by executive order on the grounds that the company's smartphones could
be spying devices for the Chinese government. This move by a nation whose government espionage
agencies were
exposed
using every US telecom, tech and social media company as a conduit for their global
harvesting of private citizens' data as well as that of foreign heads of state.
Moreover, the White House claim that Huawei is an instrument of Beijing state authorities is a
risible form of guilt projection. The Trump administration's ban on Huawei is nothing more than US
government abusing its state power to hamper a Chinese competitor from outperforming American tech
corporations. Huawei's products are reputedly cheaper and smarter than US rivals. Some observers also
point out that the Chinese technology is invulnerable to hacking by the American spy agency, the NSA,
further adding to its consumer appeal. Outperformed on market principles, the US government takes a
legalistic, propagandistic sledge hammer to smash Huawei from the marketplace in order to bestow an
unfair advantage to inferior American corporations.
So, just who exactly is being an instrument for whom?
Governments in all nations of course use their legislative, fiscal and policy resources to try to
build up key companies for their national economic development. It's standard practice throughout
history and the world over. Governments can use subsidies and grants to boost companies, or tariffs to
shield them from foreign competition.
The US, however, is a stellar example of how government intervenes strenuously at every stage in
the market to benefit private corporations. Without massive injections of public money for grants, tax
deductions, subsidies, and so on, American corporations would not have risen to the scale they have,
as Michael Parenti documents in 'Democracy for the Few'. This relationship, of course, negates the
myth of US "
free market capitalism
." In reality, American corporations are publicly supported
entities whose profits go to private shareholders. The overarching agent for this process of
centrally-planned corporate capitalism is the American government.
From its earliest days as a European colony, it was the newfound federal authorities who rolled
back frontiers with the native Americans through genocidal wars in order to benefit cattle and cereal
companies, mining magnates, transport and telecoms, oil firms, and firearms manufacturers.
In its young years as an imperial power, it was Washington that organized and dispatched federal
troops to wage wars in the Caribbean and Latin America – all for the sole benefit of Wall Street and
the expanding agro-industry. Retired Marine Major General Smedley Butler, in his 1930s book 'War is a
Racket', described the American military as a henchman for US corporate profits. But without the
government acting as recruiter, financier and commander-in-chief, the US Army could not function as a
henchman for the corporations.
Let's take a few specific examples in history to illustrate the instrumental role of the US
government in advancing or defending corporate interests. In 1953, President Eisenhower authorized the
coup in Iran organized by the CIA and Britain's MI6. A main objective of that intervention was to
seize Iranian oil. Five US corporations subsequently exploited the Iranian feast, until the revolution
in 1979 kicked them out along with the American puppet dictator, Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi. It's a
fair bet that current military threats from the Trump administration against Iran are prompted by a
strategic desire to reclaim American corporate interests.
In 1954, Guatemala's elected leader Jacobo Arbenz set out to nationalize underused agricultural
land to benefit the rural poor. His land reforms involved expropriating properties belonging to the
American-owned United Fruit Company, as William Blum details in 'Killing Hope.' Acting on United's
interests, Washington intervened with a CIA-backed coup against Arbenz, which subsequently led to
decades of mass murder of indigenous Guatemalans under US-backed military dictatorships.
Following the Cuban revolution in 1959, one of the main protagonists for US military invasion of
the island and for covert sabotage operations was the American soft drinks industry, headed up by
Coca-Cola and Pepsi. They feared the nationalization of sugar plantations by the Castro government
would hit their profits.
There are also
suggestions
that President John F Kennedy may have been assassinated by powerful US state forces,
working in cahoots with American corporate interests, because he didn't adopt a sufficiently
aggressive policy towards Cuba after the Bay of Pigs fiasco in 1961. Related to JFK's assassination
was his reluctance to go to war in Vietnam in the early 1960s, which big oil companies and weapons
manufacturers were all avidly pushing. His successor, the Texan Senator Lyndon Baines Johnson, who was
close to both industries, duly obliged by paving the way for all-out war in Indochina after 1964. Up
to two million Vietnamese were killed, as were some 58,000 US troops. Millions more maimed. The
corporations made huge profits from the decade-long slaughter. But the US economy began a long descent
that continues today from incurring fiscal debts over Vietnam, which prompted Washington to abandon
the gold standard, and heralded the age of funny money with the dollar acting as an overrated
international reserve currency.
Many more examples could be cited to illustrate how US government – both the White House and
Congress – are agents for corporate profits, often to the horrendous detriment of international peace
and the common good of ordinary Americans.
The 2003 war on Iraq – killing over one million civilians and maiming tens of thousands of
Americans – was widely seen as a pretext for grabbing Iraqi oil for US corporations like Halliburton,
for whom then vice president Dick Cheney was previously an executive board member.
The present warmongering towards Venezuela by Washington is openly touted by White House National
Security Advisor John Bolton as being about US corporate lust for the country's oil reserves – which
are reckoned to be the biggest on the planet.
Out of the top 12 corporate financial
donors
to politicians in Washington, three of them are weapons companies: Boeing, Lockheed Martin,
and Northrop Grumman; a fourth is oil titan Exxon-Mobil. There is an obvious correlation between
corporate bidding and foreign policies embarked on by US governments which leads to conflict and wars,
which in turn repays these corporations with soaring profits.
The American government is the best instrument that corporate money can buy.
Thus, when Trump, Pompeo and other Washington political (and media) prostitutes pontificate and
rail against Huawei, just remember: these talking heads are bought and paid for – lock, stock and
barrel.
Like this story? Share it with a friend!
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are
solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.
Technoimperialism is effective, but what it Huawei can switch to some derivative CPU and
chipsets?
Notable quotes:
"... Authored by Fan Yu via The Epoch Times, ..."
"... A wide-ranging ban similar to the one imposed on Huawei and its affiliates would effectively bar other foreign companies whose products contain at least 25 percent U.S.-sourced technology from supplying the Chinese. ..."
"... What does this mean in practice? More companies may begin to adopt localized R&D and manufacturing practices. Instead of Chinese factories supplying the world when labor costs were low, localized operations to directly supply the China market may be set up. ..."
"... Around 33.2 percent of American companies operating in China are delaying or cancelling investments in China altogether, according to the most recent American Chamber of Commerce in China survey released on May 22. If the tariffs are more permanent in nature, U.S. companies will likely move production outside of China, which is increasingly seen as a prudent choice given rising political instability within China and growing labor costs. ..."
"... If Bibi ask Chump to drop the tariffs on China for the security of Israel, What do you think will be Chump's answer? ..."
During the Cold War ,
around half of the world ran on the technologies, machinery, and political ideologies developed
by the Soviet Union. The other half - the free world - adopted those of the United States and
its allies.
As trade war
tensions between the United States and China escalate, could we be on the cusp of a new
version of the cold war, one which is driven by technology and finance?
Since U.S. President Donald Trump has deemed Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei Technologies as a national
security threat and barred it from purchasing key U.S. equipment, Beijing has engaged in an
escalating tit-for-tat that could have lasting ramifications on the technology industry going
forward.
And Huawei may just be the beginning. Several other Chinese companies are being considered
to join the blacklist with Huawei.
If a technology cold war does come to pass, it would significantly alter the existing
technology landscape, dismantle global supply chains, and cleave off the global trade network that has underpinned
China's rise as a global economic power .
Decoupling of the Global Supply Chain
Global consumers are used to seeing this familiar description donning Apple products'
packaging for years: "Designed by Apple in California. Assembled in China."
That's the model followed by most technology companies during the past few decades. American
companies develop new technologies and products in the United States, which are assembled by
comparatively cheap labor in China, and then shipped for sale globally.
Going forward, purchase orders would likely need to be rerouted.
A wide-ranging ban similar to the one imposed on Huawei and its affiliates would
effectively bar other foreign companies whose products contain at least 25 percent U.S.-sourced
technology from supplying the Chinese.
What does this mean in practice? More companies may begin to adopt localized R&D and
manufacturing practices. Instead of Chinese factories supplying the world when labor costs were
low, localized operations to directly supply the China market may be set up.
Around 33.2 percent of American companies operating in China are delaying or cancelling
investments in China altogether, according to the most recent American Chamber of Commerce in
China survey released on May 22. If the tariffs are more permanent in nature, U.S. companies
will likely move production outside of China, which is increasingly seen as a prudent choice
given rising political instability within China and growing labor costs.
Another 35.5 percent of respondents are adopting an "In China, for China" approach to
mitigate the impact of tariffs , according to the AmCham survey. That refers to manufacturing
products to be sold in China, within China. That strategy may be broadened in a full-on
technology cold war, as research and innovation may also need to be localized and companies may
need to erect internal information barriers.
Losers, Big and Small
Chinese companies will be the main losers -- there are no existing domestic replacements for
many U.S.-sourced components. For example, Huawei's chip-making arm HiSilicon currently derives
its Kirin chip architecture on license from UK-based semiconductor firm ARM Holdings. But in
May, ARM notified Huawei that it would stop licensing its chip designs to HiSilicon due to
having certain U.S.-sourced origins.
Huawei also lost access to Google's Android software platform, which is the main operating
system running on all Huawei smartphones. As of the end of May, the U.S. Commerce Department
gave Huawei a temporary, 90-day license to provide security patches to existing phones.
In addition, Huawei has been suspended from the Wi-Fi Alliance, an industry standard-setting
body for technology protocols.
These events don't just hobble Huawei -- they effectively ground its ambitions to a halt.
Without access to these technologies, there's simply no way for Huawei to reach its goal of
overtaking Samsung as the world's No. 1 smartphone supplier. And on the networking front,
Japan's SoftBank became the latest potential customer to reject Huawei for 5G networking
equipment, announcing on May 31 that it would be turning to European telecom giants Nokia and
Ericsson instead.
Should similar bans extend to other Chinese companies -- many of which have far smaller
operational support and balance sheets than Huawei -- many of them could cease operations
altogether.
Comments
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China's empire is growing and the US empire s shrinking. Unfortunately many can't grasp
that and will deny it till the end instead of accepting it and working with the next world
power. All empires come to an end.
Our economy is a consumer based economy not a manufacturing based economy like it once
was. Can we return to a manufacturing based economy? Not sure if Americans are ready to push
their kids into getting a job at the factory making boots, footballs, washing machines......
instead of swaying them into going to college. Don't forget, someone has to work in the
factories if we are going to make stuff.
If you study high wage manufacturing driven economies like Germany, you will notice that
the productivity of their workers is sky high (as it has to be in order to remain
competitive). The plants are highly automated. Workers are very well trained and have expert
skills in keeping the production line running at peek pace and quality.
Frankly, I just don't think American workers have what it takes to adopt that kind of
model.
Not with the education system we have now....the Fed has killed off the industrial trades,
and everyone thinks they will can spend $100,000 a year for an education to sit behind a desk
and play solitaire......or become a politician.
Someone has to fix the machines and get their hands dirty. Not all our kids are IT
'coders'. Now we want the gooberment to give them 'free' college for a 'diversity degree' and
they graduate with NO SKILLS and no knowledge. So we drug up our youth with drugs imported by
China and open the flood doors for worker bees. Sounds like a plan.
The free world flourished during the cold war. it was great for the West. Technology
advanced by leaps and bounds and the middle class grew. Nothing bad about this at all.
So you believe Epoch Times, a Falun Gong publication? What's missing in the article is the
most obvious: the trade war will force China to climb the value chain a lot quicker. The most
like scenario is that China will become a high-tech manufacturing powerhouse before much, if
anything, is moved back to U.S.
What would make any sane person believe that stopping the ARM license would stop them
being made in China? Has that ever worked for anything else, ever?
their tech will fall behind as the US advances. Same thing happened with the Soviet Union
once they ran out of Germans and US tech. By '91, they were woefully behind the West--like 35
years.
There was never anything wrong with Research in the USSR, Development was their problem, now as Russia again they remain at the leading edge of Research, and seem to have finally gotten a handle on Development. They have never been behind in Research, any serious scientist in the West can and will read Russian just to keep up.
Its been that way all my life, the US seems to have
forgotten it though, because they believe they're exceptional and only they can do
research.Hubris will kill you.
The Russians are pulling way ahead because of that Ubermensch stupidity, laughing the whole time at it. That smirk of Putins, its there for a reason.
What would make any sane person believe that stopping the ARM license would stop them
being made in China?
No kidding. For instance, take this statement:
Chinese companies will be the main losers -- there are no existing domestic replacements
for many U.S.-sourced components.
Propaganda via lies of omission. This could easily be turned around to say:
American companies will be the main losers -- there are no existing domestic
replacements for many Chinese-manufactured "U.S.-sourced" components.
But hey, the Epoch Times is a propaganda mill for the Falun Gong cult which the Chinese
government banned 20 years ago, so it's kind of the anti-China equivalent of The
Gatestoned Institution .
the chinese domestic market is the new big dog on the block. it is big enough to dictate
what the rest of the world will use. the hubris of the usa is arrogance squared. the
consequences are potentially damning to usa tech. this is the dumbest move in business and
geopolitical history.
The West is in for a big surprise. China has technologically advanced neighbors (Russia,
India) and a host of countries who want to do business who are also technologically advanced.
The Silk Road is well advanced to supplant trade with North America. Germany is already in
place in Russia and China and will not lose sleep with the loss of North America. It is the
US that has the most to lose.
They cannot see past their own jingo. The Chinese just thanked Trump at the Moscow summit, for forcing them to do what inertia
stopped them doing years ago. Seems like its already backfiring, and now full dedollarization is now the official
agenda. Yuan futures in most everything, convertible to gold, were just announced at one press conference. The ruble looks around -95% undervalued right now.
umm--you do know that it wasn't so long ago that Russia defaulted on all of its loans,
right? and that no one with a brain is going back into that market again, right?
No worries, the PTB in our fed government (both sides) and the globalists want cheap labor
from the illiterates that are allowed to flood our country and Europe. We will look much like
the cheap labor in China. I find it funny that 'open border' morons like the D's demand
$15/hour min wage laws for flipping a hamburger. They are nuts. Can't have it both ways.
No they didn't, they were disconnected from Gargoyle Play.Android is open source and HW played a big part in its development. Maybe more than Gargoyle.. This kind of disinformation discredits the whole article, the author is a no nothing
hack, probably Mosley moonlighting from his janitors job.
My small anecdotal experience was back in 2008 when I worked for a US Company who made
large components for nuclear projects. Like AP1000. Within a year of my working there, we
were hosting the chinese and actually sending our engineers and quality people to live in
China for 6 months at a time to TEACH THEM HOW TO MAKE THE PRODUCT. The quality people came
back disgusted because they didn't care about 'tolerances'. I have since left there, but it
was eye opening how US companies willingly sell our technology to them.
In the meantime, the corp bosses built a huge addition onto our building with luxurious
soundproof walls/doors/windows to move in. Big bucks stuff. No expense spared.
Not really, the Chi-Com government OWNERSHIP of businesses is dramatic.
When a chinese government entity (think strawman, shell company, a "holding
company") answerable and subservient to the state party apparatus owns the majority of
any company's stock and/or gives it direction from on high, it cannot be said to be "a
private company". At least not by any kind of western standard of the meaning of the word
"private".
They're trying to fake people out (and succeeding to some degree) as the western mind may
misinterpret it as merely being crony-socialism but in fact it's communist via the shell
corps.
What you describe sounds like fascism i.e. capitalism is allowed, private companies are
allowed but are directly answerable to government.
Anyways you look at it, China has a strong capitalist element. They have private property
now. They have billionaires as a result of these companies FFS. They have a stock market .
They have realestate developers. That's no longer 'communism'.
The largest corporations are government owned and a "private company" is not given
direction by any government entity in what to supply or in what quantities to supply to "the
market", there are no government mandated quotas.
And you are confused (or being evasive) about what socialism and capitalism are, fascism
& communism are both Marxist.
With capitalism, the market decides all, from pricing to profits to wages and companies
rise & fall on what is sold into that market ...thats why rickshaws never caught
on here because people didn't have to eat their horses for meat and we eventually produced
affordable cars for transport...lol.
Need I remind you that the CCP means the Chinese Communist Party?
Perhaps they need some better capitalist marketers to "rebrand" their, ahem,
operation ;-)
"... If the U.S. follows through on this threat, we should expect European governments to react very strongly. As Henry Farrell has explained , the quarrel with the U.S. over the nuclear deal and reimposed sanctions is not just about Iran. The EU and our European allies see this as the latest example of our government's excessive use of secondary sanctions, and they aren't going to give in if the U.S. escalates further. ..."
"... By threatening to sanction them for doing what they can to keep the JCPOA alive, the U.S. is giving them a big incentive to create an alternative system that will protect them from further harassment. Threatening Europe over INSTEX is madness, and carrying out that threat will make our allies even more determined to defy U.S. demands now and in the future. ..."
"... Are we really trading Britain, Canada, Germany, and Japan for … Israel and Saudi Arabia ? ..."
"... Trump, Bolton, and Pompeo are destroying our oldest, best friendships and alliances, and they don’t even pretend they’re doing it to advance American interests. They’re doing it at the behest of Saudi Arabia and Israel, which wield immense power in the form of the huge campaign donations they control in US elections. “Russian meddling” can’t hold a candle to it ..."
"... This is how you lose reserve currency status. The sad thing is they don’t even understand what that means and what the results would be. ..."
"... I predict Europe caves. They are post WW II satrapies, not allies. The refreshing thing about Trump is he doesn’t pretend otherwise. ..."
"... Is Trump insane? Sanctioning Iran at the behest of Israel and Saudi Arabia, two global pariahs, and rubbing the US’s traditional allies’ noses in it would be disastrous in a world where old alliances are still valid. But let’s look at the world through Trump’s eyes. ..."
Bloomberg reports that the U.S. is
threatening major European allies with sanctions over their "special purpose vehicle,"
formally known as the Instrument in Support of Exchange (INSTEX):
The Trump administration escalated its battle with European allies over the fate of the
Iran nuclear accord, threatening penalties against the financial body created by Germany, the
U.K. and France to shield trade with the Islamic Republic from U.S. sanctions, Bloomberg News
reports.
Sigal Mandelker, the Treasury Department's undersecretary for terrorism and financial
intelligence, signaled in a May 7 letter obtained by Bloomberg that Instex, the European
vehicle to sustain trade with Tehran, and anyone associated with it could be barred from the
U.S. financial system if it goes into effect.
Europe's INSTEX has been designed first and foremost as a workaround to handle humanitarian
trade with Iran that is effectively blocked because financial institutions are afraid of doing
any business with Iranian customers as a result of U.S. sanctions. The immediate goal is to
allow trade in medicine and food to be processed without risking U.S. penalties. The U.S. is
now threatening to penalize anyone involved in this effort to get food and medicine to the
Iranian people. European governments assumed that putting their officials in charge of running
it would deter the U.S. from attacking it, but they have underestimated just how deranged our
government is on this issue.
Threatening to sanction European officials
and companies for making use of this mechanism shows just how irrational and destructive U.S.
policy is. The Trump administration's Iran obsession is driving it to threaten punitive
measures against its own allies because they created a means to engage in legitimate trade in
humanitarian goods. That confirms a few things that we already suspected. First, it tells us
that the U.S. is determined to cut off all legitimate trade with Iran, including trade in
supposedly exempted humanitarian goods. They are actively working to cause the Iranian people
as much misery as they can. Second, it tells us that the administration is willing to
wreck its relations with some of its closest European allies to pursue their economic war
against the Iranian people. U.S. interests and longstanding relationships with important allies
are being sacrificed for the sake of a vindictive and outrageous policy of collective
punishment against a population of more than eighty million people.
If the U.S. follows through on this threat, we should expect European governments to
react very strongly. As Henry Farrell has explained , the quarrel with
the U.S. over the nuclear deal and reimposed sanctions is not just about Iran. The EU and our
European allies see this as the latest example of our government's excessive use of secondary
sanctions, and they aren't going to give in if the U.S. escalates further.
By threatening to sanction them for doing what they can to keep the JCPOA alive, the
U.S. is giving them a big incentive to create an alternative system that will protect them from
further harassment. Threatening Europe over INSTEX is madness, and carrying out that threat
will make our allies even more determined to defy U.S. demands now and in the future.
“Threatening Europe over INSTEX is madness, and carrying out that threat will
make our allies even more determined to defy U.S. demands now and in the
future.”
Are we really trading Britain, Canada, Germany, and Japan for … Israel and Saudi
Arabia ?
Is Trump out of his mind?
Trump, Bolton, and Pompeo are destroying our oldest, best friendships and alliances, and
they don’t even pretend they’re doing it to advance American interests.
They’re doing it at the behest of Saudi Arabia and Israel, which wield immense power in
the form of the huge campaign donations they control in US elections. “Russian
meddling” can’t hold a candle to it.
Is the Pope Catholic? Seriously, it’s been clear since he rode down his fancy
escalator that Trump is mentally ill. Any one of a number of clinical diagnoses can be made.
Not to mention the fact that his core supporters are clearly in the Cult of Trump.
Trump’s complete disdain for our European allies has been evident for years. So,
naturally he’s all about threatening them. Remember, it’s a zero sum game for
Trump on everything. If Europe isn’t losing, than he is. And that just can’t
happen. He has to be the winner 100% of the time. Reality and facts be damned.
This is a gambit to destroy European political opposition ahead of war with Iran. Uncle
Sam is going to need unfettered access to NATO military bases if the war becomes protracted
(which it will).
The Europeans should realize that knuckling under on INSTEX is not going to be the end of
the story for them.
Is Trump insane? Sanctioning Iran at the behest of Israel and Saudi Arabia, two global
pariahs, and rubbing the US’s traditional allies’ noses in it would be disastrous
in a world where old alliances are still valid. But let’s look at the world through
Trump’s eyes.
He sees these traditional allies heaping up troubles for themselves by abandoning any
immigration quality control in favour of ‘one world’ nonsense, and doing so in
the face of palpable discontent from their indigenous populations – in what is arguably
an insane case of democracy deficit. Welcoming potential terrorists and culture destroyers
into Europe en mass is, for Trump, evidence of a cultural marxist mindset deserving of little
of his respect. His body language around Frau Merkel speaks volumes.
On the other hand, Israel’s leadership uncompromisingly champions its culture and
national security, and Trump is happy to reward such policy. Netanyahu is tough on
Israel’s enemies, not tough of his own people. Trump respects that ‘bigly’,
as he would say, while Europe’s policies seem culturally suicidal, inexplicable. Of
course, Trump needs campaign funding and support from America’s Israel lobby, and Saudi
contracts mean jobs in the important defence sector, but you get the impression that Trump
actually despises the current European elites as ideological enemies.
"... Trump administration is escalating its battle with "European allies" over the fate of the Iran nuclear accord, and is "threatening penalties against the financial body created by Germany, the U.K. and France to shield trade with the Islamic Republic from U.S. sanctions. " ..."
"... While it is obvious that the US ire was sparked by the realization - and alarm - that cracks are appearing in the dollar's reserve status, opponents of Instex argue - at least for public consumption purposes - that the mechanism is flawed because the Iranian institution designated to work with Instex, the Special Trade and Finance Instrument, has shareholders with links to entities already facing sanctions from the U.S ..."
"... "When transactions move beyond that, it doesn't matter what vehicle's out there, if the transaction is sanctionable, we will evaluate it, review it, and if appropriate, levy sanctions against those that were involved in that transaction," Pompeo said. "It's very straightforward." ..."
"... In 2018, Europe made a huge stink about not being bound by Trump's unilateral breach of the Iranian deal, and said it would continue regardless of US threats. But now that the threats have clearly escalated, and Washington has made it clear it won't take no for an answer, it will be interesting to see if Europe's resolve to take on Trump - especially in light of the trade war with China - has fizzled ..."
"... that's too Boltonesque or Pompeonish and would only denigrate Europe for no reason. ..."
"... This is the latest move (in a very long line) by Jewish-freemason banksters to take over the world. The USA is owned and run by them and is used simply for their ends and purposes. ..."
"... Trumpsters cheering on DJT need to be aware that they have as much regard and affection for you and for your country as they do for a mangy dog. ..."
"... The US is starting to act a bit too unhinged now. Even the zombies are starting to wonder what the problem is with the US and the USD. Not very smart to be so loud, aggressive and threatening all the time. ..."
"... What we are witnessing in the US sanctions, threats, and illegal and costly military operations around the globe are the final throes and spasms of a dying, yet still dangerous, wounded animal ..."
"... Global trade in its current form with trade routes stretching all around the world is unsustainable due to rapidly depleting oil/energy. ..."
"... If you cut through all the propaganda and look only at actions taken by the U.S. government, it certainly does look like America is taking numerous intentional steps to disconnect itself from global trade with long-standing international partners in Europe, Asia and the Middle East ..."
"... America acting the big bully and pissing off all our international trade partners is just an act. Don't worry, the long term plan is exactly what you're wishing for, more or less. Though, since the Middle East still has so much oil, chances are America and its military will remain there for quite a while longer -- but that's the only reason. ..."
"... America is on the path of sanctioning itself into isolation. The US is shooting itself someplace much more sensitive with all these sanctions, tariffs, and warmongering. ..."
"... Soon the isolated US will ONLY have Israel, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Canada and Britain to have economic relationship with. I wonder what do these assets of the US and former British colonies can offer to one another in the form of meaningful trade? Oil, maple syrup, weapons, sand, and British tea. ..."
"... In 2018, Europe made a huge stink about not being bound by Trump's unilateral breach of the Iranian deal, and said it would continue regardless of US threats. But now that the threats have clearly escalated, and Washington has made it clear it won't take no for an answer, it will be interesting to see if Europe's resolve to take on Trump - especially in light of the trade war with China - has fizzled. ..."
"... It's easier to replace SWIFT than replace a reserve currency the petro-dollar is today. They've tried at no avail. So long as our economy kicks ***, it will be hard to replace USD as a reserve money. ..."
"... The issue isn't just SWIFT. It's "access to US markets". Sayanim Pompeo is threatening them with the nuclear option: Financial MAD. ..."
"... Trump seems to think he's CEO of the planet and all the countries are just different departments of his corporation. ..."
"... It's worse than that. Thump thinks that Bibi is Chairman of the Board, and Adelson is a Senior Board Member of a small (((Board))) ..."
It's going from bad to worse for Europe, whose currency had
just hit session lows after Brussels confirmed that Italy faces a massive fine over its debt, when the Euro was hit with a double
whammy after Bloomberg reported that the Trump administration is escalating its battle with "European allies" over the fate of
the Iran nuclear accord, and is "threatening penalties against the financial body created by Germany, the U.K. and France to shield
trade with the Islamic Republic from U.S. sanctions. "
According to Bloomberg, the Treasury Department's undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence, Sigal Mandelker, sent
a letter on May 7 warning that Instex, the European SPV to sustain trade with Tehran, and anyone associated with it could be barred
from the U.S. financial system if it goes into effect.
As a reminder, last September, in order to maintain a financial relationship with Iran that can not be vetoed by the US, Europe
unveiled a "Special Purpose Vehicle" to bypass SWIFT. Back then
we predicted that Washington would not be too delighted with this development seeking to undermine the dollar's reserve status.
We were right.
"I urge you to carefully consider the potential sanctions exposure of Instex," Mandelker wrote in the letter to Instex President
Per Fischer. "Engaging in activities that run afoul of U.S. sanctions can result in severe consequences, including a loss of access
to the U.S. financial system."
Germany, France and the U.K. finalized the Instex system in January, allowing companies to trade with Iran without the use of
U.S. dollars or American banks, allowing them to get around wide-ranging U.S. sanctions that were imposed after the Trump administration
abandoned the 2015 Iran nuclear deal last year.
Not surprisingly, a senior admin official behind the eltter said the U.S. decided to issue the threat " after concluding that
European officials, who had earlier downplayed the significance of Instex in conversations with the Trump administration, were far
more serious about it than they had initially let on. "
The official, who asked not to be identified discussing internal deliberations, said the letter was intended to serve as a
warning that the U.S. would punish anyone associated with Instex -- including businesses, government officials and staff -- if
they were working to set up a program to help Iran evade U.S. sanctions.
"This is a shot across the bow of a European political establishment committed to using Instex and its sanctions-connected Iranian
counterpart to circumvent U.S. measures, " said Mark Dubowitz, the chief executive officer of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies
in Washington.
When asked to comment on the letter, the Treasury Department issued a statement saying "entities that transact in trade with the
Iranian regime through any means may expose themselves to considerable sanctions risk, and Treasury intends to aggressively enforce
our authorities."
At the heart of the latest US move is the argument that Iran and its central bank use deceptive financial practices and haven't
implemented minimum global safeguards against money laundering and terrorism financing, according to Bloomberg.
While it is obvious that the US ire was sparked by the realization - and alarm - that cracks are appearing in the dollar's
reserve status, opponents of Instex argue - at least for public consumption purposes - that the mechanism is flawed because the Iranian
institution designated to work with Instex, the Special Trade and Finance Instrument, has shareholders with links to entities already
facing sanctions from the U.S .
Meanwhile, during a visit to London on May 8, Mike Pompeo also warned that there was no need for Instex because the U.S. allows
for humanitarian and medical products to get into Iran without sanction.
"When transactions move beyond that, it doesn't matter what vehicle's out there, if the transaction is sanctionable, we will
evaluate it, review it, and if appropriate, levy sanctions against those that were involved in that transaction," Pompeo said. "It's
very straightforward."
In 2018, Europe made a huge stink about not being bound by Trump's unilateral breach of the Iranian deal, and said it would
continue regardless of US threats. But now that the threats have clearly escalated, and Washington has made it clear it won't take
no for an answer, it will be interesting to see if Europe's resolve to take on Trump - especially in light of the trade war with
China - has fizzled.
Makes me wonder why year after year China's GDP increases and never decreases while the US GDP does periodically go into the
negative zone and when it is positive, it isn't that much positive.
With our control we try to have over foreign countries coupled
with our antiquated and overpriced education system, we are heading nowhere very fast while China continues to grow.
This is the latest move (in a very long line) by Jewish-freemason banksters to take over the world. The USA is owned and run
by them and is used simply for their ends and purposes.
Trumpsters cheering on DJT need to be aware that they have as much regard and affection for you and for your country as they
do for a mangy dog.
Europe has been servile to the US since the end of WW2. Germany in particular has continually bowed to US pressure and surely
the time has come to kick the US out of Ramstein Air Base which houses over 60,000 personnel including 5000 non US military.
The US also continues to stir its anti Russia interference in compliant countries especially the Ukraine. Europe should dismantle
the EU and the euro and revert to sovereign nations using their own currencies. NATO is US driven and hinders not helps European
cooperation. There is no military threat in Europe full stop.
The US is starting to act a bit too unhinged now. Even the zombies are starting to wonder what the problem is with the US and the USD. Not very smart to be so loud, aggressive and threatening all the time.
What we are witnessing in the US sanctions, threats, and illegal and costly military operations around the globe are the final throes and spasms of a dying, yet still dangerous, wounded animal. The US has been killed by the criminal Satanic
Ashkenazi Bolshevik Khazar filth who did 911. The US and Israel are the two most hated countries on earth.
This is all part of a long term plan intended to rearrange global trade arrangements. The future we are heading into is one
where "global" trade will be much more regional, by necessity. Global trade in its current form with trade routes stretching all
around the world is unsustainable due to rapidly depleting oil/energy.
Europe, Asia and the Middle East need to make their own
financial and trade arrangements -- this manufactured disagreement will force companies and governments to adapt to that reality.
America is intentionally cutting itself off from trade with Europe and Asia to force self-sustainability for the Americas continent
and for American companies, because that's what the future demands -- it is what's sustainable long term.
The Trade War and this
contrived spat with Europe and many other trade-related "conflicts" getting publicity are all part of a multi-pronged action plan
to force painful and politically untenable changes on companies and governments in preparation for a future that will be characterized
by much less oil/energy and by extension, much more localized and regional trade and finance.
America is intentionally cutting itself off from trade with Europe and Asia to force self-sustainability for the Americas
continent and for American companies
I'd love to believe that but you're going to have to take your war machine home with you or what you say means **** all.
If you cut through all the propaganda and look only at actions taken by the U.S. government, it certainly does look like America
is taking numerous intentional steps to disconnect itself from global trade with long-standing international partners in Europe,
Asia and the Middle East.
Actions speak louder than words. The rational for bringing an end to all these energy-intensive trade
and financial arrangements that were created back when oil WAS cheap and plentiful begins to make a lot of sense.
America acting
the big bully and pissing off all our international trade partners is just an act. Don't worry, the long term plan is exactly
what you're wishing for, more or less. Though, since the Middle East still has so much oil, chances are America and its military
will remain there for quite a while longer -- but that's the only reason.
"Iran and its central bank use deceptive financial practices and haven't implemented minimum global safeguards against money
laundering and terrorism financing, according to Bloomberg." This is akin to Stalin telling Mao to be nicer to his citizens.
potkettleblack.
No nation will ever be sovereign until the International Banking Tyrants and their relatives to the third cousin receive a
very public guillotine haircut.
Everyday, a new threat by the rusty meat-grinder known as the Untied State of Israel. Which country will we read a war tweet
about next?
America is on the path of sanctioning itself into isolation. The US is shooting itself someplace much more sensitive with all
these sanctions, tariffs, and warmongering.
Soon the isolated US will ONLY have Israel, Saudi Arabia, UAE, Canada and Britain to have economic relationship with. I wonder
what do these assets of the US and former British colonies can offer to one another in the form of meaningful trade? Oil, maple
syrup, weapons, sand, and British tea.
In 2018, Europe made a huge stink about not being bound by Trump's unilateral breach of the Iranian deal, and said it would
continue regardless of US threats. But now that the threats have clearly escalated, and Washington has made it clear it won't
take no for an answer, it will be interesting to see if Europe's resolve to take on Trump - especially in light of the trade
war with China - has fizzled.
however obsolete the SWIFT system is there isn't any credible alternative to the old bank wire system. It's coming though.
Should be an easy fix in this day and age. US doesn't want to lose control of who's wiring what and to whom, Capisce?
It's easier
to replace SWIFT than replace a reserve currency the petro-dollar is today. They've tried at no avail. So long as our economy
kicks ***, it will be hard to replace USD as a reserve money.
"... China assembled an "unreliable entities list" for retaliation against foreign companies, individuals and organizations that "do not follow market rules, violate the spirit of contracts, blockade and stop supplying Chinese companies for noncommercial reasons, and seriously damage the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies." ..."
"... And out of nowhere, Trump warned Mexico to stop the immigrant flow in 10-days or face tariffs. Global CEOs who were rushing to rearchitect their China supply chains, digested the risk that these investments could be instantly devastated by some future tariff - imposed to achieve Americas geopolitical objectives - and they prepared to warn shareholders they're putting new investment on hold. As the US treasury yield curve inverted, with 3mth bills at 2.34% and 10yrs at 2.12%. Which of course, is one of the most reliable warnings of looming recession. ..."
"... "Tariffs are being used as a proactive, combative tool. The GDP hit will be at least double. Modelling these tariffs require more complex frameworks." ..."
"... " Global trade was already in the process of fracturing ," added the strategist. "Now Huawei can't use Google's operating system." Their phones are as good as paperweights. "But do you really want to bet that Huawei can't spend the next 6mths building a competing operating system?" We're entering a world of competing superpowers. " The overall impact will be to operate economies with redundant technologies, fewer efficiencies, lower ROEs, lower ROAs. And ironically, or perhaps by design, it'll be bad for profits, but okay for labor ." ..."
Submitted by Eric Peters, CIO of One River Asset Management
"Don't say we didn't warn you!" declared the China People's Daily. And historians rushed to remind us that Beijing used the phrase
in advance of their 1962 border war with India and 1979 war with Vietnam.
China assembled an "unreliable entities list" for retaliation against foreign companies, individuals and organizations that "do
not follow market rules, violate the spirit of contracts, blockade and stop supplying Chinese companies for noncommercial reasons,
and seriously damage the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese companies."
Pence responded by warning Beijing we could double tariffs. "Engaging in activities that run afoul of US sanctions can result
in severe consequences, including a loss of access to the US financial system," warned the US Treasury's undersecretary for terrorism
– you see, the Europeans are building systems to circumvent American sanctions. Today, those sanctions are directed at Iran, Russia,
North Korea, Venezuela, but tomorrow they may be directed at China.
Naturally, the Europeans threatened only themselves - 1,500-year habits are hard to break. Germany and France fought bitterly
over who would become European Commission President. Brussels warned Rome to honor its obligation to contain its growing debt. Italy's
Salvini threatened to launch a parallel currency – step #1 in the process to abandon the euro and default.
And out of nowhere, Trump warned Mexico to stop the immigrant flow in 10-days or face tariffs. Global CEOs who were rushing to
rearchitect their China supply chains, digested the risk that these investments could be instantly devastated by some future tariff
- imposed to achieve Americas geopolitical objectives - and they prepared to warn shareholders they're putting new investment on
hold. As the US treasury yield curve inverted, with 3mth bills at 2.34% and 10yrs at 2.12%. Which of course, is one of the most
reliable warnings of looming recession.
Framework
"Economists generally use tax frameworks to evaluate the trade war," said my favorite strategist. "They calculate a -0.4% hit
to GDP, which is not such a big deal. But they're using the wrong tool." Tax frameworks treat tariffs as a tax. They then model
how a nation's currency adjusts to the tax, how corporate profit margins shrink to absorb the tax, and how consumers shoulder the
remaining burden. "Tariffs are being used as a proactive, combative tool. The GDP hit will be at least double. Modelling these tariffs
require more complex frameworks."
"If all of the affected nations simply agreed to adopt new tax regimes, then the tax framework would work fine," continued my
favorite strategist. "But the world has built specialized supply chains. So if Nation A tries to hurt Nation B, and Nation B is
part of critical supply chains that impact Nation A, then there are many things B can do to harm A in non-linear ways." Banning
rare earth metal exports is a small example. "Once Apple locks down their product production for Nov 2019 release, China knows exactly
how to push that past Feb 2020."
" Global trade was already in the process of fracturing ," added the strategist. "Now Huawei can't use Google's operating system."
Their phones are as good as paperweights. "But do you really want to bet that Huawei can't spend the next 6mths building a competing
operating system?" We're entering a world of competing superpowers. " The overall impact will be to operate economies with redundant
technologies, fewer efficiencies, lower ROEs, lower ROAs. And ironically, or perhaps by design, it'll be bad for profits, but okay
for labor ."
"... "It is foreseeable that the latest U.S. tariff hikes on China, far from resolving issues, will only make things worse for all sides," according to the white paper, which also listed details of what it described as U.S. backtracking. ..."
"... As Vice Commerce Minister Wang Shouwen, who led the working-level team in the negotiations, said China is willing to work with the US to find solutions, but the latter's strategy of maximum pressure and escalation can't force concessions from China: "When you give the U.S. an inch, it takes a yard", he said. ..."
And, as of this weekend, we now appear to be in the "despondent acceptance" phase (unlike
the Kubler-Ross model, acceptance precedes anger and nuclear war), because as Xinhua reported
overnight, China is now laying the blame squarely on the US for the breakdown of trade talks
between the world's two biggest economies, but hinted at its willingness to resume stalled
negotiations with Washington while rejecting any attempt to force concessions from Beijing.
In a
white paper on China's official position on the trade talks released by the State Council
Information Office on Sunday, Beijing made it clear the US government "should bear the sole and
entire responsibility" for the current stalemate, and hit back at allegations that Beijing had
backtracked from its earlier promises.
The trade war has not " made America great again," the white paper said, but has done
serious harm to the U.S. economy by increasing production costs, causing higher prices hikes,
damaging growth and people's livelihoods, as well as creating barriers to U.S. exports to
China.
"It is foreseeable that the latest U.S. tariff hikes on China, far from resolving issues,
will only make things worse for all sides," according to the white paper, which also listed
details of what it described as U.S. backtracking.
"The Chinese government rejects the idea that threats of a trade war and continuous tariff
hikes can ever help resolve trade and economic issues," according to the white paper. "Guided
by a spirit of mutual respect, equality and mutual benefit, the two countries should push
forward consultations based on good faith and credibility in a bid to address issues, narrow
differences, expand common interests, and jointly safeguard global economic stability and
development," it said, according to
Bloomberg .
As Vice Commerce Minister Wang Shouwen, who led the working-level team in the
negotiations, said China is willing to work with the US to find solutions, but the latter's
strategy of maximum pressure and escalation can't force concessions from China: "When you give
the U.S. an inch, it takes a yard", he said.
Meanwhile, when asked about US firms’ complaints that customs clearance was taking longer since the start of the trade war, he advised companies to contact the relevant authorities. “If certain firms are faced with specific issues, they can talk to local commerce departments,” he said.
On the increasingly touchy matter of exports of rare earth minerals, Wang repeated Beijing’s comments of the past week. “With the world’s richest rare earth resources we are willing to satisfy the normal needs of other countries,” he said. “But it’s unacceptable if other countries use rare earths imported from China to suppress China’s development.”
But in what could be the worst news for bulls who are clutching at any straw now to indicate an improvement in diplomatic relations, when asked about the possibility of a summit between Xi and Trump on the sidelines of the Group of 20 summit in Osaka, Japan later this month – as suggested by the American president in May – Wang said he had no information on the matter, according to the SCMP.
Shi Yinhong, an adviser to China’s State Council and a specialist in US affairs at Renmin University in Beijing, said that despite the pressure from the US, Beijing had shown restraint in its efforts to fight back... which it has indeed, suggesting that Trump's read of the calculus - one according to which China has more to lose than gain from taking trade war to the next level - is the correct one.
“In the areas of trade and technology, China has less leverage than the US, but it has kept its retaliatory measures within these areas,” he said. “If it extended its efforts to areas like North Korea and Iran, it could do much greater damage to Trump.”
The punchline: when addressing the chances of the two sides achieving a breakthrough in their trade negotiations by the time of the G20 summit, Shi said: “The difference is too wide and would be impossible for them to bridge in a month.”
"... Meanwhile on Thursday a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman responded to the White House position at a moment Pompeo keeps up the pressure campaign on European allies, saying, the US has not offered proof that Huawei's products present a security risk. ..."
"... "We hope that the United States can stop these mistaken actions which are not at all commensurate with their status and position as a big country," said spokesman Geng Shuang, according to Reuters. ..."
"... And Huawei, for its part, is reportedly taking steps to block its employees from taking part in technical meetings with American contacts, which has even included sending home American employees that were based at its Chinese headquarters in Shenzen. ..."
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has again put Germany and the rest of Europe on notice regarding China's controversial
telecom giant Huawei, warning they could be cut off from crucial US intelligence sharing over Huawei's 5G networks now
being built.
Pompeo issued the ultimatum following a meeting with German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas on Friday, saying the decision
on whether to allow Huawei equipment would have severe consequences, according to
Reuters
. His
words came at the start of a five-day European tour: "They [Germany] will take their own sovereign decisions, [but we]
will speak to them openly about
the
risks
... and in the case of Huawei the concern is
it
is not possible to mitigate those anywhere inside of a 5G network
," Pompeo
said
.
Germany, alongside the UK and France, has refused to budge amidst the ratcheting pressure from the US over worries that
China's intelligence is using its next generation networks as "back door" for aggressive telecommunications
eavesdropping.
Pompeo told the news conference further:
"(There
is) a risk we will have to change our behavior in light of the fact that we can't permit data on private citizens or
data on national security to go across networks that we don't have confidence (in)."
As we reported previously the Trump administration
first
notified its Berlin counterparts
of the intelligence sharing concerns in early March, when US Ambassador to Germany
Richard A. Grenell told Germany's economics minister in an official letter that the European ally and intelligence
partner "wouldn't be able to keep intelligence and other information sharing at their current level if Germany allowed
Huawei or other Chinese vendors to participate in building the country's 5G network."
It was noted at the time the warning is
"likely
to cause alarm among German security circles"
amid persistent terror threat, largely the result of Merkel's
disastrous "Open Door" policies which allowed over 1 million middle eastern immigrants into he country. And yet it
appears Germany's national security state establishment has remained unmoved, or at least unable to prevail over
Merkel's government.
Meanwhile on Thursday a Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman responded to the White House position at a moment Pompeo
keeps up the pressure campaign on European allies, saying, the US has not offered proof that Huawei's products present a
security risk.
"We hope that the United States can stop these mistaken actions which are not at all commensurate with their status and
position as a big country," said spokesman Geng Shuang, according to Reuters.
And Huawei, for its part, is
reportedly
taking steps to block
its employees from taking part in technical meetings with American contacts, which has even
included sending home American employees that were based at its Chinese headquarters in Shenzen.
Apparently both Lighthizer & Mnuchin opposed the tariffs on Mexican goods. If these
tariffs remain in place for some months it could have a major impact on the profitability of
the auto companies who are already sucking wind as sales slow.
I suppose this is an attention getter for AMLO to get his act together to reduce the flood
of illegals attempting to cross the border.
jdledell Agreed. The Mexican tariff threat is incredibly stupid. Trump pretty much had
that trade deal in the bag and this may just ruin it. I fought the falsely "sold" Iraq
invasion as hard as I could including to Hannah, Scooter and Cheney's faces. Once the thing
was decided I offered to accompany the 3rd Infantry Division as an adviser but the neocons
would not allow it in spite of the land force commander's request.
Colonel Lang, It was your stand against the Iraq invasion that first brought you to my
attention. To the detriment of this country and much of the world, your advice was not taken.
I have seriously wondered since those days, if this country will ever recover from the damage
done by following Cheney and gang.
"... The long, dense economic relationship appears to have passed its peak, writes Patrick Lawrence. ..."
"... The fallout from these mutually imposed taxes on trade will be considerable all by itself. Global supply chains will inevitably be disrupted -- a potential threat to worldwide economic stability. U.S. importers are expected to start shifting purchases away from China in favor of alternative suppliers with lower cost structures. American investors are likely to reconsider the mainland as a production platform, in many cases diverting investment dollars elsewhere. ..."
"... In the financial markets, this process is termed "decoupling." The long, dense economic relationship between the U.S. and China, the reasoning runs, appears to have passed its peak. ..."
"... With bilateral trade talks stalled, both sides have begun to indicate -- directly or by inference -- that they are now prepared to draw blood. Once the long-term damage begins, as appears increasingly likely, it is difficult to see how there will be any turning back from it. ..."
"... The only known back door into Huawei systems was created by the National Security Agency, which hacked its servers at some point between 2010 and 2012; this was revealed in the documents Edward Snowden made public in mid -- 2013. In effect, the U.S. accuses China of doing what it has already done. ..."
"... "When it comes to policy caprice motivated by paranoia and Deep State lies, the attack on Huawei is in a class all by itself," David Stockman, the former White House budget director, wrote on his blog earlier this month. "The whole case has been confected by Washington-domiciled economic nationalists who think prosperity stems from the machinations of the state and that state-sponsored 'national champions' are essential to winning the race for global economic and technological dominance." ..."
"... Last week the president suggested that the Huawei dispute can be negotiated as part of a broader agreement on trade. At the same time, Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence, has been crisscrossing the country to warn U.S. companies, universities, and other institutions of the perils of doing business with China. Coats's focus is on the high-technology sector. ..."
"... There are two lessons to draw from this spectacle. Trump's position on Huawei gives the game away: If the company is truly a national security threat, it makes no sense to offer it as a chip to be bargained in trade talks with Beijing. Equally, Coats's barnstorming tour is a clear indication that the national security apparatus is actively seeking to cast China as a strategic threat to the U.S. -- as the Pentagon declared it to be in a defense review earlier this year. ..."
"... Turning off the supply of rare earths is not the "nuclear option" China may consider it, as there are alternative suppliers. At the same time, the mainland accounts for nearly three-quarters of world supplies. When it blocked sales to Japan during a diplomatic dispute in 2010, prices rose precipitously and there was mayhem among manufacturers dependent on Chinese supplies. ..."
"... Xi made a remark in Jiangxi that is not to be missed. "We are now embarking on a new Long March," he said, referencing the famous retreat Mao led after Chinese Nationalists defeated the Red Army in 1934. "And we must start all over again." ..."
"... Unless Washington opens to a more cooperative partnership with Beijing -- an unlikely prospect -- this could be the moment China begins to displace the U.S. as the preeminent power in the western Pacific. ..."
"... The US has to regain a real economy and stop the insane military spending. Regardless of China. ..."
"... ‘”Trump’s position on Huawei gives the game away: If the company is truly a national security threat, it makes no sense to offer it as a chip to be bargained in trade talks with Beijing.” Absolutely the case. Trump has been caught before in this same kind of contradictory stance, as with tariffs on steel and aluminum. ..."
"... Trump seems to think he can command the wind and the waves. He has an immense ego, and there is the fact that he is a good deal less clever than he thinks he is. ..."
"... Trump believes that by intimidation and threats, he can make something happen that cannot happen through the ordinary operations of the economies. In this we see him most like the thugs that came to run a number of European countries in the 1930s. ..."
"... Trump’s “MAGA” is nothing more than thinking you can make that heart-warming post-WWII slogan, “the American Dream,” come alive again, many decades later and in an entirely different set of circumstances. “The American Dream” was based in a world where almost every competitor was prostrate from war while America remained relatively unscathed. So, America supplied, for a while, a huge share of the world’s demands, but its share has been declining ever since. ..."
"... Naturally, many Americans want to believe otherwise. Trump’s base – the nation’s Wal-Mart shoppers and the residents of its huge gulag of trailer parks – certainly does, and its hopes comes tinged with everything from superstition to religiosity. ..."
"... America’s elites, the members of its power establishment, do not believe in the same way, but they are deeply concerned about America’s relative decline. ..."
"... They do believe that America’s still great remaining strength can be used to extract concessions from the world without sacrificing anything at home and without sacrificing its role as the center of world empire, a role that comes with many perks and privileges ..."
"... One thinks of the infamous German industrialists and bankers’ – as well as notable American ones – early support for Hitler, although I do not mean to say the situations are identical. ..."
"... You can try fighting by the methods Trump is using, but those methods risk, through acts like the blithe laying on of massive new tariffs and sanctions, not only reduced economic activity in the world, they risk ultimately real wars. ..."
"... The real pity is that Trump at his core is not that much different from the rest of the fools who have been leading this country for the past several decades. He’s just “old school” in his style: he doesn’t wear soft kid gloves whilst attempting to strangle his geopolitical competitors the way all his chums before him did, the sonorous Barack Obama included. ..."
"... Constant warfare is a big part of US consumption. ..."
"... It is becoming increasingly clear that the US is subject to an arms industry racket which is draining its resources and ruining its real potential. ..."
"... We are becoming a country of idle over-weight vets running around on motorcycles wearing red MAGA hats, supported by billionaires, while the rest toil. ..."
"... This will likely come to a head sooner rather than later, and the conflict can be understood in broader terms as between a hegemonic global model and a multi-polar global model ..."
"... While confidence that such measures can inflict enormous harm is justified, the corresponding confidence that America’s preeminent position atop the world’s economic structures is not subject to challenge or change is misguided. The challenge has been ongoing for over five years now, and the change will likely appear suddenly. The preference would be for the U.S. guided to a soft landing into a multi-polar world, but Washington’s policy hawks seem committed to rolling the dice. ..."
"... Washington’s policy setters are gangsters who operate largely through intimidation, extortion and racketeering. ..."
"... This trade war sounds dangerous – didn’t the Smoot Hawley tariffs precipitate the great depression? And the inevitable economic war (even if it is a faux war based on lies, driven by the neocons) could well lead to a real war if we let it….. ..."
"... But trade wars are easy to win! Our very smart cheeto-in-chief has told us. You wouldn’t doubt him would you? ..."
"... The US has abdicated their manufacturing and innovative technologies, shutting down heavy industry under Reagan and Bush I (replacing it with a “service economy”) while outsourcing high end technology and offshoring technical jobs, initially to China mostly under Clinton and Bush II. ..."
"... It’s tempting to conclude that tariffs and action against Huawei are part of the same strategy. I don’t think they are. The tariffs are playing to Trump’s voter gallery. ..."
"... So long as the Chinese can find a way to save face AND give face to Trump, compromise is possible. Huawei is about the Deep State being unable to access Huawei’s facilities. Its a double bluff. The NSA etc (via 5 Eyes) have great access to western controlled telecoms. ..."
The long, dense economic relationship appears to have passed its peak, writes Patrick
Lawrence.
Special to Consortium News
P resident Donald Trump's trade war with China is swiftly taking a decisive turn for the
worse.
Step by step, each measure prompting retaliation, a spat so far limited to tariff increases,
now threatens to transform the bilateral relationship into one of managed hostility extending
well beyond economic issues. Should Washington and Beijing define each other as adversaries, as
they now appear poised to do, the consequences in terms of global stability and the balance of
power in the Pacific are nearly incalculable.
The trade dispute continues to sharpen. Later this week Beijing is scheduled
to raise tariffs already in place on $60 billion worth of American exports -- the latest in
a running series of escalations Washington set in motion nearly a year ago. Two weeks later the
U.S., having increased tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese products earlier this month, is
to consider imposing levies on an additional $325 billion worth of imports from the
mainland.
The fallout from these mutually imposed taxes on trade will be considerable all by
itself. Global supply chains will inevitably be disrupted -- a potential threat to worldwide
economic stability. U.S. importers are expected to start shifting purchases away from China in
favor of alternative suppliers with lower cost structures. American investors are likely to
reconsider the mainland as a production platform, in many cases diverting investment dollars
elsewhere.
For its part, China is already rotating its gaze westward toward the Middle East and Europe.
As if to underscore the point, the East Hope Group, a large Chinese manufacturer, announced
late last week that it plans to
invest $10 billion in Abu Dhabi's industrial sector. Beijing is already drawing Western
Europe into its trillion-dollar Belt
and Road Initiative . In time, Europe could begin to replace the U.S. as a source of the
foreign investment capital China needs.
Decoupling
In the financial markets, this process is termed "decoupling." The long, dense economic
relationship between the U.S. and China, the reasoning runs, appears to have passed its
peak.
With bilateral trade talks stalled, both sides have begun to indicate -- directly or by
inference -- that they are now prepared to draw blood. Once the long-term damage begins, as
appears increasingly likely, it is difficult to see how there will be any turning back from
it.
Two weeks ago, the White House issued an executive order barring
purchases of telecommunications equipment from any foreign company deemed to pose a threat to
U.S. national security. It also requires American companies to obtain licenses before exporting
U.S. telecoms technology to such firms. While an administration official described the order as
"company and country agnostic," it is all but explicitly intended to damage the global position
of Huawei, the highly competitive Chinese company that is a leader in cellular telephone sales
and 5G telecommunications networks.
Huawei has long been in Washington's sights. Chief among the allegations against it , the
company is accused of providing China with a "back door" into its telecoms networks, so
allowing Beijing to spy on any entity using Huawei equipment. The U.S. has never provided
evidence of this, and both Huawei and Beijing vigorously deny any such arrangement. The
only known back door into Huawei systems was created by the National Security Agency, which
hacked its servers at some point between 2010 and 2012; this was revealed in the documents
Edward Snowden made public in mid -- 2013. In effect, the U.S. accuses China of doing what it
has already done.
"When it comes to policy caprice motivated by paranoia and Deep State lies, the attack
on Huawei is in a class all by itself," David Stockman, the former White House budget director,
wrote on his blog earlier this month. "The whole case has been confected by
Washington-domiciled economic nationalists who think prosperity stems from the machinations of
the state and that state-sponsored 'national champions' are essential to winning the race for
global economic and technological dominance."
Contradictory Narrative
There is little question that freezing Huawei out of the U.S. market and depriving it of
U.S. -- made components will do damage, in all likelihood lasting, to the company. The
Eurasia Group terms the administration's executive order "a grave escalation with China
that at a minimum plunges the prospect of continued trade negotiations into doubt." But as it
has on other policy questions, the Trump administration is tripping over its own contradictory
narratives at this point.
Last week the president suggested
that the Huawei dispute can be negotiated as part of a broader agreement on trade. At the same
time, Dan Coats, the director of national intelligence, has been crisscrossing the country
to
warn U.S. companies, universities, and other institutions of the perils of doing business
with China. Coats's focus is on the high-technology sector.
There are two lessons to draw from this spectacle. Trump's position on Huawei gives the
game away: If the company is truly a national security threat, it makes no sense to offer it as
a chip to be bargained in trade talks with Beijing. Equally, Coats's barnstorming tour is a
clear indication that the national security apparatus is actively seeking to cast China as a
strategic threat to the U.S. -- as
the Pentagon declared it to be in a defense review earlier this year.
Beijing has so far shown restraint in its responses, but there are signs it is stiffening
its spine. On Friday it issued a draft of its own set of
tighter regulations governing potential cyber-security breaches.
Xi Jinping had earlier visited a rare-earth processing facility in Jiangxi Province -- a
move read as the Chinese leader's subtle suggestion that Beijing may consider blocking exports
of minerals that are essential components in a variety of high-tech devices.
Turning off the supply of rare earths is not the "nuclear option" China may consider it,
as there are alternative suppliers. At the same time, the mainland accounts for nearly
three-quarters of world supplies. When it blocked sales
to Japan during a diplomatic dispute in 2010, prices rose precipitously and there was
mayhem among manufacturers dependent on Chinese supplies.
Xi made a remark in Jiangxi that is not to be missed. "We are now embarking on a new Long
March," he said, referencing the famous retreat Mao led after Chinese Nationalists defeated the
Red Army in 1934. "And we must start all over again."
With formal talks lapsed for the time being, there is now no shortage of signaling from
either Washington or Beijing. But Xi, China's most assertive leader since the Great Helmsman,
appears to understand the moment as larger than mere gestures. U.S. -- China relations have
entered a decisive phase. America cannot win in a long-term confrontation with China.
Unless Washington opens to a more cooperative partnership with Beijing -- an unlikely
prospect -- this could be the moment China begins to displace the U.S. as the preeminent power
in the western Pacific.
Patrick Lawrence, a correspondent abroad for many years, chiefly for the International
Herald Tribune , is a columnist, essayist, author, and lecturer. His most recent book is "Time
No Longer: Americans After the American Century" (Yale). Follow him @thefloutist . His web site is www.patricklawrence.us.
Support his work via www.patreon.com/thefloutist .
If you value this original article, please considermaking a donationto Consortium News so we can bring you more stories like this
one.
dean 1000 , May 31, 2019 at 11:12
The Empire the US built and acquired after WWII could not last no matter who is president.
We have been advised of this coming reality for 30 or 40 years. Washington can’t adjust
b/c it is controlled by a two party system that is owned by the 10%.
Since wall street bought a bunch of manufacturing companies and exported them to China the
US hasen’t had a real economy. It has been one bubble economy after another. A stock
bubble, tech bubble, dot com bubble, and a killer 8 trillion $ housing bubble, and a
completely unnecessary bank bailout.
The US has to regain a real economy and stop the insane military spending. Regardless of
China.
Zhu , May 31, 2019 at 06:14
Trump, in effect, is walling the US off from the rest of the world, as Ming-Qing dynasty
China did until 1911.it turned out badly for Chinese people. It’s likely to turn out
badly for the US.
Truth , May 29, 2019 at 17:27
One solution to rare minerals is to break the illegal clinton & bush era mining
agreements around the Grand canyon and Nevada which has turned our resources into cash from
russia and canada into the pockets of the deep state “elected” in D<C and
these states. It would be nice if every now and then a real journalist who publishes a full
story would get a complete story published. Consortium does better than most but still needs
to step up their game.
An article that includes explaining why all NAFTA and trade agreements since Kennedy have
been total sellouts of USA in exchange for party owned companies of the "elected"
‘”Trump’s position on Huawei gives the game away: If the company is
truly a national security threat, it makes no sense to offer it as a chip to be bargained in
trade talks with Beijing.” Absolutely the case. Trump has been caught before in this same kind of contradictory stance, as with tariffs on
steel and aluminum.
I think the truth is that he is a man ready to use any gimmick to get what he wants,
regardless of logic or facts or principle. Another way to say that is to speak of a criminal
mentality.
It is exactly what the mob has always done in making someone an offer they can’t
refuse. “Don’t want to pay protection money? Well, don’t be surprised if
your joint gets burned down.”
Trump essentially wants to transfer huge amounts of trade surplus from China to the United
States, not by any change in the economic activity or policies of the two countries but by
fiat.
But of course, the world doesn’t work that way.
The United States’ trade deficits are its own doing, not China’s. The United
States doesn’t save, and it doesn’t tax adequately. It consumes, and a productive
country like China is only too pleased to supply what it wants. That makes a flow of goods in
one direction and a flow of money in the other. Economics 101.
Trump seems to think he can command the wind and the waves. He has an immense ego, and
there is the fact that he is a good deal less clever than he thinks he is.
Trump believes that by intimidation and threats, he can make something happen that cannot
happen through the ordinary operations of the economies. In this we see him most like the
thugs that came to run a number of European countries in the 1930s.
He genuinely does not understand – or if he understands, he doesn’t care
– what is behind the surpluses and deficits and just insists that they will be changed
as a matter of his personal will. Does that not remind us of anyone from history?
At any rate, it comes down to his admiring “the strong man” and believing he,
and he alone, can play that role for the United States. And there are more than a few
Americans that believe him too. After all, the great American journalist and historian who
documented the rise and fall of the Nazis, William L. Shirer, once said that he thought the
United States might be the first country to go fascist voluntarily. He based that thought on
his observation of many attitudes and beliefs and trends in the United States.
Trump’s “MAGA” is nothing more than thinking you can make that
heart-warming post-WWII slogan, “the American Dream,” come alive again, many
decades later and in an entirely different set of circumstances. “The American
Dream” was based in a world where almost every competitor was prostrate from war while
America remained relatively unscathed. So, America supplied, for a while, a huge share of the
world’s demands, but its share has been declining ever since.
In today’s world, all the old competitors have not only come roaring back, but a lot
of new ones have come into being, and that reality is the future.
Naturally, many Americans want to believe otherwise. Trump’s base – the
nation’s Wal-Mart shoppers and the residents of its huge gulag of trailer parks –
certainly does, and its hopes comes tinged with everything from superstition to
religiosity.
America’s elites, the members of its power establishment, do not believe in the same
way, but they are deeply concerned about America’s relative decline. They have been
working away for years on the problem, as in their past bashing of Japan or China, but they
are not ready to work for fundamental change in America, as, for example, in its tax and
savings structures and its grotesque inequalities.
They do believe that America’s still great remaining strength can be used to extract
concessions from the world without sacrificing anything at home and without sacrificing its
role as the center of world empire, a role that comes with many perks and privileges. And
while most of them do not like Trump’s style or background, I think for now they are
willing to see whether he can get the ugly job done. One thinks of the infamous German
industrialists and bankers’ – as well as notable American ones – early
support for Hitler, although I do not mean to say the situations are identical.
You can try fighting by the methods Trump is using, but those methods risk, through acts
like the blithe laying on of massive new tariffs and sanctions, not only reduced economic
activity in the world, they risk ultimately real wars.
Even if they don’t go so far as war, they are shaking up some fundamental post-WWII
arrangements that America is going to miss. Decades-old allies, like some of those in Europe,
are beginning to re-think their relationship with such a hostile, single-minded America and
to glance around in other directions, as towards the very China Trump attacks and towards
Russia, a country whose openness to business would have resembled a miracle under the
communists and whose wealth of natural resources offers altogether new opportunities.
Realist , May 30, 2019 at 01:32
The real pity is that Trump at his core is not that much different from the rest of the
fools who have been leading this country for the past several decades. He’s just
“old school” in his style: he doesn’t wear soft kid gloves whilst
attempting to strangle his geopolitical competitors the way all his chums before him did, the
sonorous Barack Obama included.
The problem that bothers the US policy makers is real: what to do about the balance of
payments deficit? The Trump team seems to be nit-picking areas where imports can be reduced,
for instance by blocking Chinese tech exports.
All of these moves are nonsense because they
miss the real problem: the US economy has a long standing structural quandary. It devotes so
much of its resources to flashy, ornamental and useless defense high tech weapons and gismos
that it is running itself into the ground.
It is becoming increasingly clear that the US is
subject to an arms industry racket which is draining its resources and ruining its real
potential. What needs to be done is to cut the military budget in half and redirect the
resources to improving the infrastructure of the country and making investment once again
profitable inside the USA. Where is the politician who dares make these proposals? Wake up
America. We are becoming a country of idle over-weight vets running around on motorcycles
wearing red MAGA hats, supported by billionaires, while the rest toil.
bardamu , May 29, 2019 at 00:07
It is strange to discuss confrontation with China only in terms of trade deals so soon
after Obama’s “pivot to Asia,” Trump’s militarism with respect to
North Korea, and the militarism of both the Obama and Trump regimes as regards Russia and
also through western and central Asia, which are clearly areas in which China has no less
natural interest than the United States.
Among these, surely tariffs are the least of most anyone’s worries.
jaycee , May 28, 2019 at 16:27
This will likely come to a head sooner rather than later, and the conflict can be
understood in broader terms as between a hegemonic global model and a multi-polar global
model.
The hegemonic global model has been an American project since the demise of the Soviet
Union, usually presented in euphemism – “globalization”, the
“exceptional” nation, the “rule-based international system”, etc. In
recent years, US politicians have overstepped by a reckless use of the international
financial system to deter designated adversaries.
Presently moving through Congress are bills
designed to use sanctions (“maximum pressure”) to attack both Russia’s Nordstream natural gas pipeline to Europe and China’s claims in the South China Sea.
While confidence that such measures can inflict enormous harm is justified, the corresponding
confidence that America’s preeminent position atop the world’s economic
structures is not subject to challenge or change is misguided. The challenge has been ongoing
for over five years now, and the change will likely appear suddenly. The preference would be
for the U.S. guided to a soft landing into a multi-polar world, but Washington’s policy
hawks seem committed to rolling the dice.
Realist , May 28, 2019 at 17:41
Washington’s policy setters are gangsters who operate largely through intimidation,
extortion and racketeering. If you look up the definitions of those words you will see they
describe to a tee what the American government does. Shutting down Nordstream (and all the
other sanctions over transparently absurd claims) is meant entirely to damage the Russian
economy and destabilise the country’s government, plus to steal away customers in the
energy sector.
They are protecting nobody’s “rights of navigation” in the
South China Sea, rather they are telegraphing to Bejing that Chinese trade with the world can
be shut down on a moment’s notice by Uncle Sam, specifically they are trying to put the
kibosh on the Chinese “Belt and Road Initiative.” The cusses in Washington have
gone so far as to tell Canada that it does not have control over the Northwest Passage, long
considered to be within its internal waters–you know, all those islands connected by
ice for most of the year. Hence forth, Washington decreed that they are international waters
and that it would control them. If that’s being a good neighbor to a country that has
supported your every crazed demand for over 200 years, the “Great White North”
needs to get a restraining order from the World Court against Uncle Sam, plus they need to
find better friends elsewhere on the planet.
I tend to substitute the euphemism “rogue nation” for those others.
Excellent comment.
Realist , May 28, 2019 at 16:22
India, Vietnam, and the Philippines will thank China for the opportunity to manufacture
schlock for sale at Wal*Mart and for the major investments that new Chinese shareholders will
have made in their companies. These countries will now have wares to trade along the Belt and
Road linking all of Eurasia where everyone keeps getting richer by the day. Since people the
world over, except for congenitally retarded neocons, know a good deal when they see one, all
these countries will start telling Uncle Sam to cram it when he keeps demanding they sanction
their new found friends and trading partners because freedom and democracy, Putin and the
other names on Sam’s shit list. They’ll start deciding that all those American
bases give them no clout, no influence, no pay-off and no security… nothing useful at
all, unless prosecuting the crimes and repairing the damage caused by the garrison soldiers
provides local entertainment. It will be time to relocate those rat-holes to the American
side of Trump’s Wall.
Will the silver lining be new American self-sufficiency in manufacturing? The development
of needed resources using new innovative technologies? A plethora of jobs at good pay for
working American men and women? Will American oligarchs once again begin investing in America
itself? If you can arrange that with American greenbacks now buying a tenth as many Yuans,
Euros, Yen, Rupees, Rubles and even Pesos than they once did because Trump decided to
“shake things up,” maybe you can sell all those treasuries needed to run the
government in Washington to the Tooth Fairy.
It’s not true that “you can never go
home again:” just watch the dollars come flooding back to North America when the whole
rest of the world stops trading in them. This whole bit of history should be engaging to
watch on some future television show similar to James Burke’s
“Connections.”
If only Barack Obama had eased up on the extreme Trump bashing at
that White House Correspondents’ Dinner.
Harpo Kondriak , May 28, 2019 at 20:13
“Watch those dollars come flooding back” – when the real fun starts.
Those that don’t understand why there has been little inflation from the bank bailouts
will get their answer. And they won’t like it.
Seamus Padraig , May 28, 2019 at 14:46
As a life-long protectionist, I always believed that our foolish dependence on imports
would ultimately end in tears, and it is now clear how right I was. Just to think: we could
have saved ourselves all this trouble and misery simply by voting down NAFTA and declining to
extend Most-Favored Nation trade status (as it used to be called) to China 25 years ago. But
now, putting our industry back on track is really gonna hurt. Pity …
Zhu , May 31, 2019 at 06:39
Any US reindustrialization is likely employ robots. The homeless will just keep on
increasing.
Godfree Roberts , May 28, 2019 at 12:29
“Europe could begin to replace the U.S. as a source of the foreign investment
capital China needs.”?
China is the leading recipient of FDI but its need for foreign capital is rapidly diminishing
and it is the world leader in IP
Zhu , May 31, 2019 at 06:40
A fair amount of foreign investment is laundered bribe money from China.
evelync , May 28, 2019 at 11:28
This trade war sounds dangerous – didn’t the Smoot Hawley tariffs precipitate
the great depression?
And the inevitable economic war (even if it is a faux war based on lies, driven by the
neocons) could well lead to a real war if we let it…..
I can’t help but secretly imagine that perhaps the retaliation that Patrick Lawrence
writes about – namely China’s shift to other trade partners – happens
smoothly and quickly enough to deprive our neocons of their super power resources to put an
end to what Charles Misfeldt in his comments refers to as Crooks, liars, thieves, cowards and
traitors running things…..errr ruining things.
I know that’s not the answer because it could be devastating too.
It’s up to the electorate to shift away from the ideologues, both neoliberal and
neocons.
But will we demand better government?
Most politicians in power have been too afraid to challenge the idea of
“exceptionalism” which is used to keep the primitive war machine going.
Thanks for the article and the interesting and informative comments….much
appreciated…
Jeff Harrison , May 28, 2019 at 11:19
But trade wars are easy to win! Our very smart cheeto-in-chief has told us. You
wouldn’t doubt him would you?
Actually, one wonders why anyone takes the US and its accusations seriously. Especially by
the European vassal states. Yes, your equipment/software will have a backdoor if the US wants
one there. That much is clear from the Snowden releases. And a Reuters report this morning
gives a hint at how it’s done. Huawei apparently is continuing to make the mistake of
sending things out via FedEx. Magically, two of the parcels wound up in the US without the
benefit of Huawei changing their shipping request. Huawei would never have known if they
hadn’t looked at the routing of the parcel after they got it. Hopefully, there
wasn’t any sensitive information in the documents routed to the US because it’s a
sure thing that the USG now has copies of them. Same for the European vassals. Angela
Merkel’s phone hacked. Electronic interception equipment installed on undersea
telephone cables. That’s before we get to the NSA office in all the telecoms spying on
us. Most of the world’s telecommunications run through the US. So, not only do we get
to listen in on a phone call from Paris to Des Moines, we get to listen in on one from Paris
to Shanghai.
And the European vassals continue to toe the American line albeit a bit more
reluctantly.
michael , May 28, 2019 at 11:15
The US has abdicated their manufacturing and innovative technologies, shutting down heavy
industry under Reagan and Bush I (replacing it with a “service economy”) while
outsourcing high end technology and offshoring technical jobs, initially to China mostly
under Clinton and Bush II.
Short-term profits soared with the cheaper labor, but giving away
high end technologies leading to innovations for China was resoundingly stupid. Chinagate was
(is) much more dangerous than Russiagate to National Security.
Having given away
America’s capabilities to China, no amount of negotiating will “level the playing
field” . We can no longer compete with China not because of labor costs, but because of
the improvements the Chinese have made in so many fields over twenty years, while America sat
stagnant (except of course for overpriced weapons and surveillance tools to watch American
citizens).
Zhu , May 31, 2019 at 06:47
The US has always imported its Einsteins and Teslas. We Americans are educated to be
cannon fodder in wars of vanity. At best, we’re educated to be Trump – Romney
style connivrrs and crooks.
Historically, when two hegemonic powers clash the result is always war. What we are
witnessing between Washington and Beijing today is no different. But Washington will not
allow China to ‘displace the US as the preeminent power in the western Pacific.’
The trade war will become world war. https://www.ghostsofhistory.wordpress.com/
does not have a valid certificate (Firefox warned me).
Charles Misfeldt , May 28, 2019 at 08:44
I look at this picture and see all the representative’s on America’s side of
the table are conservative scumbags who have no intention of engaging in behavior that
benefits myself or the majority in America. Crooks, liars, thieves, cowards and
traitors…
MichaelWme , May 28, 2019 at 06:55
“a spat so far limited to tariff increases”
Not quite. The US has announced that any Chinese person travelling outside of China can be
arrested, as it had Meng Wanzhou arrested in Canada for selling Huawei phones to Iranians.
China threatened to execute 3 Canadians in retaliation, so Canada released Ms Meng from
prison and put her under house arrest while the legal processes of extradition are now
thought to require many years.
China hasn’t executed the 3 Canadians, and Ms Meng is in
her C$20 million home, and is likely to remain there for the foreseeable future. What
happened to Ms Meng can happen to any Chinese executive who travels outside China to the EU
or the Americas or Japan.
E Wright , May 28, 2019 at 04:50
It’s tempting to conclude that tariffs and action against Huawei are part of the
same strategy. I don’t think they are. The tariffs are playing to Trump’s voter
gallery.
So long as the Chinese can find a way to save face AND give face to Trump,
compromise is possible. Huawei is about the Deep State being unable to access Huawei’s
facilities. Its a double bluff. The NSA etc (via 5 Eyes) have great access to western
controlled telecoms.
They don’t want to lose that access by allowing an outside
operator, so they accuse Huawei of what they are doing, on the assumption that Beijing does
what they do.
A January 2018 Bloomberg article suggests that Chinese officials may reduce their purchases
of U.S. government bonds. It is very unlikely that China can do so in any meaningful way
because doing so would almost certainly be costly for Beijing. And even if China took this
step, it would have either no impact or a positive impact on the U.S. economy.
China reduced its holdings of U.S. debt in March by about $20.5 billion, bringing its
overall ownership down to $1.12 trillion.
There was some more detailed coverage of this not long ago, probably on Strategic Culture.
China has largely stopped buying US treasuries for a few years now, and more recently has
been very slowly reducing its holdings. It has to recycle its US dollars from its exports to
the US somehow - instead of buying US treasuries and thereby funding the US military
encirclement of China, it is using them for infrastructure investments in Eurasia under BRI -
much of that is denominated in US dollars.
So that Carnegie Endowment crap is nothing but mindless bullshit propaganda*. No wonder
the US fails in everything it tries to do these days - these are the sort of idiots who
"advise" the US government what to do!!
As to that troll - B's advice is always this: Don't feed the trolls
* Disclaimer - I haven't read the troll's links, nor do I intend to.
Russia has largely eliminated its holdings of US treasuries. Many other countries have
also reduced their holdings, including several US allies (eg Japan, if I recall correctly).
Many countries in Eurasia now have huge gold reserves instead, which is a much better bet -
not just Russia and China but also Kazakhstan, for example.
China reduced its holdings of U.S. debt in March by about $20.5 billion, bringing its
overall ownership down to $1.12 trillion.
Those U.S. Treasuries fluctuations are very likely following trade movements rather
than political intentions. As commented before, China's enormous exports require large-scale
FX handling and USTs are the easiest way to do that.
It's not a credible political threat to sell those off, as the next wave of 'QE' money
printing is imminent and it will specifically target USTs (per Bloomberg article two days
ago, with projected Fed balance sheet to soon grow beyond the recent peak). In other words,
anything China might sell will be absorbed by the Federal Reserve with freshly printed money.
In the scheme of the money printing madness, another trillion USD is not a large
amount.
Why has Russia then sold their USTs? Probably for fear of being disconnected from the
SWIFT system and being stuck with worthless paper. In any case Russia's total divestment of
their entire UST stock didn't register in the ebb and flow of the market.
President Trump loves to blame China for the job losses that have devastated American
workers under globalization. But the truth is that Trump is blaming the wrong party. Trump's
reckless trade war against China is misguided and amounts to a colossal charade that will not
solve the actual problem.
Yes, it is true that numerous American manufacturing jobs have been shipped overseas to
China, thereby leaving American workers jobless and suffering. But China did not steal these
jobs.
No. These jobs were given to China. It was all legal and legitimate. China merely accepted
the gift.
What would anyone expect China to do? Accepting these jobs was a perfectly rational course
of action.
China was an underdeveloped nation with a large population of poor people willing to work
for a fraction of the hourly wages of American workers. And then corporations came along and
presented China with an attractive offer: We would like to build manufacturing plants in China
and hire droves of your unemployed people to work there. What was China supposed to do?
Naturally, China said yes.
This is hardly stealing.
Are You Tired Of The Lies And Non-Stop Propaganda?
It is true that these new jobs in China were intended to displace American workers. But does
that concern belong to China? Does China have the responsibility to care for the well-being of
American workers? Is China supposed to prioritize American workers over its own workers?
Of course not.
China is supposed to look out for itself and for its own workers, not for American workers.
Thus it was perfectly proper for China to allow the manufacturing plants to be built in China
and employ Chinese workers. China did not steal these jobs.
So if China is not at fault, then who is to blame for the devastation caused to American
workers?
The answer is plain to see, and it lies within our own shores. The fault belongs squarely
with corporate America.
It was corporate America that made these decisions. Corporate America decided to close their
American plants and open new plants in China. Corporate America decided to lay off multitudes
of American workers and ruin entire American communities.
And who profited from the destruction to American workers? It was the wealthy executives and
shareholders of American corporations. They earned millions of dollars for themselves by
cutting the costs of their workforce.
This is part of the larger trend of economic inequality that is eroding the entire middle
class in America. Wealth is being shifted away from the workers down below and transferred up
into the hands of the wealthy executives and shareholders at the top.
Trump blaming China is nonsense. China is not at fault. To be sure, China is hardly an angel
and indeed engages in improper trade practices. But even if China agreed to whatever
bone-headed demands Trump is seeking, the problem still would not be solved. The truth is that
America cannot possibly compete against China on labor costs. The standard of living is much
lower in China and thus Chinese workers are willing to accept wages far below living wages in
America. So corporate America will continue to transfer more and more jobs to China and
elsewhere. If we do not address this fundamental economic reality, then we will never solve the
problem.
Trump blaming China has an insidious aspect to it as well. Focusing all the ire upon China
is a grand misdirection that conceals the true culprit, namely, the super-rich corporate
executives and shareholders in America.
This is part of Trump's standard playbook. Trump falsely proclaims to be fighting for
blue-collar workers, when in truth, Trump acts entirely in favor of the rich at the top.
Surprisingly, this seems to work. Some of the hard-working Americans who are being crushed
by Trump's idiotic trade war and who should be denouncing Trump, nonetheless praise him for
standing up to China, believing that Trump is fighting for blue-collar jobs. It is painful to
witness such good people falling victim to Trump's despicable con job.
In order to actually save the middle class, we need to focus on the true cause of the
problem. We must direct our great powers of reform where they belong -- upon the wealthy
executives and shareholders of corporate America who caused this problem in the first
place.
The nature of the problem is that corporate America has no incentive to protect American
workers. In fact, corporate America has every incentive to harm American workers by shifting
their jobs overseas.
So the financial incentives must be reconfigured. If corporate America is going to ship
American jobs overseas, it must not be permitted to pocket all the profits themselves and leave
their displaced workers with nothing. Instead, corporations that send jobs offshore must be
required to sufficiently compensate their displaced American workers. Executives and
shareholders must not be permitted to enrich themselves unless and until their workers are
financially secure.
Our society must favor people over profits, not profits over people.
This article was
originally published by "
Salon " -
Amid the escalating economic war between the
US and China, discussions have intensified on how Beijing might stand up to the economic
power of America,
especially given that the global economy is increasingly dependent
on the US dollar as the main currency for international trade, and the closing of US markets
could do some serious damage to China's export-oriented companies. China's main foreign-policy
publication, the
Global Times
, points to three trump cards that Beijing could use
to at least level the playing field in its fight with the Trump administration and cause
appreciable harm to the US economy, possibly forcing its opponent to temporarily scale back
its ambitions.
According to an
article
in the
Global Times
by a professor at the Renmin University of China, the three
trump cards are:
1) banning the export of rare earths to the US;
2) blocking US companies' access to Chinese markets; and
3) using China's portfolio of US Treasury bonds to bring down the US government debt
market.
Each of these trump cards are worth looking at in detail,
both in terms
of their impact on the US economy and also in terms of any possible retaliation from the
US and the repercussions for the global economy as a whole.
Banning the export of rare earths to the US would actually be a pretty serious
blow for US electronics manufacturers and, indeed, US high-tech manufacturers generally.
This is because rare earths are a key raw material for the production of smartphones, various
chips, and other high-value-added products that are the biggest cash cows of US companies
such as Apple and Boeing.
President Donald Trump during a meeting with Chinese Vice Premier Liu He over trade
talks in the Oval Office, February 22, 2019
Reuters, an agency one could hardly accuse of sympathising with Beijing,
reports
: "The United States has again decided not to impose tariffs on rare earths and
other critical minerals from China, underscoring its reliance on the Asian nation for a
group of materials used in everything from consumer electronics to military equipment."
China does not exactly have a monopoly on such materials, but the market would
definitely be in short supply
without Chinese exports, with all the price implications
that would bring. Moreover, it is likely that some deficit positions will be impossible
to close no matter how much money is involved.
Not everything is that simple, however. Should such a ban be introduced, then
Beijing will encounter certain technical difficulties.
If sanctions are only imposed
on US companies, then they will still be able to purchase the necessary materials through
Japanese or European straw buyers, making the embargo pointless. But if China imposes a
total export ban, then it won't just be US companies that suffer but European ones as well,
leading to EU reprisals against Chinese exporters to Europe. This would be very painful
for China, especially given the economic war with the US that is making access to European
markets invaluable to the Chinese economy.
It appears that a ban on rare earth exports is a powerful weapon, but its use will require
the utmost delicacy and serious diplomatic efforts to avoid any extremely unpleasant side
effects.
The second trump card mentioned by the
Global Times
is blocking US
companies' access to the fast-growing and extensive Chinese market.
This should
be looked at from a political, rather than economic, point of view (although the latter
may seem logical). The aim of such restrictive measures is not to inflict unacceptable damage
on the US economy, but to make the full might of America's corporate lobbying machine work
against Donald Trump and support his political opponents.
According to
the S&P Dow Jones Indices, Asia only accounts for around 14 per cent of
the sales of S&P 500 companies. If we assume that China makes up the majority of this, then
not even a complete closure of the Chinese markets would be a disaster. There are a few
important details, however.
First,
China is the only (and final) market for sales growth for many US
companies.
So if China closes, the graphs at business presentations won't be
showing any kind of growth.
Second,
China plays a key role in many production chains that end with sales
in the US and other markets
. A loss of access to Chinese production would therefore
severely damage the competitiveness of American companies on the world (and even on
the US) market, especially if their European and Japanese competitors retain complete
access to China's production facilities.
As a result, the profits of US companies and the future of the American stock
market (which is a key political barometer given that many Americans have invested their
savings in shares) would be at risk.
It might be possible to offset these problems
by transferring production to other Asian countries with cheap labour and favourable terms,
but this couldn't be done quickly and it would be risky, given that Trump is waging trade
wars with everyone from the European Union to loyal US allies such as Japan and India. In
light of this,
US companies will have a huge incentive to prevent Trump from being elected
for a second term, and the lobbying and political capabilities of that part of the US corporate
sector that will suffer the most from this trump card could really play a key role in the
political victory of Trump's opponents.
The third trump card involves China dumping its portfolio of US Treasury bonds.
The
Global Times
writes: "China holds more than $1 trillion of US Treasury bonds.
China made a great contribution to stabilizing the US economy by buying US debt during the
financial crisis in 2008. The US would be miserable if China hits it when it is down." One
can conclude from this that
Beijing will most probably save dumping its portfolio
of US treasury bonds for dessert – in that it will have the biggest impact when the US stock
market is experiencing its next crisis.
China's Vice Premier Liu He (left) speaks during a meeting with President Donald
Trump (right) in the Oval Office of the White House on February 22, 2019
The move is not likely to cause catastrophic damage in and of itself (although the value
of US bonds will definitely fall), but if it is done at the moment when America is most
vulnerable, then China's portfolio may well end up being the straw that breaks the camel's
back.
Beijing is not displaying a particularly cocksure attitude.
As the
Global Times
' editor-in-chief quite rightly notes on
Twitter
:
"Most Chinese agree that the US is more powerful than China and Washington holds
initiative in the trade war. But we just don't want to cave in and we believe there
is no way the US can crush China. We are willing to bear some pain to give the US a
lesson."
As China lays its trump cards on the table, the world's globalised economy will
creak and collapse.
Globalisation is going backwards, and chances are we'll
end up with a completely different economic system that has more protectionism. Instead
of a global market, there will be several large regional markets with their own rules, dominant
currencies, technical standards, and financial systems.
Just as the US attack on Huawei is shortsighted
and will have serious consequences for USA,
the same would apply to China if they were to
reciprocate.
China wants to boost international
trade, not harm it, so they will work around
the bans to promote trade with others (long
term strategic play), not go head to head. I
suspect China may do something small just for
domestic optics, but the smart play is to let
the consequences of US actions play out on US
businesses, whilst boosting import substitution
and alternative supply chains.
I don't believe rare earth exports will be
banned (they may be restricted a bit as part
of a long term protection of domestic supply)
and I don't expect US Treasuries to be dumped
(buying at any scale had already ceased).
This isn't about backing one side over the
other - I just think one party is going to play
this smarter than the other.
This is a copy paste article. Why are all
these so called articles parrotting the same
line: Rare earth monopoly, whereas in
reality, they can' t even name the product
of dependency and how much it would cost to
find a different supplier.
If sanctions are only imposed on US
companies, then they will still be able to
purchase the necessary materials through
Japanese or European straw buyers, making
the embargo pointless. But if China imposes
a total export ban, then it won't just be US
companies that suffer but European ones as
well, leading to EU reprisals against
Chinese exporters to Europe. This would be
very painful for China, especially given the
economic war with the US that is making
access to European markets invaluable to the
Chinese economy.
If that is all the options they have,
they got nothing!
China watchers,
economists, and investors have been forming
battle-lines for years as they debate the
true strength and sustainability of China's
economy and its role as a global player.
Those of us that paint a picture of future
collapse and a day of reckoning are often
accused of spreading "doom-****" when we
claim that the Chinese have masked over
their dire situation by continually
expanding credit.
In January, Beijing injected a staggering
$685 billion in new credit into its
financial system and the money continues to
leak out causing assets to rise across the
globe. Today China continues to prop up the
unpropable, and yes, while no such word
exists, when it comes to China's economy it
should, for "unpropable" describes the
financial collapse that can only be
postponed but not stopped.
The article
below argues that this will have a major
impact in currency markets going forward.
Big Bad Wolf, 5G can wait, it's a luxury not
a necessity. Our networks run plenty fast
and, like Europe, we can pay higher prices
for a local workforce. China works due to
slave labor, if the people there wake up
they are done. That's why a complete
security state is necessary. Nip that
awareness in the bud. Now, go back to
Germany and celebrate Islam.
We'll just starve the rats out. China has
zero hold over us, there is nothing that
they make or export that cannot be
replaced. Will prices of some goods rise,
yes, but at the end of the day we don't need
them as much as they need us.
3 dumb cards. Strategical US dumb thinking.
US have a very short term strategy. That's
easy to understand. US will have elections
in 1.5 years and the campaign for election
is knocking at the door. China has a long
term strategy. China do not have elections.
Those US guys simply do not understand this.
rare earths (RE). Look at Russia. It
provides US with rocket engines and take
US cosmonauts to ISS. Why? To slower the
research. If Ru will not sale, the US
will accelerate the development of space
ships. So will do China with RE. They
will provide RE, maybe it will increase
the price a bit.
blocking US companies' access to
Chinese markets. Why you should do this?
China needs some US products which do
not have replacements or are protected
by IP laws. And to be clear. It is also
easier to import legally a product and
reverse engineer it, that to acquire it
illegal or spying in other countries
dumping US Treasury. Russia had far
more less US Treasury. They gradually
dump them not to interfere with the
market price. They do not want to loose
large amounts of money. But if China
sells all of them together US dollar may
crash and with it all China's financial
assets. What if US will print trillions
of dollars? US will loose, but also
China.
US is still the larger economy. Those
measures are affordable only if China is far
ahead of US. All this dumb cards will
backfire in less than 5 years. US sanctions
just showed the week points in China's
development. They will address them in order
to neutralize the effects. What should they
do? They have to look north and do what
Russia did. They will invest in software,
research, they will substitute the products.
They should just develop themselves
independent from US system. Also they will
gradually sale dollars and US Treasury.
1) banning the export of rare earths to the
US; (Hurts China exporters too)
2) blocking US companies' access to Chinese
markets; (US companies pull back US dollar
invested)
3) using China's portfolio of US Treasury
bonds to bring down the US government debt
market. (US buys back without a problem).
If China depends on this 3 matters, then it
has no Trump Cards,
President Xi's trade war is a threat, no
doubt. China's trade war against the United
States has resulted in hollowed out cities
where a once strong manufacturing sector
supported communities across the nation.
Have no illusions, this war that Xi is
waging against America is something that has
hurt us for thirty years and will likely
continue to do so. Best to fight back now
while we still can.
China will do none of these -- neoliberalism
is the reason. The key to imploding the
amerikan rat regime is to STOP buying
amerikan goods and especially services of
ANY kind...... much of the stuff is junk
anyway and can be replaced with far higher
quality goods and services available from
other states and nations.
Banning the export of rare earths to
the US....Not everything is that simple,
however. Should such a ban be
introduced, then Beijing will encounter
certain technical difficulties. If
sanctions are only imposed on US
companies, then they will still be able
to purchase the necessary materials
through Japanese or European straw
buyers, making the embargo pointless.
But if China imposes a total export ban,
then it won't just be US companies that
suffer but European ones as well,
leading to EU reprisals against Chinese
exporters to Europe. This would be very
painful for China, especially given the
economic war with the US that is making
access to European markets invaluable to
the Chinese economy.
Alternatively, China could impose quotas
on its exports to Japan and Europe based on
their current need of rare earth. It'll be
their prerogative if they want to re-export
to the US at (much higher) price. OR they
could use the US trademarked brute, thuggish
method of sanctioning those who dare to do
business with the US.
The second trump card mentioned by
the Global Times is blocking US
companies' access to the fast-growing
and extensive Chinese market. This
should be looked at from a political,
rather than economic, point of view
(although the latter may seem logical).
The aim of such restrictive measures is
not to inflict unacceptable damage on
the US economy, but to make the full
might of America's corporate lobbying
machine work against Donald Trump and
support his political opponents.
It takes more than corporate sponsorship
to get a presidential hopeful nominated.
It's really up to Deep State - the very same
Deep State that has allowed Trump launch and
take the trade war as far as he has now.
Trump's defeat in the poll would only
indicate Deep State's defeat in the trade
war with China. But the election of a new
president will not change the game. The
entire experience has left a bad taste in
China's mouth. They know about the shadow
government and no figure head will be able
to tame the angry dragon now. They could
demand the lasts of these corporations to
move and invest in China if they want access
to the 1.5 billion people's market. This
will facilitate more technology transfers or
the so-called "theft."
The third trump card involves China
dumping its portfolio of US Treasury
bonds. The Global Times writes: "China
holds more than $1 trillion of US
Treasury bonds. China made a great
contribution to stabilizing the US
economy by buying US debt during the
financial crisis in 2008. The US would
be miserable if China hits it when it is
down." One can conclude from this that
Beijing will most probably save dumping
its portfolio of US treasury bonds for
dessert – in that it will have the
biggest impact when the US stock market
is experiencing its next crisis.
Understanding that China may likely dump
their holdings, other nations (Japan, the
UK, Ireland, etc) might rush to dump theirs
before China gets the chance to have their
"dessert." Nobody wants to be left holding
the bag (of worthless treasury notes). So
it's not China's act of dumping that will
trigger the avalanche. It's the fear that
they might. So far, they are saying they
won't and giving no indication they would
for good reasons. They don't want to start
the panic now.
The Chinese have a fourth Trump
card..........stop doing business with the
U.S. all together. The U.S. does this with
Venezuela and it works very well at
collapsing the economy of the country.
The 5th option would be to get OPEC to stop
trading oil in dollars. Just that alone
would make the U.S. currency worthless, and
bring America to its knees. 9 of the
14 OPEC nations are already toying with the
idea of doing just that.
(Bloomberg) -- U.S. President Donald Trump's
decision to blacklist Huawei Technologies
Co. is making it more expensive to fatten up
China's seafood.
Futures on rapeseed meal,
which is used to feed China's massive
aquaculture industry, posted their longest
winning streak since October on expectations
supplies will tighten. The world's top fish
producer has stopped buying Canadian
rapeseed, also known as canola, for the
coming months -- a time when China usually
boosts purchases.
"There have so far been no purchases of
Canadian canola for arrival between April to
August," said Hou Xueling, an analyst at
Everbright Futures Co. That means "the bulls
could drive up prices to an unimaginable
level."
China, the largest buyer of Canadian
canola, typically increases imports from
April to August to make rapeseed meal. This
period is the peak demand season for its
fish farming sector, Hou said. The official
China National Grain and Oils Information
Center also confirmed that the Asian country
hasn't bought any Canadian canola for the
coming months.
The ongoing diplomatic spat after
Canada's arrest of Huawei's Chief Financial
Officer Meng Wanzhou late last year on a
U.S.
"I have been making this point for some time, that immigration leading to lower average
IQs, while bad, cannot logically lower scientific productivity because in absolute numbers
the talented fraction remains unaffected. There are still the same numbers of smart
people."
I wouldn't say that at all; or at least I would say the situation isn't quite what you may
think of it. Changing demographics* can certainly change economic/scientific/national policy,
perhaps disastrously so. Karlin's piece ends with an ominous reference to the Brazilian
president, but it just as easily might have been someone like America's AOC and her very
unwise 100% green energy in 10 years scheme. Changing demographics means more AOC's and more
turns at the economic disaster roulette wheel. In a democracy (or a representative republic),
it's easy for a lower IQ population to impose its disastrous ideas on the higher IQ former
majority; hence, the election of Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and the resultant economic
dysfunction.
In the future, not only will China produce quality scientific research, but efficiencies
conferred by its cultural and ethnic homogeneity may allow its corporations to out compete
American companies to a much greater degree than mere scientific discovery might otherwise
suggest. Additionally, China's economy will be so large that its companies will be able to
afford the massive R&D costs required for making ever more difficult discoveries. Their
smaller global competition likely won't be able to match spending, so China's corporations
could one day become far more dominant than you might anticipate. After all, it's really
about who can best exploit new discoveries and not just about who makes them first.
Otherwise, ancient China would have ruled the world; they invented paper, gunpowder, and the
compass.
Huawei was maybe 3% of the global smartphone market in Q4 of 2011 but it is set to pass
both Samsung and Apple in marketshare within the next five years. You see a bit of this
cultural/linguistic/ethnic homogeneity = efficiency phenomenon with the video game industry,
specifically in regards to competition between Sony and the much larger, but more
multicultural and less efficient Microsoft. Japan's Sony corporation dominates Microsoft in
sales just like their car companies dominate their American competition; GM was recently
chased out of Europe because it couldn't compete and none of these companies can sell
anything in Japan.
Also, notice that the EU core area has a white European population probably on par with
the white European-American population, but the US still has the greater share of scientific
discovery. I would posit this has much to do with the efficiency conferred by language
homogeneity in the United States (English) -- among other things. China in the future will
enjoy many of the same efficiencies the US has now, in terms of both language and culture.
And this is why India isn't as dynamic as some have predicted. Despite having a "smart
fraction", it is a low trust society deeply divided by color and class. Its leadership,
imposed by the lower IQ fraction, is also somewhat inept. The same fate awaits the United
States under current demographic trends.
*Has there been a single example of a global superpower in modern history that has lost
its ethnic majority but still retained functional status and prosperity over the long term?
Maybe Singapore (but they weren't a superpower), although I admittedly know little about that
country. Austria-Hungary? In any case, I would suspect the sample size here is far too small
to make any definitive prediction about the future of scientific discovery and resultant
economic success for the United States of America.
While the decision hasn't been made official, it was reported earlier this month by Canadian
military magazine Kanwa Asian Defense , which noted that Beijing won't just jump over to Linux
- and will instead develop their own over fears of US surveillance (and of course, in
retaliation for Huawei's blacklisting).
Thanks to the Snowden, Shadow Brokers, and Vault7 leaks, Beijing officials are well aware
of the US' hefty arsenal of hacking tools , available for anything from smart TVs to Linux
servers, and from routers to common desktop operating systems, such as Windows and Mac.
Since these leaks have revealed that the US can hack into almost anything, the Chinese
government's plan is to adopt a "security by obscurity" approach and run a custom operating
system that will make it harder for foreign threat actors -- mainly the US -- to spy on
Chinese military operations. -
ZDnet
The new OS will be developed by a newly established "Internet Security Information
Leadership Group" as reported by the
Epoch Times , citing Kanwa.
The group does not trust the "UNIX" multi-user, multi-stroke operating system either ,
which is used in some of the servers within the People's Liberation Army (PLA), Kanwa
reported. Therefore, Chinese authorities ordered to develop an operating system dedicated to
the Chinese military.
The group also believes that the German-developed programmable logic controller (PLC),
used in 70 percent of China's industrial control system today, poses huge risks to China's
national security . In its opinion, China is not a "network superpower," but merely a
"network giant," Kanwa reported. Therefore, Chinese authorities have laid out plans to
upgrade China's network -- to become more advanced in cyber technology. -
Epoch Times
Huawei, meanwhile, is dropping Android OS for its own operating system, code-named HongMeng.
It should be ready to launch in late 2019 domestically, and sometime in 2020 for international
markets, according to TechRadar .
Google announced on May 20 that it would partially cut off Huawei devices from using the
Android operating system, however the Mountain View - based company was given an extension
until August 19 by the White House. Other tech companies which have blacklisted Huawei include
Qualcomm, ARM, Micron and several tech industry standards organizations such as Bluetooth, SD
and WiFi alliances.
"Huawei knew this was coming and was preparing. The OS was ready in January 2018 and this
was our 'Plan B'. We did not want to bring the OS to the market as we had a strong relationship
with Google and others and did not want to ruin the relationship. Now, we are rolling it out
next month," said Huawei's Managing Director and VP of the Middle East Enterprise Business
Group.
The OS,
which could be called Ark OS when launched , is expected to be compatible with mobile
phones, computers, tablets, TVs, connected cars, smartwatch, smart wearables and others.
All applications that work with Android are expected to work with this new OS without any
need for further customization, Elshimy claims, adding that users will be able to download
apps from the Huawei AppGallery. - TechRadar
It is unknown whether apps available via Google's Play Store will be carried in Huawei's
store.
NEW HAVEN, Conn. (Project Syndicate) -- "When governments permit counterfeiting or copying
of American products, it is stealing our future, and it is no longer free trade." So said
President Ronald Reagan, commenting on Japan after the Plaza Accord was concluded in
September 1985.
Today resembles, in many respects, a remake of this 1980s movie, but with a
reality-television star replacing a Hollywood film star in the presidential leading role --
and with a new villain in place of Japan.
Back in the 1980s, Japan was portrayed as America's greatest economic threat -- not only
because of allegations of intellectual-property theft, but also because of concerns about
currency manipulation, state-sponsored industrial policy, a hollowing out of U.S.
manufacturing, and an outsize bilateral trade deficit.
In its standoff with the U.S., Japan ultimately blinked, but it paid a steep price for
doing so -- nearly three "lost" decades of economic stagnation and deflation. Today, the same
plot features China.
Notwithstanding both countries' objectionable mercantilism, Japan and China had something
else in common: They became victims of America's unfortunate habit of making others the
scapegoat for its own economic problems.
Like Japan bashing in the 1980s, China bashing today is an outgrowth of America's
increasingly insidious macroeconomic imbalances. In both cases, a dramatic shortfall in U.S.
domestic saving spawned large current-account and trade deficits, setting the stage for
battles, 30 years apart, with Asia's two economic giants.
Deficits made in America
When Reagan took office in January 1981, the net domestic saving rate stood at 7.8% of
national income, and the current account was basically balanced. Within two and a half years,
courtesy of Reagan's wildly popular tax cuts, the domestic saving rate had plunged to 3.7%,
and the current account and the merchandise trade balances swung into perpetual deficit.
In this important respect, America's so-called trade problem was very much of its own
making. Yet the Reagan administration was in denial. There was little or no appreciation of
the link between saving and trade imbalances. Instead, the blame was pinned on Japan, which
accounted for 42% of U.S. goods trade deficits in the first half of the 1980s.
Japan bashing then took on a life of its own with a wide range of grievances over unfair
and illegal trade practices. Leading the charge back then was a young deputy U.S. trade
representative named Robert Lighthizer. Fast-forward some 30 years and the similarities are
painfully evident.
Predictable decline in savings
Unlike Reagan, President Donald Trump did not inherit a U.S. economy with an ample
reservoir of saving. When Trump took office in January 2017, the net domestic saving rate was
just 3%, well below half the rate at the onset of the Reagan era. But, like his predecessor,
who waxed eloquently of a new "morning in America," Trump also opted for large tax cuts --
this time to "make America great again."
The U.S. national savings rate has fallen from 7.8% of GDP when Reagan took office to just
2.8% today. The result was a predictable widening of the federal budget deficit, which more
than offset the cyclical surge in private saving that normally accompanies a maturing
economic expansion. As a result, the net domestic saving rate actually edged down to 2.8% of
national income by late 2018, keeping America's international balances deep in the red --
with the current-account deficit at 2.6% of gross domestic product and the merchandise trade
gap at 4.5% in late 2018.
And that's where China assumes the role that Japan played in the 1980s. On the surface,
the threat seems more dire.
After all, China accounted for 48% of the U.S. merchandise trade deficit in 2018, compared
to Japan's 42% share in the first half of the 1980s. But the comparison is distorted by
global supply chains, which basically didn't exist in the 1980s.
Data from the OECD and the World Trade Organization suggest that about 35%-40% of the
bilateral U.S.-China trade deficit reflects inputs made outside of China but assembled and
shipped to the U.S. from China. That means the made-in-China portion of today's U.S. trade
deficit is actually smaller than Japan's share of the 1980s.
Like the Japan bashing of the 1980s, today's outbreak of China bashing has been
conveniently excised from America's broader macroeconomic context. That is a serious mistake.
Without raising national saving -- highly unlikely under the current U.S. budget trajectory
-- trade will simply be shifted away from China to America's other trading partners.
With this trade diversion likely to migrate to higher-cost platforms around the world,
American consumers will be hit with the functional equivalent of a tax hike.
Lighthizer as clueless today as he was then
Ironically, Trump has summoned the same Robert Lighthizer, veteran of the Japan trade
battles of the 1980s, to lead the charge against China. Unfortunately, Lighthizer seems as
clueless about the macro argument today as he was back then.
In both episodes, the U.S. was in denial, bordering on delusion.
Basking in the warm glow of untested supply-side economics -- especially the theory that
tax cuts would be self-financing -- the Reagan administration failed to appreciate the links
between mounting budget and trade deficits.
Today, the seductive power of low interest rates, coupled with the latest strain of voodoo
economics -- Modern Monetary Theory -- is equally alluring for the Trump administration and a
bipartisan consensus of China bashers in the Congress.
The tough macroeconomic constraints facing a saving-short U.S. economy are ignored for
good reason: there is no U.S. political constituency for reducing trade deficits by cutting
budget deficits and thereby boosting domestic saving.
America wants to have its cake and eat it, with a health-care system that swallows 18% of
its GDP, defense spending that exceeds the combined sum of the world's next seven largest
military budgets, and tax cuts that have reduced federal government revenue to 16.5% of GDP,
well below the 17.4% average of the past 50 years.
This remake of an old movie is disconcerting, to say the least. Once again, the U.S. has
found it far easier to bash others -- Japan then, China now -- than to live within its means.
This time, however, the movie might have a very different ending.
I use both. Up to Ubuntu with Mint. Plus Raspbian and Android.
But, for somethings, you can't beat Microsoft for ease of use and interoperability. I rip
and transcode my DVDs in Windows 7. I use Microsoft Office '13. Browse using Firefox, Thor
and Chrome. And I have some specific audio processing tools that only exist in Windows.
And if you are a Chinese military or other intelligence professional with access to a
"SIPR" class network it probably would be safe bet that US manufactured computer systems
and networking gear has been appropriately "modified" not to use those chipsets since long
before the "deal" of "deals" was made with the Yankee Dog ( http://www.911research.wtc7.net/wtc/groundzero/cleanup.html
) to send the remaining American technical manufacturing labor force out on the
street!...
Rinse and repeat for India's government intel and military professionals as well!....
Doesn't deal with the hardware back doors, but its a start. I do believe they have their own o/s already waiting after Kaspersky got banned a few years ago for finding both the hardware and s/w backdoors.
That hard disk firmware that called home was a classic.
Oh, yes. They're going to develop their own OS, just like Huawei. What ********. Huawei
will use vanilla android and China will pull an Apple, and rebrand Linux. But it sounds good,
to say you're going to crank out a brand new operating system, like it's a CRUD web app.
"... Since Apple gets 20% of its revenue from China and manufactures its iPhones (which generated 60% of its total 2018 revenue) there, few companies are as exposed to Beijing's retaliation. Apple has already been suffering in the region, seeing sliding revenue as consumers buy more phones from Huawei and other local brands. ..."
"... Citi warns that independent due diligence reveals " a less favorable brand image desire for iPhone and this has very recently deteriorated." As a result, Citi is materially lowering its sales and EPS estimates below consensus as China represents 18% of Apple sales "which we believe could be cut in half. " ..."
"Apple's iPhone, iPad, and Mac systems are at risk of experiencing demand
destruction due to collateral damage from the sales ban to Huawei."
U.S. companies such as Apple and Nike, which rely on China for a major part of their growth
and which have targets painted on their backs as Beijing and Washington ratchet up trade-war
tensions, are "bracing for China's retaliatory wrath" according to
Bloomberg
.
While Beijing has yet to formally retaliate after Trump blacklisted Huawei,
Chinese state media last week said China is "well armed to deliver counterpunches," without
giving specific details. And as companies await China's next move, there is rising, if
unwelcome, suspense over what form retaliation might take. Companies might "just have to
read the tea leaves on how their business operations are being treated,'' Erin Ennis, senior
vice president of the U.S.-China Business Council, said in an interview with Bloomberg
Television on Saturday.
As Bloomberg notes, one option China could use is from the 2017 "template" when relations
with South Korea deteriorated over Seoul's decision to deploy a missile shield. The
government curbed travel to South Korea, hurting cosmetics companies that rely on Chinese
tourists, while local authorities shut most of Lotte Shopping's China stores, alleging fire
safety violations. Consumers boycotted South Korean products, dealing a devastating blow to
Hyundai Motor sales. A similar pattern of action took place during the 2013 trade feud with
Japan which escalated over territorial disagreements in the East China Sea.
... ... ...
Since Apple gets 20% of its revenue from China and manufactures its iPhones (which generated 60% of its total 2018 revenue)
there, few companies are as exposed to Beijing's retaliation. Apple has already been suffering in the region, seeing sliding revenue
as consumers buy more phones from Huawei and other local brands. According to relatively optimistic research by Wedbush analyst Dan
Ives, blowback from Trump's Huawei ban could cost Apple about 3% to 5% of its iPhone sales in China.
... ... ...
Citi warns that independent due diligence reveals "
a less favorable brand image desire for iPhone and this has very
recently deteriorated."
As a result,
Citi is materially lowering its sales and EPS estimates below consensus as
China represents 18% of Apple sales "which we believe could be cut in half.
"
The article is devoid any technical substance and operated with value threat notion. As such this attempt of to spread FUD.
In this case the USA are fighting to preserve their technological edge by trying to destroy the leading China company which became a
competitor to domestic firms.
Control of Wi-Fi network is damaging to the targeted nation security. The question is: who would allow such a control? All
measures will be deployed against foreign powers exploitation.
But what about control of telecoms and putting NSA equipment directly in telecom data centers like the NSA practices
domestically and in vassal countries, for example, in Ukraine. And they manages to spy of Angela Merkel phone in Germany. Please
note that Germany is one of the most sophisticated technically nations in the world.
Notable quotes:
"... The anti-Huawei campaign intensified last week, when President Donald Trump signed an executive order that effectively banned the use of Huawei equipment in U.S. telecom networks on national security grounds and the Commerce Department put limits on the firm's purchasing of U.S. technology. Google's parent, Alphabet, suspended some of its business with Huawei , Reuters reported. ..."
"... The Americans are now campaigning aggressively to contain Huawei as part of a much broader effort to check Beijing's growing military might under President Xi Jinping. Strengthening cyber operations is a key element in the sweeping military overhaul that Xi launched soon after taking power in 2012, according to official U.S. and Chinese military documents. The United States has accused China of widespread, state-sponsored hacking for strategic and commercial gain. ..."
"... "Restricting Huawei from doing business in the U.S. will not make the U.S. more secure or stronger," the company said in a statement in response to questions from Reuters. Such moves, it said, would only limit "customers in the U.S. to inferior and more expensive alternatives." ..."
n early 2018, in a complex of low-rise buildings in the Australian capital, a team of government hackers was engaging in a
destructive digital war game.
The operatives – agents of the Australian Signals Directorate, the nation's top-secret eavesdropping agency – had been given a
challenge. With all the offensive cyber tools at their disposal, what harm could they inflict if they had access to equipment
installed in the 5G network, the next-generation mobile communications technology, of a target nation?
What the team found, say current and former government officials, was sobering for Australian security and political leaders: The
offensive potential of 5G was so great that if Australia were on the receiving end of such attacks, the country could be seriously
exposed. The understanding of how 5G could be exploited for spying and to sabotage critical infrastructure changed everything for
the Australians, according to people familiar with the deliberations.
Mike Burgess, the head of the signals directorate, recently explained why the security of fifth generation, or 5G, technology was so
important: It will be integral to the communications at the heart of a country's critical infrastructure - everything from electric
power to water supplies to sewage, he said in a March speech at a Sydney research institute.
Washington is widely seen as having taken the initiative in the global campaign against Huawei Technologies Co Ltd, a tech
juggernaut that in the three decades since its founding has become a pillar of Beijing's bid to expand its global influence. Yet
Reuters interviews with more than two dozen current and former Western officials show it was the Australians who led the way in
pressing for action on 5G; that the United States was initially slow to act; and that Britain and other European countries are
caught between security concerns and the competitive prices offered by Huawei.
The Australians had long harbored misgivings about Huawei in existing networks, but the 5G war game was a turning point. About six
months after the simulation began, the Australian government effectively banned Huawei, the world's largest maker of telecom
networking gear, from any involvement in its 5G plans. An Australian government spokeswoman declined to comment on the war game.
After the Australians shared their findings with U.S. leaders, other countries, including the United States, moved to restrict
Huawei.
The anti-Huawei campaign intensified last week, when President Donald Trump signed an executive order that effectively banned the
use of Huawei equipment in U.S. telecom networks on national security grounds and the Commerce Department put limits on the firm's
purchasing of U.S. technology. Google's parent, Alphabet,
suspended
some of its business with Huawei
, Reuters reported.
Until the middle of last year, the U.S. government largely "wasn't paying attention," said retired U.S. Marine Corps General James
Jones, who served as national security adviser to President Barack Obama. What spurred senior U.S. officials into action? A sudden
dawning of what 5G will bring, according to Jones.
"This has been a very, very fast-moving realization" in terms of understanding the technology, he said. "I think most people
were treating it as a kind of evolutionary step as opposed to a revolutionary step. And now that light has come on."
The Americans are now campaigning aggressively to contain Huawei as part of a much broader effort to check Beijing's growing
military might under President Xi Jinping. Strengthening cyber operations is a key element in the sweeping military overhaul
that Xi launched soon after taking power in 2012, according to official U.S. and Chinese military documents. The United
States has accused China of widespread, state-sponsored hacking for strategic and commercial gain.
If Huawei gains a foothold in global 5G networks, Washington fears this will give Beijing an unprecedented opportunity to
attack critical infrastructure and compromise intelligence sharing with key allies. Senior Western security officials say
this could involve cyber attacks on public utilities, communication networks and key financial centers.
In any military clash, such attacks would amount to a dramatic change in the nature of war, inflicting economic harm and
disrupting civilian life far from the conflict without bullets, bombs or blockades. To be sure, China would also be
vulnerable to attacks from the U.S. and its allies. Beijing complained in a 2015 defense document, "China's Military
Strategy," that it has already been a victim of cyber-espionage, without identifying suspects. Documents from the National
Security Agency leaked by American whistleblower Edward Snowden showed that the United States hacked into Huawei's systems,
according to media reports. Reuters couldn't independently verify that such intrusions took place.
However, blocking Huawei is a huge challenge for Washington and its closest allies, particularly the other members of the
so-called Five Eyes intelligence-sharing group – Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. From humble beginnings in the
1980s in the southern Chinese boom town of Shenzhen, Huawei has grown to become a technology giant that is deeply embedded
in global communications networks and poised to dominate 5G infrastructure. There are few global alternatives to Huawei,
which has financial muscle – the company reported revenue for 2018 jumped almost 20 percent to more than $100 billion – as
well as competitive technology and the political backing of Beijing.
"Restricting Huawei from doing business in the U.S. will not make the U.S. more secure or stronger," the company said in a
statement in response to questions from Reuters. Such moves, it said, would only limit "customers in the U.S. to inferior
and more expensive alternatives."
For countries that exclude Huawei there is a risk of retaliation from Beijing. Since Australia banned the company from its
5G networks last year, it has experienced disruption to its coal exports to China, including customs delays on the Chinese
side. In a statement, China's foreign ministry said it treated "all foreign coal equally" and that to assert "China has
banned the import of Australian coal does not accord with the facts."
Tension over Huawei is also exposing divisions in the Five Eyes group, which has been a foundation of the post-Second World
War Western security architecture. During a trip to London on May 8, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo issued a stark
warning to Britain, which has not ruled out using Huawei in its 5G networks. "Insufficient security will impede the United
States' ability to share certain information within trusted networks," he said. "This is exactly what China wants; they want
to divide Western alliances through bits and bytes, not bullets and bombs."
Chinese President Xi Jinping (left) is shown around the offices of Huawei in London by company founder Ren Zhengfei in 2015. Ren
has rejected allegations that Huawei would engage in espionage on behalf of the Chinese government. REUTERS/Matthew Lloyd/Pool
Employees work on a mobile phone production line at Huawei's factory campus in the southern Chinese city of Dongguan. Huawei has
eclipsed telecom equipment giants Ericsson and Nokia in terms of market share. REUTERS/Tyrone Siu
Huawei's 74-year old founder, Ren Zhengfei, is a former officer in China's military, the People's Liberation Army. "Mr. Ren
has always maintained the integrity and independence of Huawei," the company said. "We have never been asked to cooperate
with spying and we would refuse to do so under any circumstance."
In an interview with Reuters at the company's headquarters in Shenzhen, Eric Xu, a deputy chairman, said Huawei had not
allowed any government to install so-called backdoors in its equipment - illicit access that could enable espionage or
sabotage - and would never do so. He said 5G was more secure than earlier systems.
"China has not and will not demand companies or individuals use methods that run counter to local laws or via installing
'backdoors' to collect or provide the Chinese government with data, information or intelligence from home or abroad," the
Chinese foreign ministry said in a statement in response to questions from Reuters.
Washington argues that surreptitious backdoors aren't necessarily needed to wreak havoc in 5G systems. The systems will rely
heavily on software updates pushed out by equipment suppliers - and that access to the 5G network, says the United States,
potentially could be used to deploy malicious code.
So far, America hasn't publicly produced hard evidence that Huawei equipment has been used for spying.
Asked whether the United States was slow to react to potential threats posed by 5G, Robert Strayer, the State Department's
lead cyber policy diplomat, told Reuters that America had long been concerned about Chinese telecom companies, but that over
the past year, as 5G loomed closer, "we were starting to talk more and more with our allies." Banning Huawei from 5G
networks remains "an end goal," he said.
"... The sort of result that's to be expected from a Fire-Aim-Ready approach to policy making ..."
"... They're trying real hard to take a large company out of business without any evidence of said company doing anything wrong. Never even looked at them before but this definitely makes me want to get a Huawei phone next. And to stay well clear of everything from any US based company. ..."
"... Nothing here is really Huawei's fault - they're just the coincidental closest target to impact point of a greater trade war. All the posturing against Huawei specifically is just that - posturing. ..."
"... Basically it's because Mr. President is paranoid and somewhat crazy. A sane president would not be so childish, ..."
"... It's an empire in decline fighting the was for global supremacy, the democrats are just as crazy, not that I like Trump ..."
"... It's often said that wounded animals are the most dangerous. That's what this looks like to me. The US empire might be near dead, but one swipe of its huge tail can still break you if you get in the way. ..."
"... The US will never be as dominant as it was in the decades after WW II, but that was a one shot deal mainly because it had the only large industrial base that hadn't been blown to smithereens by the end of the war. ..."
"... Indeed. And how much have we heard about backdoors in Cisco and others here of late - it's a multiple, not a percentage. They all need a bit of pointing and laughing in a sense. IIRC, the telnet "backdoor" required one to be inside the LAN already...while the other baddies the Reg has reported on did not. ..."
No cybersecurity rules means networks are destined to be balkanized
... ... ...
One possible consequence, Steven Weber, professor of political science and international relations at UC Berkeley, told The Register
, is a world where boundaries are shaped more by technology standards than geographic features.
That is to say, we may be headed toward nationalized technology stacks that don't interoperate and nationalized supply chains.
This defeats the entire purpose of an open internet
... ... ...
Google has suspended Huawei's license to use its Android mobile operating system. The decision prevents the Chinese company from
adding Google services like Gmail, Google Maps, Play Store and other Google apps to new devices, though existing ones
will continue to function . It also complicates
security updates and all but guarantees Huawei will forge ahead with its rumored fork of the Android Open Source Project.
Microsoft has pulled the Huawei MateBook X Pro from its online store; Huawei devices are no longer available at BestBuy.com. At
Amazon.com, however, Huawei laptops, tablets and phones can still be had.
Huawei forward
Huawei could open up a branch company in the USA. Design, program, manufacture, and market those USA products as a USA company.
Nothing left to target.
Of course, still sending the profits home.
Re: Huawei forward
Also Chinese investors could buy a significant number of shares of US companies, making them suspect of Chinese affiliation, and
the US government will be faced with the dilemma of closing US companies. Re: Huawei forward
Trump conveniently forgets..
Anything that doesn't accord with his very, very limited world view. He also tends to forget which lies he told last time and
will happily contradict himself.. Re: Huawei forward
Unless the Chinese govt rolls over and declares Trump the winner of his trade war, apparently. If that happens, all the security
worries will blow away like a fart in the wind.
How does that work, exactly? Well, since Trump has never bothered to spell out what he wants the Chinese to do, he can declare
victory at any moment, but he wants a statement of surrender to show the faithful.
They're trying real hard to take a large company out of business without any evidence of said company doing anything wrong.
Never even looked at them before but this definitely makes me want to get a Huawei phone next. And to stay well clear of everything
from any US based company.
Nothing here is really Huawei's fault - they're just the coincidental closest target to impact point of a greater trade war.
All the posturing against Huawei specifically is just that - posturing.
But that's not the same as saying the greater trade war is without merit. It absolutely makes a difference how overall trade
between the US and China is structured, and a certain segment of our market has been saying for a long time that we had the short
end of the stick here and needed to change things. Even the El Reg author acknowledged that.
Of course it's much more complex to ask whether this tactic is actually going to fix anything, or just make things worse. Your
mileage may vary.
And I can imagine that if you are neither an American nor a Chinese citizen, then you don't really stand to gain anything from
this fight no matter who wins, so it's understandable if you're more frustrated than anything else. I don't blame anyone for not
wanting to jump into a fight that doesn't affect them - just remember that it does affect someone else.
It will be interesting to see what the Chinese targets are going to be. Probably GM and farmers since that hits Trump's base
- just as electioneering starts for 2020.
Then wait for Boeing to be really suffering from the 737Max before announcing a ban on Boeing in China (airbus manufacture there)
There is a lot of 'good ole boy' stuff that goes into every Airbus plane no matter where it is made so Trump could easily stop
Airbus from operating in China.
China could retaliate by treatening to start calling in all the US Debt that it carries. That will sink the DOW in a flash.
The Trump bubble will burst and he'll be impeached (well that's what I hope)
The Yuan could easily replace the USD as the world's currency.
Trump had better watch out or this will end badly for him. His grasp of history relating to trade wars can probably be measured
on a pinhead.
It's often said that wounded animals are the most dangerous. That's what this looks like to me. The US empire might be near
dead, but one swipe of its huge tail can still break you if you get in the way.
I seem to remember the same being said in the 80s when it was Japan that had the huge trade advantage over the US. Now granted
China is FAR larger and will easily overtake the US as world's largest economy without its per capita GDP needing to exceed 30%
of the US's, but like Japan did with its aging population China has some demographic challenges awaiting it when the parents of
the two "one child" generations reach retirement age, which is just beginning.
The US will never be as dominant as it was in the decades after WW II, but that was a one shot deal mainly because it had the
only large industrial base that hadn't been blown to smithereens by the end of the war.
Indeed. And how much have we heard about backdoors in Cisco and others here of late - it's a multiple, not a percentage. They
all need a bit of pointing and laughing in a sense. IIRC, the telnet "backdoor" required one to be inside the LAN already...while
the other baddies the Reg has reported on did not.
What makes the Huawei router telnet backdoor (now patched) unusual is that for 8 long years GCHQ has been code-reviewing Huawei
products in a dedicated department. Didn't that include routers?
Japanese CPU designer Arm has a facility in Austin, Texas, USA, that validates Arm-compatible and licensed chip designs for
customers around the world, including those in China, and thus is restricted by the White House's latest crackdown.
Moral of this story. Don't do business with the US, they will turn on you whenever it's financially beneficial for them and
unilaterally break deals, without any means for recourse.
An unreliable partner. Like any other bully, best to let them play in the sandbox by themselves.
What is interesting is that Huawei got some fundamental patents in connection to 5G, without licensing these patents there
will be no 5G role out, and Nokia and Ericsson are at least 1 year behind Huawei in development of 5G ...
This is political, and is being used by Trump to get China to move on the Trade agreement, which he want to "fix", but it might
end up causing the rollout of 5G to be delayed by years.
"What are the Chinese going to do - sue them in Federal court ?"
What could happen is that Huawei starts to sue every competitor, in every market the competitor sells in, whose competing products
use the components they're not allowed to use on the basis of unfair competition, illegal government subsidy or whatever fits
in the jurisdiction. There are a lot more courts around the world than Federal courts.
As if the US is goi g to honour those patents when it's no longer convenient.
International law is for everyone else, just look at the US' violations of the the Venezuan embassy in Washington and railroading
the UN's investigation into US war crimes.
We have a US govt that thinks that 'might makes right'. Literally the definition of a rogue state.
"The 'backdoor' that Bloomberg refers to is Telnet, which is a protocol that is commonly used by many vendors in the industry
for performing diagnostic functions. It would not have been accessible from the internet," said the telco in a statement to The Register,
adding: "Bloomberg is incorrect in saying that this 'could have given Huawei unauthorized access to the carrier's fixed-line network
in Italy'.
Remember it was Bloomberg that published the article about motherboards that were made in China having an extra chip that 'leaked'
stuff back to china.
Apple and Supermicro were the main targets (amongst others).
Both companies undertook extensive investigations and found no evidence of these chips.
Despite repeated appeals Bloomberg refused to relase their evidence to the world.
To me this implies that it was a bit of fiction designed to make certain stocks go down so that shorters could make a killing.
People may take it for granted that their 'phones work everywhere but it was not ever thus. I used to have to borrow a tri-band
'phone for visits to the US. My normal mobile worked everywhere except the US. Later on I had the same problem with South Korea.
There was a time (back in the analogue TV days) when a TV bought in one European country wouldn't work in many of the others.
Digital TV is based on common underlying compression standards. (Although, even here there is scope for creating artificial incompatibilities.)
Unfortunately there is no common transmission standard, although DVB satellite transmission schemes are fairly widely adopted.
People can now move almost anywhere in the world reasonably cheaply. Some of their gadgets are useless outside their home country.
Many of these problems are caused by "special interest groups", manufacturer inspired protectionism and plain political stupidity.
People can now move almost anywhere in the world reasonably cheaply. Some of their gadgets are useless outside their home
country.
Many outside electrical gadgets have problems in the USA. They use a different voltage and AC frequency from that used by developed
countries. Happily, that means that their stuff doesn't work outside the "land of the fee".
The Trump administration has started a trade war with China, which has responded in kind. Trade wars eventually come to an
end even if it takes a long time. The "Cold War" with the Soviet Union was carried out as both an arms race, and a trade war and
while that took 45 years to conclude, it did end.
Masking the US/China trade war as a security issue doesn't work very well. Threatening to stop the sale of mobile phones using
a US designed open source operating system because of concerns about security holes in a yet to be rolled out 5g core network
is a weak argument. If there are 5G issues, why not 4G?. Where is the evidence, given that Huawei have set up a joint venture
with GCHQ to examine the core network software.? Is this another "Weapons of Mass Destruction" report where we are asked to believe
without evidence. We all ended up with egg on our collective faces then. Tony Blair's reputation was, and still is, trashed. May's
reputation could similarly ............ (Ok, I concede that would be a stretch!)
The weakest part of the argument is that it denies itself a way out when the trade war ends (or is suspended). Donald and Xi
could come to a truce tomorrow (a beautiful victory?) but that would leave the declared security issues unresolved. If the US
removes the trade ban on Huawei surely they will be letting Chinese spying tools into strategic national networks. What about
the mobile phones?. They are said to be a security risk now because the US (parroted by 5 eyes) says so. That won't magically
disappear because the US and China come to an agreement on steel imports. Will the UK and other countries who have followed the
lead of the US similarly change track when the US and China make up. ?
We are following our special relationship partners down a deep rabbit hole based on the assertions of some highly suspect political
operators.
Well said. Much of this problem is due to the deregulation of Corporate financials. I'm not a finance person so am not sure
that's the correct term. What I'm talking about is at the time of globalization/free trade when RRSPs were allowed to participate
in corporate stock outside of national scope. Such was the case in Canada at the time. Since then, these corporations outsource
as much work as possible to developing economies to reduce cost and most no longer have any R&D worth mentioning, all in the name
of increasing profit for the Ponzi/Pyramid scheme that is the deregulated stock market and that is effect of changing the corporate
tax burden. Since the late 1970s corporations have been able to increasingly buy their own taxation system, it seems. The more
regulated, or in authoritarian regimes financially controlled, corporations still seem to have effective R&D.
The above boils down to the populace having been duped by bad faith politicians. As much I don't like Trump and his crazy train
this all started a long time before him.
Actually, the politicians themselves were duped by the bad faith bankers and in general people who got compensated in options.
It can even look like good intentions.
The deregulation that allowed for evil things like CDS (being able to buy fire insurance on your neighbor's house...without
his knowledge, and even get a can of gasoline in the deal) - was sold as a way to make getting loans easier for minorities so
they could buy homes and have a stake in society - a good thing that would result in less crime and violence and more self-policing.
What it actually was is more interesting - in the insurance biz it's illegal to sell insurance to other than the entity directly
involved, and there are also regulations that the insurance company has to keep the buck to pay claims in hand - this was all
missing from the Frank-Clinton removal of Glass Steagall.
The road to hell is indeed paved with good intentions, or at least can be sold as such.
In hindsight, we know that some of the financialization tech new instruments invented as a result by Blythe Masters of JP Morgan
and some others developed in the City of London turned out to be "weapons of financial mass destruction".
There was plenty of blame to go around (in this case the left side of the aisle started the ball rolling, but...no one was
at all innocent). From the banks making loans that were obviously never going to be paid off - no need to care as now Goldman
Sachs, AIG, JP Morgan, and of course Deutsche bank were standing there buying the loans to sell tranches at a profit - to the
people taking those loans, to the people buying the tranches of them....
If so I think it is time for China to take Taiwan back.
That wouldn't the US modus operandus. There'd need to be a false flag operation like the USS Liberty (but done without exposing
it's actually a false flag.
USS Liberty a false flag operation - ahh setting up a US intelligence vessel to be shot up by the Israelis. How did rhapsody
work or were they hit by US aircraft in disguise?
Wow. The Americans have certainly let their paranoia show immensely
But this move of what they have done is bassically similar to what the USA were claiming Huawei and China could do shutting
off 5G services because of their kit
America certainty have a paranoid schizophrenia mental illness building
"Are you now or were you ever a member of the Communist party" questions of the 1950's. The reds under every bed paranoia of
that age is alive and kicking.
Yeah, I had to answer that one for a security clearance in the '70's myself. One wonders how Brennan, Chief of CIA for the
previous admin, was an avowed communist yet still managed to get that job?
His role in the current thrashing is interesting to say the least.
Brennan is not an "avowed communist". That lie came about based on the fact that he voted for Gus Hall, the Communist Party
presidential candidate in 1976. There is no evidence that Brennan himself was ever a member of the Communist Party or even that
his political viewpoint is communist generally.
But that his political enemies consider calling him a communist to be an effective attack says a lot about American paranoia.
Ok: Trump is a nasty, corrupt, ignorant child and his motivations in this are probably as petty and wrong as is ever the case.
And you can't ignore the fact that this is happening in the context of a wider trade war, which, while it may have some logical
underpinnings (China does steal and cheat on a an epic scale) is also contaminated by the Orange Idiot's floundeing incompetence
and wayward spite.
So I am no apologist for Trump or his toxically incompetent administration: it may actually be almost as vile as the Chinese
regime at this point in time.
But the fact that the attack on Huawei is being mounted by people who are stupid, ignorant and explicitly odious doesn't mean
it is the wrong thing to do.
I've said before that it is irrelevant whether Huawei has been caught producing dodgy hard- or software and I have framed my
point in terms of capabilities and intentions: emphasising that capabilities are what count here.
It's simply this: China has an authoritarian, undemocratic, repressive, ofttimes murderous regime; it ruthlessly oppresses
minorities among its citizens; practises draconian censorship; has shown every sign of territorial aggressiveness and growing
military adventurism; is building up its armed forces at a worrying rate; is becoming ever wealthier and more powerful; and has
the ability both in technological know-how and in industrial capacity to supply a sizeable fraction of the free world's communications
and computing infrastructure. With no checks or balances or transparency, the Chinese state could compel any of its companies
to do whatever it wishes ("Make this happen for us, and keep your mouths shut about it, or next month you will be executed for
corruption"), and every aspect of its behaviour in the last 20 years proves that it will use technology -- a wonderful equaliser
in the world of asymmetric warfare -- for its own ends, lying, stealing and cheating at every turn. I don't see how this is even
a controversial statement by this point.
So the question is not what China intends, but what it can do, and this ought to worry us very badly. Given everything
we know of China's government, it would be suicidally stupid to gift it with power, influence or any kind of entry into
our just-about-free societies.
As the west wakes up to the threat of China, actual conflict becomes ever more likely (I would personally suggest, inevitable,
unless regime change occurs, which seems most improbable). China will become ever more strongly motivated to resort to technological
sabotage and espionage. Right now we don't want China stealing data on our (for example) nuclear submarine fleet. If it comes
to conflict, we don't want them bricking those boats while they're still dockside.
So Huawei is just the start. China certainly could use its companies for malign ends: so we must act protectively, as if it
is doing so, and will do so in the future.
"So the question is not what China intends, but what it can do"
This goes against pretty much every standard the Western world stands for. China COULD compel Huawei to put in backdoors. But
then again Huawei kit is probably the most closely-studied kit in the world, and it is trivially easy to compare firmware releases
to make sure that the kit you have is running the same version as a trusted reference version. It might be more difficult to check
that the hardware you get isn't a one-off specially modified version instead of the standard one, but the organisations likely
to be targeted in this way are either big enough to have the resources for deep checks or would not be buying Huawei kit anyway.
For the vast majority of commercial customers and 100% of retail customers, having eg GCHQ check out the kit is a perfectly
acceptable safeguard, indeed one which they do not even get from other vendors' kit (eg Cisco) which might be backdoored with
other countries' spying malware.
A, buy kit from china and check it for backdoors, weaknesses, vulnerabilities.
C, buy kit from a company HQ in Finland (but with chips made all over the world) and don't bother checking for any flaws, vulnerabilities
etc but trust it implicitly cos Finns are really nice people.
And therein is the problem. It is not pres Trump, he is only supporting the US 3 letter agencies and they are the ones with
the big problem. Their problem is that they want to put backdoors in Huawei networking equipment but if they do that it
means that the Chinese government will have samples of the US spying software and there is the big problem. The 3 letter agencies
can only see one way out of that and it is banning Huawei equipment, in their eyes that makes the problem go away and leaves their
spying on the population as normal using the so called American equipment.;
"deal with longstanding issues like government favoritism toward local companies"
How is it that that can be a point of contention ? Name me one country in this world that doesn't favor local companies.
These people company representatives who are complaining about local favoritism would be howling like wolves
if Huawei was given favor in the US over any one of them.
I'm not saying that there are no reasons to be unhappy about business with China, but that is not one of them.
Here's the problem. Lets say the sake of argument Huawei is not guilty of
putting spyware in their 5G stuff. How would they prove it? They basically given out there
source code, and apart from such slack security features nothing was found, but that was
apparently no enough.
Apart from proving a negative there is nothing they can do. I'm not saying that China is not
a repressive regime, but to be honest I don't think they have the resources to filter out the
juicy bits of the 5G traffic, and have enough on their hands just monitoring their internal
massive population without having to take on the US as well. And why should they, since the NSA
is already doing such a great job of it already.
The problem is that the great Orange one and is motley collection of right wing hawks are
thinking that is what i would do in China's place and getting themselves lathered up in a right
wing frenzy where they see reds under every bed.
If China was smart (and they are), what they should do is announce that all Apple phones are
banned in China and all Chinese companies are not allowed to do business with Apple, until
Apple can prove they do not provide back doors for the US government in their equipment. I
wonder what effect a 10% drop in apple share price and all those pension funds that depend on
them will have
..and we're all going to be poorer for it. Americans, Chinese and bystanders.
I was recently watching the WW1 channel on youtube (awesome thing, go Indy and team!) - the
delusion, lack of situational understanding and short sightedness underscoring the actions of
the main actors that started the Great War can certainly be paralleled to the situation
here.
The very idea that you can manage to send China 40 years back in time with no harm on your
side is bonkers.
"... The ban might actually provide a bit of a boost to other software developers, if it prompts users to look beyond the Google offerings that came with their phone and seek out some alternatives. In most cases, the alternatives are far better. ..."
Currently everybody else is losing. Forcing other countries (supposedly friends and
allies) to abandon equipment of one manufacturer for that of your own company is not very
nice and for us quite expensive. And that is not even factoring in the known fact that some
of these manufacturers had backdoors in their equipment - for which actual proof exists. So
considering our own national security we should forbid companies to do business with e.g.
Cisco...
Powerful is not the same as lawful, no matter what those in positions of power might claim
or like to imagine.
Is this a distinction worth making? Yes, because otherwise law enforcement officers come
to think that their word is law, and that they are themselves above the law. The result of
that is a police state.
Probably true. Huawei are probably just collateral damage in the inevitable socio-economic
conflict between the US and China. The US is used to running the world (not especially well
if you ask me). China with four times the population and an economy about the same size as
the US that is growing much faster doesn't actually seem to have that much interest in
running the world. But since the US is run by folks with no principles, poor memories, few
useful skills,and no planning ability whatsoever, I have to guess that the Chinese will "win"
in the long run.
Pretty irritating that Huawei is simply leverage while the US and China thrash out a trade
deal.
I have a Mate 10 Pro and the best phone I've had, was planning to go for the Mate 30 Pro
when it comes out.
Reckon I still will, I've already been reducing dependence on Google before this happened
anyway. I'll have to shift my business email over to ProtonMail like I already do with my
personal accounts. I'm trying out OSM instead of gmaps. I've already ditched gplay music.
Just need Proton calendar which is in development and that's another service binned off.
Not sure what's going to happen with apps I've bought through Google and have active subs
though...
The problem isn't the apps you use, there certainly are equivalents of the Google ones.
But they still mostly rely on the Google Play API to interface with your phones devices and
storage mechanisms. OSM is a pretty good replacement for gmaps, but will be of little use
without Google Location Services.
Will the ban actually prevent anyone using a Huawei device from accessing a Google service
(eg. Gmail) or just prevent them from downloading the official Google apps to do so? I
suspect the latter as the first would seem impossible to police. In which case there are
better alternatives out there.
The ban might actually provide a bit of a boost to other software developers, if it
prompts users to look beyond the Google offerings that came with their phone and seek out
some alternatives. In most cases, the alternatives are far better.
For email, try AquaMail. Easily handles my many email addresses split across Gmail, own
domains using Google's mailservers, Yandex and own domains using Yandex's mailservers.
OSMAnd+ provides as good mapping as Google Maps (better in remote and off-road areas), is
much more customiseable and you can download entire country maps to your phone, without
pissing about with Google Maps's silly area selection download. And its navigation is pretty
decent, lthough it lacks the Googley stuff like weather and nearest junk food shop
listings.
Wire is an encrypted messaging/video-calling/VOIP app, offering everything Hangouts (or
whatever Google's offering is called this week) does.
Yandex browser or Kiwi browser are Chrome but with added support for extensions
PulseSMS is text messaging with built in backup and the ability to send and receive SMS
through your phone from your laptop.
You can put backdoor in the router. The problem is that you will never be able to access it.
also for improtant deployment countires inpect the source code of firmware. USA is playing dirty
games here., no matter whether Chinese are right or wrong.
They're not necessarily silos. If you design a network as a flat space with all interactions
peer to peer then you have set yourself the problem of ensuring all nodes on that network are
secure and enforcing traffic rules equally on each node. This is impractical -- its not that if
couldn't be done but its a huge waste of resources. A more practical strategy is to layer the
network, providing choke points where traffic can be monitored and managed. We currently do
this with firewalls and demilitarized zones, the goal being normally to prevent unwanted
traffic coming in (although it can be used to monitor and control traffic going out). This has
nothing to do with incompatible standards.
I'm not sure about the rest of the FUD in this article. Yes, its all very complicated. But
just as we have to know how to layer our networks we also know how to manage our information.
For example, anyone who as a smartphone that they co-mingle sensitive data and public access
on, relying on the integrity of its software to keep everything separate, is just plain asking
for trouble. Quite apart from the risk of data leakage between applications its a portable
device that can get lost, stolen or confiscated (and duplicated.....). Use common sense. Manage
your data.
"... The real issue is the semiconductors - the actual silicon. ..."
"... China has some fabs now, but far too few to handle even just their internal demand - and tech export restrictions have long kept their leading edge capabilities significantly behind the cutting edge. ..."
"... On the flip side: Foxconn, Huawei et al are so ubiquitous in the electronics global supply chain that US retail tech companies - specifically Apple - are going to be severely affected, or at least extremely vulnerable to being pushed forward as a hostage. ..."
Internet, phones, Android aren't the issue - except if the US is able to push China out of
GSM/ITU.
The real issue is the semiconductors - the actual silicon.
The majority of raw silicon wafers as well as the finished chips are created in the US or
its most aligned allies: Japan, Taiwan. The dominant manufacturers of semiconductor equipment
are also largely US with some Japanese and EU suppliers.
If Fabs can't sell to China, regardless of who actually paid to manufacture the chips,
because Applied Materials has been banned from any business related to China, this is pretty
severe for 5-10 years until the Chinese can ramp up their capacity.
China has some fabs now, but far too few to handle even just their internal demand - and
tech export restrictions have long kept their leading edge capabilities significantly behind
the cutting edge.
On the flip side: Foxconn, Huawei et al are so ubiquitous in the electronics global supply
chain that US retail tech companies - specifically Apple - are going to be severely affected,
or at least extremely vulnerable to being pushed forward as a hostage.
"... The British aerospace sector (not to be confused with the company of a similar name but more Capital Letters) developed, amongst other things, the all-flying tailplane, successful jet-powered VTOL flight, noise-and drag-reducing rotor blades and the no-tailrotor systems and were promised all sorts of crunchy goodness if we shared it with our wonderful friends across the Atlantic. ..."
"... We shared and the Americans shafted us. Again. And again. And now *they* are bleating about people not respecting Intellectual Property Rights? ..."
"Without saying so publicly, they're glad there's finally some effort to deal with longstanding issues
like government favoritism toward local companies, intellectual property theft, and forced technology
transfers."
The British aerospace sector (not to be confused with the company of a similar name but more Capital
Letters) developed, amongst other things, the all-flying tailplane, successful jet-powered VTOL flight,
noise-and drag-reducing rotor blades and the no-tailrotor systems and were promised all sorts of crunchy
goodness if we shared it with our wonderful friends across the Atlantic.
We shared and the Americans shafted us. Again. And again. And now *they* are bleating about people not
respecting Intellectual Property Rights?
And as for moaning about backdoors in Chinese kit, who do Cisco et al report to again? Oh yeah, those
nice Three Letter Acronym people loitering in Washington and Langley...
A claimed deliberate spying "backdoor" in Huawei routers used in the core of Vodafone
Italy's 3G network was, in fact, a Telnet -based remote debug interface.
The Bloomberg financial newswire reported this morning that Vodafone had found
"vulnerabilities going back years with equipment supplied by Shenzhen-based Huawei for the
carrier's Italian business".
"Europe's biggest phone company identified hidden backdoors in the software that could have
given Huawei unauthorized access to the carrier's fixed-line network in Italy,"
wailed the newswire.
Unfortunately for Bloomberg, Vodafone had a far less alarming explanation for the deliberate
secret "backdoor" – a run-of-the-mill LAN-facing diagnostic service, albeit a hardcoded
undocumented one.
"The 'backdoor' that Bloomberg refers to is Telnet, which is a protocol that is commonly
used by many vendors in the industry for performing diagnostic functions. It would not have
been accessible from the internet," said the telco in a statement to The Register ,
adding: "Bloomberg is incorrect in saying that this 'could have given Huawei unauthorized
access to the carrier's fixed-line network in Italy'.
"This was nothing more than a failure to remove a diagnostic function after
development."
It added the Telnet service was found during an audit, which means it can't have been that
secret or hidden: "The issues were identified by independent security testing, initiated by
Vodafone as part of our routine security measures, and fixed at the time by Huawei."
Huawei itself told us: "We were made aware of historical vulnerabilities in 2011 and 2012
and they were addressed at the time. Software vulnerabilities are an industry-wide challenge.
Like every ICT vendor we have a well-established public notification and patching process, and
when a vulnerability is identified we work closely with our partners to take the appropriate
corrective action."
Prior to removing the Telnet server, Huawei was said to have insisted in 2011 on using the
diagnostic service to configure and test the network devices. Bloomberg reported, citing a
leaked internal memo from then-Vodafone CISO Bryan Littlefair, that the Chinese manufacturer
thus refused to completely disable the service at first:
Vodafone said Huawei then refused
to fully remove the backdoor, citing a manufacturing requirement. Huawei said it needed the
Telnet service to configure device information and conduct tests including on Wi-Fi, and
offered to disable the service after taking those steps, according to the document.
El Reg understands that while Huawei indeed resisted removing the Telnet
functionality from the affected items – broadband network gateways in the core of
Vodafone Italy's 3G network – this was done to the satisfaction of all involved parties
by the end of 2011, with another network-level product de-Telnet-ised in 2012.
Broadband network gateways in 3G UMTS mobile networks are described in technical detail in
this Cisco (sorry)
PDF . The devices are also known as Broadband Remote Access Servers and sit at the edge of
a network operator's core.
Plenty of other things (cough, cough, Cisco) to panic about
Characterising this sort of Telnet service as a covert backdoor for government spies is a
bit like describing your catflap as an access portal that allows multiple species to pass
unhindered through a critical home security layer. In other words, massively over-egging the
pudding.
Many Reg readers won't need it explaining, but Telnet is a routinely used method of
connecting to remote devices for management purposes. When deployed with appropriate security
and authentication controls in place, it can be very useful. In Huawei's case, the Telnet
service wasn't facing the public internet, and was used to set up and test devices.
Look, it's not great that this was hardcoded into the equipment and undocumented – it
was, after all, declared a security risk – and had to be removed after some pressure.
However, it's not quite the hidden deliberate espionage backdoor for Beijing that some
fear.
Twitter-enabled infoseccer Kevin Beaumont also shared his thoughts on the story,
highlighting the number of vulns in equipment from Huawei competitor Cisco, a US firm:
For example, a pretty bad remote access hole was discovered in some Cisco
gear , which the mainstream press didn't seem too fussed about. Ditto hardcoded root
logins in Cisco video surveillance boxes. Lots of things unfortunately ship with insecure
remote access that ought to be removed; it's not evidence of a secret backdoor for state
spies.
Given Bloomberg's previous history of trying to break tech news, when it claimed that tiny
spy chips were being secretly planted on
Supermicro server motherboards – something that left the rest of the tech world
scratching its collective head once the initial dust had settled – it may be best to take
this latest revelation with a pinch of salt. Telnet wasn't even mentioned in
the latest report from the UK's Huawei Cyber Security Evaluation Centre, which savaged
Huawei's pisspoor software development practices.
While there is ample evidence in the public domain that Huawei is doing badly on the
basics of secure software development, so far there has been little that tends to show it
deliberately implements hidden espionage backdoors. Rhetoric from the US alleging Huawei is a
threat to national security seems to be having the opposite effect around the world.
With Bloomberg, an American company, characterising Vodafone's use of Huawei equipment as
"defiance" showing "that countries across Europe are willing to risk rankling the US in the
name of 5G preparedness," it appears that the US-Euro-China divide on 5G technology suppliers
isn't closing up any time soon. ®
Bootnote
This isn't shaping up to be a good week for Bloomberg. Only yesterday High Court judge Mr
Justice Nicklin
ordered the company to pay up £25k for the way it reported a live and ongoing
criminal investigation.
"... The US Department of Commerce said it would put Huawei on its so-called Entity List, meaning that the American companies will have to obtain a licence from the US government to sell technology to Huawei. At the same time, US president Donald Trump signed an executive order declaring the US telecoms sector faced a "national emergency" -- giving the commerce department the power to "prohibit transactions posing an unacceptable risk" to national security . ..."
"... "The US has basically openly declared it is willing to engage in a full-fledged technology war with China," he said. ..."
"... Huawei has few alternatives for critical semiconductors to Qualcomm, which would likely be denied an export license if the US follows through on its threat of putting Huawei on the "Entity List" (the second most stringent category, but still sufficient for the US to bar licensing). One is Murata, but Japan has joined the US ban on Huawei 5G products, and would presumably fall in line if the US were to ask Japan to tell Murata not to sell semiconductors to Huawei. ..."
"... On top of that, Ethiopian Air's forceful criticism of the 737 Max gives China air cover. Unlike Lion Air, which is widely seen as a questionable operator, readers who fly emerging economy carriers give Ethiopian Air high marks for competence and safety. One even wrote, "I have flown Ethiopian Air. It's certainly far better than Irish-owned and operated Ryan Airlines (even though the latter has white pilots with nice Irish accents)." ..."
"... Chinese interests have made large investments many countries in Africa, so it's conceivable it could get other countries on the continent to follow its lead. Admittedly, China plus those countries collectively may not be large enough to do considerable damage to Boeing. But this action would break the hegemony of the FAA as certifier for US manufacturers, and that could prove crippling in the long run. ..."
The White House and US Department of Commerce took steps on Wednesday night that would in effect ban Huawei from selling technology
into the American market, and could also prevent it from buying semiconductors from suppliers including Qualcomm in the US that are
crucial for its production .
The US Department of Commerce said it would put Huawei on its so-called Entity List, meaning that the American companies will
have to obtain a licence from the US government to sell technology to Huawei. At the same time, US president Donald Trump signed
an executive order declaring the US telecoms sector faced a "national emergency" -- giving the commerce department the power to "prohibit
transactions posing an unacceptable risk" to national security .
Paul Triolo, a technology policy expert at Eurasia Group, a risk consultancy, said it was a "huge development" that would not
only hurt the Chinese company but also have an impact on global supply chains involving US companies such as Intel, Microsoft and
Oracle.
"The US has basically openly declared it is willing to engage in a full-fledged technology war with China," he said.
Huawei has few alternatives for critical semiconductors to Qualcomm, which would likely be denied an export license if the
US follows through on its threat of putting Huawei on the "Entity List" (the second most stringent category, but still sufficient
for the US to bar licensing). One is Murata, but Japan has joined the US ban on Huawei 5G products, and would presumably fall in
line if the US were to ask Japan to tell Murata not to sell semiconductors to Huawei.
The advantages of China going after Boeing, as opposed to making life miserable for US technology companies, would be considerable.
Targeting, say, Microsoft would be an obvious tit for tat. By contrast, China was the first country to ground the 737 Max, and its
judgment was confirmed by other airline regulators and eventually the FAA. China does not have a credible competitor to Boeing, so
it could wrap continued denial of certification of the 737 Max in the mantle of being pro-safety, even if independent parties suspected
this was a secondary motive.
On top of that, Ethiopian Air's forceful criticism of the 737 Max gives China air cover. Unlike Lion Air, which is widely
seen as a questionable operator, readers who fly emerging economy carriers give Ethiopian Air high marks for competence and safety.
One even wrote, "I have flown Ethiopian Air. It's certainly far better than Irish-owned and operated Ryan Airlines (even though the
latter has white pilots with nice Irish accents)."
Chinese interests have made large investments many countries in Africa, so it's conceivable it could get other countries on
the continent to follow its lead. Admittedly, China plus those countries collectively may not be large enough to do considerable
damage to Boeing. But this action would break the hegemony of the FAA as certifier for US manufacturers, and that could prove crippling
in the long run.
Another issue that hasn't gotten the attention it warrants is that Boeing appears to lack the stringent software development protocols
necessary for "fly by wire" operations. Boeing historically has relied on pilots being able to reassert control over automated functions';
Airbus has "fly by wire" systems as far more prominent and accordingly the expectation and ability of pilots to override these systems
is lower.
However, many articles noted that MCAS took the 737 further into a fly-by-wire philosophy than it had been before. Yet Boeing
was astonishingly lax, having only two angle of attack sensors, of which only one would be providing input to MCAS, and then on an
arbitrary-seeming basis.
By contrast, the Airbus philosophy stresses redundancy, not only in hardware -- they use not three but four angle of attack sensors
-- but in software, and even software development. "Two or more independent flight control computing systems are installed using
different types of microprocessors and software written in different languages by different development teams" and verified using
formal methods (" Approaches
to Assure Safety in Fly-By-Wire Systems: Airbus Vs. Boeing ").
Microsoft will reportedly become the latest tech giant to 'suspend' its relationship with
Huawei, according to
the South China Morning Post .
One week after Washington first imposed strict limits on Huawei and its affiliates that will
make it almost impossible for American firms buy Huawei products or sell American-made
components to the company, a handful of chipmakers, telecoms companies and tech firms
(Alphabet) have reportedly scaled back or severed their relationship with Huawe.
Though Microsoft said yesterday that it hadn't made a decision, the SCMP reported Friday
morning that Microsoft had decided to stop accepting new orders from Huawei for operating
systems and other content-related services: Windows operating systems for laptops and other
content-related services. The US software giant has already removed Huawei laptops from its
online stores.
Just one more prime example why no companies should use Microsoft software.
The issue is clear as a bell. Become dependent on a US supplier and the Gov of the USSA
could cut off your contracts with impunity. That risk is too high for any manufacturing
entity.
I am not a fan of Linux. I do not like the way it manages memory. Also while it has gotten
better, it remains something of an unmade bed in that much of the software doesn't work
particularly well. But the same cold be said for Microsoft. How many times does Windows
OFFICE have to lock up before you comprehend the nightmarish patch system which has become
Windows?
GNU meaning not Unix never developed into a GUI. Ghost BSD looks interesting, BSD PC has
limited compatibility but UNIX is flatly superior in how it handles memory. Unix is
brilliant. I also love Open Office, it is better than Microsoft Office and you can save all
your files to the Microsoft format if you want. Open Office is perfect transitional software
and FREE! Why are school districts paying microsoft instead of using Open Office.
Win 10 is invasive garbage. I don't want anything managing my computer
"automatically".
Huawei is a real wakeup call for the world... the US is an unreliable trader. They can
never be trusted. This is not just about that lunatic Turmp. If AOC ever got to the White
House she could do the same under the New Green Deal NATIONAL SECURITY EMERGENCY.
The Constitution gave Congress the exclusive power over Commerce but over time, the
Congress delegated more and more power to the Exec with this kind of dreadful outcome.
Founding Fathers wanted checks and balances. But here you have one person, interrupting
commerce and contracts with the stroke of a pen that has never been approved by Congress.
That is simply too much risk.
The Chinese like anyone else make mistakes. BUT CHINA does not repeat the same mistake
twice unlike the USSA that seems to be caught in the revolving door of mistakes.
Better that this happens early in the life of Huawei than much later. China could actually
lead the world into the adaptation of open source destroying both Microsoft, Google and Apple
at the same time. Remember Apple took BSD and then made proprietary changes. That is the
APPLE OS which is much more stable than anything Windows ever made.
While people knock apple Iphone for cost, the Apple laptops are very stable and
essentially virus and worm immune. For a novice users that's why Apples are great.
I have had Unix based machines run for years with never being turned off, always rock
stable. It is head and shoulders above everything. FreeBSD
Here is a UNIX GUI. I know nothing about these guys but will check it out. A non power
user only needs a solid browser, and a good word processor, Open Office works with BSD.
Personally I don't think Apple should be grouped with Google and microsoft. I don't see as
Apple has done anything wrong other than selling their products at a premium to the novices.
That's not a crime and novices benefit. So quit packaging Apple in with Google and
Microsoft.
BTW, Blackberry OS is Unix based. It is a canadian company so likely a US poodle.
Huawei were attacked because they are a threat to Apple, not to "our national
security." The only thing Trump cares about are the profits of big companies.
Yes, but the real question is did you cut ties with the NBA, Nike, grape Kool-Aid,
McDonald's, Popeye's, your parole officer, KFC, crotch-grabbing, your six illegitimate
children and the local welfare office?
I knew Nokia was doomed when it partnered with Microsoft. They should have instead
partnered with and help fund the Open Source Software community. By now, we'd have
spectacular phones, free of logjams of spyware, bloatware, and ads.
Now you have Windoze PC's with logjams of spyware, bloatware, and ads. Well, unless you
hack it to make it a Workable PC. It's weird having to Hack your own PC to make it sane.
Why shouldn't Corning glass or Micron flash memory be sold to Huawei for use in phones
bound for Europe? Huawei sells 30 times more phone in Europe than USA. I bought Huawei phone
in Norway and I think is my best phone ever, I use Samsung Galaxy Note 9 in USA, but I carry
the Huawei for photos and for WiFi calls from Norway. Try to do wifi calls from the Galaxy
using Starbucks wifi and then using the same wifi try Huawei, you would see the difference
right away.
The US is going to sanction itself into economic irrelevance as the rest of the world says
F you. We only have two friends now, Israel and KSA. Nice work, Donnie.
"... However, nothing in the actual piece talks about security concerns. (I point this out because I perceive a trend towards such misleading summaries and headlines which contradict what the actual reporting says.) ..."
"... These companies do not have security concerns over Huawei. But the casual reader, who does not dive down into the actual piece, is left with a false impression that such concerns are valid and shared. ..."
"... South China Morning Post ..."
"... This move by Google-USG is mostly a propaganda warfare move. Huawei doesn't depend on smartphone sales to survive. It's American market was already small, while China's domestic market is huge. China is not Japan. ..."
"... Trump's heavy handed move against Huawei will backfire. The optic is unsettling; the US looks to be destroying a foreign competitor because it is winning. ..."
"... Until the reserve currency issue favoring the "exceptional" nation changes, the economic terrorism will continue.. ..."
"... What is funny in all these stories, is that there is little to no Huawei equipment (not the end-user smart phone, home router and stuff, but backbone routers, access equipment,..) anywhere in the US -- they are forbidden to compete. Most telcos are quite happy to sell in the US, as the absence of these Chinese competitors allows for healthy margins, which is no longer true in other markets. ..."
"... The US is trying desperately to quash tech success / innovation introduced by others who are not controlled by (or in partnership with) the US, via economic war, for now just politely called a trade war - China no 1 adversary. ..."
"... Attacking / dissing / scotching trade between one Co. (e.g. Huawei) and the world is disruptive of the usual, conventional, accepted, exchange functioning, and throws a pesky spanner in the works of the system. Revanchard motives, petty targetting, random pot-shots, lead to what? ..."
"... The war against Huawei is only one small aspect within the overall Trade War, which is based on the false premise of US economic strength. Most of the world wants to purchase material things, not financial services which is the Outlaw US Empire's forte and most of the world can easily forego. Trump's Trade War isn't going as planned which will cause him to double-down in a move that will destroy his 2020 hopes. ..."
However, nothing in
the actual piece talks about security concerns. (I point this out because I perceive a trend towards such misleading summaries
and headlines which contradict what the actual reporting says.)
The British processor company ARM, which licenses its design to Huawei, cites U.S. export controls as the reason to stop cooperation
with Huawei:
The conflict is putting companies and governments around the world in a tough spot, forcing them to choose between alienating
the United States or China .
Arm Holdings issued its statement after the BBC reported the firm had told staff to suspend dealings with Huawei.
An Arm spokesman said some of the company's intellectual property is designed in the United States and is therefore " subject
to U.S. export controls ."
Additionally two British telecom providers quote U.S. restrictions as reason for no longer buying Huawei smartphones:
BT Group's EE division, which is preparing to launch 5G service in six British cities later this month, said Wednesday it would
no longer offer a new Huawei smartphone as part of that service. Vodafone also said it would drop a Huawei smartphone from
its lineup. Both companies appeared to tie that decision to Google's move to withhold licenses for its Android operating software
from future Huawei phones.
These companies do not have security concerns over Huawei. But the casual reader, who does not dive down into the actual
piece, is left with a false impression that such concerns are valid and shared.
That the Trump administration says it has security reasons for its Huawei ban does not mean that the claim is true. Huawei
equipment is as good or bad as any other telecommunication equipment, be it from Cisco or Apple. The National Security Agency
and other secret services will try to infiltrate all types of such equipment.
After the sudden ban on U.S. entities to export to Huawei, chipmakers like Qualcomm temporarily stopped their relations with
Huawei. Google said that it would no longer allow access to the Google Play store for new Huawei smartphones. That will diminish
their utility for many users.
The public reaction in China to this move was quite negative. There were many calls for counter boycotts of Apple's i-phones
on social media and a general anti-American sentiment.
The founder and CEO of Huawei, Ren Zhengfei, tried to counter that. He gave a
two hour interview (vid, 3 min excerpt with subtitles)
directed at the Chinese public. Ren sounds very conciliatory and relaxed. The Global Times and the South China Morning
Post only have shortexcerpts
of what he said. They empathize that Huawei is well prepared and can master the challenge:
I do not believe this is precisely what will happen. Huawei already has its licenses purchased. In addition they could decide
to disrespect the IP if this was the case.
Huaweis's suppliers in Japan, South Korea, Taiwan (ROC), and Britain are examining if they can continue to make business with
Huawei, while some have already declared a suspension in cooperation.
The issue is that these non-American companies nonetheless use some American components of technology, and if they proceed
they will be sanctioned by the US themselves.
It is the same reason why Russia's Sukhoi did not in the end sell its SSJ-100 airliners to Iran -- East Asian tech companies
can hardly be expected to be more gung-ho on defying the US than Russia's leading defense plant......
@p #2 - Huawei surely has their processors *as of now*.
That - if USA would not ban Huawei (HiSilicon) processors, because of using that ARM technology. Thing is, Huawei would be
isolated from next-generation ARM processors. They are locked now in their current generation.
Even Qualcomm today, for what I know, bases their processors on ARM's "default" schemes, instead of doing their development
"from scratch", in a totally independent way. It would push for slow but steady decline as "top" smartphone vendor into "el cheapo"
niche.
Boeing is the counter-part in the contest to destroy Huawei. China has great leverage over Boeing's future. It is the nation with
the biggest market now and downstream for 10-20 years. China need planes, thousands of them.
As for Huawei's chief doubting the prowess of the Chinese students, he only needs to look at the rapidity of the conversion
of his nations' economy to a 98% digital economy. All that conversion was done by local, entrepreneurial innovators in the software
and hardware tech sector. It happened only in China and completely by Chinese young people who had phones and saw the future and
made it happen.
It has been Chinese minds building Chinese AI on Chinese Big Data.
Yes, they need Russian technologists and scientists. Those Russian minds in Russia, in Israel, in South Korea are proven difference
makers.
The need China now has will meet the solution rapidly. For five years, the Double Helix of Russia-China has been coming closer
in education and R&D institutes in both nations. China investors and Chinese sci-tech personnel are in the sci-tech parks of Russia,
and Russians are in similar facilities in China. More will happen now that the Economic War against China threatens.
Huawei will have solutions to replace all US components by the end of the year. It will lose some markets. but it will gain
hugely in the BRI markets yet to be developed.
In the long run, the US makers will rue the day Trump and his gang of Sinophobes and hegemonists took aim at Huawei and China's
tech sector.
This move by Google-USG is mostly a propaganda warfare move. Huawei doesn't depend on smartphone sales to survive. It's American
market was already small, while China's domestic market is huge. China is not Japan.
Besides, it's not like Europe is prospering either. Those post-war days are long gone.
And there's no contradiction between what the CEO said and the Government line: both are approaching the same problem from
different points of view, attacking it from different fronts at the same time. "Patriotism" is needed insofar as the Chinese people
must be prepared to suffer some hardships without giving up long term prosperity. "Nationalism" ("politics") is toxic insofar
as, as a teleological tool, it is a dead end (see Bannon's insane antics): the Chinese, after all, are communists, and communists,
by nature, are internationalists and think beyond the artificial division of humanity in Nation-States.
Talking Digital and security in the same sentence is laughable.... NOTHING Digital is 'secure',,, never has,,, never will.
Digital destroys everything it touches. At present, excepting for now the low wage States, it is destroying economies ever
so slowly one sector at a time. This has nothing to do with security and everything to do with the dying West, especially the
USA which is trying desperately to save what's left of its production whether it be 5G, Steel plants or Nord Stream. The West
created China when it happily allowed and assisted Western corporations to move the production there in order to hide the inflation
that was being created for wars and welfare and now has to deal with the fallout which eventually will be their undoing.
A full-blown trade war was probably inevitable, driven by geopolitical concerns as much or more than economics.
One wonders what each of China and US has been doing to prepare. It seems like the answer is "very little" but since it's USA
that is driving this bus, I would think that USA would've done more to prepare (than China has).
PS It's not just Boeing. China also supplies the vast majority of rare earth minerals.
Her captivity and probable imprisonment in the US explain his attitude. She is a high profile pawn. The US must convict her
in order to justify what they have done to her so far. She may not serve time, in the US prisons, but she will be branded a guilty
person, guilty of violating the Empire's rules (laws).
Imagine Ivanka in the same situation. Her daughter singing in Mandarin would be little help. The Trump Family will be a number
one target for equal treatment long after "45" leaves office.
The US Empire is wild with Power. All of that Power is destructive. And all the globe is the battlefield, except USA. But History
teaches that this in-equilibrium will not last long.
We've seen how Europe caved to US pressure to stop trading with Iran. Now Japan and others are caving to pressure to stop trading
with China. There is already pressure and negotiation to stop Nordstream. And all of the above leads to questions about Erdogan's
resolve.
Trump's heavy handed move against Huawei will backfire. The optic is unsettling; the US looks to be destroying a foreign competitor
because it is winning.
The ramifications of trade war with China (where the supply and manufacturing chain of most consumer electronics is these days)
is disruptive. Trump has created uncertainty for many manufacturers since there is Chinese part content is just about everything
these days. Some manufacturers might relocate production to the US but most will try to simply decouple from the US entirely.
Exposure to the US is really the problem not exposure to China.
The trade war with Iran was also unlikely to persist. But it has persisted, and deepened as European poodles pretended to resist
and then pretended not to notice that they didn't.
A new Bloomberg opinion piece agrees with that view
No, it doesn't b. You say USA trade war will fail because it lacks international support. Bloomberg says USA should get international
support to make it more effective. The difference is that it is highly likely that USA will get international support. It already
has support from Japan.
USA has proven that it can effectively manipulate it's poodle allies. Another example is Venezuela where more than two dozen
countries recognized Guido only because USA wanted them to.
<> <> <> <> <> <> <>
It's not Trump but the US Deep State that causes US allies to fall in line. Any analysis that relies on Trump as President
is bound to fail as his public persona is manipulated to keep Deep State adversaries (including the US public) off-balance.
Like President's before him, Trump will take the blame (and the credit) until another team member is chosen to replace him
in what we call "free and fair elections".
What is funny in all these stories, is that there is little to no Huawei equipment (not the end-user smart phone, home router
and stuff, but backbone routers, access equipment,..) anywhere in the US -- they are forbidden to compete. Most telcos are quite
happy to sell in the US, as the absence of these Chinese competitors allows for healthy margins, which is no longer true in other
markets.
So the Huawei ban hits first and foremost the US' partners.
China can only undo the US-exceptionalsim if and when it can visibly project military power. The only way to achieve
that is tt has to make great haste in building a few fleets of aircraft carriers, fregats and destroyers, etc. It must
build a grand, visibly magnificent Chinese Navy.
Modi wins in India, another victory for the world oligarchs. Exactly mimicking conditions in the U$A. Media and governmental
capture by the uber wealthy...
The US is trying desperately to quash tech success / innovation introduced by others who are not controlled by (or in partnership
with) the US, via economic war, for now just politely called a trade war - China no 1 adversary.
Afaik, the entire smart-phone industry is 'integrated' and 'regulated' by FTAs, the WTO, the patent circuit, the Corps. and
Gvmts. who collaborate amongst themselves.
Corps. can't afford to compete viciously because infrastructure, aka more encompassing systems or networks (sic) are a pre-requisite
for biz, thus, Gvmts. cooperate with the Corps, and sign various 'partnerships,' etc.
sidebar. Not to mention the essential metals / components provenance, other topic. see
Attacking / dissing / scotching trade between one Co. (e.g. Huawei) and the world is disruptive of the usual, conventional,
accepted, exchange functioning, and throws a pesky spanner in the works of the system. Revanchard motives, petty targetting, random
pot-shots, lead to what?
As I wrote in the Venezuela thread, major US corps are already belt tightening by permanently laying off managers, not already
cut-to-the-bone production staff, and another major clothing retailer is closing its 650+ stores. And the full impact of Trump's
Trade War has yet to be felt by consumers. As Wolff, Hudson and other like-minded economists note, there never was a genuine recovery
from 2008, while statistical manipulation hides the real state of the US economy. One thing that cannot be hidden is the waning
of revenues collected via taxes which drives the budget deficit--and the shortfall isn't just due to the GOP Congress's tax cuts.
The war against Huawei is only one small aspect within the overall Trade War, which is based on the false premise of US economic
strength. Most of the world wants to purchase material things, not financial services which is the Outlaw US Empire's forte and
most of the world can easily forego. Trump's Trade War isn't going as planned which will cause him to double-down in a move that
will destroy his 2020 hopes.
Data for 2019 is probably slightly different, but the trends should keep on. That data also does not separate Android-based
phones from non-Android phones. So, segmenting Android into Google and China infrastructures would mean
1) Huawei retains a $152B market - China
2) Huawei retains an unknown share in $87B market - APAC
3) Huawei loses a $163,9B market - all non-China world.
At best Huawei looses 40,7% of world market. That if all APAC population would voluntarily and uniformly drop out of Google
services into Huawei/China services (which they would not). At worst Huawei retains 37,7% of the marker (if APAC population would
uniformly follow Google, which they would not either).
"... Since the end of the Cold War, the American government has become increasingly delusional, regarding itself as the Supreme World Hegemon. As a result, local American courts have begun enforcing gigantic financial penalties against foreign countries and their leading corporations, and I suspect that the rest of the world is tiring of this misbehavior. Perhaps such actions can still be taken against the subservient vassal states of Europe, but by most objective measures, the size of China's real economy surpassed that of the US several years ago and is now substantially larger , while also still having a far higher rate of growth. Our totally dishonest mainstream media regularly obscures this reality, but it remains true nonetheless. ..."
"... Provoking a disastrous worldwide confrontation with mighty China by seizing and imprisoning one of its leading technology executives reminds me of a comment I made several years ago about America's behavior under the rule of its current political elites: ..."
"... Normal countries like China naturally assume that other countries like the US will also behave in normal ways, and their dumbfounded shock at Ms. Meng's seizure has surely delayed their effective response. In 1959, Vice President Richard Nixon visited Moscow and famously engaged in a heated "kitchen debate" with Premier Nikita Khrushchev over the relative merits of Communism and Capitalism. What would have been the American reaction if Nixon had been immediately arrested and given a ten year Gulag sentence for "anti-Soviet agitation"? ..."
"... But Bolton's apparent involvement underscores the central role of his longtime patron, multi-billionaire casino-magnate Sheldon Adelson, whose enormous financial influence within Republican political circles has been overwhelmingly focused on pro-Israel policy and hostility towards Iran, Israel's regional rival. ..."
"... Although it is far from clear whether the very elderly Adelson played any direct personal role in Ms. Meng's arrest, he surely must be viewed as the central figure in fostering the political climate that produced the current situation. Perhaps he should not be described as the ultimate puppet-master behind our current clash with China, but any such political puppet-masters who do exist are certainly operating at his immediate beck and call. In very literal terms, I suspect that if Adelson placed a single phone call to the White House, the Trump Administration would order Canada to release Ms. Meng that same day. ..."
As most readers know, I'm not a casual political blogger and I prefer producing lengthy
research articles rather than chasing the headlines of current events. But there are
exceptions to every rule, and the looming danger of a direct worldwide clash with China is
one of them.
Consider the arrest last week of Meng Wanzhou, the CFO of Huawei, the world's largest
telecom equipment manufacturer. While flying from Hong Kong to Mexico, Ms. Meng was changing
planes in the Vancouver International Airport when she was suddenly detained by the Canadian
government on an August US warrant. Although now released on $10 million bail, she still
faces extradition to a New York City courtroom, where she could receive up to thirty years in
federal prison for allegedly having conspired in 2010 to violate America's unilateral
economic trade sanctions against Iran.
Although our mainstream media outlets have certainly covered this important story,
including front page articles in the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal
, I doubt most American readers fully recognize the extraordinary gravity of this
international incident and its potential for altering the course of world history. As one
scholar noted, no event since America's deliberate 1999
bombing of China's embassy in Belgrade , which killed several Chinese diplomats, has so
outraged both the Chinese government and its population. Columbia's Jeffrey Sachs
correctly described it as "almost a US declaration of war on China's business
community."
Such a reaction is hardly surprising. With annual revenue of $100 billion, Huawei ranks as
the world's largest and most advanced telecommunications equipment manufacturer as well as
China's most internationally successful and prestigious company. Ms. Meng is not only a
longtime top executive there, but also the daughter of the company's founder, Ren Zhengfei,
whose enormous entrepreneurial success has established him as a Chinese national hero.
Her seizure on obscure American sanction violation charges while changing planes in a
Canadian airport almost amounts to a kidnapping. One journalist asked how Americans would
react if China had seized Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook for violating Chinese law especially if
Sandberg were also the daughter of Steve Jobs.
Indeed, the closest analogy that comes to my mind is when Prince Mohammed bin Salman of
Saudi Arabia kidnapped the Prime Minister of Lebanon earlier this year and held him hostage.
Later he more successfully did the same with hundreds of his wealthiest Saudi subjects,
extorting something like $100 billion in ransom from their families before finally releasing
them. Then he may have finally over-reached himself when Washington Post columnist
Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi dissident, was killed and dismembered by a bone-saw at the Saudi
embassy in Turkey.
We should actually be a bit grateful to Prince Mohammed since without him America would
clearly have the most insane government anywhere in the world. As it stands, we're merely
tied for first.
Since the end of the Cold War, the American government has become increasingly delusional,
regarding itself as the Supreme World Hegemon. As a result, local American courts have begun
enforcing gigantic financial penalties against foreign countries and their leading
corporations, and I suspect that the rest of the world is tiring of this misbehavior. Perhaps
such actions can still be taken against the subservient vassal states of Europe, but by most
objective measures, the size of China's real economy surpassed that of the US several years
ago and is now substantially larger ,
while also still having a far higher rate of growth. Our totally dishonest mainstream media
regularly obscures this reality, but it remains true nonetheless.
Provoking a disastrous worldwide confrontation with mighty China by seizing and
imprisoning one of its leading technology executives reminds me of
a comment I made several years ago about America's behavior under the rule of its current
political elites:
Or to apply a far harsher biological metaphor, consider a poor canine infected with the
rabies virus. The virus may have no brain and its body-weight is probably less than
one-millionth that of the host, but once it has seized control of the central nervous
system, the animal, big brain and all, becomes a helpless puppet.
Once friendly Fido runs around foaming at the mouth, barking at the sky, and trying to
bite all the other animals it can reach. Its friends and relatives are saddened by its
plight but stay well clear, hoping to avoid infection before the inevitable happens, and
poor Fido finally collapses dead in a heap.
Normal countries like China naturally assume that other countries like the US will also
behave in normal ways, and their dumbfounded shock at Ms. Meng's seizure has surely delayed
their effective response. In 1959, Vice President Richard Nixon visited Moscow and famously
engaged in a heated "kitchen
debate" with Premier Nikita Khrushchev over the relative merits of Communism and
Capitalism. What would have been the American reaction if Nixon had been immediately arrested
and given a ten year Gulag sentence for "anti-Soviet agitation"?
Since a natural reaction to international hostage-taking is retaliatory international
hostage-taking, the newspapers have reported that top American executives have decided to
forego visits to China until the crisis is resolved. These days, General Motors sells more
cars in China than in the US, and China is also the manufacturing source of nearly all our
iPhones, but Tim Cook, Mary Barra, and their higher-ranking subordinates are unlikely to
visit that country in the immediate future, nor would the top executives of Google, Facebook,
Goldman Sachs, and the leading Hollywood studios be willing to risk indefinite
imprisonment.
Canada had arrested Ms. Meng on American orders, and this morning's newspapers reported
that a former
Canadian diplomat had suddenly been detained in China , presumably as a small
bargaining-chip to encourage Ms. Meng's release. But I very much doubt such measures will
have much effect. Once we forgo traditional international practices and adopt the Law of the
Jungle, it becomes very important to recognize the true lines of power and control, and
Canada is merely acting as an American political puppet in this matter. Would threatening the
puppet rather than the puppet-master be likely to have much effect?
Similarly, nearly all of America's leading technology executives are already quite hostile
to the Trump Administration, and even if it were possible, seizing one of them would hardly
be likely to sway our political leadership. To a lesser extent, the same thing is true about
the overwhelming majority of America's top corporate leaders. They are not the individuals
who call the shots in the current White House.
Indeed, is President Trump himself anything more than a higher-level puppet in this very
dangerous affair? World peace and American national security interests are being sacrificed
in order to harshly enforce the Israel Lobby's international sanctions campaign against Iran,
and we should hardly be surprised that the National Security Adviser John Bolton, one of
America's most extreme pro-Israel zealots,
had personally given the green light to the arrest. Meanwhile, there are credible reports
that Trump himself remained entirely unaware of these plans, and Ms. Meng was seized on the
same day that he was personally meeting on trade issues with Chinese President Xi. Some have
even suggested that the incident was a deliberate slap in Trump's face.
But Bolton's apparent involvement underscores the central role of his longtime patron,
multi-billionaire casino-magnate Sheldon Adelson, whose enormous financial influence within
Republican political circles has been overwhelmingly focused on pro-Israel policy and
hostility towards Iran, Israel's regional rival.
Although it is far from clear whether the very elderly Adelson played any direct personal
role in Ms. Meng's arrest, he surely must be viewed as the central figure in fostering the
political climate that produced the current situation. Perhaps he should not be described as
the ultimate puppet-master behind our current clash with China, but any such political
puppet-masters who do exist are certainly operating at his immediate beck and call. In very
literal terms, I suspect that if Adelson placed a single phone call to the White House, the
Trump Administration would order Canada to release Ms. Meng that same day.
Adelson's fortune of $33 billion ranks him as the 15th
wealthiest man in America, and the bulk of his fortune is based on his ownership of extremely
lucrative gambling casinos in Macau, China . In effect, the Chinese government currently has
its hands around the financial windpipe of the man ultimately responsible for Ms. Meng's
arrest and whose pro-Israel minions largely control American foreign policy. I very much
doubt that they are fully aware of this enormous, untapped source of political leverage.
Over the years, Adelson's Chinese Macau casinos have been involved in all sorts of political
bribery scandals , and I suspect it would be very easy for the Chinese government to find
reasonable grounds for immediately shutting them down, at least on a temporary basis, with
such an action having almost no negative repercussions to Chinese society or the bulk of the
Chinese population. How could the international community possibly complain about the Chinese
government shutting down some of their own local gambling casinos with a long public record
of official bribery and other criminal activity? At worst, other gambling casino magnates
would become reluctant to invest future sums in establishing additional Chinese casinos,
hardly a desperate threat to President Xi's anti-corruption government.
I don't have a background in finance and I haven't bothered trying to guess the precise
impact of a temporary shutdown of Adelson's Chinese casinos, but it wouldn't surprise me if
the resulting drop in the stock price of Las Vegas Sands Corp would reduce
Adelson's personal net worth were by $5-10 billion within 24 hours, surely enough to get his
immediate personal attention. Meanwhile, threats of a permanent shutdown, perhaps extending
to Chinese-influenced Singapore, might lead to the near-total destruction of Adelson's
personal fortune, and similar measures could also be applied as well to the casinos of all
the other fanatically pro-Israel American billionaires, who dominate the remainder of
gambling in Chinese Macau.
The chain of political puppets responsible for Ms. Meng's sudden detention is certainly a
complex and murky one. But the Chinese government already possesses the absolute power of
financial life-or-death over Sheldon Adelson, the man located at the very top of that chain.
If the Chinese leadership recognizes that power and takes effective steps, Ms. Meng will
immediately be put on a plane back home, carrying the deepest sort of international political
apology. And future attacks against Huawei, ZTE, and other Chinese technology companies would
not be repeated.
China actually holds a Royal Flush in this international political poker game. The only
question is whether they will recognize the value of their hand. I hope they do for the sake
of America and the entire world.
"... Launching a tech war or a trade war against any country is not appropriate, nor is it the best way to defend national security, Macron said. ..."
"... Out of the total of 70 billion U.S. dollars Huawei spent on buying components in 2018, some 11 billion dollars went to U.S. companies, the Reuters reported Friday. ..."
"... The spirit of openness is what helped the United States develop. However, Washington's restrictions on Huawei, based on unfounded allegations and political speculations, fall foul of the golden rules it once embraced ..."
WASHINGTON, May 22 (Xinhua) --
Washington last week declared a national emergency over what it claimed are technological
threats, and announced restrictions on sale and transfer of American technologies to China's
Huawei.
The telecom company has long been accused by the United States of being able to use its
network equipment to spy on foreign nations for the Chinese government. However, "no
intelligence service has published clear evidence that Huawei inserted 'backdoors' for Chinese
authorities to access the data that passes through its networks," according to a December 2018
article by U.S. media Politico.
Given the lack of proof that Huawei threatens U.S. security, last week's twin moves by
Washington -- the use of state apparatus to oppress a company -- are a reflection of nothing
but bullying.
The smearing campaign against Huawei aside, the United States has also been trying to rally
Europe to abandon Huawei products, citing security threats. It was not welcome.
"Europe must not be dragged into the trade dispute between China and the United States,"
Germany's powerful BDI industrial lobby group was quoted by media reports as saying in a
statement on Thursday.
France too refused to take orders from the United States. "Our perspective is not to block
Huawei or any company," President Emmanuel Macron told the VivaTech conference in Paris on
Thursday.
Launching a tech war or a trade war against any country is not appropriate,
nor is it the best way to defend national security, Macron said.
The ban on the supply of U.S.-made chips to Huawei is a lose-lose in any sense, as it poses
a threat to Huawei's viability and U.S. companies also pay the price.
Out of the total
of 70 billion U.S. dollars Huawei spent on buying components in 2018, some 11 billion dollars
went to U.S. companies, the Reuters reported Friday.
"The ban will financially harm the thousands of Americans employed by the U.S. companies
that do business with Huawei," said Catherine Chen, a Director of the Board at Huawei, in a The
New York Times article on Friday. "A total ban on Huawei equipment could eliminate tens of
thousands of American jobs."
Although Huawei does not do much business in the United States, the company is the sole
provider of networking equipment to many rural American internet providers, according to a CNN
article on Tuesday.
"Those companies have said it will take time -- or may be impossible -- to replace their
Huawei technology with a rival's," it added.
As a move to ease the repercussion of the ban, the U.S. Department of Commerce on Monday
issued a 90-day temporary license loosening restrictions on business deals with Huawei.
Huawei doesn't intend to isolate itself from others, but wants to make as many friends as
possible, its founder Ren Zhengfei told Chinese media on Tuesday when asked why Huawei didn't
use substitutes before the United States took the latest aggressive measures.
"We don't want to do harm to friends," he said. "We want to help them achieve good balance
sheets. Even if we make adjustments, we still ought to render help."
The spirit of
openness is what helped the United States develop. However, Washington's restrictions on
Huawei, based on unfounded allegations and political speculations, fall foul of the golden
rules it once embraced
.
For Washington to win in an era of cooperation and inter-dependence, it would be better to
revive the spirit of openness.
"... In a company-wide memo, ARM told employees that their designs contain "US origin technology," which would be affected by the Trump administration's May 15 Executive Order to "protect our country against critical national security threats." ..."
"... Also cunning thing would be to change brand name a bit like change/remove 1 letter. ..."
"... Yet, they find out they are buying from another vendor that complies with China's demands and poof there goes another company ..."
"... Xi should have listen to Deng Xiaoping. Keep your head down, go about your business and shut the **** up. But Xi the chest pounding panda declared Made in China 2025 and spooked everyone. China should de-robe him then hang him high! ..."
"... There has been a suspiciously sudden rise in China hawkishness among American citizens (e.g., commentators on these boards) coincident with what to outside observers has been a very obvious post-Russia tsunami of political and MSM anti-China propaganda (it's often easier to see propaganda from the outside than from the inside). ..."
"... Yes, but not all of China is restricted from using ARM. Only Huawei. Other phone manufacturers will be unaffected. ..."
Japanese-owned chip designer
ARM Holdings
has notified its staff to halt "
all active contracts,
support entitlements, and any pending engagements
" with Huawei and its subsidiaries in order to comply with the
recent US clampdown, according to the
BBC
. Based in the
UK and owned by Japan's Softbank, ARM designs and licenses processors used in all types of electronic devices, including
smart phones, tablets, laptops, televisions, automotive systems and more.
"
ARM is the foundation of Huawei's smartphone chip designs, so this is an insurmountable obstacle for Huawei
,"
said Geoff Blaber of CCS Insight, adding: "That said, with an abundance of companies in Huawei's supply chain already
having taken action to comply with the US order,
Huawei's ability to operate was already severely affected
."
In a company-wide memo, ARM told employees that their designs contain "US origin technology," which
would be affected by the Trump administration's May 15
Executive Order
to "protect our country against critical national security threats."
The US has argued that the Chinese government could force companies such as Huawei to install backdoors on their devices
to allow for spying on US networks - an accusation Huawei has repeatedly denied.
Softbank - which is also one of Japan's largest mobile carriers - has joined with
Japan's largest carriers
DoCoMo and KDDI in announcing that they will stop taking orders for Huawei handsets.
Nope, cross licensing is strictly forbidden under the licensing
ARM uses. If uou want to use ARM based designs, you have two
choices. Buy the chips already made, or license a core and fab the
package yourself.
If you fab it yourself, you have to market the cores and chips
as being nased on theirs.
That's it. I learned this when looking to have some Asics made
up for compute decices and decided to review all of my options. I
decided two things looking into that.
1 I wouldn't have anything made until I could have them made
here in the US. Still waiting for a FAB with older equipment to
for such things to pop up. I simply don't trust China.
2 I would start from scratch using a RISC design with MIT
license to avoid the decades of no development by actually having
a real open licensing scheme. The GPL crap sucks.
Licenses to independent third parties do not matter yet.
"ARM Holdings
has notified its staff to halt "
all
active contracts, support entitlements, and any pending
engagements
" with Huawei and its subsidiaries"
KASHGAR, China -- A God's-eye view of Kashgar, an ancient city in
western China, flashed onto a wall-size screen, with colorful icons
marking police stations, checkpoints and the locations of recent
security incidents. At the click of a mouse, a technician explained,
the police can pull up live video from any surveillance camera or
take a closer look at anyone passing through one of the thousands of
checkpoints in the city...
There's no such things a national security. This is U.S. corporate
security protecting the corporate interests of the other telecom
corporations that license to operate through the U.S. corporation.
Comprendo?
The way this gloal fraud operates really is a laughable
pathetic joke with what's hidden because is criminal. That includes
everything globally that alleged to be classified or some level of so
called top secret but none of it is. The sedtion and treason of the
government saw to those eliminations along with the cancellation of
all NDA's, or other similar docments to attempt to use threat,
coercion, murder as a consequence.
When is there going to be a fully functional so called smart phone
that is not hackable, trackable, fully compliant with all unalienable
rights, usable globally, with a degree of voice and data encryption
to ensure no possibility of interception or monitoring? Oh and free
phone w/ $25 unlimited voice and data monthly.
Xi should have listen to Deng Xiaoping. Keep your head down, go about
your business and shut the **** up. But Xi the chest pounding panda
declared Made in China 2025 and spooked everyone. China should
de-robe him then hang him high!
Simple! Send the Chinese navy to Venezuela at the time when the
U.S. is sending its naval forces to Iran. That should rattle
Washington greatly. That should up the ante greatly too. Then see
who blinks first.
There has been a suspiciously sudden rise in China hawkishness among
American citizens (e.g., commentators on these boards) coincident
with what to outside observers has been a very obvious post-Russia
tsunami of political and MSM anti-China propaganda (it's often easier
to see propaganda from the outside than from the inside).
A good
discussion of the opposing point of view has just aired on RT, among
the host, an American living in Russia, Fred Teng, President of the
America China Public Affairs Institute, and James Bradley (American),
author of The China Mirage. You may think this is just propaganda
from the opposite direction, but if so you will at least have two
poles to position yourself between rather than just one side of the
story. If you have an open mind.........it is well worth watching.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=6C1kYnrm1cA
All you ignorant fuckers need to
take a one month vacation to China. Come back and lets talk then.
Your world outlook will have been greatly humbled and you would be
more willing to be of the cooperative model of world politics rather
than this senseless belligerence I see here.
I remember being photographed at every highway underpass. I
remember not being able to view You Tube or any video on Facebook
because it was blocked...
This is an major O'sh2t because all of China's cell phones use ARM!
China is now like African no internet village because they don't have
smart phones... LOL
"... And once trade talks had broken down, there was a 'scramble' to implement the measures against Huawei. ..."
"... this report effectively confirms that the administration wasn't being entirely truthful when it said there was 'no link' between Huawei and the trade talks. Trump said back in December that he would go so far as to intervene in efforts to extradite Meng Wanzhou if it would help with the trade talks. And although that would be extreme, we should rule it out just yet. ..."
If there was any lingering doubt that President Trump has treated Huawei like a 'bargaining
chip' during trade talks with the Chinese,
Bloomberg just put the issue to rest.
In a report sourced to administration insiders,
BBG reported that the Trump administration waited to blacklist Huawei until talks with the
Chinese had hit an impasse, because they were concerned that targeting Huawei would disrupt the
talks. Plans to punish Huawei - including possible economic sanctions - had been kicking around
for months. And prosecutors took their first tentative steps toward holding Huawei
'accountable' by convincing Canada to arrest Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou.
And once trade talks had broken down, there was a 'scramble' to implement the measures
against Huawei.
Though BBG doesn't offer a definitive answer on this, it reports that some are suspicious
that Trump is pressuring Huawei to 'gain a negotiating edge' with Beijing (meanwhile, the
Chinese leadership are furious about the decision).
Timing of the U.S. action raised questions about whether President Donald Trump is
punishing the company in part to gain a negotiating edge with Beijing in a deepening clash
over trade. Talks between Beijing and Washington deadlocked this month as Trump accused China
of backing out of a deal that was taking shape with U.S. officials, saying China reneged on
an agreement to enshrine a wide range of reforms in law.
Another take on what happened suggested that the decision to hold back on Huawei actually
came from the bureaucracy, as administration officials were worried President Trump would just
scrap the measures as a favor to Xi, like he did last year with ZTE Corp. Those concerns
haven't entirely abated.
Washington has offered Huawei some wiggle room by suspending the new restrictions for 90
days. The company has been stockpiling chips, and reportedly already has enough to keep its
business running for three months.
But this report effectively confirms that the administration wasn't being entirely
truthful when it said there was 'no link' between Huawei and the trade talks. Trump said back
in December that he would go so far as to intervene in efforts to extradite Meng Wanzhou if it
would help with the trade talks. And although that would be extreme, we should rule it out just
yet.
EU and China struggle over key concerns ahead of summit😲
Yet the summit might not produce a joint statement - as previous Chinese pledges on
speeding-up talks on an investment agreement, plus opening up its markets more to European
companies, havefailed to materialise.
"We can certainly agree on a joint statement, the question is how substantive this will
be," a senior EU official said. The EU wants to see concrete steps from China.
Failing to agree on a joint statement, however, is a sign of the EU's unsuccessful bid
to commit China to give greater access of its markets to European companies, and engage
seriously in reforming global trade rules within the World Trade Organisation (WTO).
The EU hoped to make China address longstanding European complaints, and to commit to
concluding an investment agreement that aims to secure better market access and fair
treatment for European companies in China by 2020.
The EU also hopes to achieve an agreement on indications of geographical origins to
protect European brands in China by the end of the year.
An EU official said that the recent foreign investment law adopted in China, does not
address all the issues of concern for Europeans,for instance on prohibited sectors,
dual regime for foreign and domestic operations, and on forced technological
transfer.
"We agree there has been a lot of promises, it is time for action, not only words.
[…] We want to make sure we have a modern framework for investment protection in a
binding agreement with mechanism to solve disputes," the EU official added.
“While the [European] Commission is getting tougher on China, at least for
now it does not seem to be aiming for a confrontation with China,” he said.
But even if the EU doesn’t fully align itself with the increasingly
hawkish Trump administration , a shift in China-EU relations seems inevitable.
“The EU has no interest in cooling its China relationship, but if it does not act
now to protect its economy from unfair state-owned enterprise competition in the EU market,
then the citizens of Europe might ask for more protection,” Wuttke said.
“[There is] growing realism in Europe and the end of naivety when it comes to
China.”
Exclusive: In China, the Party’s push for influence inside foreign firms stirs
fears😲
BEIJING (Reuters) - Late last month, executives from more than a dozen top European
companies in China met in Beijing to discuss their concerns about the growing role of the
ruling Communist Party in the local operations of foreign firms, according to three people
with knowledge of the discussions.
China got fucked the minute they agreed to invest trillions into US debt securities in
exchange for being given unlimited access to sell into the US market. This terrible
arrangement set them up to be crushed economically if the US were to close its doors to
Chinese exports, and to lose much of what they made from their trade surplus with the US if
they ever tried to unload their holdings.
Their main stock market now is down over 30% since the tariffs went into force last June,
and they are closing factories so fast that the price of oil to heat and power those
factories has fallen by the same 30+% as the Chinese stock market. And now, were the Chinese
to start off loading their US Treasury holdings, they would drive the bond market down about
10-20%, which would be another several hundreds of billions of dollars lost. A clean sweep
mop up operation would be done by the Fed and Anointed Banks in a afternoon. Answer this, why
is a good soldier to the PLA, HSBC advertising like crazy for deposit's in $ when they have
unlimited access to the Yuan? BOOM !!!
China's future access to U.S. dollars via their exports is the sword hanging above their
Chicom heads.
The Chinese were advised for a long time that they were going to have to make changes in
their trade policies if they were to avoid their present troubles. They were told not to hold
the US Treasury securities they were forced to buy, and instead sell them off slowly and
re-invest the capital into domestic infrastructure projects that would expand the size of the
Chinese middle class. And they were told to diversify their export markets, so that they
would not be so dependent on the US consumer to buy Chinese products, The Chinese did little
on the first initiative, and little on the second as well, although the second is difficult
to accomplish since there are not many consumer markets that can buy anywhere near what the
US can buy.
Not a pretty picture. But many saw this day coming. Unfortunately for China, not nearly
enough of the decision makers in the Forbidden City did. Xi Jinping played the card to walk
away from agreed upon section of the trade deal, he played his hand. Confusis say, you made
your bed now sleep in it...............
China would go from having the largest overall trade surplus in the world to having a
trade surplus smaller than Ireland if you take away the U.S. Trade Surplus China
Steals……….
Xi Jinping has now lost Face and the Entire Globe now knows it.
Well that should end the extradition case of Ms Weng. Clearly politically motivated. Her
attorney's Steptoe in DC are top drawer. This also means that Huawei may sue Trump for
damages.
That's because Steptoe never loses to the DOJ. There are three top firms in DC that are
DOJ killers. Steptoe is one of them. Williams & Connolly another. The Ted Stevens Case
was the greatest legal slaughter of the DOJ in history. 6 Gov attorney's sanctioned and
threatened by the Judge for disbarment. That's the way to kick the Gov ***. All six counts
dropped!
Meng is still in Canada so that is a Canadian Jurisdiction but the Canadian law is express
that political motivation is insufficient grounds for extradition. This is evidence of
precisely that.
All this over a charge of fraud... LOL. It doesn't get any weaker than that!
China will never do that. They are about business and they are not going to harm a
customer over politics. Trump does this routinely. He puts sanctions on Venezuela to harm the
women and children to soften up the Gov. He has done it with Russia. It is always indirect
attacks to get something unrelated. The cowardly conduct of a bully. Hitler did the same sort
of things. The siege of Stalingrad for example.
The damage Trump is doing to Google is incomprehensible. Huawei is one of Google's largest
customers. Can you even imaging the implications?
If you were a manufacturer of smartphones and were licensing an OS from Google and Trump
then blocks the license.... How many makers of smartphone do you think will want to be
dependent on this kind of lunatic gov? No country should want to deal with the US for
anything. Look at Russia, they were buying jet engines for their MC 21 and Trump Gov cuts
them off. Now they are making their own engines not buying US made engines. How does that
help the US manufacturer? Russia will make their engines and compete with the US makers.
"... China will only redouble its efforts to produce advanced technologies domestically. ..."
"... As a negotiating strategy, the decision makes even less sense. U.S. officials claim it had nothing to do with stalled trade talks, but it certainly looks like Trump wants to use Huawei as leverage, just as he did last year with ZTE Corp ..."
"... Worse, the decision undermines the implicit point of any U.S.-China trade deal: not just to increase commerce but to stabilize relations between the world's two most powerful nations. ..."
"... targeting Huawei so nakedly will only further marginalize the few moderates in the Chinese leadership and embolden hawks who see conflict as unavoidable ..."
"... Crushing Huawei, by contrast, simply looks like a strategic miscalculation -- and one with potentially disastrous consequences. ..."
Banning one of China's most high-profile companies from US networks makes sense. Putting it out of business does
not.
In its struggle with China over trade and national security, the US has many legitimate grievances, and a
variety of weapons for seeking redress. That doesn't mean it should use all of them.
The nuclear missile the U.S. just launched at Huawei Technologies Co. Ltd. is a case in point. Last week, the
Commerce Department placed Huawei and nearly 70 of its affiliates on an "
Entity
List
," which means that U.S. suppliers may now need a license to do business with them. Both Huawei's mobile
phones and its network equipment rely on American components, including advanced semiconductors. If the ban is
applied stringently, it
could drive
one of China's most high-profile companies -- employing more than 180,000 people -- out of business.
That would be a serious mistake. The U.S. has long argued that Huawei poses a national-security threat. And
there certainly are legitimate
reasons to worry
that incorporating Huawei gear into America's networks will leave them vulnerable both to
spying and, in the event of a conflict, sabotage. But the U.S. is already taking other prudent steps to prevent
Huawei equipment from being used domestically. Seeking to put the company out of business as well is both
disproportionate and deeply unwise.
For one thing, it will impose collateral damage. Blameless companies around the world -- including Huawei's
American suppliers
-- could lose business, face disruptions and incur significant new costs. Allies that have
resisted
U.S. pressure to shun Huawei's equipment will resent being backed into a corner: Even if President
Donald Trump loosens the noose a bit, they can hardly take the chance that restrictions won't be re-imposed later.
China will only redouble its efforts to produce advanced technologies domestically.
As a negotiating strategy, the decision makes even less sense. U.S. officials claim it had nothing to do with
stalled trade talks, but it certainly looks like Trump wants to use Huawei as leverage,
just as he did last year
with ZTE Corp. Trump has already
invoked
national security far too often in pursuing his scattered trade battles. Doing so here would set
another terrible precedent while almost certainly backfiring: It will aggravate the current impasse and give
Beijing little incentive to abide by any eventual agreement.
Worse, the decision undermines the implicit point of any U.S.-China trade deal: not just to increase commerce
but to stabilize relations between the world's two most powerful nations. While tensions are inevitable, a healthy
trading relationship should in theory restore ballance, reminding both sides of the benefits of cooperation and
strengthening constituencies that have reason to prefer peace to war. By contrast, targeting Huawei so nakedly
will only further marginalize the
few moderates
in the Chinese leadership and embolden hawks who see conflict as unavoidable. For ordinary
Chinese, it will be hard to avoid the impression that the U.S. is simply trying to limit their economic
possibilities.
Even on its own terms, finally, this gambit is likely to fail. To be effective, an assault on Huawei would need
to be embedded in a larger strategy with a clearer endgame in mind. That's nowhere in evidence: Is the aim to
cripple China's tech industry? Teach the country its place? Give a boost to non-Chinese suppliers? Provoke a
conflict? End one? Without a more focused goal, Trump risks simply alienating U.S. allies, infuriating average
Chinese and raising the chances of confrontation, all to no obvious end.
What the U.S. needs is a larger plan that seeks a healthier coexistence with China. That means building up
America's defenses, leveraging its competitive strengths, working with allies to pressure China to conform to
global norms, and taking the lead in writing new rules that can constrain its more disruptive behavior. Crushing
Huawei, by contrast, simply looks like a strategic miscalculation -- and one with potentially disastrous
consequences.
With $105 billion in global sales last year, Huawei has a vast web of customers and suppliers on
nearly every continent. The company is the world's largest provider of equipment used in 5G telecom networks, and the
second largest seller of cellphones. Last week, Huawei said that it spends more than $1 out of every $7 of its annual
$70 billion procurement budget buying equipment from U.S. companies.
Google said it would restrict Huawei's access to future updates of its Android operating
software, which powers many of Huawei's phones. Other U.S. manufacturers also began suspending business dealings with
the Chinese firm.
The markets punished many of those suppliers Monday, including Intel, Broadcom and Qualcomm, as
well as Micron and semiconductor manufacturer Cypress. Chip makers Qualcomm and Broadcom fell 6 percent. Intel
declined nearly 3 percent, and Lumentum Holdings shares fell more than 4 percent after the company said it would stop
selling to Huawei.
The United States said last week it was adding Huawei to a
trade blacklist
because the company "is engaged in activities that are contrary to U.S. national security or
foreign policy interest." That punishment means U.S. firms aren't allowed to sell to Huawei unless they get special
approval from the government.
On Monday evening, the Commerce Department
slightly eased
the timing of the restrictions, saying it would allow some transactions to continue for 90 days,
to facilitate "certain activities necessary to the continued operations of existing networks and to support existing
mobile services." The temporary reprieve will allow Huawei to receive U.S. equipment to service existing Huawei
mobile phone users and rural broadband networks.
Kevin Wolf, a former senior Commerce Department and current partner at Akin Gump, called the
reprieve "very narrow." "It's not relief for exporters. It really is to prevent unintended operational problems with
existing networks," Wolf said.
The United States views Huawei as a security risk because it believes the company has close ties
to the Chinese government, which Huawei has denied. U.S. officials have said Huawei could potentially tap into and
monitor sensitive U.S. communications through its network technology.
Ren Zhengfei, the founder of Huawei, said that the U.S had underestimated his company as he
sought to dismiss the impact of the ban.
"The current practice of U.S. politicians underestimates our strength," Ren said in a group
interview with Chinese media Tuesday morning. Huawei had a stockpile of chips and "can't be isolated" from the world,
he said.
The 90-day extension "doesn't mean much" and Huawei is fully prepared for the American actions,
Ren said, even appearing to brag about luring workers away from U.S. companies.
"We are very grateful to the U.S. companies. They have made a lot of contributions to us," he
said in the comments, which were shared in real time by state media. "Many of our consultants are from American
companies like IBM."
Earlier, Huawei reacted to Google's decision to stop allowing updates by saying the Chinese
company had "made substantial contributions to the development and growth of Android around theworld."
"As one of Android's key global partners, we have worked closely with their open-source platform
to develop an ecosystem that has benefitted both users and the industry," said spokesman Joe Kelly, adding that
Huawei would continue to provide security updates and after-sales services to its existingsmartphone and tablet
products.
Google's announcement came at an awkward time for Huawei, which on Tuesday is expected to unveil
its Honor 20 series of smartphones in London, and security experts were divided on how quickly and severely the ban
could hurt Huawei.
Some said Huawei is bigger and better prepared for the blockade than its Chinese competitor ZTE
was last year when the Trump administration restricted ZTE from doing business with U.S. firms. The U.S.
later eased
ZTE's punishment.
Washington announced last week that it would impose new prohibitions on Huawei, including a
ban on US companies selling components or services to the telecoms giant. The seriousness of
these actions is difficult to understate, as Rosenblatt Securities analyst Ryan Koontz
explained. If Huawei is pushed to the brink of collapse, Beijing might label this 'an act of
war'.
"The extreme scenario of Huawei's telecom network unit failing would set China back many
years and might even be viewed as an act of war by China," Koontz wrote. "Such a failure
would have massive global telecom market implications."
But bringing a massive global Chinese firm to its knees is one way to demonstrate to
Beijing, and the rest of the world, which ignored Washington's warnings about Huawei, the true
reach of American economic power. And it's one way to put a timer on talks with Beijing,
ensuring that the trade skirmish won't drag on until the height of campaign season.
American firms weren't the only ones to act. In Europe, German chipmaker Infineon
Technologies said it would suspend deliveries to Huawei, at least until it has had a chance to
determine the significance of Washington's executive order (though company sources later denied
these reports and said shipments to Huawei would continue).
Since hostilities with the US began, Huawei has been stockpiling components. It now has
enough of a buffer supply to keep its business running without interruption for at least three
months.
Nikkei reported late last week that Huawei had reportedly asked suppliers to help it build
up enough stockpiles to last it a year, but it's unlikely that Huawei has accumulated enough
buffer stock to last it anywhere near as long.
If Washington refuses to back down, this three-month window might become the next critical
deadline for the trade talks.
If it wasn't clear before, we now know that President Trump wasn't kidding when he said late
last year that Huawei could become 'a bargaining chip' in the trade skirmish. Whether the
prosecution of Meng Wanzhou factors into it remains to be seen, but President Trump did tell
Fox News over the weekend that he wouldn't allow China to surpass the US on his watch.
Huawei's odds of finding replacement suppliers are slim, as Koontz explained. Huawei "is
heavily dependent on U.S. semiconductor products and would be seriously crippled without supply
of key U.S. components."
It's clear where Beijing stands on this. We wouldn't be surprised to see a 'consumer
movement' emerge in China where middle-class consumers ditch foreign phones and proudly
proclaim their support for Huawei.
On Sunday afternoon, President Trump threatened Iran with military intervention via tweet.
Yet, analysts blamed the growing pressure on Huawei for the risk-averse trading atmosphere.
US stocks were on track to open lower. Meanwhile, Huawei's dollar-denominated corporate
bonds tumbled again on Monday after one of their biggest declines in recent memory on Friday.
The selloff comes as fears of a Huawei bankruptcy are beginning to intensify.
Beijing has maintained its aggressive posture, with its Ministry of Foreign Affairs warning
in response to news of the Google ban that China would do what it needed to do to protect its
companies' "legitimate rights", and also hinted at legal actions it might take. Over the
weekend, Beijing compared the trade skirmish with its actions in the Korean War, about as clear
a sign as any that we're in for a protracted conflict.
Whatever happens, it looks like the showdown over Huawei has eclipsed the broader trade-war
narrative. So much for the Huawei crackdown being a 'separate issue' from the trade talks, like
Trump officials had previously insisted.
Bottom line: If we don't get a deal by the end of June, this trade war is going to really
heat up.
So, Huawei is dependent upon Western semiconductor manufacturers. But I thought the
Chinese were the leaders in innovation? That's all I hear on here and elsewhere. Seems to me
that they should have invented and created their own semiconductor industry back in the
1800's when Westerners began to mess with them. One would think that the great and powerful
and super duper intelligent Chinese would have discovered and invented it first in the first
place. Certainly the Chinese or their pals in the USSR could have done so sometime in the
'50s, '60s, '70s, '80s or '90s? No?
The US might win this battle but it has already lost the war. It is in a position similar
to Ukraine which was the richest and most developed Sovjet republic after the breakup - but
which is now one of the biggest shitholes in the entire Galaxy, feasted upon by a bunch of
Zionazi oligarchs. Think of the US as an Ukraine on steroids.
Trump and his diverse actions will hurt Huawei. Maybe even badly. Long term, maybe even
short term, the US won't gain anything from it. It is in a position where it can only lose.
Not because the potential of the US isn't "terrific" (actually it coud be the most promising
country) - but because the US is designed to fail as it is basically a failed state
already.
Im confused, how would not choosing to do business with Huawei possibly be considered an
act of war?
Especially when China largely keeps their markets closed to the west?
After speaking to some Chinese immigrrants... according to them, they'll never come to any
kind of fair agreement with the west. They're not interested in a level playing field at all.
All they care about is making sure the Chinese state gets all the benefits in order to
further Chinas power and influence.
Great news. Huawei already has completed development of its own OS, no doubt an Android
clone. This finally gives us a path off of the Goolag/ Android OS. In 19 months Rabbi Trump
will be gone, which is good, but his destroying the Android monopoly may be his biggest
achievement.
An android clone? No way that would be stealing again. No they will make their own special
sauce OS that will electrocute the citizen if they don't adhere to the state directives.
There are so many other better ways to run a phone interface , I wonder if these two
systems have been kept as monopolies so that the Spooks at the NSA and CIA are able to find
their way around easily
The take away quote
"
Wang also reiterated the principled stand against the "long-arm jurisdiction" imposed by
the United States.
"
Empire is having its hand slapped back in Venezuela, Iran, Syria, ???
Where are they going to get their war on?
I see empire as a war junkie and they are starting to twitch in withdrawals which is
dangerous but a necessary stage. Trumps latest tweets show that level of energy.
The
spinning plates of empire are not wowing the crowds like before.....what is plan Z?
Indeed, the biggest cost may be imposed on investors, who for years have inflated the
economic potential of communist China's state-directed economy. Major public companies in the
United States, including Apple, Caterpillar, and Boeing, are among some of the leading
exporters to China. Yet exports to China accounted for just 7.2 percent of overall American
exports in 2018. According to the U.S. Trade
Representative , the top export categories that year were: aircraft ($18 billion),
machinery ($14 billion), electrical machinery ($13 billion), optical and medical instruments
($9.8 billion), and vehicles ($9.4 billion).
Hmmm. This sounds suspiciously like the arguments Brexiters have dragged out about the EU.
Remember the "German car manufacturers will help us get everything we want because we're such
a large market and they can't afford to lose us"?
People of a country can decide to put up with a heck of a lot of economic pain if they
decide they're defending their country.
Base issue seems clear. Two large economies with very different models of governing. One a
Totalitarian state run economy, and our economy based on greed and consumption, to support
GDP. The theory that the world need be interconnected by trade, has run its course. We really
don't even need a Nafta re done treaty. All 3 economies have exhausted what works for them,
and can simply abandon what doesn't. If a cuntry has something to sell and the buyer country
sees a price advantage the deal will go down.
Tariffs do not get passed along into higher consumer prices unless the product has a very
high inelasticity in demand.
Here's a thought experiment: suppose I sell an imported product for $10. The government
imposes a 25% tariff, so I decide to up the price to $12.50. Here's your issue: if I could
charge $12.50 for the product, why wouldn't I just have charged that in the first place?
Charity? No, I didn't charge that because every time I tried, sales collapsed.
And if you understand retail, especially imports, gross margins are enormous. Sales prices
can be 10 times cost of goods. So that $10 product probably just cost $1. And a 25% tariff on
$1 is only 25 cents. Top of the line iPhones cost about $180 to make but retail for close to
$1000.
Tariff expenses come out of some combination of negotiated lower prices with vendors, lost
jobs as importers seek to cut costs, and lower profits. Consumer prices are the last thing to
consider.
Please excuse my ignorance. We hear about a war on this and a war on that all the time. Now a
trade war which we are winning (or not). How will we know that we won? After victory do we
buy more stuff from China or less? Will their prices for stuff be higher or lower? I am a
financially comfortable retired person who has plenty of stuff that I have accumulated over
the years; a trade victory might have a different meaning to a young couple starting a life.
Who gets the spoils of victory, me or the youngsters?
China has been running much the same economic model as Japan in the 1970's and 1980's, an
export-led autarchy heavily dependent on debt financing. When Japan started to open its
financial markets in the later 1980's, things started grinding to halt and by the early
1990's stagnation started.
China is on much the same track, though Xi has been careful not to liberalize the
financial markets too much, and has otherwise done a good job of keep growth on track. But it
can't last, and if a trade war does not tip China into stagnation, something else will in the
not-too-distant future.
Any downturn will bring the legitimacy of the CCP into question, and the traditional
response of dictatorships in that situation is to find a foreign conflict to distract the
population. With mutual distrust, and even dislike, growing on both sides, things could get
very messy.
In the 2017/2018 trade year, the US exported $12 billion of soy to China. That's.
particularly important for two reasons:
* China accounts for the majority of US soy exports, so the trade war affects that sector
more that the others you mention.
* The people affected are one of the cores of Trump's base.
The latter point is particularly significant, because the success or failure of the war
will be determined by political stamina, not by economics directly. Who can hold out longer,
Xi or Trump, as his political position erodes. One of the "weaknesses" of a democracy is the
greater sensitivity to the broader political environment (ie, not just the Politburo). Are
you so sure that the US will win this war of attrition?
@Kent – Thank you! Finally someone with actual understanding about retail and the
ridiculous profit margins of imported goods, especially from Asia. As someone who worked
first-hand at a shoe factory in China, managing the account, I was aghast at how low U.S.
companies like Nike or even Wal-Mart drove down the production costs ($6-18 dollars landed),
while selling the shoes for $30 – $120 dollars.
Theoretically all that juiced-up profits from outsourcing should have been reinvested to
create new jobs for U.S. workers over the past 20 years. That's what economists and corporate
lobbyists will argue. Empirically, however, those profits were reinvested to the stock market
for fat quarterly bonuses.
The underlying issue with China is their long standing demand to disclose all development
info about any product doing trade in China. Take Apple, they butted heads with the FBI and
refused to unlock an Iphone that belonged to a killer. Then they enter China and the
government there demands all the tec info for phone development and Apple simply hands over
their deepest secrets. Its the same for Ford, Cat or any others wanting to do business in
China. I for one, can live without any China trade if these have to be the requirements.
There is a long list of other cheap labor countries that would welcome our trade without
being forced to provide trade secrets.
"So what happens in the next T-bill auction when China doesn't show up and instead sits on
the sidelines–does the Treasury end up paying higher interest rates to sell the
instruments necessary to finance our federal spending? And, if so, what does an increase in
those interest rates do to our economy?"
Interest rates for treasuries are always set by the Federal Reserve. The secret sauce is
the Primary Dealer banks. They are required, by law, to make the market for treasuries.
Meaning they have to buy any treasuries that aren't sold. And they do so at the interest rate
set by the Fed. And they always, always have all the money they need to do so. The Fed just
prints it and adds it to their balances.
It's the beauty of a fiat currency. The USA cannot be held hostage to foreign financial
agents.
This trade war is about regime in change in China, as Bannon has said on many occasions. The
Chinese are finally waking up to our true intentions. America can't allow a more successful
economic model to exist anymore than they allow socialism in Venezuela.
The only surprising outcome of the clash will be that American corporations will
experience massive collateral damage due to supply chain disruption and being shut out of the
largest consumer market in the world in China.
The U.S. Empire has decided if U.S. corporation can't run ruff shod over the Chinese
government like they do here and everywhere else, they cannot be allowed to submit to Chinese
government rule in exchange for the benefits of the Chinese market place.
It's probably the only time in recent history that the defense of market forces resulted
in a direct hit on the "free" market itself. Like all front line troops, U.S. corporations
will suffer many casualties in the battle ahead. They didn't volunteer for this trade war and
they had no idea that this would be a hill that many would die on.
The paradox of this situation is not lost on them and most are paralyzed by what lies
ahead.
You are conveniently forgetting that much of the Chinese goods subject to the increased
tariffs are goods manufactured by American corporations utilizing Chinese labour due to its
much reduced costs. Those American companies are going to lose market share and profits
because of these new tariffs. They will not be happy!
I wonder if they could by commodities? Buy surplus oil would be a logical choice. They could
sell their treasuries, use dollars for oil, thereby drive up the price of oil for everyone,
including the US.
Granted that could eventually help the US, but in the short term could be a pain.
Slugger , I don't think your question is ignorant at all. I think it's very wise. If
only we asked the "Why?" and "What does a win look like?" of all these literal and figurative
wars, we might get somewhere.
I do not, ultimately, believe Trump's trade war with China is going to make the US into a
manufacturing powerhouse again. Those days have come and gone. It will definitely increase
the cost of a lot of junk we buy from China.
The hope, however, is that it will force China into a position wherein we could demand
more fairness in terms of patents and technology theft.
The time when it was beneficial for China to trade real goods for numbers in a computer was
long since past. They keep doing it out of habit. Trump is doing both countries a big favor.
Historically, it has not been wise to discount China's capacity to overcome disruptions that
would vivisect virtually any other civilisational hegemon on this planet. China survived the
Mongols, the English, and the Japanese. And itself many many times over.
We're barely a blink in the eye of China's history. I would not be as sanguine about who
"needs" whom more over the long term.
(Just to be clear: I have more than my share of criticisms of American trade policy of the
past couple of generations, including our posture vis-a-vis China.)
"Slugger
May 17, 2019 at 9:58 am
Please excuse my ignorance. We hear about a war on this and a war on that all the time. Now a
trade war which we are winning (or not). How will we know that we won? After victory do we
buy more stuff from China or less? Will their prices for stuff be higher or lower? I am a
financially comfortable retired person who has plenty of stuff that I have accumulated over
the years; a trade victory might have a different meaning to a young couple starting a life.
Who gets the spoils of victory, me or the youngsters?"
You. Definately you.
Youngsters need to be able find a job that pays for their basic needs and a path to be
able to keep growing or stabilize that lifestyle.
This war bumps prices higher, but won't bring those jobs back. High skill jobs are already
in high demand with few takers so more of those won't help the majority. The rest will either
be automated, moved from China to other countries (which is already happening as China wants
to move from sweatshops to a consumer middle class economy and places like India and Vietnam
are taking up the slack), or abandoned due to a lack of profit margins.
I'm not saying we should or shouldn't do this with China. They haven't exactly been
treating us or our companies well after all. But this is NOT going to benefit the regular
American. Low skill, sustainable, reliable work is just Not going to be a thing.
What will help is encouraging the ability to gain high skills and mobility for those high
skill jobs that are in desperate need of workers, aiding low skill workers so that they can
afford the things they need and not be 100% exploited, and figure out what to do with the
many many middle age and up folks who were trained to be middle class to transition them into
one or the other and not hate life while doing so.
We can go fix or break our trading systems with other countries as we see fit, but we
really need to stop thinking it's going to fix things. Same goes for immigration for that
matter.
The author shows his ignorance. The Bank of China is a commercial bank. Foreign reserves are
held by the People's Bank of China. Different entities. I assume the rest of the article is
full of inaccuracies.
It is hard to know if China has already lost. Their published economic numbers are not very
accurate. A key point is that the standard economic models of International Trade are wrong.
"Free Trade" can have benefits, but does mandate optimal outcomes. For example, lower cost
players can transfer economic production to their soil. There are many equilibrium points
(vs. the one of standard economics) in international trade when productivity changes or there
are economies of scale. With many of these points it would be better a nation not Trade. The
US Trade with China fits this bill. This non-standrd was demonstrated by Baumol and See:
https://www.amazon.com/Conflicting to
-National-Interests-Robbins-Lectures/dp/0262072092/ref=sr_1_5?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1473299717&sr=1-5&keywords=Baumol+Trade
We need to follow the actual Terrain of economic results vs. the incorrect map of standard
economics.
Organizational and Technological stage drives over 80% of economic growth (see Solow). The
Chinese have latched on to US creativity to drive their economy (plus an investment rate of
45% vs. 20% for the US). In parallel the US went Crony Capitalist and its TFP went from 3% to
.4%/year. Can a Crony capitalist US recover its productivity growth and can a State
Capitalismt Chinese dictatorship be innovative without the West. The US under Trump is
attempting to displace its currrent ruling elites. This will not happen in China. My guess is
China has lost at trade and will lose at Economic productivity growth.
Sounds more like a pointless Pyrrhic victory. Tit-for-tat trade wars have many unintended
consequences, can easily expand into other sectors, and ultimately consumers and employees
will bear the burden.
Americans' fear and hatred of China is so great that we are yearning for China's lost
regardless of how it may harm Americans.
Take the latest "emergency order" to put Huawei in the "entity list" to ban it from
purchasing American products. If implemented, it will cost American companies $11 billions of
sales from Huawei, and lost of thousands of high tech and good quality jobs. If Huawei is
destroyed, the 5G market will probably be picked up by Swedish and Finland companies, and the
smart phones market by South Korean Samsung, not any US company. But who cares, as long as
Huawei is destroyed, right?
Take a look of all opinion pages in the media and comments in the Internet, if the supply
chain is moved from China to Vietnam, then it is a win for Americans, right? Who care whether
Vietnamese can produce it as efficiently as Chinese or not, or whether Vietnam is also a
communist country?
This *jihadic* style pursuit to destroy China is also blinding ordinary intelligent
Americans of common sense about the relative strengths and weaknesses of both sides. This
author, for example, ignores all the possible ways Chinese can hit back if they also decide
to go the self-destructive ways or even "nuclear" (figuratively or literally) options. And
yes, the options are not restricted to financial tool like US bonds only, e.g.
1. Stop selling rare earth to American companies – which means we can't even make
F-35 fighters. The last congressional study finds that it will take at least 10 years for US
to re-open our rare earth mine.
2. Start making the life of all American companies difficult in China – GM and Ford
are selling more cars in China than in US, Apple has its 2nd largest market in China. The
growth rate of China for these companies are higher than US.
3. Stop cooperating with US on geopolitical front, e.g. start helping North Korea to
perfect their ICBM, or buying lots of oil from Iran, etc.
These are just random thoughts I come out from 2 minutes of brainstorming. I am very sure
1.4 billions people can think of many things much more deeply and creative than me. Have the
author or any of the people in DC think through all the possibilities before shouting for
war? Good luck if you think they do.
And rest assured when the dusk settles, ordinary Americans will NOT be any penny richer or
our life any better.
This country has a long history of insecurity toward and racism against Asians. Sadly, the
current fight proves that this ugly chapter has not close.
Right now Trump administration clearly wants to slow down China development and Chinese
leadership understand that. The game is probably similar to the game the USA played with the USSR
-- create economic difficulties to the point when disintegration, or the social upheaval is possible.
China level of internal debt denominated in dollars probably dwarf their Treasury holdings (this also is true for Russia).
This situation is considered by many commenters a huge weak point and that might be
Trump team calculation: in their current situation Chinese's can't afford to lose such a large export market as the USA: many
enterprises will simply be bankrupt.
The US consumers might still feel the pinch, but ultimately Beijing needs the trade surplus more than the USA needs their
trade.
If this is wrong, Trump administration might make already bad situation worse, as if China
can switch goods flows and survive more of less intact that might undermine dollar as the
reserve currency. They also now will probably completely ignore sanctions against Iran, making
them non-essential: a kick in the chin to the Trump and neocons who surround him in WH.
Looks like we are on the wedge of creation of two hostile to each other neoliberal systems instead of one: one with the center in
Washington and the
second with the center in Peking.
It is bad strategy to attack several countries simultaneously (the war on two forints) and
that's what Trump is doing: Iran, Russia and China are three major battlefields now. There are
also some tensions with EU too.
The concept of face while somewhat interesting is probably exaggerated and is redundant here.
This comments really gats to the bottom of it: " It has always seemed to me that "Face" is the
distant inferior cousin of Honor and a much closer sibling to Pride or even Hubris. That is, the
Asian concept of Face has everything to do with how you are perceived and almost none with how
you "are". Honor, meanwhile, demands a rigorous adherence to a code of conduct and force of will
that places less emphasis on perception and more on "being". Westerners (myself included) tend to
get those two confused. "
Notable quotes:
"... 6: It goes a pretty long way to be aware of some more imaginative things that especially state aligned business can do if you are in China. Things like precision weighing any electronic equipment you take there before and after are just best practice. ..."
I
don't think the Washington decision makers, as opposed to perhaps career Sinologists in the
State Department, quite understand the dynamics of the Trump Administrations relationship with
China and the risks America appears to be running. The bit that seems to be missing is a
realistic appreciation of "Face".
A quick search of the internet reveals scholarly definitions of "Face" together with the
description of it in socio - cultural terms that in my opinion do not do it justice. Couple
that with Western insensitivity, NeoCon hubris and Trumps preference for believing everything
is a negotiable transaction and we are set up for a monumental falling out with China that has
lethal consequences for America.
I will give a few examples of Face, you can find plenty more on your own. Did you know it is
an insult to request a Chinese to sign a written contract? If he has agreed to the terms and
said as much in front of other Chinese then that is enough. "Face" does the rest. Did you know
that in certain circumstances "Face" requires you to lie to, or ignore, authorities in support
of family and friends? This last, in my opinion, is the reason for the current Chinese attempt
at omnipresent surveillance; "we tremble at the power of the Emperor in Peking, but the
mountains are high".
Col. Lang makes the point that the Japanese went to war to dispel the threatened perception
that "they weren't the men they thought they were". Well with "Face' in China its more than
that, you are your "Face". To damage someones "Face" is to create a lifelong mortal, implacable
enemy. There is no way, short of death, to recover once you have given offense. Against that
standard Trump, Bolton and Pompeo are playing with fire. "Just kidding" doesn't cut it.
It may surprise some of you to know that the West was trading with China right through the
cold war - in US dollars only. Nixon didn't discover China either. It also may surprise some
that China is perfectly capable of making very high quality reasonably priced sophisticated
goods, and always has been. The reason that Walmart sells cheap Chinese schlock is because
that's what they asked China to supply. As for "stealing intellectual property", don't make me
laugh. We all do it and China has plenty of very smart people that create first rate IP of
their own. I make the case that China is a sophisticated and capable economy, with its own
amour propre, not some third world hole populated by leaders that can be bought or
threatened, and Trump risks forgetting this at our peril.
To this end I note that the trade war is not going to Americas advantage, China has vast
holdings of American debt, China buys Iranian oil, judging by reports of Sochi discussions,
Russia AND China are likely to support Iran and both Korea and Taiwan are vulnerable. In my
opinion President Trump has a very small window left in which to fire Bolton and perhaps Pompeo
and embark on a more conciliatory line, before China becomes an irreversible, implacable
enemy.
So unless we economically surrender to them expect war?
See, that's the attitude Trump and the Trade Representative display. It is
impossible we could find a compromise that would be better for both sides. It is a purely
binary zero-sum game. If we do not "win," then we "lose," which means surrendering to an
implacable enemy who will destroy us. It's no wonder the majority of the world's people think
America is the greatest danger to world peace. This is why Bolton is able to find support
throughout the nomenklatura. Most Chinese still hold to Confucian concepts of honor,
something the American elites abandoned decades ago as unprofitable.
My son, Jason, is fluent in both Mandarin and Cantonese was headquarered in Hong Kong for
years but now works out of Tokyo but spends a great deal of time in China conducting
business. He would probably argue that, if anything, Walrus is understating the importance of
Face in China. There are numerous rituals associated with interacting with Chinese that must
be observed in order for communication and agreement to flow properly.
I think many in America, maybe even Trump, have an image of China as a backward country
full of uneducated dumb people. Nothing could be further from the truth as a large segment of
the population is not only eductated but intellectually the equal of Americans.
As far as handling the trade war between China and the U.S., I think in some ways China
has an advantage in it's government directed relationship with business. It allows China to
react quickly to adverse conditions, faster and with more cohesiveness than our capitalist
system. Watch for China to move it's manufactured products through numerous other countries
to avoid some of the impact of tariffs.
China is also not as responsive to consumer complaints as the U.S. democracy. As soon as
Trump's base starts complaining about the higher prices at Walmart etc. Congress and Trump's
re-election campaign officials will start to make China tariffs seem intolerable.
I would think the Chinese see Trump as something to be persevered for a few years regardless
of who he surrounds himself with at this point. I wonder if they have a term for "face
incapable" as a parallel concept to the Russian "agreement incapable"? As such they probably
see his administration as a no more sophisticated than a hornets nest, to be avoided if
possible and swatted if necessary.
It has always seemed to me that "Face" is the distant inferior cousin of Honor and a much
closer sibling to Pride or even Hubris. That is, the Asian concept of Face has everything to
do with how you are perceived and almost none with how you "are". Honor, meanwhile, demands a
rigorous adherence to a code of conduct and force of will that places less emphasis on
perception and more on "being". Westerners (myself included) tend to get those two
confused.
If the Chinese were bound by the authors concept of Face, China must be a paradise without
corruption. Instead of polluted water land and air, wizened elders concerned over their
stewardship and the lose of face from an environmental catastrophe, would provide a
harmonious balance between man and nature. Instead, its a paradise and a ghetto where
passerby's walk nonchalantly around the dieing. Where companies reluctantly provide netting
to slow the steady suicide of their workers. They do tend to plan for the long term, and they
can certainly hold a grudge I would agree. How far are you willing to bend-knee for someone
else's concept of pride though? Tariffs, which have been around since antiquity, seem like a
small infraction for all this talk of life-long mortal, implacable enemies. Yesterday I saw a
Chinese TV program that roughly translated said Donald Trump was literally in the White House
crying over soybean prices. POTUS literally crying over the Chinese governments response to
our rising tariffs after decades of unfair trade practices that benefited the Chinese (elites
anyway). So you shouldn't think that saving Face is a two way street or will result in a
mutually beneficial deal.
IMO, China has been "an irreversible, implacable enemy" for decades now. It just so
happens that our own fifth column in the Party of Davos have aided and abetted this
implacable enemy while making sure that we voluntarily disarmed and did not fight back a war
that they are fully engaged in. The consequence has been that we are paying for our own
destruction. China is more authoritarian & militaristic today than it was three decades
ago and there are several people who believe they currently pose an existential threat to the
US & the West in general.
While tariffs may not be the best strategy, we have to admire Trump's courage and
determination to finally fight back in the face of massive internal opposition from our fifth
column. When you look at the sheer scale at which the Chinese are buying think-tanks,
academics, media, K-Street lobbyists & political influence it is staggering and only the
Israeli influence operation is bigger in depth & breadth. Ever since Bill Clinton gave
China Most Favored Nation status and the Party of Davos furthering their own narrow
short-term financial interests, we have directly financed and transferred technology to China
and dismantled our industrial base. China joined the WTO but has thumbed their noses at every
adverse WTO ruling that showed they play not by the rules but are predatory.
You dismiss the scale of IP theft, forced technology transfer, product dumping, state
subsidies and industrial espionage as everyone does it. That's typical of the China
apologists in the West.
I think you over-estimate China's financial strength. There are several macro analysts
with excellent long-term analytical track records who believe that China is desperately short
USD. This theme that you note that China can crash the UST market is already proven to be
false. China in fact sold hundreds of billions of UST in 2014-2016 with no perturbation in
the UST market.
On the contrary the financial pressure on China is increasing as their debt-fueled
malinvestments grow. I'm willing to bet you that we'll see this pressure manifest in a
devaluation of the RMB.
Sure, they've kicked our ass these past couple decades. Now they've got cocky and think they
own us. Supply chains can re-orient.
As a red-blooded American I'd like my home team to seriously up their game and of course
beat the Chinese at their own mercantilist game. A good start would be to put the squeeze on
their massive USD short position. Eurodollar market is a perfect spot to begin. The Chinese
have US$1.3 trillion debt maturing in 12 months. They've either got to redeem or rollover.
Devalue & bleed reserves. Or else sell USD assets & lose collateral. Margin call
time! Wake-up call time for BRI - if Trump chooses to squeeze at this immediate
vulnerability. Trump can also take the next critical step - restrict their access to our
capital markets. The SEC can also come down hard on all their fraudulent listings.
Maybe Australia is losing its best & brightest moving to China. Not here. In fact it
is the opposite. Young Chinese techies whoever can get a visa are immigrating here. Wealthy
Chinese including top CCP officials are using every mechanism that they can avail to get
their capital out. Chinese capital controls are tightening. If they had an open capital
account their trillion dollar reserve would vanish overnight as capital flees. You must know
that China's domestic security budget is larger than their defense budget. The CCP fear their
own people more than anyone else. Why do you think they're amping up their domestic
surveillance expenditure?
I can also give you an anecdotal experience. Newly minted billionaire and founder of Zoom,
Eric Yuan spoke to our tech analyst team a year ago. I happened to be in that meeting. He was
categorical that if he had been in China and had half the success, CCP would effectively
control his company. He said every Chinese techie dreams of moving to America.
Jack Ma, was banded out here in the west as the new breed Chinese tech entrepreneur. A
billionaire on the Davos circuit. Did he really own Alibaba or was it the CCP? How come his
shareholding was suddenly zeroed out?
Do you think any smart Chinese really trusts the CCP? Why would they? You talk about
"face" & culture and the 3,000 year history of the Han people. What about the history
& culture of the Tibetans? Or the culture & traditions of the Uyghurs with over 2
million of them currently undergoing brutal "re-education" in concentration camps in
Xinjiang?
The authoritarian CCP have had a free ride on us for over two decades. It is time to suit
up and give them a little taste of their own medicine. I hope Trump retains his resolve.
I don't care one iota about their "Face". Not at the expense of deindustrializing large
sections of the American Heartland. Which has already happened. Our trade relationship with
China has been a disaster. The only people to benefit are large shareholders.
As for them holding our debt it's threat is non-existent. Let them sell all of the bonds.
China currently owns $1.13 trillion in Treasurys, a fraction of the total $22 trillion in
U.S. debt. The Federal Reserve if need be can buy them all up but even that won't be
necessary due to insatiable demand for the bonds even at these ridiculous low interest
rates.
In fact their obsession with "Face" indicates a psychopath. Defines as no sense of right
and wrong and is generally bolder, more manipulative, and more self-centered than a
sociopath. That sums up their dealings with us the last 25 years.
Only a fool continues to play this game of theirs. Stealing our technology at will, forced
50/50 partnerships, currency manipulation, dumping into our country to destroy industries,
etc. etc. etc.
Plus they are expanding geographically now due to us making them rich. They are 1.3
million homogeneous Han for the most part. Especially compared to our country. I have to say
their government has definitely improved the lives of their citizens as a whole and I respect
that. But enough of our weak kneed leaders giving away the store.
I personally am being hurt by the tariffs due to many LVP flooring products I sell are
sourced from China. I have no problem taking a hit for the greater good and have been working
on sourcing from different locations.
Thanks for pointing the finger at China -looking out for their own interests - the bloody
bas-ards.
I guess you believe that had China had remained insular, the US would not have
de-industrialized to a different country? As if NAFTA wasn't a great sucking sound. Hmm. Me
things the problem lies closer to home - but no finger pointing there.
Totally impressed with the TrumpTareef - Totally on top of everything.
Oh wait, the tax advantages that encourage de-industrialization remain. But I guess Trump
doesn't understand taxes and how wealthy corporations and people use them to move production
overseas and not pay taxes ....
Meanwhile, global de-dolarization accelerates. At some % the US loses its special status
and there will be a reckoning.
I see a lot of hot air - not new policy: Manufacturing did not come back, US
infrastructure is a joke and continues to crumble, workforce participation continues
dropping, and hourly median wage remain stagnant. Why? Because it requires actual policies
that lessen the profitability of some (very wealthy friends in the circle Trump wants to
run).
Here's my prediction - Trump will fold by summer or sooner.
Apologies for butting-in in an otherwise fascinating conversation... but....
There is considerable but misplaced talk of "capitalism" being thrown about in some
threads, whilst Harlan worries about the deindustrialization of the West, ostensibly, due to
China. China has little to do with deindustrialization. A centralized monetary system coupled
with electoral politics, can only be sustained through the use of perpetual fiscal
deficits.
In order for the political construct to be able to run perpetual fiscal deficits, national
debt must necessarily expand. As debt conforms to the law of diminishing marginal utility
however, this is a compounding strategy.
Thus, in order to compensate for the loss of purchasing power, government borrowing must
progressively increase till eventually it goes parabolic. Hence the reason debt in the USA
doubled between 2008 and 2016. This is the parabolic phase.
In order to sustain this strategy, fiscal revenue must ideally expand. In order to
increase fiscal revenue however, legislation must be brought to bear. As legislation and
fiscality become progressively more restrictive in one country, economic actors migrate to
countries where they can achieve an economic advantage.
As a corollary, as legislation and fiscality become progressively more restrictive,
barriers are raised in business and industry. As barriers rise, so does unemployment and/or
under employment whilst business dynamism is proportionally stifled.
In this context therefore, artificially lowering interest rates to ostensibly kick start
the economy, actually reinforces the offshoring dynamic to the detriment of SMEs and the
benefit of large corporations.
If China can be blamed for anything therefore, it can only be blamed to have opened the
doors wide open to Western corporations to allow them to shift their production technology
out of Europe and the USA.
All the while, the finance industry is laughing all the way to the bank.... their own
bank that is.. ..
Chas Freeman was president Richard Nixon's senior interpreter for Nixon's visit to China.
Here is an interesting description by Freeman of some of that trip--
Something to which not enough consideration is given is that China has a considerable
volume of foreign loans, those are increasing, they are denominated in dollars (particularly
since the yuan is not convertible), and must be serviced in dollars. That means that China
needs a lot of dollars which it obtains via selling goods to the United States.
Said another way, China cannot reduce the amount it sells to the U. S. or buy more from
the U. S. without a convertible currency or reducing its level of foreign debt.
Your commentary exudes the naivety that the Chinese have preyed on for the past 50 years.
Their meekish and subservient mannerisms hide a ruthless and immoral inner nature. They would
still be a backward country if not for our elite's insatiable greed. What have they produced
organically that wasn't ripped off from developed countries? What do they offer cultural
other than a social credit system with improved state surveillance techniques? They treat
their own people like dogs and they still have dog eating festivals. China offers a way of
life that is an antithesis of the West, so it is inevitable that there will be a clash. The
question isn't if but when. The longer we delude ourselves into thinking that economics will
change China, the more blood will be shed when the reckoning occurs.
Chinese chauvinism puts American exceptionalism to shame. They've been the Celestial Empire
thousands of years longer than the upstart Anglo-American Empire. In last 30 years the
Western Elite dumped "noblesse oblige" for "get it while you can". China's entry into the WTO
directly hallowed out manufacturing in the Mid-West ultimately resulting to Donald Trump's
trade war.
This was a result of CEOs and Wall Street Raiders moving manufacturing to low wage, no
environmental regulation, nations to make a quick buck. China was a willing partner in the
con in order to modernize.
China's retail sales are now greater than America's. Since the US declared an economic
war, GM will have to drop Buick and Cadillac brands and market their cars in China as
Chinese. But "Face" likely will make that ploy unsuccessful.
GM sold over 4 million vehicles in China last year, even more than it sold in the North
American market. The U.S. only exported 267,000 passenger vehicles to China. Apple sales
declined 30% in China. In an economic war Chinese will avoid buying American branded
products. They have alternatives. Americans don't have a choice at Walmart except to pay the
higher prices due to the tariffs.
Those GM vehicles were built in China by a JV with majority Chinese ownership. The product
line sold at Wal-Mart has plenty of things made in countries other than China. We have a
twenty trillion dollar economy with Chinese imports making up 500 billion. We've got plenty
of options.
China has been emboldened as the west moved their manufacturing base there and transferred
their technology. They've been taking the next steps directly influencing our politics.
Huawei while it claims it is an employee owned company is controlled by the CCP as many
"private" companies in China. The west would be foolish to not put an end to Chinese
subterfuge that undermines their economy and national security.
I don't buy it at all. As others have pointed out China requires access to American markets
to 1) make their dollar denominated loan payments and 2) keep foreign manufacturing located
in the country. The cost of tariffs to the United States is finding alternative sources in
supply chains and higher end cost to consumers. We're insanely rich, we can afford that
without issue. The cost of tariffs to China, in the ultimate analysis, is foreign companies
moving their manufacturing out of the country, which would utterly devastate them.
So far as I understand the Trump administration is demanding nothing more than China play
by the rules of the game as written. If they're not willing to do so, **** 'em.
A well written contract contains enforceable penalties for non-performance with the money
often held in escrow. That's the way I write them. Trump is using the balance of US/China
trade to penalize the Chinese for reneging on the verbal and draft agreements they made with
us.
True. I am not familiar with the agreements so can't discuss it intelligently.
Just saying it seems hardly anyone lives up to agreements any more regardless of in writing
or not.
And dealing with countries is dealing with the people who represent it ..I do believe you
catch more flies with honey than vinegar. You can always swat them later if honey doesn't do
the trick.
This is a traditional problem deeply embedded in Chinese culture. Westerners in the 1800s
concluded that it was impossible to write a binding contract in classical Chinese. There were
hopes for Mandarin, but... I was reading about this as a college student studying Chinese
in the 1970s and have never ceased running across complaints about it. Chinese contracts are
only as good as the will of the contractors and the influence you can bring to bear. When you
are dealing with government, a contract is good until the officials get replaced with new
faces. Even big players like McDonald's are not exempt.
"...what was meant as the flagship of McDonald's planned expansion into the People's
Republic of China (it already had outlets in Hong Kong and Taiwan) was destined for
controversy. In 1994 -- only two years after opening -- a legal battle pitted the
transnational corporation against Beijing's government in a land dispute symptomatic of
China's no holds barred modernization.
"In question was McDonald's 20-year lease on the strategically located property at
Wangfujing -- a busy central shopping district -- and the city's attempts to shutter the
restaurant to make way for a new super sized shopping mall. McDonald's balked at the eminent
domain order, which flattened the surrounding neighborhood. In the end the burger joint was
the lone building standing amid acres of rubble. The dispute raised serious concerns among
foreign investors over the efficacy of business contracts in China at a time when the
Communist state was seen as the future of global markets.
"But in late 1996 McDonald's China president Marvin Whaley announced a reconciliation. "In
a spirit of teamwork and partnership, we've developed a plan that will allow our strong
expansion in the city to continue."
Note that it took two years for the "spirit of teamwork and cooperation' to kick in for a
multi-billion dollar cooperation who could presumably have just been given another good spot
for a hamburger stand. If the officials involved had been willing. Your mileage may vary, but
you are unlikely to do better.
Chinese will respect a verbal contract - the difficulty is getting them to say the terms in
front of other Chinese. Lieing to you is permissible.
Our business solved the problem by using irrevocable letters of credit. That way we could
both blame the banks and not accuse each other of skulduggery. Hence Face was always kept
intact.
For the record and to preclude pointless ad hominem attacks, the Chinese are intelligent
hard working people for whom sophisticated business and finance was a way of life while we
were still living in mud huts. They revere education. They do not subscribe to Modern Judeo
Christian ethics but a much older Confucian creed. For that reason pleas for China to 'play
by the rules" just do not compute.
China is not some modern, fly by night, Westphalian creation. You are dealing with the
Middle Kingdom - 3000 years old and the Chinese, after centuries of oppression now demand
respect. The idea that once again the West can dictate to China is offensive to Chinese and,
considering their economy, downright delusional.
China has its problems. Face as a concept does not extend beyond family and immediate
friends, so the concept of higher loyalty to a Chinese nation (ie patriotism) is not strong.
Neither is respect for national law, nor respect for institutions or companies. This is the
source of all commercial crime (eg: fraud, adulterated products pollution).
The governments reaction to the tendencies of its population include draconian punishments
and now attempts at nationwide surveillance.
The problem Trump fails to recognise is that the CCP and its leaders have Face. Threaten
that and China will become an implacable and unbeatable enemy.
The underlaying philosophies are in some ways diametrically opposed. We in the West are
object and goal oriented, with an ideals based culture, while the East has more of a feedback
oriented view, ie. Yin and Yang.
Even the concept of time is different, as we think of ourselves as individuals, thus
moving through our context, the future is in front and the past behind, traveling the events
of our lives. While the Eastern view is the past is in front and the future behind, as they
see themselves as part of their context and necessarily witness events after they occur, then
the situation continues.
Both are valid in their own context. Though our presumption of moving toward some ideal is
flawed. When some is good, more is not always better. Consider efficiency, which is to do
more with less. Then the ideal of efficiency would be to do everything with nothing. Those
most committed to this view see Armageddon as the door to their ideal state.
What should be kept in mind about the East is that with Communism and the Party system,
then becoming China Inc, to global capitalism, they have adopted essentially Western ideas
and tried framing them through their own lens. The reason would be that such an ideals, goal
oriented paradigm is very effective in the short and medium term, but creates that much more
blowback, in the long term. While China might seem a threat to the current American status
quo, the real danger is our own social and economic breakdown. We have been living on the
equivalent of a national home loan since Reagan, if not Roosevelt and if the holders of that
debt try calling it due, say trading it for remaining public assets, we will be revisiting
feudalism.
The Russian and the Chinese, as well as the Iranians, etc. are really just boogie men,
being thrown up to distract us. This Iranian situation seems to have be a total disconnect
with reality. Something is brewing, whether planned, or just the wheels really coming off the
train.
Both we and the Chinese seem to be headed to our own versions of Brexit. The Russians went
through it with the fall of the Soviet Union.
"...the concept of higher loyalty..." Sounds like the Chinese exclusion act might have
been a good idea afterall. How many generations in the US will it take for a Chinese national
to actually assimiate and become "American"?
"...unbeatable enemy." The PRC is not the Middle Kingdom. President Xi is not the subject
of Master Po's "Everlasting Wrong" and he is well aware that China is certainly not
"unbeatable". These are trade negotiations and right now they need us one hell of a lot more
than we need them. Convincing his fellows in the CCP of that is probably going to be harder
for him than for Trump to do the same with Congress.
Walrus, I find the most illuminating thing about your informative post is the reaction you
elicited. Comment after comment, in my opinion, illustrates some degree of unwillingness or
inability to acknowledge and tolerate a culture clearly different from ours. I am reminded of
a South Park episode called "Toleration" in which the whole town wrongly assumes toleration
of the other requires wholehearted celebration of the other. Nothing could be further from
the truth. There's plenty many of us don't like about today's Chinese culture and society,
but it's their culture and society. They don't have to conform to our ways anymore than we
have to conform to theirs, but we should acknowledge the difference and deal with it.
In the name of tolerance of another culture are we going to surrender to their predatory
behavior? Are we going to allow the Chinese to continue to "beat us at our own game" as
Walrus alludes? Sure the Party of Davos have benefited from the current relationship but why
should the US in it's national interest continue to allow an authoritarian state to steal our
IP, subsidize their companies to dump products in our market and prevent our companies to
sell into their market unless they transfer technology, only to have it stolen?
That type of predatory behavior is not about cultural difference but taking advantage of a
situation that we allowed. Tariffs may not be the best strategy but at least Trump is saying
the current arrangement no longer works. It makes no sense to say in order to protect Chinese
"face" we should continue this arrangement where we have the short end of the deal. I hope
that Trump doesn't back down in the face of Chinese influence operations in the US and his
perception of what's best for his reelection. IMO, the Chinese threat is significantly larger
than any threat from Russia or Iran, and saying we should walk on eggshells to not offend
their cultural sensibilities is frankly ridiculous.
I believe Walrus over-estimates their strengths. There is a reason why their "best and
brightest" continue to immigrate to Silicon Valley in droves. I know some of them personally
as I have backed their entrepreneurial ventures. They will be the first to tell you that they
have given up a lot in terms of familial connection to immigrate to the US as they don't
share nor do they want their kid's futures to be subject to the capriciousness of Xi
Jinping's authoritarian vision.
Jack, why surrender to their predatory behavior? Just stop dealing with them. Stop allowing
American nationalists to buy Chinese made goods and stop selling China our goods. Why not
make the stuff ourselves or learn to do without? Why are those American farmers growing
soybeans for the Chinese. Let them grow stuff for Americans. Sure this approach is even more
extreme that the current tariff war, but it will make us immune to Chinese predatory
practices, won't it? The isolation of Sakoku as the purest form of American nationalism. As
an added benefit of implementing a policy of Sakoku, there would be no more American foreign
adventurism.
I say this tongue in cheek realizing it will never be implemented. But wouldn't this a
better implementation of American nationalism than demanding that all other countries simply
bend to our demands in all matters?
I wholeheartedly agree with you that we should end our overseas interventionism. I've
opposed it for a long time from Vietnam to Iraq & Syria. The costs in the trillions of
dollars, the destabilization of fragile societies to the unnecessary sacrifices of our
soldiers and their families have not provided any meaningful benefit to us.
As far as China is concerned I believe the situation is more complex. One thing I've
noticed in general and exemplified by the comments on this thread is the conflation of the
heritage and Confucian values of the Chinese people on the CCP. Let's not be under any
illusion. The CCP is unabashedly totalitarian. I've no quarrel with the Chinese people. On
the contrary they have my deepest sympathies for having to endure under the boot of the
CCP.
Of course any change in their form of government is for them to effect just as our
forefathers did here. The important point that I believe needs to be made is that we provided
the finance, the technology and the markets to enable the economic development of an
authoritarian regime. An argument can be made that those early decisions to bring in China
into the global economic framework was in the belief it would enable them to reform. I was
persuaded then by Sir James Goldsmith & Ross Perot and others that the GATT trade deal
driven by Wall St would be a disaster for our working class. Neither Bill Clinton nor the
Republicans asked the question then what if the CCP doesn't reform and instead intensifies
their authoritarianism?
Of course the big transfer of our industrial base was completely our own doing as our
political system is fully captured by the Party of Davos. In retrospect it should be clear
that the CCP never intended to relinquish their monopoly on power and would become even more
repressive to maintain it. The CCP is not our friend. They are an implacable enemy who are
now using their growing economic and military strength to directly interfere and subvert our
societies. The scale of their influence operations and the direct use of cash to purchase
influence and espionage is something much larger than at the depth of the Cold War with the
Soviet Union. It is high time we understand this threat and act. At least Trump in his own
limited way gets that something needs to change even if in his mind it is purely
transactional. I'd like to highlight a current example where the Trump administration is
moving to ban Huawei from our market. Opeds are being furiously written and published in our
national media in defense of Huawei, while the company hires the top cybersecurity official
in the Obama administration with top secret clearance as their lobbyist. There are no Opeds
here or in China that Google, Facebook, and other US companies are banned in China. Why is
that? IMO, it's because we accept the authoritarianism of the CCP. The neocons made a lot of
noise demonizing Sadam & Assad as brutal dictators, yet they're silent as Xi Jinping has
millions of Uighurs in concentration camps. If we don't act to check the CCP now our
grandchildren will regret it as they'll have to fight a war.
Quote -"The idea that once again the West can dictate to China is offensive to Chinese and,
considering their economy, downright delusional."
I believe this is the underlying driver to the individual Chinese acceptance of the cost to
any conflict, it also links directly to what they see as a Century of Humiliation where China
wasn't powerful. The very use of the word Humiliation in any translation directly links into
their concept of Face.
Quote- "China has its problems, Face as a concept does not extend beyond family and immediate
friends"
I believe to extend and change this cultural concept of what constitutes Face is behind
the national introduction of Social Credit scores for all citizens and available on line to
all citizens. It is in fact intended as a national reputation system whereby an unrelated
Chinese can lose Face when interacting with other citizens. China is the elephant in the room
in any Western political, defence and economic policy debate.
IMHO, the USA holds most of the cards in this negotiation:
1. The USA trade deficit with China is huge and China needs to sell to the USA, as it will
not find other countries to make up for the lost market.
2. It is not uncommon for supply chains to change. Goods that today are manufactured in
China will likely be made in other asian countries which have even lower wages if the trade
war really goes for a significant amount of time.
3. The inflationary and GDP contraction risk of a trade war is not that high, as the
imported chinese goods make up only 2,3% of the USA GDP.
4. The fact that China has lots of USA sovereign debt is not something that can not be
solved by the FED. A few economists have already pointed that in the past 5 or 10 years.
5. China already is an enemy of the USA. Worst case, it will be more active in the
hotspots in the World, instead of only spying and hacking the hell out of the USA.
So, do not panic. The ones that should be panicking are the chinese.
China gets our middle class and the west gets cheap socks in return.As our middle class
disappears overseas our cheap socks become unaffordable because there are no jobs for our
young workers.The only way to get our middle class back is to stop buying cheap socks.or to
put the price up on our middle class.any idiot can make cheap socks but middle class is
priceless.the backbone of a stable society.Secondly any society that lives beyond its means
through over population is doomed and under no circumstances must it be allowed to
expand.China's growing affluence will increase competition for resources as it's middle class
expands and this will lead to conflict.Cheap socks might end up causing WWIII
Just as a reminder - having run International businesses, I just want to clarify that U.S.
Businesses are not saints. There is a certain amount of cheating, browbeating and stealing as
long as we don't get caught and profits are increasing.
We might not like the Chinese using our methods but that is the way the cookie crumbles.
At this point about two-thirds of Prudential's profits come from overseas subsidiaries and
one of the reasons for that success is our ability to mimic what works in their domestic
companies and to do it somewhat better and cheaper.
Since the profits were repatriated to the U.S., I had to deal with a lot of government
flack about hurting their domestic companies and their employees.
1: Highly sophisticated Culture. They tend to react pretty well if one can show a more
then basic degree of understanding of their history.
2: They greatly prefer nuance. Simple answers imply simple minds.
3: I have not been in the position to actually have to get formal contracts with them. I
can certainly echo however that making a Chinese promise something in front of other Chinese
about whose perception he cares is usually sufficient to have a pretty honorable commitment
to something, it is often easier said then done.
4: I initially had some disdain for the Chinese way of not directly letting you know how
annoyed they are at any given point (Russians are fairly straightforward in this), but
essentially, their point of view is also that if you are incapable of assessing how annoyed
they are you are not a valid negotiation partner.
5: Also, keeping annoyance beneath the radar does not create scenes, and if a scene is
created reactions may have to be forced. Vengeance is a thing with the Chinese . My
impression is that they can be mollified though, and generally regard vengeance as an
expensive luxury item, I also got the impression that you need to go out of your way to
seriously become a target of vengeance, just professional disagreements are not a cause for
vengeance, especially not if you are a foreigner. They also have a pathway of not having to
take vengeance to save their faces by asserting that the offender is
insane/feebleminded/crazy and thus beneath vengeance. Its not a position you want to be in
though.
6: It goes a pretty long way to be aware of some more imaginative things that especially
state aligned business can do if you are in China. Things like precision weighing any
electronic equipment you take there before and after are just best practice.
Via ChasFreeman.net,
Remarks to the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies China Program
Ambassador Chas W. Freeman, Jr. (USFS, Ret.)
Senior Fellow, Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs, Brown University
Stanford, California, 3 May 2019
President Trump's trade war with China has quickly metastasized into every other domain
of Sino-American relations.
Washington is now trying to dismantle China's
interdependence with the American economy, curb its role in global governance, counter its foreign
investments, cripple its companies, block its technological advance, punish its many deviations
from liberal ideology, contest its borders, map its defenses, and sustain the ability to penetrate
those defenses at will.
The message of hostility to China these efforts send is consistent and apparently
comprehensive. Most Chinese believe it reflects an integrated U.S. view or strategy. It does not.
There is no longer an orderly policy process in Washington to coordinate, moderate, or
control policy formulation or implementation. Instead, a populist president has effectively
declared open season on China.
This permits everyone in his administration to go after
China as they wish. Every internationally engaged department and agency – the U.S. Special Trade
Representative, the Departments of State, Treasury, Justice, Commerce, Defense, and Homeland
Security – is doing its own thing about China. The president has unleashed an undisciplined
onslaught. Evidently, he calculates that this will increase pressure on China to capitulate to his
protectionist and mercantilist demands. That would give him something to boast about as he seeks
reelection in 2020.
Trump's presidency has been built on lower middle-class fears of displacement by immigrants and
outsourcing of jobs to foreigners. His campaign found a footing in the anger of ordinary Americans
– especially religious Americans – at the apparent contempt for them and indifference to their
welfare of the country's managerial and political elites. For many, the trade imbalance with China
and Chinese rip-offs of U.S. technology became the explanations of choice for increasingly unfair
income distribution, declining equality of opportunity, the deindustrialization of the job market,
and the erosion of optimism in the United States.
In their views of China, many Americans now appear subconsciously to have combined
images of the insidious Dr. Fu Manchu, Japan's unnerving 1980s challenge to U.S. industrial and
financial primacy, and a sense of existential threat analogous to the Sinophobia that inspired the
Anti-Coolie and Chinese Exclusion Acts.
Meanwhile, the ineptitude of the American elite revealed by the 2008 financial crisis, the
regular eruptions of racial violence and gun massacres in the United States, the persistence of
paralyzing political constipation in Washington, and the arrogant unilateralism of "America First"
have greatly diminished the appeal of America to the Chinese elite.
As a result, Sino-American interaction is now long on mutual indignation and very short
on empirically validated information to substantiate the passions it evokes.
On each
side, the other is presumed guilty of a litany of iniquities. There is no process by which either
side can achieve exoneration from the other's accusations. Guesstimates, conjectures,
a priori
reasoning
from dubious assumptions, and media-generated hallucinations are reiterated so often that they are
taken as facts. The demagoguery of contemporary American populism ensures that in this country
clamor about China needs no evidence at all to fuel it. Meanwhile, Chinese nationalism answers
American rhetorical kicks in the teeth by swallowing the figurative blood in its mouth and
refraining from responding in kind, while sullenly plotting revenge.
We are now entering not just a post-American but
post-Western
era.
In
many ways the contours of the emerging world order are unclear. But one aspect of them is certain:
China will play a larger and the U.S. a lesser role than before in global and regional governance.
The Trump administration's response to China's increasing wealth and power does not bode well for
this future. The pattern of mutual resentment and hostility the two countries are now establishing
may turn out to be indelible. If so, the consequences for both and for world prosperity and peace
could be deeply unsettling.
For now, America's relationship with China appears to have become a vector compounded of many
contradictory forces and factors, each with its own advocates and constituencies. The resentments
of some counter the enthusiasms of others. No one now in government seems to be assessing the
overall impact on American interests or wellbeing of an uncoordinated approach to relations with
the world's greatest rising power. And few in the United States seem to be considering the
possibility that antagonism to China's rise might end up harming the United States and its Asian
security partners more than it does China. Or that, in extreme circumstances, it could even lead
to a devastating trans-Pacific nuclear exchange.
Some of the complaints against China from the squirming mass of Sinophobes who have attached
themselves to President Trump are entirely justified. The Chinese have been slow to accept the
capitalist idea that knowledge is property that can be owned on an exclusive basis. This is, after
all, contrary to a millennial Chinese tradition that regards copying as flattery, not a violation
of genius. Chinese businessfolk have engaged in the theft of intellectual property rights not just
from each other but from foreigners. Others may have done the same in the past, but they were
nowhere near as big as China. China's mere size makes its offenses intolerable. Neither the
market economy in China nor China's international trade and investment relationships can realize
their potential until its disrespect for private property is corrected. The United States and the
European Union (EU) are right to insist that the Chinese government fix this problem.
Many Chinese agree. Not a few quietly welcome foreign pressure to strengthen the enforcement of
patents and trademarks, of which they are now large creators, in the Chinese domestic market. Even
more hope the trade war will force their government to reinvigorate "reform and opening." Fairer
treatment of foreign-invested Chinese companies is not just a reasonable demand but one that serves
the interests of the economically dominant but politically disadvantaged private sector in China.
Chinese protectionism is an unlatched door against which the United States and others should
continue to push.
But other complaints against China range from the partially warranted to the patently bogus.
Some recall Hermann Göring's cynical observation at Nuremberg that:
"The people can always be
brought to the bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is tell them they are
being attacked and denounce the pacifists for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to
danger. It works the same way in any country."
There is a lot of this sort of manipulative
reasoning at play in the deteriorating U.S. security relationship with the Chinese. Social and
niche media, which make everything plausible and leave no truth unrefuted, facilitate this. In the
Internet miasma of conspiracy theories, false narratives, fabricated reports, fictive "facts," and
outright lies, baseless hypotheses about China rapidly become firm convictions and long-discredited
myths and rumors find easy resurrection.
Consider the speed with which a snappy phrase invented by an Indian polemicist –
"debt-trap diplomacy" – has become universally accepted as encapsulating an alleged Chinese policy
of international politico-economic predation. Yet the only instance of a so-called a "debt trap"
ever cited is the port of Hambantota, commissioned by the since-ousted autocratic president of Sri
Lanka to glorify his hometown.
His successor correctly judged that the port was a white
elephant and decided to offload it on the Chinese company that had built it by demanding that the
company exchange the debt to it for equity. To recover any portion of its investment, the Chinese
company now has to build some sort of economic hinterland for the port. Hambantota is less an
example of a "debt trap" than of a stranded asset.
Then too, China is now routinely accused of iniquities that better describe the present-day
United States than the People's Middle Kingdom. Among the most ironic of such accusations is the
charge that it is China, not a sociopathic "America First" assault on the international
status
quo
, that is undermining both U.S. global leadership and the multilateral order remarkably
wise American statesmen put in place some seven decades ago. But it is the United States, not
China, that is ignoring the U.N. Charter, withdrawing from treaties and agreements, attempting to
paralyze the World Trade Organization's dispute resolution mechanisms, and substituting bilateral
protectionist schemes for multilateral facilitation of international trade based on comparative
advantage.
The WTO was intended as an antidote to mercantilism, also known as "government-managed trade."
China has come strongly to support globalization and free trade. These are the primary sources of
its rise to prosperity. It is hardly surprising that China has become a strong defender of the
trade and investment regime Americans designed and put in place.
By contrast, the Trump administration is all about mercantilism – boosting national power by
minimizing imports and maximizing exports as part of a government effort to manage trade with
unilateral tariffs and quotas, while exempting the United States from the rules it insists that
others obey.
I will not go on except to note the absurdity of the thesis that "engagement" failed to
transform China's political system and should therefore be abandoned. Those who most vociferously
advance this canard are the very people who used to complain that changing China's political order
was
not
the objective of engagement but that it
should
be. They now condemn
engagement because it did not accomplish objectives that they
wanted
it to have but used to
know that it
didn't
. It is telling that American engagement with other illiberal societies
(like Egypt, the Israeli occupation in Palestine, or the Philippines under President Duterte) is
not condemned for having failed to change them.
That said, we should not slight the tremendous impact of America's forty-year opening to China
on its socioeconomic development.
American engagement with China helped it develop
policies that rapidly lifted at least 500 million people out of poverty.
It transformed
China from an angry, impoverished, and isolated power intent on overthrowing the capitalist world
order to an active, increasingly wealthy, and very successful participant in that order. It
midwifed the birth of a modernized economy that is now the largest single driver of the world's
economic growth and that, until the trade war intervened, was America's fastest growing overseas
market. American engagement with China helped reform its educational system to create a
scientific, technological, engineering, and mathematical ("STEM") workforce that already accounts
for one-fourth of such workers in the global economy. For a while, China was a drag on human
progress. It is now an engine accelerating it. That transformation owes a great deal to the
breadth and depth of American engagement with it.
Nor should we underestimate the potential impact of the economic decoupling, political
animosity, and military antagonism that U.S. policy is now institutionalizing.
Even if
the two sides conclude the current trade war, Washington now seems determined to do everything it
can to hold China down. It seems appropriate to ask: can the United States succeed in doing this?
What are the probable costs and consequences of attempting to do it? If America disengages from
China, what influence, if any, will the United States have on its future evolution? What is that
evolution likely to look like under conditions of hostile coexistence between the two countries?
Some likely answers, issue by issue.
First
: the consequences of
cutting back Sino-American economic
interdependence.
The supply chains now tying the two economies together were forged by market-regulated
comparative advantage. The U.S. attempt to impose government-dictated targets for Chinese
purchases of agricultural commodities, semiconductors, and the like represents a political
preemption of market forces. By simultaneously walking away from the Paris climate accords, TPP,
the Iran nuclear deal, and other treaties and agreements, Washington has shown that it can no
longer be trusted to respect the sanctity of contracts. The U.S. government has also demonstrated
that it can ignore the economic interests of its farmers and manufacturers and impose politically
motivated embargoes on them. The basic lesson Chinese have taken from recent U.S. diplomacy is
that no one should rely on either America's word or its industrial and agricultural exports.
For these reasons, the impending trade "deal" between China and the United States – if there is
one – will be at most a truce that invites further struggle. It will be a short-term expedient,
not a long-term reinvigoration of the Sino-American trade and investment relationship to American
advantage. No future Chinese government will allow China to become substantially dependent on
imports or supply chains involving a country as fickle and hostile as Trump's America has proven to
be. China will instead develop non-American sources of foodstuffs, natural resources, and
manufactures, while pursuing a greater degree of self-reliance. More limited access to the China
market for U.S. factories and farmers will depress U.S. growth rates. By trying to reduce U.S.
interdependence with China, the Trump administration has inadvertently made the United States the
supplier of last resort to what is fast becoming the world's largest consumer market.
The consequences for American manufacturers of "losing" the China market are worsened by the
issue of scale. China's non-service economy already dwarfs that of the United States. Size
matters. Chinese companies, based in a domestic market of unparalleled size, have economies of
scale that give them major advantages in international competition. American companies producing
goods – for example, construction equipment or digital switching gear – have just been put at a
serious tariff disadvantage in the China market as China retaliates against U.S. protectionism by
reciprocating it. One side effect of the new handicaps U.S. companies now face in the China market
is more effective competition from Chinese companies, not just in China but in third country
markets too.
Second
: the U.S. effort to
block an expanded Chinese role in global
governance
.
This is no more likely to succeed than the earlier American campaign to persuade allies and
trading partners to boycott the Chinese-sponsored Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
That has isolated the United States, not China. Carping at the Belt and Road initiative and
related programs from outside them does nothing to shape them to American advantage. It just
deprives American companies of the profits they might gain from participating in them.
The United States seems to be acting out of nostalgia for the simplicities of a bipolar world
order, in which countries could be pressured to stand with either the United States or its then
rival. But China is not hampered by a dysfunctional ideology and economic system, as America's
Soviet adversary was. What's more, today's China is an integral member of international society,
not a Soviet-style outcast. There is now, quite literally, no country willing to accept being
forced to make a choice between Beijing and Washington. Instead, all seek to extract whatever
benefits they can from relations with both and with other capitals as well, if they have something
to offer. The binary choices, diplomatic group-think, and trench warfare of the Cold War have been
succeeded by national identity politics and the opportunistic pursuit of political, economic, and
military interests wherever they can be served. Past allegiances do not anywhere determine current
behavior.
The sad reality is that the United States, which led the creation of the Bretton Woods
institutions that have been at the core of the post-World War II rule-bound international system,
now offers these institutions and their members neither funding nor reform. Both are necessary to
promote development as balances of supply, demand, wealth, and power shift. The new
organizations, like the AIIB and the New Development Bank, that China and others are creating are
not predatory intrusions into the domain of American-dominated international finance. They are
necessary responses to unmet financial and economic demand. Denouncing them does not alter that
reality.
Other countries do not see these organizations as supplanting pre-existing lending institutions
long led by the United States. The new institutions supplement the World Bank Group and regional
development banks. They operate under slightly improved versions of the lending rules pioneered by
the Bretton Woods legacy establishments. China is a major contributor to the new development
banks, but it does not exercise a veto in them as the U.S. does in the IMF and World Bank. The
AIIB's staff is multinational (and includes Americans in key positions). The New Development
Bank's first president is Indian and its principal lending activity to date has been in South
Africa.
Washington has chosen to boycott anything and everything sponsored by China. So far, the sad
but entirely predictable result of this attempt to ostracize and reduce Chinese influence has not
curbed China's international clout but magnified it. By absenting itself from the new
institutions, the United States is making itself increasingly irrelevant to the overall governance
of multilateral development finance.
Third
: the U.S. campaign to
block China's international investments,
cripple its technology companies, and impede its scientific and technological advance.
The actions of the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to prevent
Chinese investment in American industry and agriculture are well publicized and are becoming ever
more frequent. So are official American denunciations of Chinese telecommunications companies like
Huawei and ZTE amidst intermittent efforts to shut them down. In an ominous echo of World War I's
anti-German, World War II's anti-Japanese, and the Cold War's anti-communist xenophobia, the FBI
has begun issuing loud warnings about the menace posed by the large Chinese student presence on
American campuses. Washington is adjusting visa policies to discourage such dangerous people from
matriculating here. It has also mounted a strident campaign to persuade other countries to reject
Chinese investments under the "Belt and Road" initiative.
In the aggregate, these policies represent a decision by the U.S. political elite to try to
hamstring China, rather than to invest in strengthening America's ability to compete with it.
There is no reason whatsoever to believe this approach can succeed. China's foreign direct
investments have more than doubled over the past three years. Third countries are openly declining
to go along with U.S. opposition to intensified economic relations with China. They want the
capital, technology, and market openings that Chinese investment provides. U.S. denunciations of
their interest in doing business with China are seldom accompanied by credible offers by American
companies to match what their Chinese competitors offer. You can't beat something with nothing.
It's also not clear which country is most likely to be hurt by U.S. government obstruction of
collaboration between Chinese and American STEM workers. There is a good chance the greatest
damage will be to the United States. A fair number of native-born Americans seem more interested
in religious myths, magic, and superheroes than in science. U.S. achievements in STEM owe much to
immigration and to the presence of Chinese and other foreign researchers in America's graduate
schools. The Trump administration is trying to curtail both.
China already possesses one-fourth of the world's STEM workforce. It is currently graduating
three times as many STEM students annually as the United States. (Ironically, a significant
percentage of STEM graduates in the United States are Chinese or other Asian nationals. Around
half of those studying computer sciences in the United States are such foreigners.) American loss
of contact with scientists in China and a reduced Chinese presence in U.S. research institutions
can only retard the further advance of science in the United States.
China is rapidly increasing its investments in education, basic science, research, and
development even as the United States reduces funding for these activities, which are the
foundation of technological advance. The pace of innovation in China is visibly accelerating.
Cutting Americans off from interaction with their Chinese counterparts while other countries
continue risks causing the United States to fall behind not just China but other foreign
competitors.
Finally
: the
U.S. military
is in China's face
.
The U.S. Navy and Air Force patrol China's coasts and test its defenses on a daily basis. U.S.
strategy in the event of war with China – for example, over Taiwan – depends on overcoming those
defenses so as to be able to strike deep into the Chinese homeland. The United States has just
withdrawn from the treaty on intermediate nuclear forces in part to be able to deploy nuclear
weapons to the Chinese periphery. In the short term, there is increasing danger of a war by
accident, triggered by a mishap in the South China Sea, the Senkaku Archipelago, or by efforts by
Taiwanese politicians to push the envelope of mainland tolerance of their island's unsettled
political
status quo
. These threats are driving growth in China's defense budget and its
development of capabilities to deny the United States continued military primacy in its adjacent
seas.
In the long term, U.S. efforts to dominate China's periphery invite a Chinese military response
on America's periphery like that formerly mounted by the Soviet Union. Moscow actively patrolled
both U.S. coasts, stationed missile-launching submarines just off them, supported anti-American
regimes in the Western Hemisphere, and relied on its ability to devastate the American homeland
with nuclear weapons to deter war with the United States. On what basis does Washington imagine
that Beijing cannot and will not eventually reciprocate the threat the U.S. forces surrounding
China appear to pose to it?
Throughout the forty-two years of the Cold War, Americans maintained substantive
military-to-military dialogue with their Soviet enemies. Both sides explicitly recognized the need
for strategic balance and developed mechanisms for crisis management that could limit the risk of a
war and a nuclear exchange between them. But no such dialogue, understandings, or mechanisms to
control escalation now exist between the U.S. armed forces and the PLA. In their absence Americans
attribute to the PLA all sorts of intentions and plans that are based on mirror-imaging rather than
evidence.
The possibility that mutual misunderstanding will intensify military confrontation and increase
the dangers it presents is growing. The chances of this are all the greater because the internal
security and counterintelligence apparatuses in China and the United States appear to be engaged in
a contest to see which can most thoroughly alienate the citizens of the other country. China is a
police state. For Chinese in America, the United States sometimes seems to be on the way to
becoming one.
It's hard to avoid the
conclusion
that, if Washington stays on its current
course, the United States will gain little, while ceding substantial ground to China and
significantly increasing risks to its wellbeing, global leadership, and security.
Economically
, China will become less welcoming to American exports. It will
pursue import substitution or alternative sourcing for goods and services it has previously sourced
in the United States. With impaired access to the world's largest middle class and consumer
economy, the United States will be pushed down the value chain. China's ties to other major
economies will grow faster than those with America, adversely affecting U.S. growth rates. Any
reductions in the U.S. trade deficit with China will be offset by increases in trade deficits with
the countries to which current production in China is relocated.
China's role in
global governance
will expand as it adds new institutions and
funds to the existing array of international organizations and takes a larger part in their
management. The Belt and Road initiative will expand China's economic reach to every corner of the
Eurasian landmass and adjacent areas. The U.S. role in global rule-making and implementation will
continue to recede. China will gradually displace the United States in setting global standards
for trade, investment, transport, and the regulation of new technologies.
Chinese
technological innovation
will accelerate, but it will no longer advance
in collaboration with American researchers and institutions. Instead it will do so indigenously
and in cooperation with scientists outside the United States. U.S. universities will no longer
attract the most brilliant students and researchers from China. The benefits of new technologies
developed without American inputs may be withheld rather than shared with America, even as the
leads the United States has long enjoyed in science and technology one-by-one erode and are
eclipsed. As cordiality and connections between China and the United States wither, reasons for
Chinese to respect the intellectual property of Americans will diminish rather than increase.
Given the forward deployment of U.S. forces, the Chinese
military
has the great
advantage of a defensive posture and short lines of communication. The PLA is currently focused on
countering U.S. power projection in the last tenth or so of the 6,000-mile span of the Pacific
Ocean. In time, however, it is likely to seek to match American pressure on its borders with its
own direct military pressure on the United States along the lines of what the Soviet armed forces
once did.
The adversarial relationship that now exists between the U.S. armed forces and the PLA already
fuels an arms race between them. This will likely expand and accelerate. The PLA is rapidly
shrinking the gap between its capabilities and those of the U.S. armed forces. It is developing a
nuclear triad to match that of the United States. The good news is that mutual deterrence seems
possible. The bad news is that politicians in Taiwan and their fellow travelers in Washington are
determinedly testing the policy frameworks and understandings that have, over the past forty years,
tempered military confrontation in the Taiwan Strait with dialogue and rapprochement. Some in
Taiwan seem to believe that they can count on the United States to intervene if they get themselves
in trouble with Chinese across the Strait. The Chinese civil war, suspended but not ended by U.S.
unilateral intervention in 1950, seems closer to a resumption than it has been for decades.
As a final note on politico-military aspects of Sino-American relations, in the United States,
security clearances are now routinely withheld from anyone who has spent time in China. This
guarantees that few intelligence analysts have the Fingerspitzengefühl – the feeling derived from
direct experience – necessary to really understand China or the Chinese. Not to worry. The
administration disbelieves the intelligence community. Policy is now made on the basis of
ignorance overlaid with media-manufactured fantasies. In these circumstances, some enterprising
Americans have taken to combing the dragon dung for nuggets of undigested Chinese malevolence, so
they can preen before those in power now eager for such stuff. There is a Chinese expression that
nicely describes such pretense: 屎壳螂戴花儿 -- 又臭又美 – "a dung beetle with flowers in its hair still
stinks."
All said, this does not add up to a fruitful approach to dealing with the multiple challenges
that arise from China's growing wealth and power. So,
what is to be done?
该怎么办？
Here are a few
suggestions
.
First
, accept the reality that China is both too big and too embedded in the
international system to be dealt with bilaterally. The international system needs to adjust to
and accommodate the seismic shifts in the regional and global balances of wealth and power that
China's rise is causing. To have any hope of success at adapting to the changes now underway,
the United States needs to be backed by a coalition of the reasonable and farsighted. This
can't happen if the United States continues to act in contempt of alliances and partnerships.
Washington needs to rediscover statecraft based on diplomacy and comity.
Second
, forget government-managed trade and other forms of mercantilism. No
one can hope to beat China at such a statist game. The world shouldn't try. Nor should it
empower the Chinese government to manage trade at the expense of market forces or China's
private sector. Governments can and – in my opinion – should set economic policy objectives,
but everyone is better off when markets, not politicians, allocate capital and labor to achieve
these.
Third
, instead of pretending that China can be excluded from significant
roles in regional and global governance, yield gracefully to its inclusion in both. Instead of
attempting to ostracize China, leverage its wealth and power in support of the rule-bound order
in which it rose to prosperity, including the WTO.
Fourth
, accept that the United States has as much or more to gain than to
lose by remaining open to science, technology, and educational exchanges with China. Be
vigilant but moderate. Err on the side of openness and transnational collaboration in
progress. Work on China to convince it that the costs of technology theft are ultimately too
high for it to be worthwhile.
Fifth
and finally, back away from provocative military actions on the China
coast. Trade frequent "freedom of navigation operations" to protest Chinese interpretations of
the U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea for dialogue aimed at reaching common understandings
of relevant interests and principles. Ratify the Convention on the Law of the Sea and make use
of its dispute resolution mechanisms. As much as possible, call off military confrontation and
look for activities, like the protection of commercial shipping, that are common interests.
Seek common ground without prejudice to persisting differences.
In
conclusion
:
both China and the United States need a peaceful
international environment to be able to address long-neglected domestic problems.
Doing
more of what we're now doing threatens to preclude either of us from sustaining the levels of
peace, prosperity, and domestic tranquility that a more cooperative relationship would afford.
Hostile coexistence between two such great nations injures both and benefits neither. It
carries unacceptable risks. Americans and Chinese need to turn from the path we are now on.
We can – we must – find a route forward that is better for both of us.
The article presents itself as being forward thinking, yet no
mention of the robot revolution and how destabilizing it will be
for both sides. As it stands today, it seems the economic conflict
is between the US and China-perhaps. But when these robots come on
line the economic war is going to be between the laborer and the
employee world wide.
The demise of the US economy and
manufacturing base in the US is a direct result of cheap labor, so
one has a clear picture of what cheap labor will do. Outside of
stuff falling from the sky for free, there isn't anything that
will be more devastating to the world labor market than a robot
enhanced with AI. Sure, products may become cheaper due to
reduced labor cost, but if people do not have a job to raise
enough income, then how are they going to buy stuff? Clearly, the
whole capitalistic system will collapse and then what? What will
be our choices? Will we have to shun progress in order to save the
current system that has brought us all this wonderful labor saving
innovation? Will people choose the hard road over the easy road?
It seems to me that things always take the path of least
resistance.
The only advantage China has is cheap labor.The robot revolution
will upset the apple cart for both sides. It will be interesting,
to say the least, when both sides realize that innovation is both
a blessing and a curse.
This is a pretty good article, I agree with a lot of it. The part
I don't like is the author's extreme worship of property rights.
He ignores the commons, things held in common by the people,
things like science and culture. For example, Disney's copyright
on its films will never expire if Disney can help it. Even an
American's personal data is now someone else's private property,
probably including their genetic data since even genes can be
patented.
"... More broadly, Wilkerson pegs the ramping up of confrontation with China as "all about keeping the [military-industrial] complex alive" that Wilkerson explains "the military was scared to death would disappear as we began to pay the American people back" a peace dividend at the end of the cold war. US government efforts against terrorism, explains Wilkerson, have also been used to ensure the money keeps flowing. ..."
Former Army Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, who was chief of staff for Secretary of State Colin Powell in the George W. Bush administration,
warns in a new The Real News interview with host Sharmini Peries that the United States government is driving down a "highway to
war" with China -- a war for which Wilkerson sees no sound justification.
The drive toward war is not undertaken in response to a real threat posed by China to the people of America. Instead, argues Wilkerson,
the US government is moving toward war for reasons related to money for both the military and the broader military-industrial complex,
as well to advance President Donald Trump's domestic political goals.
Wilkerson, who is a member of the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity's Academic Board, elaborates on the US military's
money-seeking motivation to advance the new China scare, stating:
All of this right now, first and foremost, is a budget ploy. They want more money.
And that's largely because their personnel costs are just eating their lunch. And, second, it's an attempt to develop - and
this has something to do with money too of course - another threat, another cold war, another feeding system .
The military just hooks up like it is hooking up to an intravenous, you know, an IV system and the money just pours out-slush
fund money, appropriated money, everything else.
More broadly, Wilkerson pegs the ramping up of confrontation with China as "all about keeping the [military-industrial] complex
alive" that Wilkerson explains "the military was scared to death would disappear as we began to pay the American people back" a peace
dividend at the end of the cold war. US government efforts against terrorism, explains Wilkerson, have also been used to ensure the
money keeps flowing.
Google has reportedly suspended its licences and product-sharing agreements with Chinese
communications giant Huawei, as Washington accuses the company of spying for Beijing. The
Silicon Valley tech giant has cut its business deals with Huawei that involve the transfer of
hardware and software, Reuters and The Verge report. Following the move, Huawei will lose
access to Android operating system updates, and its forthcoming smartphones will be shut out of
some Google apps, including the Google Play Store and Gmail apps. The Chinese firm however will
still have access to the open source version of the Android operating system.
We have confirmed this is genuine.
Huawei will only be able to use the public version of Android, and won't get access to
proprietary apps and services from Google
Huawei will have to create their own update mechanism for security patches https://t.co/7eTi4JvWsE
Washington repeatedly accused Huawei of installing so-called 'backdoors' into its products
on behalf of the Chinese government. The heads of six US intelligence agencies warned
American citizens against using Huawei products last year, and the Chinese company's phones
were banned from US military bases shortly afterwards.
cle"> "Without Walmart there is no middle class or lower class..." What a load of
tripe. Walmart pays middle class wages for probably 4 people at each store, the rest get
poverty level wages and many are on public assistance while working at Walmart. I've always
thought Laffer was a loon but, that comment just proves it. He is talking like there is no
economy outside of Walmart, and that is not the case at all. Walmart took on the job of being
China's distributor for China - and helped to get factories moved from the US to China.
Walmart is most certainly no hero in the story of American economics.
"Thinking that tariffs are the magical tool that is bringing the entire supply chain, the
entire ecosystem, to the United States is a task that's larger than even Apple could
accomplish," Wiens told VICE News. WATCH NEXT: The Hidden Homelessness Crisis In California -
http://bit.ly/2E1fnUK
"... All last week, anti-American propaganda flourished across the country, with the slogan "Wanna talk? Let's talk. Wanna fight? Let's do it. Wanna bully us? Dream on!" going viral on Chinese social media platforms. ..."
With the trade war between the US and China suddenly erupting after a 5-month ceasefire,
CCTV 6, the movie channel of China's leading state television broadcaster, aired three
anti-American movies last week,
reported What's On Weibo .
The three movies are Korean war films: Heroic Sons and Daughters (1964), Battle on
Shangganling Mountain (1954), and Surprise Attack (1960), which aired about one week after
President Trump raised an existing 10% tariff on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods to
25%.
All last week, anti-American propaganda flourished across the country, with the slogan
"Wanna talk? Let's talk. Wanna fight? Let's do it. Wanna bully us? Dream on!" going viral on
Chinese social media platforms.
... ... ...
China's government broadcasting anti-American movies to hundreds of millions of its people
shows how officials are starting up the propaganda machines ahead of a potential armed conflict
with the US...
Chinese spokesperson Hu Xijin writes: "there's no equal negotiation without fighting." No
need for negotiation (or fighting). Assuming Trump imposes the rest of the tariffs, US trade
with China will recede to nothing. Inciting anti-American feelings in mainland China just
makes the break in relations easier. Goodbye China!
China has no intention of going to actual war over trade with the U.S. - they have plenty
of other potential markets, as is repeatedly alluded to here and elsewhere. This televised
propaganda is about manipulating the attitudes of their own disillusioned, controlled
populace.
So they're broadcasting regular American television? Those shows do a great job demeaning
and shitting on average American men while holding up minorities and freaks as capable
people. They didn't need to invent any propaganda; just use the same **** *** producers have
been feeding us dumb goyim for decades.
Isage master of the The famous paper tiger threat of turning something into glass, empty
fuckin threat from a country whose professional army has managed to lose every major conflict
in the last 50 years to poorly equipped sometimes barefoot soldiers armed with nothing more
that AK -47s.
please see Korean villagers, Vietnamese villagers, iraqi villagers, afghan villagers and
Syrian Villagers.
and the vaunted Israelis who who only win against ancient armies with ancient gear, but
faced with dedicated Hezbollah Lebanese villagers again .....lose.
Give it up, you are masters of snatching defeat from the jaws of victory... not much
else.
"... Negotiating with countries is different from the wheeling and dealing world of New York real estate. This should be especially clear with a nation-first politician like Donald Trump. ..."
"... Where making maximum demands on other parties might work in New York, it's much less likely if one is dealing with proud, independent nations - that should have been the lesson from the North Korea fiasco. ..."
"... Disclosure: I/we have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72 hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article. ..."
by: Shareholders Unite
Shareholders
Unite Small-cap, macro, value, momentum Shareholdersunite
(11,300 followers) Summary It is difficult to see the Chinese caving to the demands of the Trump government, which seem to involve
a wholesale change of China's economic model.
Either some middle ground is found or we risk a serious escalation with multiple risks to the state of the world economy, with
many known and unknown facilities.
The end state could be a wholesale decoupling of the American and Chinese economies, and while some would applaud such an outcome,
it's unlikely to be better than what we've got.
The Trump administration seems to have the illusion that if you raise the stakes high enough, other countries will cave to US
demands. There might also be an element of creating foreign adversary in order to unite the domestic front, we don't know.
Trade tensions have been taken way too far when the government slapped tariffs on Canadian steel exports because of national security
concerns, but in the case of China, there are some legitimate concerns. Mind you, these concerns don't involve:
China's mercantilism - its trade surplus has all but vanished (see below).
The bilateral trade deficit the US has with China that's way overstated (much of the value added comes from other countries,
most notably the US), meaningless and not amenable to change from deliberate policy measures (the US trade deficit is caused by
a lack of savings with respect to investments; in so far as policy manages to reduce the bilateral trade deficit with China, the
deficit will simply reappear elsewhere as long as the saving/investment balance isn't changed).
While China has "manipulated" its currency in the past in order to keep it low, in recent years they've done exactly the opposite,
trying to keep their currency from falling.
China isn't paying for the tariffs, US importers and consumers are.
Negotiating with countries is different from the wheeling and dealing world of New York real estate. This should be especially
clear with a nation-first politician like Donald Trump.
Where making maximum demands on other parties might work in New York, it's much less likely if one is dealing with proud,
independent nations - that should have been the lesson from the North Korea fiasco.
Just as there is one thing worse than a severe economic recession, which is caving to US pressure for the Iranian ayatollas, the
same holds for Chinese politicians in charge of policy.
It's true that the pain from the escalation in the trade war is probably significantly larger in China compared to the US, but
that doesn't make them more likely to be the first to cave, especially considering that what the US administration seems to demand
is a wholesale
change of China's economic model . That's never going to happen. Since there are no free elections, they can endure the pain
for longer, and much fewer people own stocks, so even while the sell-off in China might be worse, it's hitting much fewer people.
In fact, caving to US demands, or even being seen to be caving, might well be a one-way ticket to political oblivion. Which is
why China's leaders called President Trump's bluff. Contrast this with the situation in the US.
Trade experts like Krugman
argue that the short-term economic impact as such on the US economy is fairly moderate, and who are we to disagree? However,
a further escalation isn't likely to go by unnoticed, and there is this ephemeral concept called "confidence", of which the stock
market might be one of the best indicators:
The market is already reeling, and this could become uncomfortable pretty soon for a president who prides himself on the rally
in the markets.
The real danger
The risk is that this becomes a protracted conflict with each party digging in, egged on by heated domestic rhetoric. The longer
this lasts, the greater the following risks:
Sentiment spilling over in the real economy
A large yuan depreciation
Collateral damage
A wholesale decoupling of the Chinese and American economies
Sentiment is turning, and at a certain point, this can very well start to affect consumption, investment, and lending decisions
in the real world. We're not there yet, but look how the sell-off at the end of last year cowered the Fed into one of the more spectacular
retreats in policy. This wasn't because of the market sell-off itself but because of the increasing signs that sentiment could hit
the real economy, even if much of the more immediate risks were abroad.
Moreover, in a highly leveraged financial system, you never know what you're going to find when the investor flows recede. Things
can go very fast here. Look how Argentina was able to sell a 100-year bond in 2016, only to be hit by the receding flows pretty soon
after.
Another real risk is a substantial yuan depreciation . It's the most effective way the Chinese can absorb the direct tariff cost
on their competitiveness, but it runs the risk of becoming a self-fulfilling prophesy.
The markets have already twice succumbed to yuan depreciation scares, in 2015 and at the start of 2016, and the PBoC spent $1
trillion of its $4 trillion reserves plus draconian capital controls to stop the rot.
We're not talking hypotheticals here - guess when that gap-up happened? On the day of the Trump tweets announcing the 25% tariffs:
A substantial yuan depreciation will risk inserting a major deflationary blow to the world economy as it exports the effects of
the US tariffs on China to the rest of the world.
Given the shaky state of the eurozone, we're not relishing this prospect at all. We have long argued that the eurozone is one
downturn away from disintegration, with Italy as its focal point.
Italy is already in a recession and has a dysfunctional government consisting of a left-wing and right-wing populist party which
are constantly bickering. What's more, it has unsustainable debt dynamics and a potential banking doom loop, should the debt dynamics
trigger a market selloff, and has no lender of last resort.
With all the debt and leverage in the world economy, it's a bit like riding a bicycle - you have to keep cycling to stop falling
over.
Decoupling
While the direct monetary impact of the tariffs is fairly moderate (it's a modest, albeit highly regressive, tax increase), another
likely consequence is a further relocation of supply chains and decoupling of the US and Chinese economies.
We have already read numerous company CCs which described rerouting supplies from China, albeit not usually back to the US, and
we're not imagining stuff. From Monday's issue of DigiTimes:
If 10% tariffs can do that, 25% of tariffs will accelerate this and the next round, where the US levies tariffs on all Chinese
imports even more.
Some within the US administration seems to relish this, as it weakens China economically, but a hard Chinese landing won't pass
the US unnoticed, and the end result could very well be two competing economic blocks and a new sort of cold war.
One of the very first economic measures the Trump government took was to get the US out of the TPP, which not only gave up a lot
of leverage over China, but the mostly ASEAN countries who are part of the TPP (without the US) are now firmer in China's orbit as
a result, and they will have unenviable choices to make in terms of their future alignment.
It's also unfortunate that Trump has been waging trade wars on multiple fronts (see
here for an overview ), alienating many partners in the process.
Now might be as good a time as any to remind people of the unpopular thesis that trade isn't a zero-sum game and that both the
US and China have greatly benefited from their economic integration the past couple of decades.
The US got increased exports as well - not as spectacular as the Chinese exports to the US, but this is in part an optical illusion.
Much of China's exports to the US contain value added produced elsewhere, even from the US itself:
You see that less than half of the value added of Chinese electronics export to the US is actually produced in China itself. The
iPhone is a classic example:
In the case of the Apple iPhone, this means that China's
exports balance accounts for the full $500 iPhone value, when China adds only approximately $15 to $30 of the value to the phone.
Most of the iPhone value accretes to Samsung in Korea ($150) and to Apple - the brand owner and engineer. This highlights how
the normal accounting of trade flows is inherently distorted under the current trade-deficit estimates.
Yes, the US has lost manufacturing jobs as a result, but it failed to compensate those who lost from trade like other countries
have (via massive active labor market policies, for instance in the Nordic countries, where there is little in the way of an industrial
waste land as a result).
The US has also gained. It found willing buyers for its Treasuries, keeping interest rates low, cheap consumer goods, keeping
inflation low - which allowed the Fed to keep low interest rates, and which in turn increased economic growth and employment.
It's not perfect, and we're not blind to China's IP theft and the conditions it places on American companies operating in the
country. But China's rise has propelled half a billion people out of poverty and turned them into eager consumers of US agricultural,
cultural and high-tech products.
Conclusion
While a number of American grievances are right, the Trump administration seems to want a wholesale sellout of China, abandoning
its economic model. That's not going to happen, and even less so because they also antagonized potential allies, like ASEAN countries,
the EU and Canada.
There are two choices here: either some middle ground is found or this could spiral out of control, with major economic risks
involved and a wholesale decoupling of the Chinese and American economies. Economics 101 argues quite clearly that that world is
unlikely to be better than the one we have, despite all the imperfections of the latter.
Disclosure: I/we have no positions in any stocks mentioned, and no plans to initiate any positions within the next 72
hours. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it (other than from
Seeking Alpha). I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
33 out 90 suppliers of Huawei are US companies. If Huawei do not buy from them who will buy
them? It's two way street.
Trump is breaking neoliberalism createing two camps of neoliberal countries hostile to each
other. Potential partners for China are Russia, Turkey, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan and North
Korea so this would be a weaker, but still formidable in economic and military capacity
block.
On Wednesday, U.S. President Donald Trump issued an executive order barring U.S. firms from
using telecom equipment made by companies accused of being a national security risk; this
includes Chinese tech giant Huawei. The U.S. Commerce Department questioned whether Huawei will
be able to continue purchasing components from its American suppliers. In response, the Chinese
Commerce Ministry said on Thursday
Huawei will survive with supply chain alternatives and reengineering designs, it will make
Huawei stronger with better products. American high tech products and parts suppliers can
wait until American companies come up with design to utilise their products, hopefully not
long enough to cripple all these high tech parts manufacturers.
"... US Tariffs Have Nothing to Do With Competition, These are Steps to Contain China ..."
"... Or do they want to cut off all opportunities for China's future development? In my opinion, the relevant measures that the Americans have been initiating since the very beginning of the trade war to the present day are most likely real steps to contain China rather than some form of sanctions. This is a desire to hinder China's development in various spheres, specifically in trade, economic development, industrial development, science and technology, in the financial sphere and even in the area of human resources in China. They want to hamper our development on all sides. ..."
"... You might know that we used to have the popular concept of the so-called "hybrid war" but I would not describe the behaviour of Americans using this term. They just want to cut off all of China's development opportunities. They want to limit our ability to thrive as much as possible. ..."
"... Today I heard you talking about Russia, about the principles of preserving your development and sovereignty, I agree with that. The geopolitical situation is different for everyone, the history is different. There may be differences in how countries approach dealing with issues. ..."
"... The advantage of the United States is its hegemony in the global financial system. The second advantage is the strong alliance system that was formed after the Second World War and the Cold War. And another one is a still high level of weapons development in the world. ..."
"... Over the past decades, Americans have repeatedly initiated hostilities, and acute social inequality has flared up inside the country. Today, hegemony in the ideological system is being lost; and some countries and regions' confidence in the USA is being lost. ..."
Dmitry Kiselyov, the general director of Rossiya Segodnya International Information Agency, discussed the recent
escalation in the Sino-American trade war with Kong Dan, the former chairman of CITIC Group; Zhang Weiwei, a Chinese
professor of international relations at Fudan University and a senior research fellow at the Chunqiu Institute; and Li Shimo,
an investor and billionaire, founder and managing director of Chengwei Capital, owner of many US Silicon Valley companies.
US Tariffs Have Nothing to Do With Competition, These are Steps to Contain China
Dmitry Kiselyov: What resources does China have?
Kong Dan: Without a trade war, our view of the United States would be superficial; now we
know the other side as well. I, as a representative of business circles, do not really
understand the subtleties of what the Americans want. Do they just think that Chinese
development is unacceptable for them?
Or do they want to cut off all opportunities for China's future development? In my opinion,
the relevant measures that the Americans have been initiating since
the very beginning of the trade war to the present day are most likely real steps to
contain China rather than some form of sanctions. This is a desire to hinder China's
development in various spheres, specifically in trade, economic development, industrial
development, science and technology, in the financial sphere and even in the area of human
resources in China. They want to hamper our development on all sides.
Dmitry Kiselyov: But is it hostile?
Kong Dan: I would call this approach competition. But competition can be different: hostile,
non-hostile
Dmitry Kiselyov: Competition without rules is animosity
Kong Dan: You might know that we used to have the popular concept of the so-called "hybrid
war" but I would not describe the behaviour of Americans using this term. They just want to cut
off all of China's development opportunities. They want to limit our ability to thrive as much
as possible.
China May
Regulate Energy Imports from US Amid Trade Row Competition has various forms or different
aspects. I also have a counter-question for you, how do Russians assess the nature of those
sanctions measures that the Americans have implemented against Russia?
The United States considers us its adversaries. They previously included Russia, China,
Iran, and North Korea on their blacklist, a list of terrorist forces. And China is first on the
list. Are we hostile to them?
Today I heard you talking about Russia, about the principles of preserving your development
and sovereignty, I agree with that. The geopolitical situation is different for everyone, the
history is different. There may be differences in how countries approach dealing with
issues.
I previously worked as the head of the largest state-owned company in China, so, of course,
I understand what kind of mission one carries on his/her shoulders. I am willing to make
efforts to stimulate the development of the Russian-Chinese partnership as a whole; I think
there is still a lot to do in this direction. The US underestimates the potential of President
Putin and Russia, China and President Xi Jinping. They will pay a heavy price for it.
I would like to name two advantages of the trade war for us.
First of all, we have an advantage in a unique, specific management system in the trade
fight with the United States. I believe that the Americans do not want to minimize the trade
deficit; they just want to eliminate our institutional advantage. Of course, we will not
retreat from such a line. If the Americans want to
cross the red line , then I am sure that President Xi and the Chinese government has a
definite response to win the trade war.
Secondly, we have our colossal domestic market, which has no competitors throughout the
world. Our consumer and innovation markets provide us with a large number of advantages and
room, giving China an opportunity to make a manoeuvre. Therefore, their blockage gives China
a chance to become even stronger. We must express our appreciation to our mentor, Trump, for
this, for this lesson and for forcing China to figure out how to withstand the threats on its
own.
Why China is Likely to Emerge Victorious in Trump-Driven Trade War
Dmitry Kiselyov: You said you have confidence that China will emerge victorious in this
trade war, what does this victory mean? When will it come?
Kong Dan: Trump has said many times that he can hit our stock market to destroy it. As for
us, we are doing everything well, we are successfully organising work, and we are looking for
ways for rapid development in recent years. Our goal of a 100-year-old rebirth of the nation
can be achieved -- and that is our victory Of course, we understand that the United States
wants to impede our development. If they want to destroy us then I think they will fail. Only
in their dreams!
Zhang Weiwei: I support Mr Kong's view that the Chinese consumer market is the largest in
the world! Especially, in the field of innovation. And if one leads the battle with such
colossal markets, then the
initiators will surely fail .
'If US Continues to Maintain Hegemony, It Will Suffer Heavy Losses'
Dmitry Kiselyov: What will then become of the defeated United States?
Kong Dan: It is very hard to explain all this only in military terms. China neither wants to
seize the United States nor does it want to take a dominant position like the United States. We
simply do not want the United States to cut off all the opportunities for our country's
development.
Li Shimo: I would like to note that in the course of a trade war, each of the parties has
its own strengths and weaknesses. Our advantage is that we have a strong political system. The
second one is social cohesion. The third one, as has already been stated, China has quite large
domestic markets. The fourth one, China is the world's largest trading country and also the
largest trading nation in the history of mankind.
The advantage of the United States is its hegemony in the global financial system. The
second advantage is the strong alliance system that was formed after the Second World War and
the Cold War. And another one is a still high level of weapons development in the world.
However, the United States and China have different development goals. China is simply
looking for suitable paths to future accelerated development. But the US has a dilemma.
Previously, there was a different situation, there was hegemony -- a very important driving
force, a very important pillar, the so-called "soft power", and particularly they had
ideological dominance. Over the past decades, Americans have repeatedly initiated hostilities,
and acute social inequality has flared up inside the country. Today, hegemony in the
ideological system is being lost; and some countries and regions' confidence in the USA is
being lost.
Therefore, if they now wish to continue to maintain hegemony,
they will suffer heavy losses. But if they back down from it -- for instance, Trump wants to
abandon ideological dominance -- it will turn into a power struggle in its purest form. This
will lead to a loss of ideological advantage in the international arena.
How to assess the outcome of the battle? I would suggest that you read the 19th National
Congress of the Communist Party of China report delivered by President Xi Jinping. In it, he
outlined two challenges: the first one -- 2035, the second one -- 2049. These two goals are
quite clear and realistic If we can complete these tasks, then the victory will be ours.
China's Three Future Milestones: 2021, 2035, 2049
Dmitry Kiselyov: What are these challenges?
Kong Dan: China has two development goals for the current century. The first is that by 2021
when the CPC will celebrate its 100th anniversary, it will fully and comprehensively build a
moderately prosperous society in China. Another goal by 2049, when it will be 100 years since
the founding of the PRC, China should reach the level of the most advanced developed countries.
Moreover, there is another intermediate task between these two goals of the current century --
by 2035 China has to move into the category of moderately developed countries.
Zhang Weiwei: China borrowed its methodology and planning practices from the USSR. However,
over the past decades, we have brought a lot of innovation into this process. Now it is no
longer the old decision-making but strategic and guiding planning. The Americans could see that
over the past 40 years China has been fulfilling all its five-year plans ahead of schedule, and
that frightened them. If we are talking about how the China-US trade war will end, then
personally I would like to quote Americans who say: "if you can't beat them, join them".
China Presents New Model of Development as Western & Soviet Models Failed
Dmitry Kiselyov: How many fingers are needed to describe the Chinese model, and what in fact
is that, if we are talking about the alternative?
Zhang Weiwei: The Chinese Model of Development has several features. First, the leading
ideology must be based on real facts. "Practice is the sole criterion of truth". As a result,
we found that a developing country, such as China, needs to carry out modernisation. Looking at
the rest of the world, it becomes clear that the Western model is not successful. The Soviet
model also did not prevail. Therefore, Deng Xiaoping said that we need to follow our own path.
We did not fall into the trap of "colour revolutions", we were looking for the path we needed
based on reality. That is the key thing.
I would like to add a
little bit. If we talk about reforms in socialist countries, we can name two basic models.
The first is the Gorbachev model, which is characterised by a radical nature. This is
political and economic shock therapy. The cost of such reforms was very high and they were not
quite successful.
The Cuban Castro model implies supportive conservative therapy. They did not build a market
economy; they were not included in the processes of globalisation but resorted only to spot
adjustment and correction.
Reforms according to the Chinese model are characterised by balance, prudence, and
sustainability. We have carried out bold economic reforms, built a market economy, and joined
the process of globalisation. However, we treat political reforms with caution and prudence;
everything should serve economic reforms, and, ultimately, improve people's living
standards.
The American model provides for the concept of political equality "One person, one vote", a
multiparty system for governing a country. Strictly speaking, it only started working in 1965.
The Chinese model began to take shape in 1978. Their starting points are more than ten years
apart. Of course, they can compete with each other but I consider the Chinese model to be more
successful and attractive; and I have already been talking about this for 20 years.
The views and opinions expressed by the speakers and the contributor do not necessarily
reflect those of Sputnik.
China's state media signaled a lack of interest in resuming trade talks with the U.S. under
the current threat of higher tariffs, while the government said stimulus will be stepped up to
buttress the domestic economy.
Without new moves that show the U.S. is sincere, it is meaningless for its officials to come
to China and have trade talks, according to a commentary by the blog Taoran Notes, which was
carried by state-run Xinhua News Agency and the People's Daily, the Communist Party's
mouthpiece. The Ministry of Commerce spokesman
said Thursday he had no information about any U.S. officials coming to Beijing for further
talks.
U.S. equities fell on concern that talks between the world's two largest economies have
stalled. The Shanghai Composite Index also declined. "If the U.S. doesn't make concessions in
key issues, there is little point for China to resume talks," said Zhou Xiaoming, a former
commerce ministry official and diplomat. "China's stance has become more hard-line and it's in
no rush for a deal" because the U.S. approach is extremely repellent and China has no illusions
about U.S. sincerity, he said. No Rush for a Deal
According to Zhou, the commerce ministry spokesman on Thursday effectively ruled out talks
in the near term. In comments to the media, ministry spokesman Gao Feng said that China's
three major concerns need to be addressed before any deal can be reached, adding that the
unilateral escalation of tensions in Washington recently had "seriously hurt" talks.
The U.S. has been talking about wanting to continue the negotiations, but in the meantime it
has been playing "little tricks to disrupt the atmosphere," according to the Taoran commentary
on Thursday night, citing Trump's steps this week to curb Chinese telecom giant Huawei
Technologies Co.
"We can't see the U.S. has any substantial sincerity in pushing forward the talks. Rather,
it is expanding extreme pressure," the blog wrote. "If the U.S. ignores the will of the Chinese
people, then it probably won't get an effective response from the Chinese side," it added.
The blog reiterated China's three main concerns for a deal are tariff removal, achievable
purchase plans and a balanced agreement text, as first revealed by Vice Premier Liu He. They
mark the official stance as much as the will of the Chinese public, it wrote.
"If anyone thinks the Chinese side is just bluffing, that will be the most significant
misjudgment" since the Korean War, it said.
Read: China Vows 'People's War' as Trade Fight Takes Nationalist Turn
In addition to putting the Taoran commentary on WeChat, the People's Daily newspaper had
three defiant articles on the trade war in the physical newspaper Friday.
A front page commentary from the Communist Party's propaganda department headlined 'No Power
Can Stop the Chinese People from Achieving Their Dream' said "the trade war will not cripple
China, it will only strengthen us as we endure it," citing the hardships China has overcome
from the Opium War to floods to the SARS epidemic in 2002-2003.
There were two editorials on page three, with one saying "China doesn't intend to change or
replace the U.S., and the U.S. can't dictate to China or hold back our development." The other
said claims from some officials in the U.S. that they have "rebuilt" China over the past 25
years are "outrageous" and shows their vanity, ignorance and distorted mentalities.
US President Donald Trump declared a national emergency over Huawei, which he has deemed a
national security threat. His new executive order makes it more difficult for US companies to
do business with the Chinese tech giant. RT America's Manila Chan chats with investigative
journalist Ben Swann, who says no evidence exists for the Trump administration's claim.
#RTAmerica#InQuestionRT#QuestionMore
U.S. cannot spy via Chinese made technology products. That is the problem. When did
competition against American technology get to be a national security threat? It is about
creating a monopoly of only certain products in America. I hope American companies fight
back. Prices in American stores have already started to rise. Monopolies mean high
prices.
In the age of technology...any country
who doesn't SPY on other countries or their own citizens is LYING thru their teeth! USA is NO
DIFFERENT than CHINA.....they both are rogue nations, competing for the same thing,
TECHNOLOGY LEADERSHIP! The problem is....HUAWEI just got the upper hand in 5G technology
before the US can compete...so as such, the US threatens other countries with scare tactics
until the US can develop and deploy 5G technology to compete with CHINA. It's all about MONEY
and BUSINESS.
USA has dishonestly gathered more data on it's own civilians than it can access or
understand in several lifetimes, they have the gaul to attack others without proof?
UNREAL
Boeing and Hollywood are two week stops that China can hit with impunity.
Notable quotes:
"... China has outspent the US on R&D since 2009 and now invests three times as much each year. ..."
"... The issue with these chips highlights just how ridiculous the American position is. The chips referred to are Intel processors they use in servers and qualcomm (arm core) processors in cell phones. Funny thing is, these processors are not even made in the US, and their replacement isn't that much of an issue, not for a company with the resources Huawei possesses. ..."
"... For government and other high security uses China has options like the MIPs based Loongson but that wouldn't work in the commercial environment so hopelessly devoted to x86 and windows. Probably the best solution would be to make an x86 analog like AMD markets, and it wouldn't take that long to do. ..."
"... The United States attacked China's largest telecom equipment maker Huawei. If China decides to retaliate, it could target chip giants like Qualcomm and Broadcom, which rely heavily on it for revenue, or tech giant Apple, which depends on them for iPhone manufacturing. ..."
"... Huawei's competitors Nokia and Ericsson would stand to win from the above ban as the United States and its allies would resort to them for 5G deployment. Nokia's and Ericsson's stocks rose more than 4% and 2% in early trading on May 16. . . here ..."
"... Chip fab is the only remaining significant technological lead that America retains anymore, but the raw engineering brainpower behind that industry in the US is mostly imported from China anyway. The Chinese have no shortage of brilliant engineers, they just have not really had the need to do without Intel and AMD before. Now they do. ..."
"... Within a year or so China will be producing chips as good as America's. Another year after that and America will be eclipsed in that industry. No longer will people be looking for "Intel Inside!" stickers on products but rather "Huawei Inside!" . ..."
"... What doesn't seem to be clear, or else ignored/excused here -- China is today just as globalist as the US and in fact the multinational corporations in control of both countries are inextricably linked, especially in the high tech sector currently under the intense MoA thread microscope. ..."
"... By our standards exploitation of workers in China is a grim picture , which compares with the grim blue collar conditions in the US, the equal and opposite result of the globalist equation wrt offshoring factory jobs endemic to capitalist production. ..."
"... MoA China "experts" should study the reality of globalization after removing the rose colored glasses if you wish to be considered analysts instead of merely wishful thinkers/cheerleaders of groupthink delusion. ..."
@William Gruff #75: China is already producing world-class ARM chips. HiSilicon 's latest Kirin
processors are on par with Qualcomm's Snapdragon and Samsung's Exynos processors. Apple's
A-series is ahead of them all, but what does it matter if Apple's rising prices and falling
quality are going to kill Apple anyway?
Per Reuters, Huawei spends $11b on US components, and its ability to withstand this hit will
vary by segment: "Huawei being unable to manufacture network servers, for example, because
they can't get key U.S. components would mean they also stop buying parts from other
countries altogether," said an executive at a Huawei chip supplier.
"They can relatively better manage component sourcing for mobile phones because they have
their own component businesses for smartphones. But server and network, it's a different
story," the executive said.
Are there any articles on how dependent Apple and Boeing are on Chinese components? This
strategy seems incredibly short-sighted.
Remember the "Asian pivot"? Did Huawei and other critical tech companies start making
independent chips back then? Or before? When were the tariffs planned? Speculation, anyone?
The issue with these chips highlights just how ridiculous the American position is. The chips
referred to are Intel processors they use in servers and qualcomm (arm core) processors in
cell phones. Funny thing is, these processors are not even made in the US, and their
replacement isn't that much of an issue, not for a company with the resources Huawei
possesses.
Huawei already has its own arm based soc's it uses in it's high end phones and they can
replace processors in it's low end phones with lesser versions of these.
The Intel processors will be tougher to do for the commercial market because of software
compatibility issues.
For government and other high security uses China has options like the MIPs based Loongson
but that wouldn't work in the commercial environment so hopelessly devoted to x86 and
windows. Probably the best solution would be to make an x86 analog like AMD markets, and it
wouldn't take that long to do.
The United States attacked China's largest telecom equipment maker Huawei. If China
decides to retaliate, it could target chip giants like Qualcomm and Broadcom, which rely
heavily on it for revenue, or tech giant Apple, which depends on them for iPhone
manufacturing.
Huawei uses Qualcomm's modems in its high-end smartphones and has been in settlement talks
with the chip supplier over a licensing dispute. Tensions between the United States and
Huawei could delay this licensing settlement, sending Qualcomm's stock down 4.4% on May
16.
Huawei's competitors Nokia and Ericsson would stand to win from the above ban as the
United States and its allies would resort to them for 5G deployment. Nokia's and Ericsson's
stocks rose more than 4% and 2% in early trading on May 16. . .
here
"Soon U.S. chip companies will have lost all their sales to the second largest
smartphone producer of the world. That loss will not be just temporarily, it will become
permanent." --b
This is a crucial and important development. So long as China is just developing their
domestic chip designs as an academic exercise they will forever trail behind the market
leaders by at least one technological iteration. Why try so hard with chip designs that will
only ever just be used in college degree theses papers and proof of concept models? Real
innovation comes from scratching an itch; from fulfilling an actual need. Chip fab is the
only remaining significant technological lead that America retains anymore, but the raw
engineering brainpower behind that industry in the US is mostly imported from China anyway.
The Chinese have no shortage of brilliant engineers, they just have not really had the need
to do without Intel and AMD before. Now they do.
In the short term the transition will be painful for China. The first few iterations of
their replacement chip designs will be buggy and not have the features of chips they could
have bought for cheaper from the US. They will also have problems ramping up capacity to meet
their needs. Typical growing pains, in other words. In the long term, though, this will be
seen as the point at which the end started for America's chip tech dominance. Within a
year or so China will be producing chips as good as America's. Another year after that and
America will be eclipsed in that industry. No longer will people be looking for "Intel
Inside!" stickers on products but rather "Huawei Inside!" .
Isnt it clear the US is globalist? Uhhm, well, yes, it's only been clear for the prior 75
years at least. In fact Lenin laid it all out during WWI so one could
say it's been clear for 100 years.
What doesn't seem to be clear, or else ignored/excused here -- China is today just as
globalist as the US and in fact the multinational corporations in control of both countries
are inextricably linked, especially in the high tech sector currently under the intense MoA
thread microscope.
Why aren't Huawei making making more smartphone chips in production? Because so many
Chinese component manufacturers are still heavily invested in churning out product for Apple.
These companies employ millions in "relatively high paying" factory jobs and account for a
large slice of Chinese export income and stock market capitalization. These corporate
oligarchs supported by the Chinese government retain a vested interest in the status quo.
This is not to minimize Huawei or Chinese growing ability to compete at the design and
innovation level as well as production, it is simply rightsizing the perspective to fit the
reality. Huawei production is growing worldwide but this doesn't mean Apple or Samsung will
evaporate or fall by the wayside and the Chinese need Apple and its markets too . In
fact, Huawei is now willing for the first time to sell microchips to third party cell phone
producers including Apple. Successful capitalist growth for China depends on increasing
production into new products, technologies and markets not replacing current platforms with
new. The product cycle will take care of itself in time anyway.
China is still in the industrial growth phase of its capitalist development, although
beginning to transition to the higher phase for sure. Of course.
MoA China "experts" should study the reality of globalization after removing the rose
colored glasses if you wish to be considered analysts instead of merely wishful
thinkers/cheerleaders of groupthink delusion.
Trump calculation is probably that neoliberalism in China already corrupted Communist Party enough for US being able to
destabilize the country buy depriving it of export revenue. And it is true that influence neoliberal Fifth column in china exists
and can compete with Communist Party for power. If Trump timing is correct China will be crushed. If this in incorrect the
USA might be crushed. This is a very high stake game as Trump burn bridges way too easily (being reckless and arrogant all his
life). Bulling as a negotiating tactics might be OK for New York real estate market is not that good in negotiating with
countries such as China.
Both countries are neoliberal countries but Chinese have more flexibility as remnants of Communist Party control remain in
place. But the same remnants are also a bog danger, as China might find itself in the position of the USSR when the US
crushed oil price and deprived it of much of its export revenue. In this case Communist Party will be blamed for social
disruptions and might lose power due tot he power of Chine Fifth column of
nouveau riche like happened in the USSR (opposition was supported by huge cash injections from the USA). I hope they study the
USSR experience very carefully and will not repeat Gorbachov mistakes (although it is difficult, as it is very difficult to find a
more stupid politician then Gorbachov, unless we assume that he was a traitor). Also the level of nationalism in China is
much higher and that might help. In any case this uncharted territory for both China and the USA.
The Trump administration seems to have the illusion that if you raise the stakes high enough, other countries will cave to US
demands. There might also be an element of creating foreign adversary in order to unite the domestic front. If Chinese will hold
their position tight despite the pain, Trump might lose the election in 2020 as he will be unable to protect the economy for
more then a year and the first signs of reception nullify his changes, as he will be blames for it.
Notable quotes:
"... This article titled 'Face' by Walrus over at SST is well worth a read alongside b's piece. https://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2019/05/face-by-walrus.html ..."
"... Both these articles give a very clear picture of what the drunken louts 'Team Trump' are up against in their so called trade war. Very much like a drunken spectator climbing into the ring thinking he can take on a professional boxer. ..."
"... The US attack on China did not start with Trump. This is what Obama's military "Pivot to Asia" was about, as was the TPP, which explicitly was designed to develop an economic alliance that left China out. Capitalist trade wars are also not new, as are hot wars. They are part of capitalism. ..."
"... "Intellectual property" is a laughable assertion, an audacious attempt by the US to corner all human advances and claim them as the property of US capitalists, to be only used for their profits. As if! ..."
"... What an appalling ruling elite in the USA. Blamers and punishers. Never take any responsibility for their murderous acts ..."
"... The U.S. talks about pressuring China until they give in. China talks about a solution that respects the dignity of each party. ..."
"... I had the sudden realisation that US politics is essentially monarchist in its nature, for all the complicated legal and constitutional structures that have been built around it over the past 240+ years. US politics and culture are fixated on one individual with extreme powers; the superhero obsession in Hollywood is one symptom of that. ..."
"... In a way the US now resembles the Ottoman empire during that empire's Sultanate of Women period (late 1500s to mid-1700s) when sultans' power was dominated by their mothers, viziers and sometimes the janissaries who became a hereditary class during that period. ..."
"... Idolatry is universal. People always gravitate towards Alpha personalities. ..."
"... In looking into US culture and why it gives rise the type of leadership it has, I think it may be the belief in exceptionalism. Exceptionalism may also carry with it the belief that all other peoples want to be like them and all they (Americans) have to do is free those peoples from the nasty dictators ruling over them. ..."
"... Patrick Armstrong in one of his articles has said that in his dealings with US officials as Canadian ambassador or diplomat, is that American officials genuinely believed that all they had to do was overthrow the evil dictator and the people would welcome Americans or willingly join the US system. ..."
"... But, at the same time, on another level, Americans understand that the president is a puppet and must obey orders, or have his brains blown out in bright daylight, in the town square. ..."
"... We hold both these views simultaneously, hence, as Orwell called it, Doublethink. ..."
"... The British court said, no patent, no copyright and no monopoly can last longer than 7 years. that was 1787-89, and it explains the for a short time clause in the USA constitution. ..."
"... I don't think the US sees the world's nations as commanded by their senior politician. Far from it, but to keep the US public locked in a child's mentality, the govt and its MSM present every political event/action/reaction as between personalities. Can't have reason and logic breaking out among the minions can we? ..."
"... China's "competitive advantages" are too big for a confederation of micro-countries in the Pacific to overcome. ..."
"... b said;" the U.S. economic system is based on greed and not on the welfare of its citizens." Bingo! Jrabbit @ 52 said;"US foreign policy has been remarkably consistent for over 20 years." Maybe the last 100 yrs.? Demonize countries people and rulers, and take their stuff, but why not? We are, don't ya' know, the exceptional nation, doing gods work. Manifest Destiny, isn't it great? ..."
"... Smacking down China is a strategic priority for the Deep State. ..."
"... the neocons in the US believes it is now or never to defend the USA unique position as world power. They believe, that if they don't fight now, they will have lost. I say, they already have. ..."
"... Trust the UnitedSnake to blame the Chinese for reneging on an agreement ! Fact is, Trump's team Add in last minute conditions that are totally unacceptable to China. Chinese commentators are fuming at the audacity of the demands. 'WTF, Do they think we'r their gawd damned 51st state ?' ..."
"... Typical UnitedSnake's 'negotiation' tactics, designed to fail ! Thats how Clinton justity his bombing of ex Yugo, by blaming Belgrade for the breakdown of negotiation ,to justify its 78 days of aerial arsons against Yugo. ..."
Both these articles give a very clear picture of what the drunken louts 'Team Trump' are
up against in their so called trade war. Very much like a drunken spectator climbing into
the ring thinking he can take on a professional boxer.
@ Peter AU 1 | May 17, 2019 4:33:54 PM |
1 5 Trump
demanded concessions on trade
banned Huwei
made military [plans with Taiwan
saber rattled in the China Sea
Trump wants improved trade conditions for improved economic climate in the U.S.
But there are others in the admin who want something else.
But still: "backup chips it has independently developed"
That's a good one Mr Moon.
The US attack on China did not start with Trump. This is what Obama's military "Pivot to
Asia" was about, as was the TPP, which explicitly was designed to develop an economic
alliance that left China out.
Capitalist trade wars are also not new, as are hot wars.
They are part of capitalism.
"Intellectual property" is a laughable assertion, an audacious attempt by the US to corner
all human advances and claim them as the property of US capitalists, to be only used for
their profits.
As if!
What an appalling ruling elite in the USA. Blamers and punishers. Never take any
responsibility for their murderous acts.
Rise up people, these are dangerous, stupid leaders and elites.
B says: Whatever face is at the top is only representing the layers below.
Yes, this is the case when complex governmental systems are functioning properly. In
this case power is distributed throughout the system, based on the role each individual
within the system. People must have a collaborative culture for complex systems to function
properly.
People of an authoritarian nature hate complex systems and distributed power, as such
systems limit the freedom of action of the authoritarian leader. The corollary to this is
that systems must be kept simple to accommodate authoritarian leaders. And simple systems
are much less powerful and effective than complex systems.
My observation is that, in the U.S., authoritarianism is the dominant culture, as
opposed to a collaborative culture of the Chinese that is implied by B's comment.
Indeed we see many signs in these negotiations that the U.S. is operating based on a
culture of authoritarianism, whereas China is operating based on a culture of
collaboration. Among the signs:
The tendency that B. noted of Americans to assign all power to the leader.
(This is not the first time, and in fact it is a common mistake of the U.S. and one of the
reasons that their regime change efforts almost never achieve a result that is favorable
for the U.S.)
The U.S. talks about winning and losing. China talks equity.
The U.S. talks about pressuring China until they give in. China talks about a
solution that respects the dignity of each party.
The principle behind negotiations for people of a collaborative culture is 'Win-Win or
No-Deal'. For Authoritarians, Win-Win is a compromise, and compromise is the equivalent of a
loss. My conclusion is that there is only a very low probability that the U.S. and China will
successfully negotiate a trade deal. The cultures of the authoritarian Americans and the
collaborative Chinese are too divergent. China will only accept Win-Win and the U.S. cannot
accept Win-Win.
Classic US empire strategy.
Build up a supplier and when they start to be serious a competitor take them down.
Asian Tiger crisis,forcing occupied Japan into the Plaza Accord etc.
They left it too long with China, way too long.
China has not recycled its trade dollars surplus into USTs since 2014.
No replacement suppliers like Vietnam or Indonesia etc will do either, no more vendor
finance
for the US.
It will have to live within its means, no wonder the neocohens are going
insane.
We are watching the death of the $ as GRC first hand.
NO jared, Trump is in charge, fully responsible and yet totally irresponsible. He hires
and fires, he barks the orders, Trump is not captive. You may desperately wish to believe
that but NO, Trump wants it like this and NO dissent.
This is Henry Kissinger's plan implemented by Trump. A war criminal implementing a
sociopath war criminal's plan. Trump is a killer and an oligarchs stooge and he like the
rewards.
See the fabulous Aaron Mate discussion previously linked in the last thread.
I'd be curious to know what other MoA barflies think of the US tendency to personalize
other countries' governments and political systems and reduce them all to monarchies of one
sort or another, and what this says about the American psychology generally. So much of the
US slather and accusations against Russia and China and what those nations are supposedly
doing look like psychological projection of the US' own sins and malevolent behaviour.
I was in hospital nearly 20 years ago for a major operation and some of my recuperation
there was spent watching a few old "Star Trek: Next Generation" episodes. Watching those
shows, I was struck by how much "power" the Star Trek captain Jean-Luc Picard appeared to
wield. Every one of his subordinates deferred to his decisions and very few challenged
him.
I know this is an old TV show with scripts that emphasise individual action over
collective action and delineating a whole culture on board the Starship fleet (this is a
long time before "Game of Thrones") but I had the sudden realisation that US politics is
essentially monarchist in its nature, for all the complicated legal and constitutional
structures that have been built around it over the past 240+ years. US politics and culture
are fixated on one individual with extreme powers; the superhero obsession in Hollywood is
one symptom of that.
In a way the US now resembles the Ottoman empire during that empire's Sultanate of Women
period (late 1500s to mid-1700s) when sultans' power was dominated by their mothers,
viziers and sometimes the janissaries who became a hereditary class during that period.
@ dh-mtl 21
You provided an excellent analysis of two very different kinds of people, westerners and
Asians (Chinese). Americans who believe that Chinese are pretty much like them, and respond
to people, to pressures and and to situations in the same way, are badly mistaken.
I would add another: Westerners want instant results and quick profits whereas Chinese take
the long view. Heck, they've been around for five thousand years so why not.
I'm glad you raise the issue of increased prices for US consumers, b. I have been looking
in vain for a mention of this even in alternative media. Nobody appears to be talking about
it.
If I can go off track for a moment the events surrounding Boeing are highly significant
and a parallel to what is happening generally in the US. Here is a something I wrote for
naked capitalism but did not send - Yves is too fierce and I don't trust her. A bit like a
feminine Colonel what's his name Laing...
Because of the prestige of Boeing Wall Street left its dimantling until quite late -
1997. GE and Ford had already produced their versions of the 737 Max in the 1960s with the
Corvair and the Pinto respectively as finance people started to take over the running of US
companies. There is something very sad in watching a once magnificent company reduced by
bankers to a shadow of its former self.
There has been a trade imbalance for quite a while but it didn't seem to matter much. The
Chinese raised their standard of living, Americans got cheap stuff, surplus dollars went
into treasuries to fund the deficit.
It all worked pretty well until Trump and MAGA. Somehow he thinks he'll bring the jobs
back but no Americans are going to make sneakers and circuit boards for $2 an hour.
I have just replied to Karlof1 in I think the previous thread and I link into this. In
looking into US culture and why it gives rise the type of leadership it has, I think it may
be the belief in exceptionalism. Exceptionalism may also carry with it the belief that all
other peoples want to be like them and all they (Americans) have to do is free those
peoples from the nasty dictators ruling over them.
Patrick Armstrong in one of his articles has said that in his dealings with US officials as
Canadian ambassador or diplomat, is that American officials genuinely believed that all
they had to do was overthrow the evil dictator and the people would welcome Americans or
willingly join the US system.
All the economic momentum is in Eurasia, centering on China, India, and Russia.
China is spearheading this drive and re-assuming its historical status as the richest
land in the world. Instead of resisting, Washington should be working with projects like
the BRI that help enrich everyone. (Indeed, why doesn't Washington announce a BRI for North/South America, perhaps a Yellow
Brick Road? But that's an aside...)
And concerns about Chinese spying through their companies should be equaled with
internal reflection about the practice in the United States. Perhaps it would be wise for
both countries to develop and practice international standards that respect human rights in
an Everything's Connected world.
Given how the US and China frequently treat "different" people with disdain, that's a
lot to ask. But no country or people is spotless regarding abusing human rights and some
wisdom with power would be welcome from both governments.
You point out that our entertainment industry focuses its plots on strong leaders, and Good
Guys vs Bad Guys, and we definitely internalize that, especially when our overlords want to
demonize another country, and use our entertainment-induced perspective as a shortcut.
They tell us that the leader of the targeted country is a Bad Guy and we must kill the
people in order to save them. And Americans nod and comply. Except for the 5% that prefers
peace, and they argue that the leader is not a Bad Guy, so we shouldn't kill the people to
save them.
No American ever thinks to argue international law or basic morality, we just argue about
the plot lines.
But, at the same time, on another level, Americans understand that the president is a
puppet and must obey orders, or have his brains blown out in bright daylight, in the town
square.
We hold both these views simultaneously, hence, as Orwell called it, Doublethink.
China has succeeded because it does not honor copyright and patent monopolies. Western
civilization is failing because it imposes the feudal monopoly by rule of law system.. The
state will make sure a few fat cats are lords and the masses are their slaves.
---
It is almost asking the change of China's political system." <= no its not, the struggle
today is freedom, human rights and the right to self determination not socialism vs
capitalism.. it the struggle today is capitalism vs monopolism.. because monopolism aims to
make every single human being alive its slave to a very few monopoly powered corporate
giants.. China is a clear example of what can be if the masses are allowed to compete
without the shackles of copyrights, patents and other thin air monopolies.
Some aspects of China's trade behavior can and should be criticized.
Why? Because of that "intellectual property" stuff? Japan basically built itself from the
ground up in the post-war through allowed and unallowed intellectual property theft. Canon
and Nikon, for example, essentially fac-similed Leica during that period; after the
transition to digital, they erased their theft past, but it doesn't change the objective
truth both wouldn't exist without stealing technology from a defeated country (Germany). It
did the same with missile reentrance technology it stole from the USSR after the Cold
War.
< Technology is a product of the human mind.. copyright and patents are thefts of the
products of the human mind.. and human mind assets do not belong to anyone, to any
country.. Instead, copyright and patents (intellectual property) are and should be in the
public domain (but the scum that write the laws have created from thin air; rights which do
not exist, and given the rights they fabricated to their feudal lords and the corporations
owned by such lords. So the lawmaking scum have made it possible for a few (feudal lords)
to establish and maintain a monopoly in the good life, over the masses in the world. ..
Just as in the in England, France and Switzerland, where only the rich, corrupt
politicians, and criminal few hung out and traded copyright and patent monopolies in the
coffee houses, (much like stocks and bonds are traded today, monopoly trading was a game
between fat cats (today's the fat cats are wall street barons), ..monopolies allow rich and
wealth to support their royal life styles at the price of enslaving the masses to poverty.
Luckily a court in England, threaten by an angry crowd of the masses, denied the wealthy
their perpetual lifetime patents and copyright demands, no longer could the fat cats
squeeze ownership of an intellectual creation from its creator, convert it to intangible
property, and use the intellectual property to monopolize the world.
The British court
said, no patent, no copyright and no monopoly can last longer than 7 years. that was
1787-89, and it explains the for a short time clause in the USA constitution.
I don't think the US sees the world's nations as commanded by their senior politician. Far
from it, but to keep the US public locked in a child's mentality, the govt and its MSM
present every political event/action/reaction as between personalities. Can't have reason
and logic breaking out among the minions can we?
As for Trump being in charge, I rather doubt it, no US president has been "in charge" of
any thing except possibly what is for lunch since Washington.
Too many policies Trump began, such as negotiations with NK, have been trashed by his
"teams" who I believe are actually his minders put in place by the Deep State.
Is Trump a great guy? A NY developer by their very nature is not a great guy. But I do
think he wants to be seen as a great president. To do that he has to pull off some deals
that will be remembered which is why he wanted the deal with NK, that Pompeo blew up.
I also think that the govt is preparing for the time when the dollar is no longer the
reserve currency. And to do that you need to pull manufacturing back from abroad (from
China), seize critical assets (from Venezuela),break any and all treaties that require you
to spend money you won't have (making NATO (pay as you go).
All things the govt is doing, admittedly with the most horrific management team since
Taft's. But they are moving on all fronts to circle the wagons of US commerce.
They know what is coming, some of them may see war as the way to bilk a few more
trillions out of the treasury, but I don't think the military will let them. For they know
that if they go up against a nation that Russia and China support and botch it, that
R&C will go for the throat and that, more so than the currency crash would be the end
of the US.
These moves we see are very serious because the end game is for the continued existence
(or death)of the US. And many of these tactical moves are very high risk because they
hasten the end of the dollar. I give the dollar five years more, tops. Then it will be just
one in a basket of currencies until the yuan makes its way to the top.
And where that strange UN Agenda 21 fits in this I don't know, its plan for the US is
for drastically reduced population (70% loss, from what?)the remaining population in mega
cities and truly vast areas of no go set aside for the "environment." It reads like a
National Parks program on crack with a side of Hunger Games.
The next five years are going to be really critical and I personally think the US will
only make it by the skin of its teeth.
@ Jen. Another thought. The era in which the current state of America was conceived.
British colonies in a war of separation or independence against the British. Europe and
Britain at that time mostly ruled by hereditary monarchs nobles and lords ect.
Americans which I take it at that time would have been mostly British ancestry had done
away with hereditary monarchs and so forth. It would have been somewhat exceptional at the
time. In the targeting of the leader of a nation as the source of all evil, I wonder if
that relates back to doing away with hereditary leadership especially monarch.
President Trump has declared a national emergency due a threat to the US from "the ability
of foreign adversaries to create and exploit vulnerabilities in information and
communications technology or services, with potentially catastrophic effects, and thereby
constitutes an unusual and extraordinary threat to the national security, foreign policy,
and economy of the United States," so various actions and prohibitions have been stipulated
here .
I think war reporting rules are in place with China, and Trade war has started.
Every month that passes without a crisis is a success for China right now as it over takes
US in GDP, tech, and trade links.
Key issues are bringing Europe in - the Huawei ban extended to Europe is battlefield #1,
Northstream (gas link to Russia) is #2.
First get Europe on board, the US can up things a lot further.
If Trump gets this right, he can delay outright defeat by China under well beyond his 8
years are up. (Bush or Obama early on could have won, or could have found a peaceful
solution).
A president doesn't have to obey the orders of the powers that be just because they
threaten to kill him otherwise. A brave president would defy them to do their worst. If
they went ahead and killed him, he would still have accomplished something important. By
exposing the nature of the system, he would have robbed it of its legitimacy and brought a
revolution much closer.
You've all been trained very well to ignore the class warfare.
China's "peaceful rise" was convenient when it enriched the Western elite.
But when China makes a play for equal footing, the must be smacked down. In each case (rise, smack-down) ordinary people (like yourselves) get f*cked. Kissinger's NWO? It's for the children.... No, not YOUR children. Welcome to the rabbithole.
Best example of a country stealing foreign inventions and protecting its 'uneconomical'
industries with tariffs is the USA.
It was notorious that in the C19th American publishers pirated authors and musicians from
Europe, particularly of course from Britain where the intellectual properties of Dickens
and his contemporaries laid the basis for many an American publishing fortune.
Among the primary victims were American authors who couldn't compete against stolen
imports.
I am not so sure the conclusions of the article are correct. Tariffs on Chinese factories
will force production to other countries in the area like Vietnam where costs are not going
to be much higher than China.
Granted, the US may be pissed off that Huawei is placing back doors in their systems but
I suspect that they are only copying what the US has done for years with US companies like
Microsoft.
My daughter managed 5 factories located in China of a clothing manufacture based in the
US some years ago. She said there was constant chaos as the workers were continually on
strike. Bad air, dangerous machines, poor wages. few bathrooms, bad water, childcare is
chaining you child to a fence for the day, and the like. Her boss flew to China and asked
for the cheapest costs possible. They showed him a factory full of little children cranking
out production. He left crying his eyes out. He was a cold hearted bastard but even that
was too much for him to see.
I viewed first hand the destruction trade agreements like NAFTA caused to good union
wages and benefits in the US. Hell, that is what got Trump elected. It is tough to watch
your children go into the same profession and make 50% less in wages and fringes 30 years
later.
Intellectual property and patents? No so sure about that, the views here are new to me.
I always supported them but I guess I need to dig deeper on that one.
In the net I think China is the loser, fewer jobs, higher food costs, their markets are
down 30%, ours are peaking and are seen as a safe haven for money. Export numbers for China
are dropping as is the trade balance.
At this point it is not a trade war but a re balancing of markets IMHO. If it was a real
trade war things would be far worse. Middle supplier countries will be hurt, US farmers,
some markets win some lose. If it was business as usual then it would be business as usual.
Trump is stirring the pot and what the endgame is is anyone's guess. Did anyone really
believe China would just bend over and accept any demands from the US?
All that being said China can easily wait it out and hope Trump loses and the policy is
reversed which I am sure his policies will be reversed if anyone else gets elected.
Your link about Boeing is a good one. Today at Naked Capitalism was a
story about a possible 'payback' link between Huawei and Boeing. China has the option
of causing a great deal of pain to both the US and Boeing in retaliation.
They could declare the recertified 737-MAX to be unsafe, so much so they're cancelling
all orders and forbidding any landings in or overflights of China. If Canada hadn't screwed
up so badly, the local Bombardier airplane might have been substituted for the 737. But
Canada did goof in a major way.
There is no way that the US could subsidize the growth of a larger population base
forever.
China sends vast amounts of manufactured goods to the United States; the US pays for all
this with dollars it can effortlessly print. So who is subsidizing whom?
The National Basketball Association Inc. is hiring its first head of government and
public affairs in China as it seeks to protect its most important international market at
a time of high tension in the U.S.-China relationship.
What I don't like about Chas Freeman's article is his tone-deafness.
He has been around government enough to know better. Smacking down China is a strategic
priority for the Deep State. But Chas says:
There is no longer an orderly policy process in Washington to coordinate, moderate, or
control policy formulation or implementation. Instead, a populist president has
effectively declared open season on China.
It's a bit disturbing to see people here read Kissinger's 2014 Op-Ed (finally) but say
nothing about Chas Freeman's assertion that it's all made up by a "populist" President.
<> <> <> <> <> <> <>
If the above hurt your feeling please feel free to retreat to your happy place. We'd all
be better off.
Not happy, just learned to live with it. I think I get your point. The policy really
means little, the underlying issues will never change.
Been in the rabbit hole for a really long time. If more people jump in maybe things will
really start to change.
I am not so sure the conclusions of the article are correct. Tariffs on Chinese factories
will force production to other countries in the area like Vietnam where costs are not
going to be much higher than China.
First of all, this is not a new phenomenon: low wages, low technology industries are
already being transferred to India and SE-Asia. The Chinese know this and there are
innumerous articles on the internet you can find about it.
But even if this process accelerates, that won't solve the manufacturing problem of the
USA: it will continue to be abroad. Besides, China's "competitive advantages" are too big
for a confederation of micro-countries in the Pacific to overcome. It has a socialist
economy (centrally planified economy, under the hegemony of the working class); it has 1.5
billion people that will only peak in 2030; it is decades ahead in built infrastructure; it
has a huge scale economy advantage (e.g. infrastructure projects that are required to reach
a certain desired productive level, which are profitable in China, may not be profitable in
e.g. Malaysia simply because it is too small); its financial sector is not dominant over
production. But then, I repeat: even if the USA nukes China, manufacturing still won't go
back to American soil.
America's problem is a secular fall of its profit rates, not manufacturing capacity: it
can import whatever and how much products it needs simply because it can print world money
(Dollar system).
b said;" the U.S. economic system is based on greed and not on the welfare of its
citizens." Bingo! Jrabbit @ 52 said;"US foreign policy has been remarkably consistent for over 20
years." Maybe the last 100 yrs.? Demonize countries people and rulers, and take their stuff, but
why not? We are, don't ya' know, the exceptional nation, doing gods work. Manifest Destiny, isn't it great?
I know next to nothing about the "Huawei" business, so a new
article about it is something to grab at. Pretty cut and dried, huh? Hauwei is pure
evil, and no 'ifs' or 'buts' about it.
But who is this guy. A couple of quick searches turned up some more of his output.
'It's now or never': The untold story of the dramatic, Canadian-led rescue of Syria's
White Helmets
How Israel became a defender of the Syrian people
Just another neocon hack peddling BS, so I'm back to square one.
China will wait it out until Trump is out of office. The Chinese leadership is pretty
smart and had at least three years to prepare for the worst case scenario. Once Chinese
industries as a whole follow Huawei's footsteps (i.e. Plan B), there will be no turning
back. They'll set off Plan B once they see Trump winning 2020.
Are we to asume from "Some aspects of China's trade behavior can and should be criticized"
that the United States are shining example of trade (and all other) policies,all others to
follow?
For government and other high security uses China has options like the mips based
Loongson but that wouldn't work in the commercial environment so hopelessly devoted to
x86 and windows. Probably the best solution would be to make an x86 analog like amd
markets, and it wouldn't take that long to do.
Chinese-Taiwanese joint venture Zhaoxin has been making x86 processors since
2013, based on VIA Technologies' x86 license. These processors are manufactured by
Taiwanese TSMC, but may switch to Chinese SMIC
once it launches its 14nm process later this year.
"Whatever face is at the top is only representing the layers below." --b
The truth of this is also why so many in America hate Trump so much. He is too perfect a
reflection of what America truly stands for. Trump accurately represents America, from
America's bloated, over-inflated sense of self-importance and worth to America's
pussy-grabbing foreign policy. Trump-hate is really self-hate.
Delusional American Russiagater Trump Derangement Syndrome victims will protest, but
such people are incapable of taking a good hard look at themselves.
Hmm... "delusional" and "American" are redundant adjectives here. I should
be more careful with my writing style.
Mr. Gruff you have it almost correct, Americans and the USA are not one in the same and
they never have been.
I still don't think you guys get it.. The 7 article constitution of the USA apportions the
power to rule between two branches and separates the masses from their personal political
powers and their human rights. Its result is not a democracy, but a few people rule
republic. 100% of the authority to rule (operate and make decisions) is vested in one
person (Art. II, rule and decide: President w/VP backup), subject only to the powers
distributed to the two bodied legislative structure ( Art. I, pass law and raise money: 450
house+100 senate persons). Critical to understand => one person makes all decisions, and
directs the day to day government. Article III thru VII defines the judiciary and clarifies
various situations. (525 popularly elected + 2 electoral college appointed <=paid
governors) vs. 350,000,000 powerless governed persons entitled only to 3 votes/voter
[Senator(1), House members(2)] and allowed one vote/voter for each President(1) and VP(1)
<=but both Art. II persons are appointed by the electoral college).
The USA is about delivering to the ownership of a very few, all of the assets, all of
the power, and all of the services once possessed by the many. The demand for all of the
possessions of the many, to be delivered to the few, has expanded over time from 13 colony
America to earth and now space. No one but the few are entitled to anything and the USA and
other governments are there to be sure of it. But how is 'total possession vested in the
few' to be maintained? By rule of law!
But what law would transfer everyone's possessions into the ownership of a few? Ah, the
laws of monopoly.. so rule of law, from thin air , generates=> monopoly powers
and rights of ownership.. Examples of laws that bear monopoly powers and that transfer
ownership rights are copyright laws, patent laws, as they convert monopoly powers that once
the many shared (via governments) now belong to the few. The transfer is called
privatization. Oil is controlled for the benefit of the private few by ownership laws and
right to produce contracts. All in all the function of t he USA has been to make a few very
wealthy at the expense of the many.
The trade issues, sanctions, wars, tariffs, race wars, oil wars, religious wars etc. are
about which people are going to be the few. Until the form and function of governments are
determined by the masses from the bottom, instead of by the few from the top, nothing will
ever change. The masses will suffer or prosper according to which government is the
winner.
US factories moved to China because the US economy is based on greed?!! US government greed
for the company's money maybe. US factories moved to China because it was cheaper to
produce products there and then pay the expense to ship them all the way back. The US has
one of the highest federal tax rates on earth, and add in high state taxes for an
unacceptable situation. US fiat paper money is the base problem.
William Gruff @ 72 & snake 71
I was just about to say the very same thing !
Delusions of grandeur ! And now major self-harm systems !
But are these degenerates above the law ? They are after all genocidal mass murder's!
String um up I say or shall we fry um ?
Right now the brain dead American public are like something out of -- - -
'The invasion of the body snatchers ' film
@58, JackRabitt, Smacking down China is a strategic priority for the Deep State.
the first time I got some type of glimpse of the average American Mind on China, as it
filtered down from "the deep state" to the more fearfully ill-informed quarters of society
no doubt, was in the post 9/11 universe. The person or persons pushing the meme, may have been a bit confused by all the
conspiracy theories about 9/11 unfolding at the time.
Anyway, Chinese troops he/she/they asserted readers were close to the Mexican border
approaching, advancing swiftly.
In hindsight, maybe accidentally, although I doubt, Trump combines the elements of that
narrative perfectly. And it is not my intention to argue right or wrong here. But
apparently down at the border there is this "invasion" on the other hand there's also the
Yellow Peril.
DontBelieveEitherPropaganda , May 18, 2019 9:58:41 AM |
link
Well, the chinese system of power has always been the thoughest to understand for any
outsider. It has been this way, but in the last years it seems the so called age of
information has lead to erode the curtains of this complex mechanism. At least for those
who want to look behind those curtains, and not use them to project their propaganda.. ;)
And it is a good sign that while Xi tired to establish himself in such a unique position
of power like Mao, and openly tried to put himself into the historic succession of the old
emperors (like Mao did too), that the will of the people and party still tips the scale of
power.
It means the chinese confucian tradition and its consequences for a ruler even today still
matter. Even though they are anyway lost on someone who is not of Asian origin.
What to westerners look like a dictator, is of a different nature as one can even
imagine with western eyes. Every ruler has to strive for balance, for harmony, which in
turns makes hearing of the peoples popular will be a necessity.
Even though many Chinese say, they like any other people only strive for what they need
most ;) (like harmony and compromise). Though many also say, that the chinese will always
choose stability and security over freedom. And i guess that is what many from the western
world dont get about China, and also about the Putinists.
I say let them and every one else have their choice. Just like i say let the US do theirs,
and reap what they seeded.
For those able to read German check out the Books of Peter Scholl-Latour on China. The
most telling and authorative books from a journalist who has reported first had for over 60
years, and has always defended and honored his own perspective;
While the western so called reporters were trapt in their professional delusion of pro-NATO
propaganda, and while the SDS praised the culture revolution as a democratic means, when
whole china was terrorized and millions slaugtherd.
Hard to walk that middle ground, while being attacked from ideological drones from both
sides i guess..
Anyway, the neocons in the US believes it is now or never to defend the USA unique
position as world power. They believe, that if they don't fight now, they will have
lost.
I say, they already have.
Short of pulling a Hitler on China, meaning a total annihilation of the Chinese people,
there is nothing they can do. And even Bolton will have a hard time trying to push through
a clear cut genocide ;)
We will see China rise. Those who feared of this will see that china will not be half as
bad as thought, and those who gloirfy china and put them into a good (vs bad US) black-wide
scheme will learn of the faults of the Chinese power and its projection (Like its own
believe of supremacy, of racism (a reason why china in the cold war was pretty
unsuccessful in Africa, where most knew who deeply racist Chinese treated their fellows as
workers, guest students,..).
All in all, what we need is a true and functional global community of nations and
people, where goverments truely work together to balance out the stronger world powers. And
with the pressure of Chinas rise and its strugle with the US, we may finally have a better
chance for this to at least partially succed.
I hope.. ;) Or of course it nuclear winter time. We will see.
China now, Japan in the 1980s - it's "deja vu all over again!"
"AFTER ITS DEFEAT in World War II, Japan was content to take foreign inventions -- the
transistor, the laser, the videotape player -- and convert them into products that it could
market around the world. Japan acquired much of its base of Western technology, most of it
American, perfectly legally through licensing, careful study of scientific papers and
patents, and imitation. But when the U.S. wasn't willing to share, some Japanese companies
simply copied with little regard for patents and other intellectual property rights that
the courts have only recently begun to define in many areas of high technology.
The U.S.,
confident of its technical superiority, ''sold out to the Japanese,'' says G. Steven Burrill, head of the high-technology consulting group at Arthur Young, a Big Eight
accounting firm. ''We let them share our brain.''
Now, belatedly awake to the recognition
that Japan has been eating their breakfast, lunch, dinner, and bedtime snack, American
companies are stirring. IBM vs. Fujitsu over computer software, Honeywell vs. Minolta over
automatic focusing, Corning Glass vs. Sumitomo Electric over fiber optics -- these are only
the latest, best-publicized complaints that Japan has stolen American technology.
Even as
those legal battles are fought out, the copycat cliche is becoming obsolete. A series of
studies financed by the U.S. government since 1984 warn that Japan has caught up with the
U.S. or passed it in the development of integrated circuits, fiber optics, computer
hardware engineering, and advanced materials like polymers. It is pressing hard in some
areas of biotechnology, and lags primarily in computer software.
Already there are signs
that the Japanese, buoyed by their new prowess, have assumed the arrogance of the U.S.
along with its technology."
"A MEASURE of Japan's progress can be found in the number of patent filings in the U.S.,
Japan's most important export market. ..."
"THE FACT that Americans now worry about their access to Japanese technology is an
acknowledgment of Japan's new scientific competence. When the Japanese were known primarily
as copycats, the flow of technology was essentially in one direction. It was also cheap.
Aaron Gellman, president of a consulting firm, says that for years U.S. firms licensed
technology to the Japanese without asking for a grant-back, the right to use any
improvements they made. Says Gellman: ''This was very arrogant and implied that no one
could improve on our technology.''"
"U.S. scientists and companies have failed to take advantage of opportunities to tap
Japanese academic research. ''What's wrong here is pure laziness,'' says Martin Anderson,
an analyst with the MAC Group, a consulting firm in Cambridge, Massachusetts."
Trust the UnitedSnake to blame the Chinese for
reneging on an agreement ! Fact is, Trump's team Add in last minute conditions that are totally unacceptable to
China.
Chinese commentators are fuming at the audacity of
the demands.
'WTF, Do they think we'r their gawd damned 51st state ?'
Typical UnitedSnake's 'negotiation' tactics, designed to fail ! Thats how Clinton justity his bombing of ex Yugo,
by blaming Belgrade for the breakdown of negotiation ,to justify its 78 days of aerial
arsons against Yugo.
How the UnitedSnake destroyed Toshiba and took over its crown jewel chip tech,... Toshiba was severely punished for breaking fukus
sanction on USSR, by selling state of art milling
machine to the Soviets. the unitedsnake slapped a heavy fine, demanded
the resignation of Toshiba CEO, imposed a ten
years ban on Toshiba products, FORCED the Japs
to share their latest chip tech with Merikkans. Toshiba never recovered from that disaster.
An excellent summary of many aspects of a serious and deteriorating situation. In the end, China has a lot of brainpower to apply to situations like this.They are used to speaking and writing one of the world's most difficult languages. They are used to playing Go, one of the world's most difficult board games. And their national endowment of analytical skills immensely surpasses that of the United
States.
They are said to have eight times as many students in math and science and engineering
in their universities. Xi himself is very bright, having earned degrees in difficult subjects at demanding
universities, and he is calm and very forward-thinking. Just consider that magnificent
long-term Silk Road Project. When I think of Trump with his constant mock-heroic poses and foot-high signatures on
every silly memo and his gang of noisy, pompous thugs in top appointments, I can't help
thinking I know how this will turn out in the end.
China's
yuan slide risks trolling Trump It's good to remember that would not be the first time. After the first round of
tariffs, China devalued the Renminbi and it basically
wiped out the tariffs . In fact, it didn't even need to devalue that much: 1 Renminbi
is now US$ 0.14 -- just a little over the Government max upwards band of 1:7.
In 2013, the CEO of French hi tech co Alstom
was arrested by FBI, while changing flight at
New York.
His 'crime', breaking MERIKKAN anti corruption
law by bribing govn officials in INDONESIA ! Such is the LONG arm of merikkan extra territorial jurisdiction, rings a bell ...
Ms meng ?
Just like Toshiba, the French paid a very heavy price. The CEO went to jail, Allstom,
the crown
jewel of French industry, was FORCED to sell off its core business to its main rival, GE.
!
What did Ian Fleming's fundamental law of probability says....
ONCE IS HAPPENSTENCE, TWIC IS COINCIDENCE...
US MegaCos. outsourced and 'globalised' with the blessing, nay encouragement! of the Pol.
Class. Cheaper labor and lax environmental rules, in comparison with 'home' (US, W countries,
etc.) is a mantra. That is of course good enough, and one can track, say, sh*t-clothes
factories transiting from Bangladesh, to China, to Malaysia, to Mexico, etc.
Other motives, the first is lack of responsibility and involvement which allows
domineering and rapacious behavior. Foreign co. implant can just leave, relocate, if
whatever. A random /racist term/ exploited worker in the 3rd world is not voting in US
elections.
Deadly industrial pollution is outsourced, and energy use etc. at home while not
curtailed or significantly diminished is not as high as one might see under condition of
the industries returning home - a sort of 'greener' environment can be touted.
The PTB simply cannot grasp why some US citizens, who live high on the hog, house, 2
cars, 3 kids, endless dirt cheap consumer goods, etc. produced by 'slaves' abroad,
complain. If the 'stuff' was produced at home, it would cost much more, the pay would be
going to 'low-level' US labor -- in a more closed economic circuit there would be more
'equality' as things stand today in the US - *not* claiming it's a general rule.
Trump had some confused? thoughts about turning the present situation around, and
relocating industrial - some extractive - manufacturing - jobs back home, say 1960s, with
decent pay, to ppl who would then vote for him.
The stumbling block is that profits to shareholders, oligarchs, chief CEO's, asset
trippers, usurers, Mafia types, Banks and other Fin, and Politicians who in the US are
highly paid lackeys, etc. is set to diminish, as 'the pie' can no longer be grown much to
accomodate all these grifters. Due to energy constraints, disruption of climate change,
etc.
Brit and Dutch spooks now concur with Trump the charlatan's claim of Huawei security risk ! Trust the Brits to doublecross the Chinese, after they've been given the huawei source
codes to examine and declared it free of bugs. As for the Dutch , they seems to be the goto guys these days, whenever the 5liars need
some loyal poodles to corroborate their B.S., cue the M17 'investigation'.
This is a good overview of Huawai crisis, but the reason for it is deeper. Huaway is just a skirmish in a much larger war for
the supremacy in the neoliberal world. At the same time this is a crisis of neoliberlism as social system. Much like the crisis of
Bolshevism.
After 2008 the neoliberal elite lost legitimacy. Nasty jokes about Trump and Obama are just a tip of the iceberg, they just show
the level of distrust. In a way they are like anecdotes about Brezhnev during "Stagnation" ("Zastoy" in Russian ) period.
Simplifying, Trump is some variation on the theme of of Gorbachov. and a counterrevolution against Trump was similar to the
counterrevolution against Gorbachov ("putsch" with the main difference that putsch was instigated by Gorbachov himself and he lost
power as the result). While most probably the dirt will be swiped under the carpet, some minor figures might go to jail
in the USA as the result as this was clearly attempt of the palace coup by intelligence agencies with the support of Obama
administration and Clinton wing of republican partty.
The level of lies in MSM and level of lies of politicians on the Capital Hill is a clear sign that the social crisis is reached
the state "when the elite can't govern as usual, and prols can't live usual". People working in Wall-mart essentially live in
a third world country.
The most telling sign that this stage has come is that the neoliberal elite no longer is able to tell the truth to the
population. Russiagate was partially an attempt to cement the cracks in neoliberal facade (loss of the legitimacy of neoliberal
elite) by redirecting the anger of population to the external enemy. In this sense neoliberal elite badly long for a war, which
would solve their problems, but in the modern world this is too dangerous move. But new local wars (Iran, Venezuela ) are still a
possibility, especially because Israel fifth column ( Adelson, Hassid mafia -- Kushner and Co, etc) partially controls Trump
and were able to secure the appointments of Bolton and Pompeo.
BTW attitude to Jews here turned to be much worse (especially in NYC, there are a lot of Hassidic sects). Jews also are very
convenient scapegoats and always were.
The Trump attempt to bully China is based on the understanding that China is a neoliberal state too and as such it should fold
in the name of neoliberal globalization, as the USA is the dominant neoliberal power -- kind like the USSR was for Bolshevism.
It is funny that China defection to neoliberalism doomed Bolshevism :-)
As neoliberalism is a flavor of Trotskyism (Trotskyism for the rich :-) it can't be decoupled from the neoliberal
globalization ("Financial oligarchy of all countries unite") like Trotskyism can't be decoupled for the idea of the
World revolution. If you decouple those two you will get Stalinism.
The question now is about the control of globalization. Where is the center? In the USA or in China (China is pushing its own
version via Belt and Road Initiative -- a China-centered trading network)
As for China-USA trade war timing is everything. If it is too late the USA will come out of it with bloody nose with the
continuation of the Great Recession in the cards. The root case was only patched, but never fixed -- secular stagnation continued
past 2010: concentration of wealth at the top undermine consumption of the middle class (lower class does not matter much) and
external expansion is limited as there will be no the second USSR collapse and no new markets. As Marxist taught us -- all
imperialistic wars are the wars for the redistribution of the markets. I think this might be the case now. .
If timing for Trump attack is right, China will be crushed and pushed into economic depression.
I am incompetent in this area but it looks to me that Trump in his usually bulling style overdid it putting too much
pressure, and as a result China revolted. Neither China not the USA understand the full consequences of this move, but that does not
matter. Chinese reaction suggests that "the Rubicon was crossed" and the real trade war is in th cards. May be some
compromise reached, but if the neoliberal world is stilt into two camps: USA-dominated and China-dominated (much weaker, but
Russia and possibly India, Pakistan and Iran probably will gravitate to it). Replaying the Cold War on a new level and with
much weaker cards in the USA hands.
Looks like Trump recently understood that he committed a blunder and is trying to back off, but that might be too little too
late.
Notable quotes:
"... It's the clearest sign yet that the basic assumptions of globalization are collapsing. ..."
"... the story of the use of SWIFT against Iran, and increasingly it's the story of fights over tech/networks ..."
1. A thread on why Trump decision to put Huawei on the entity list is a very big deal indeed, as
@Dimi and others are arguing.
ft.com/content/c8d6ca . This is a far
bigger step than just excluding Huawei from the US market.
2. It requires any US company that wants to supply Huawei to first ask the US government for permission. This has obvious implications
for Google's Android operating system, Qualcomm chips and a myriad of other suppliers
4. The globalization of the 1990s massively transformed the world economy. National economic systems that had previously been
separate from each other became densely interpenetrated, and deeply dependent on financial, informational and trade networks that
spanned borders.
5. These networks are structurally embedded. Supply chains have been globalized, in the pursuit of economic efficiencies. It's
hard to imagine how the world economy could work without them. But the pursuit of efficiency created strategic vulnerabilities.
6. Some networks had hub structures meaning that states that could control the hub could control the network. Others relied on
crucial components that were single sourced or sourced within an individual country.
7. The last decade has seen states move increasingly to exploit these vulnerabilities against others or to shore their own vulnerabilities
up against outside attackers. That's the story of the use of SWIFT against Iran, and increasingly it's the story of fights over
tech/networks
9. The Huawei move displays both US fears about vulnerabilities, and US efforts to exploit them. The US is worried that 5G networks
could compromise US communications to surveillance.
10. US is not only moving to push Huawei out of existing markets - but to damage Huawei's core business by potentially preventing
it from using core US components (such as Qualcomm chips or Android OS (it remains to be seen exactly which technologies will be
listed). Chinese hawks are talking about retaliating through e.g. blocking sales of rare earths again.
11. This will also reinforce Chinese efforts to build "autonomous and controllable" technology and supply chains outside US control
to decrease their vulnerability to future attack.
12. The old model of globalization is in serious trouble. The networks that tie the world economy together are being exploited
for strategic gain. The US move is both a response to fears about its own vulnerabilities, and an effort to exploit China's vulnerabilities
in return.
13. The result will likely be escalation - but we don't know for sure. We still don't have anything that approaches a strategic
analysis of this new field of politics and how it works. Historical experience provides no good recent analogies.
14. During the Cold War, the US dominated parts of the global economy and Comecon were largely disconnected, with the exception
of raw commodities such as grain. Now, the economies of US, Europe, China and Russia are deeply intertwined.
15. If you want to be pessimistic, you can resort to scorpions-in-bottles analogies. If you want to be optimistic, you can point
to continued shared interests that states have in avoiding major economic disruptions. The willingness of the US to push this so
far and so hard
16. suggests the skeptics may find their fears justified - but we'll be finding out. Interesting times for international political
economy scholars, if frightening times for the international political economy. Finis.
Why not? Hollywood those days mostly produced utter junk. It's an easy and lucrative move
Notable quotes:
"... The most obvious is the simple fact that the U.S. is much less dependent on its services exports to China than South Korea is. While certain sectors might feel some pain, it's not likely to be strong enough to force the White House to back down. (Indeed, Trump might not mind if liberal Hollywood takes a hit.) ..."
"... Similarly, many Chinese industries rely fundamentally upon licensed American services. In 2018, foreign films accounted for 38% of China's box office; the most lucrative among them were American. That trend continues: Over the weekend, "Avengers: Endgame" became the third-highest grossing film in Chinese history. ..."
Trying to boycott U.S. entertainment and travel, as Beijing did
with South Korea, will only backfire on Chinese companies and consumers.
By Adam Minter , May 17,
2019 8:00 PM
Adam Minter is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist. He is the author of "Junkyard Planet: Travels in the Billion-Dollar
Trash Trade" and the forthcoming "Secondhand: Travels in the New Global Garage Sale.
China may want to stand tough against Donald Trump's trade threats. It's going to have a hard time retaliating, though, and
not only because it doesn't import enough goods to match the U.S. president tariff-for-tariff.
One obvious target would be the
$58.9 billion in
services the U.S. exports to China. These include everything from Hollywood blockbusters to tourism and education. In theory,
Beijing could easily enough cut off the flow of American entertainment into China and Chinese students and tourists out of the
mainland. Indeed, the nationalist editor-in-chief of the Global Times newspaper has already
suggested such a strategy.
China has some experience with this. After South Korea agreed to deploy a U.S. anti-missile system on its soil in 2016, Chinese
television stations were
informed that programs involving South Korean stars wouldn't be approved for broadcast, while Chinese venues began
canceling appearances by K-pop
bands and other South Korean celebrities. On top of restrictions on outbound tourism, the measures helped knock 0.4% off South
Korea's expected growth rate in 2017.
On the other hand, the unofficial boycott didn't persuade Seoul to reverse its decision. And there are many reasons to think
a similar strategy directed at the U.S. would be even less effective.
The most obvious is the simple fact that the U.S. is much less dependent on its services exports to China than South Korea
is. While certain sectors might feel some pain, it's not likely to be strong enough to force the White House to back down. (Indeed,
Trump might not mind if liberal Hollywood takes a hit.)
The second reason is more important. Chinese businesses are often as dependent upon U.S. services as American retailers are
on their mainland-based supply chains. Restricting Chinese tourism to the U.S., for instance, would damage China's airlines, many
of which have been handsomely subsidized in a battle for dominance over hyper-competitive trans-Pacific air routes.
Similarly, many Chinese industries rely fundamentally upon licensed American services. In 2018, foreign films accounted for
38% of China's box office; the most lucrative among them were American. That trend continues: Over the weekend, "Avengers: Endgame"
became the third-highest
grossing film in Chinese history.
Chinese regulators are already worried about
slowing box-office revenue
. In 2016, they even
temporarily lifted
quotas on foreign films to help cinema owners. It's unlikely they'd seek to add new burdens now to the struggling industry.
In recent years, the most high-profile buyers of U.S. entertainment content have been China's celebrated tech champions. In
2015, Tencent Holdings Ltd. agreed to pay the National Basketball Association
$500 million
(potentially rising to $700 million) for the rights to stream the league's games, highlights and other content in China. It
was a smart investment: The NBA is the
most popular professional sports league among Chinese viewers. During the 2017 finals, more than
170 million people in China streamed the games live.
And Tencent isn't the only Chinese tech company leaning upon the NBA to boost user counts. The league has signed more than
a dozen media partnerships in China, including a
March 2019 agreement with Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. under which the NBA agreed to create content for Alibaba users. (Alibaba
Vice Chairman Joseph Tsai owns 49 percent of the Brooklyn Nets NBA franchise.)
Ultimately, the biggest impediment to any Chinese boycott of U.S. services may be the Chinese public. Though there's no question
that Chinese popular opinion is behind Beijing, there's little evidence so far that the trade war has diminished consumer enthusiasm
for American movies and vacations. During the key Chinese New Year travel period, the U.S. was the
most popular long-haul travel destination for Chinese tourists. Los Angeles reported a
6.9% boost in Chinese visitors last
year.
While some Chinese might just switch to illegal streaming services and pirated downloads if cut off from their favorite American
TV shows and movies, trying to bar them from visiting the U.S., sending their kids to university there or seeking medical treatment
could quickly provoke a backlash among middle-class citizens. Especially at a time when growth is slowing at home, that's a constituency
the government can't afford to alienate.
Of course, none of this means the Trump Administration should think its services exports are entirely immune. As American culture
becomes more globalized, it becomes easier to emulate. China's film industry is getting more polished in spite of censorship.
Yao Ming is steadily
improving Chinese
basketball in spite of China's state meddling in sport. And low-cost airlines give Chinese access to a wide variety of destinations
just as compelling as Los Angeles. For now at least, though, China will have a hard time restricting what it can't replace.
Uh, no, Tom, she won't be collecting a lot of voters, well, at least not near enough. Biden
has already been "chosen" like Hillary was over Bernie last time. You should know by now Tom,
we don't select our candidates, they're chosen for us for our own good. 2 hours ago
This is going to take a long time. You just can't turn this ship around overnight.
US Political System:
United States is neither a Republic and even less Socialistic. US, in the technical
literature, is called a Polyarchy (state capitalism). Polyarchy (state capitalism) idea is old,
it goes back to James Madison and the foundation of the US Constitution. A Polyarchy is a
system in which power resides in the hands of those who Madison called the wealth of the
nation. The educated and responsible class of men. The rest of the population is to be
fragmented and distracted. They are allowed to participate every couple of years by voting.
That's it. The population have little choice among the educated and responsible men they are
voting for.
This is not an accident. America was founded on the principle, explained by the Founding
Father that the primary goal of government is to protect the minority of the opulent against
the majority. That is how the US Constitution was designed sort of ensuring that there will be
a lot of struggle. US is not as the same as it were two centuries ago but that remains the
elites ideal.
Polyarchy (state capitalism) it is a system where small group actually rules on behalf of
capital, and majority's decision making is confined to choosing among selective number of
elites within tightly controlled elective process. It is a form of consensual domination made
possible by the structural domination of the global capital which allowed concentration of
political powers.
A republic is SUBORDINATE to democracy. Polyarchy can't be subordinated to any form of
Democracy. 2 hours ago Is the author, to use an English term, daft? Tulsi Gabbard won't get out
of the primaries, much less defeat Sanders or Biden. Farage achieved his goal (Brexit), then
found out (SHOCK!) that the will of the people doesn't mean anything anymore.
If Luongo had wanted to talk about the people's uprising, he should've mentioned the Tea
Party. 3 hours ago Gabbard appears to have some moral fibre and half a backbone, at least for a
politician, regardless of their views, Farage is a slimy charlatan opportunistic populist shill
3 hours ago (Edited) I like Tulsi Gabbard on MIC stuff (and as a surfer in my youth - still
dream about that almost endless pipeline at Jeffreys Bay in August), but...
On everything else?
She votes along party lines no matter what bollocks legislation the Democrats put in front
of Congress. And anyone standing full-square behind Saunders on his socialist/marxist
agenda?
Do me a favour. 1 hour ago (Edited) Farage left because he saw what UKIP was becoming...a
zionazi party.
Also Gabbard is a CFR member. 3 hours ago Gold, Goats and Guns? Certainly not guns under
President Gabbard! Here's her idea of "common sense gun control:"
I'm totally against warmongering, but I have to ask - what good is it to stop foreign
warmongering, only to turn around and incite civil war here by further raping the 2nd
Amendment? The CFR ties are disturbing as hell, too. And to compare Gabbard to Ron Paul? No,
just...no! 3 hours ago Always been a fan of Bernie, but I hope Gabbard becomes president. The
world would breathe a huge sigh of relief (before the assassination). 4 hours ago By this time
in his 1st term, Obama had started the US Wars in Syria and Libya and has restarted the Iraq
War.
Thus far Trump has ended the War in Syria, pledged not to get us dragged into Libya's civil
wars and started a peace process with North Korea.
Venezuela and Iran look scary. We don't know what Gabbard would actually do when faced with
the same events. Obama talked peace too.
Plaza accord, Asian Tiger crisis, and now China trade war.
Notable quotes:
"... Submitted by Christopher Dembik of SaxoBank ..."
"... The tone is clearly different in China where the official media, such as CCTV and People's Daily, adopted a tougher stance. ..."
"... As of yesterday, all the articles and TV reports mention "trade war". This terminology change means a lot and confirms that the negotiations have entered a more dangerous phase. ..."
Yesterday evening, senior Trump administration officials tried to appease tensions. US
secretary of the Treasury Mnuchin confirmed, without giving much detail, that the US-China
trade talks are still ongoing. The tone is clearly different in China where the official
media, such as CCTV and People's Daily, adopted a tougher stance. It is interesting to
note that in the previous rounds of trade disputes that occurred since Autumn 2018, People's
Daily articles mostly used the term "trade friction" instead of "trade war" until now As of
yesterday, all the articles and TV reports mention "trade war". This terminology change means a
lot and confirms that the negotiations have entered a more dangerous phase.
In addition, China has tightened its "national security" review for foreign investments,
which can be considered as another step in the retaliation process.
... ... ...
Trump's approval rate is still high
On the US domestic front, President Trump is now seeking $15 billion to bail out farmers in
order to mitigate the negative impact of the trade war. Interestingly, more and more Republican
Congressmen that were interviewed yesterday on US TV were very vocal against the latest
measures decided by the Trump administration. It is, however, unlikely to have any influence on
the ongoing process or to push the administration to comprise with Beijing. Trump is looking at
polls and the message they send is bright and clear: as of yesterday, 42% of US voters
supported Trump's policy (FiveThirtyEight). His electoral base has remained stable, faithful
and very broad since he was elected.
What's next?
By May 18 -- Potential US tariffs on global auto sector.
June 1 -- China's move to raise the rate of additional tariffs to 25% on 2,493 US
products (representing $60 billion worth of US imports) will come into effect. In addition,
list 3 tariffs from 10% to 25% decided by the USA against China will truly be implemented for
all products. For the moment, an exemption applies to list 3 products exported before May 10
and arriving in the US before June 1. For these products, the duty rate is still at 10%.
June 17 -- The USTR will hold a public hearing on potential duty of up to 25% tariffs on
virtually all Chinese goods (list 4 tariffs) that are not currently covered by previous
tariffs hikes. It will be followed by at least a week of discussions.
June 28 -- Likely meeting between presidents Trump and Xi at the G20 meeting in Osaka to
reach a compromise on trade issues.
By three methods we may learn wisdom: First, by reflection, which is noblest; Second,
by imitation, which is easiest; and third by experience, which is the bitterest." --
Confucius
The US has been the biggest offender in trade wars for decades. The petrodollar conceived
by Kissinger and Nixon forced countries to buy oil in USD. How is that not warlike? China and
other countries are trying to unhitch themselves from the dollar and who can blame them? The
problem is that when they are successful, and they will be, all those dollars will come home
to mommy and inflation will run rampant.
The country that prints the money will always have the upperhand against the country that
works hard and dirty to acquire the said money.
China is one of the cheapest producers,but that doesnt mean that the US cannot either
import or manufacture its own product.
Case in point im a salesman from greece. I know for a fact that the chinese sell a t-shirt
for 2 euros a piece (wholesale) and greek producers for 4 euros a piece. All the t-shirts are
sold (retail) for 12-70 euros. So its not about costs but about profit.
If greece decides tomorow to take back its production from the sick ***** and impose
tariffs on them literaly nothing will change.
Despite all the rhetoric about buying from other places than China, the facts remain,
manufacturing is not returning to America. Nor are the jobs coming here to America, nor is
the wealth. Conditions in America doesn't favor it. Agriculture was always America's strong
suite. But, with the trade wars causing farmers to go bankrupt, you can be assured of losing
that too. The question is now, who will feed all you American fat asses, when all your
farmers go broke?
Consumer economies are the economies of third world countries, and that is what America
has got. China, with its manufacturing economy, will go on to make investments in other
countries, and leave America in the dust.
You have had tariffs for over a year and not one company has returned from Overseas or
left China. In fact more US companies have moved manufacturing to China.
In the USA you have unions, the epa, osha, IRS... and the most litigious tort system and
most unreliable employees in the world. You have the most disability claims, the most
lawsuits against employers etc. Most absenteeism. Most employee theft. Gender issues,
bathroom issues, diversity issues. Your gov continue to pack on the minimum wages eliminating
any potential to make products to compete with the world.
In short the US is dying on the vine. Trump has caused so much bad blood with Asia, that
US global businesses will have difficulty penetrating Asian markets which are the only thing
that matters for the next 100 years. You Trumptard RACISTS are losers.
500,000 manufacturing jobs added in Us in last two years.
Where’d they come from.
US companies leaving China accelerating - relocating elsewhere in Asia, and bringing back
workers to US. Increasing location in US of foreign owned manufacturing plants to avoid trade
issues and tariffs.
The US is not only not dying on the vine, growth ACCELERATED in last several quarters.
Can’t hire skilled workers — no one available to take them. My daughter was
approached by 3 recruiters to lure her away from her job - she moved for a big pay increase -
they upped their offer 20% - and goit the job of her dreams, with all benefits at a major
company - and she is an ARTIST!! The huge increase in content production has created a golden
age even for liberal arts professions.
The US ONLY issue is its debt, which it can start to solve by simply retiring debt held by
the Fed, and continuing open market purchases and retirements. Monetize while inflation is
low and dollar strong. This will likely come with next rate drop (if we get one).
Chiona living on a MASSIVE consumer/mortgage debt bubble like the US faced in 2007. The
tide will wash over their financial industry, as it has begun, and the central government
will burn its reserves bailing them out. What goes up...
China hitting the wall of wage growth where it has become more expensive than its
competitors in SE Asia and India.
The next decade will be a lot more difficult for China. It’s totalitarian state will
need to become even more militant and oppressive to survive.
Every auto made in the world, every mower, every computer, every modem, every LED TV,
every telco switch, every smart phone, virtually any product you can think of has Chinese
Components or is manufactured in China. China is the largest semiconductor maker in the
world. LED lights... CHINA.
As we view the global economy we should consider that much of the "free trade" movement is
driven by mega companies desire for larger markets and greed. The desire of companies to both
develop and control future rules has caused them to lobby individual governments into giving
up control and becoming subservient to corporate “efficiency.”
This is probably not in the best interest of the average citizen as we can see by surging
inequality. Those concerned that a trade agreement with low wage nations will not be a great
job creator for America have history on their side. The piece below argues that fair trade
trumps free trade!
anybody pointing the finger at China because of IP theft and not doing the same to the
USSA is either brainwashed beyond repair, stupid like a piece of wood, a paid troll or any
combination of these.
"accuse the enemy of doing what you secretly do"
- plenty of people in powerful positions all across history
Most aren't paying attention to what Trump says.... he said a year ago that China was
wanting to make a deal. Trump said, "BUT,they're not ready yet" , meaning that they wanted a
small change to the imbalance like Canada and Mexico received.
China's trade imbalance is seriously astronomical compared to any other country we do
business.
Canada's trade imbalance is $20,000,000,000 per year with US.
China's trade imbalance is $420,000,000,000 per year with US.
We have almost the same trade with each $660 B with China and $620 B with Canada.
Canada is ripping us off. China is not ripping us off, they're ******* us.
Worst case is we STOP trading with China. Best case they reduce the trade imbalance
90%.
the other side of the coin is a chinese boycott of usa brands means a dollar devaluation
in the form of a tanked market. the chinese market means not much. the usa equity/bond market
is everything. a falling dollar takes a lot powder out of usa guns.
If winning elections at the expense of the electorate is the main concern of politicians,
might that suggest gross immorality amongst the political class?
On the other hand, if supporting politicians because they mouth soothing platitudes, while
yet their policies and actions, defenestrate the quality of life of the electorate, suggests
indoctrination, might that not be cause for serious concern?
Now, it's doubtless that leaders will be required to take unpopular stances sometimes, but
ought not those stances be based on cogent analysis of reality, and the elimination or
reduction of self contributory inputs?
All in all, leadership is about courage - to do what's right, and necessary, even if it
requires declaring mea culpa. Humility, is often the true indicator of leadership
abilities.
Which reminds us of Alexander, the Great that is, who had to turn back from his expedition
in India, when his troops balked at going further. He could have razzmatazzed them no doubt,
but he realized they were telling him that exhaustion was prevalent, pushing forward offered
no additional gains, and better to return home to sex their wives, teach their sons
horsemanship, give their daughters away in marriage, till their farms, chill out, smell the
roses, party, and reminisce to their children and grandkids about their adventures..
Alexander, Great that he is, listened, and with a heavy heart, due to his adventurous
nature, signaled the retreat, and homewards it was. That is why they called him Great, not
because of his martial prowess which was indeed formidable, but because of his discerning
prowess..
On the other hand, there was Marcus Crassus, who was so avaricious, he went East to war,
and got as much gold as his heart desired..molten, and poured down his throat. He died rich,
literally filled with gold, cheers...
Its real simple, if you don't like the cost of doing business in China along with being
required by the twisted communist government to turn over your intellectual property as a
requirement for doing your manufacturing there, then bring it home to America.
Not very long ago int he early 1990s I can still recall watching on the cable news
programs Chinese rockets launching and blowing up just prior to achieving orbit. The Clintons
then were at it full bore trading access to top secret rocket technologies from Loral Space
and Technology (Bernie Schwartz) CEO for campaign cash. Clintons transferred Top Secret
technologies from State Department to Commerce Department allowing them the access to Sell
out America to the Communists. It is why they had to arrange for the liquidation of Commerce
Secretary Ron Brown. Remember the video of Bill Clinton laughing and cajoling at the Ron
Brown funeral, then when he sees the camera on him, he immediately turns on the bitter tears.
These people are the phoniest crooks to ever come to power in America.
Was at Wal Mart yesterday. Surprisingly there isn't any products made in China that I
needed to buy. All the food, cleaning supplies, and toiletries are still made in the United
States. The clothing section had made in Malaysia, Singapore, India, Mexico. So in reality,
other countries can take market share from China. Some of the production will return to
United States as well.
"... The REAL REASON behind the TRADE WAR: Israhell: "I want Iran embargoed and starved to death." China: "I will buy Iran's oil." BAM! Trade War! ..."
The 'play of the day' above comes against a backdrop of markets trying to accentuate the
positive in the latest US-China trade war deterioration. Indeed, Moody's has declared a trade
deal will still be done and a Bloomberg survey of US economists shows around two thirds think a
deal will be signed by year-end, a fifth by 2020, and only 13% don't see a deal for at least
five years. Field Marshall, please take these men and women out and have them shot, there's a
good chap.
The rhetoric from China has turned starkly, aggressively nationalist. The Global Times is
calling for a "People's War", a 1930's Mao reference to repelling Japanese imperialism; "trade
war" now fills Chinese media, having been largely absent for months; and Tuesday's People's
Daily mouthpiece posted an image of the Chinese flag with "Talk -- fine! Fight -- we'll be
there! Bully us -- delusion!" superimposed on it. US President Trump is also not backing down
in a further set of trade-related tweets, again stating tariff revenues will support 'patriot'
farmers and adding: "China will be pumping money into their system and probably reducing
interest rates, as always, in order to make up for the business they are, and will be, losing.
If the Federal Reserve ever did a "match," it would be game over, we win! In any event, China
wants a deal!"
A huge fiscal deficit; trade tariffs; a rapid increase in military expenditure; 'Patriot'
farmers; and a political call for lower interest rates for a national struggle. It all sounds
very Chinese, doesn't it? But that shouldn't be a surprise. Last year's ' The Rise and Fall and
Rise of the Great Powers (and Great Currencies)' argued the historical lessons of the economics
of past power struggles are that one must have low borrowing costs, spend a lot on a large
military, and be mercantilist if your enemy is. True, one also needs to be economically
vibrant, and that isn't assured with mercantilism, militarism and large fiscal deficits. Yet
real free trade, pacifism, and austerity is *ruinous* for Great Power . Which is why the EU is
not a Great Power but a Great Whinger.
Some in the markets are starting to get this.
Regular Bloomberg commentator Noah Smith yesterday published an article --'The Grim Logic
Behind Trump's Trade War With China'-- that admits he was wrong to expect a trade deal, that
Trump is doubling down, and concludes "There may be a grim sort of logic to this approach If
Trump wants to slow China's ascent as a superpower, a trade war might be an effective way to do
it. If the harm to the US is modest and the costs for China are severe and lasting, Trump might
conclude that the former are acceptable losses. Geopolitical primacy, not maximum prosperity
for Americans, might be the president's true objective . if weakening China really is the goal,
then this could be just the opening rounds of a long and grinding trade war." That's' what I
argued back in November 2017's 'On Your Marx' special reports, which stressed a New Cold War
was likely ahead.
However, many in markets are still acting like a Treasury clerk telling Churchill that
Badolf Hissler can offer him a great deal on cut-price bullets, ships, and planes .
On a related front, we see reports of an alleged Iranian drone attack on Saudi oil
pipelines(!); also hear Iran's leader say there will be no war with the US; and Trump has
stated reports of 120,000 US troops moving to the region are fake news -- because if he were to
send troops it would " a hell of a lot more ." Mixed messages to put it mildly.
for 40 years, western liberals and capitalists have had a nebulous idea of China
developing, opening and "liberalizing." It hasn't usually occurred in the ways they wanted,
but China certainly has become a big market and has moved towards a more open economy and
somewhat, more open society overall, while still maintaining a "fascist" structure.
But we can all agree - that process is done. China's economy, society and politics are
what they are. The country is "grown-up." Do not ever expect the communist party to change
the tight, top-down structure it has. Do not expect changes to politics, do not expect anyone
in China to give up control, and certainly don't expect foreigners to have any say or
influence within China. China will always do exactly what benefits China and the CCP.
Trump is merely being a realist. So accept that, and trade/invest/exchange
accordingly.
Is it any surprise that a "Noah Smith" of Bloomberg would attribute all the wrong
motives and strategy behind President Trump's and America's trade dispute with China's
totalitarian regime?
That he sees the Chinese Communist Party as honest, good faith partners in this
scenario?
There is nothing Trump could ever do to please the internationalist media.
I seriously doubt if "weakening" China is Trump's primacy here. Perhaps a by-product but
let's finally admit one thing: The US-China trade arrangement is egregious at best. What no one is willing to discuss yet is the fact that this "philosophy" of evening out
trade with China will soon take on a life of its own: With the US consumer. We need to bring back a lot of jobs back to the US economy and that's not rocket science.
It won't happen overnight but it will indeed happen.
What is the point of this piece? To demonstrate the author’s wit and historical
knowledge (was that entire little playlet not invented)?
To maximize American prosperity long term, should the US simply allow China to cheat,
manipulate and intimidate its way to the top? China has proven that, unlike the US, its
growth is a zero sum game. It adds nothing to the equation of global growth except cheap
labor, which subtracts wealth from other nations by taking away their well-paid manufacturing
jobs. It contributes almost no raw materials, imports its food and energy, and has stolen
most of its technology at enormous cost to Western innovators.
The US has always provided net inputs to the system of global growth. Natural resources,
renewable materials (crops, renewable energy), and the relentless innovation and productivity
increases of its workforce. China is an extractor. Thus it needs to expand its borders
through exploitative economic imperialist initiatives under their One Belt One Road scam, and
their militaristic imperialism in the South China Sea. The US is a machine that puts out far
more than it takes in. China is the opposite. If the US directs its economic output away from
China’s vast and relentless maw, China’s machine will slow and sputter.
The real point of the trade war is to end the vacuum of Western and Asian prosperity by
China’s greedy and imperialist machine of economic destruction. China knows and
implements that its economic growth by definition comes at the cost of others’
prosperity. That the US took 20 years to wake the **** up is astonishing.
The key factor here is that the USA is a neoliberal state which means profits before people
and outsourcing to area with lower labor cost. Like leopard can't change its spots, neoliberalism
can't change it "free movement of goods and labor" principles, or it stop being
neoliberalism.
No jobs will come back to the USA as financial oligarchy is transnational body that uses the
USA military as an enforcer for their gang. It does not care one bit about the common people in
the USA.
Pause on the sound and fury for necessary precision. Even if the Trump administration slaps
25% tariffs on all Chinese exports to the US, the IMF has projected that would trim just a
meager slither – 0.55% – off China's GDP. And America is unlikely to profit,
because the extra tariffs won't bring back manufacturing jobs to the US – something that
Steve Jobs told Barack Obama eons ago.
What happens is that global supply chains will be redirected to economies that offer
comparative advantages in relation to China, such as Vietnam, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Cambodia
and Laos. And this redirection is already happening anyway – including by Chinese
companies.
BRI represents a massive geopolitical and financial investment by China, as well as its
partners; over 130 states and territories have signed on. Beijing is using its immense pool of
capital to make its own transition towards a consumer-based economy while advancing the
necessary pan-Eurasian infrastructure development – with all those ports, high-speed
rail, fiber optics, electrical grids expanding to most Global South latitudes.
The end result, up to 2049 – BRI's time span – will be the advent of an
integrated market of no less than 4.5 billion people, by that time with access to a Chinese
supply chain of high-tech exports as well as more prosaic consumer goods.
Anyone who has followed the nuts and bolts of the Chinese miracle launched by Little
Helmsman Deng Xiaoping in 1978 knows that Beijing is essentially exporting the mechanism that
led China's own 800 million citizens to, in a flash, become members of a global middle
class.
As much as the Trump administration may bet on "maximum pressure" to restrict or even block
Chinese access to whole sectors of the US market, what really matters is BRI's advance will be
able to generate multiple, extra US markets over the next two decades.
We don't do
'win-win'
There are no illusions in the Zhongnanhai, as there are no illusions in Tehran or in the
Kremlin. These three top actors of Eurasian integration have exhaustively studied how
Washington, in the 1990s, devastated Russia's post-USSR economy (until Putin engineered a
recovery) and how Washington has been trying to utterly destroy Iran for four decades.
Beijing, as well as Moscow and Tehran, know everything there is to know about Hybrid War,
which is an American intel concept. They know the ultimate strategic target of Hybrid War,
whatever the tactics, is social chaos and regime change.
The case of Brazil – a BRICS member like China and Russia – was even more
sophisticated: a Hybrid War initially crafted by NSA spying evolved into lawfare and regime
change via the ballot box. But it ended with mission accomplished – Brazil has been
reduced to the lowly status of an American neo-colony.
Let's remember an ancient mariner, the legendary Chinese Muslim Admiral Zheng He, who for
three decades, from 1405 to 1433, led seven expeditions across the seas all the way to Arabia
and Eastern Africa, reaching Champa, Borneo, Java, Malacca, Sumatra, Ceylon, Calicut, Hormuz,
Aden, Jeddah, Mogadiscio, Mombasa, bringing tons of goods to trade (silk, porcelain, silver,
cotton, iron tools, leather utensils).
That was the original Maritime Silk Road, progressing in parallel to Emperor Yong Le
establishing a Pax Sinica in Asia – with no need for colonies and religious proselytism.
But then the Ming dynasty retreated – and China was back to its agricultural vocation of
looking at itself.
They won't make the same mistake again. Even knowing that the current hegemon does not do
"win-win". Get ready for the real hardcore yet to come.
The Swine fever is sweeping china hog farms and since the start of 2019 200+ millions hogs
have been culled. Chinese hog production is down from 2016 high of 700 million to below 420
million by the end of the year. The fever is not under control.
Soybeans from Ukraine are unloaded at the port in Nantong, in eastern China. Imports of
soy used to come from the US, but have slumped since the trade war began. Should point out
that the Ukraine soy production matures at a different time of the year than the US soybean.
The USA planting season starts in Late april, may and june. Because of the harvest time
differences worldwide the USA supplies 80% of the late maturing soybeans needed by
October/Nov and December.
Perhaps this is one of the "casualties" ( https://www.rt.com/news/459355-us-austria-embassy-mcdonalds/
) of economic war given the significance of China and just how important it is to the U.S. in
it's purchases of $USD to maintain the illusion of it's reserve currency status and
"vigor"...
Surprised this didn't happen first at the U.S. Embassies in Russia and China?... Obviously
Ronald McDonald has turned into a charity of sorts helping out Uncle $am in his ailing
"health" these dayz!...
SUPER SIZE ME!... Cause I'm not lovin it anymore!... I'm needin it!!!!
I've never understood this "jobs aren't coming back" argument. Do you really think that it
will stop tariffs? They're happening. Better start preparing.
Oh, right, tariffs WILL bring back American jobs! Then why didn't the Administration
impose them fully in 2017? Why negotiate at all; just impose all the tariffs!?! lol
Pepe is correct as usual. Even if America tariffs the world the jobs aren't coming back as
corporations will be unable to turn profits in such a highly taxed country like America would
be. What could happen however is America can form an internal free market again going
isolationist with new home grown manufacturing.
You VERY obviously have ZERO knowledge of Chinas history and its discoveries/inventions
etc USED BY THE WEST.
I suggest that you keep your eyes open for "History Erased-China" on Y Tube. The series
shows what would happen in todays world if countries and their contributions to the world did
not happen.
It has become a cliché to quote William Butler Yeats’s poem “The
Second Coming,” written almost 100 years ago in the aftermath of World War I. But no one has said it better: “Things fall
apart; the centre cannot hold; / Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world . . . And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, /
Slouches toward Bethlehem to be born?”
Donald Trump's decision to raise duties on Chinese goods from ten to 25 percent of additional $200 billion of China exports
came into force. It is unclear how this will work and how much the US consumers will pay. Probably half of this raise
so from 5% to 10% which might be not very noticeable outside such items as shoes and clothing. The cost of Chinese's shoes already
is quite high -- plastic regular $60-30 with discounts on holiday. Leather -- $100-$50 and almost no discounts.
Trump uses his favorite "bully in the schoolyard" style, a typical the American foreign policy tactic to direct, lawless
pressure. First, they accuse partners of violations, to introduce restrictions on this basis (and at the same time to plunge world
markets into panic), and then to agree on the resumption of negotiations. But the previous decisions about tariffs were left, of
course, in force.
His gambit to conclude a deal with North Korea collapsed in failure in Hanoi in February, and
it is a huge blow to his self-styled image of a master dealmaker. Trump also faces a flurry
of congressional subpoenas at home from Democrats who now control the House of
Representatives. Hence with mounting legal and political troubles, Trump is cornered and
desperately needs a conclusion to the prolonged trade war with China, which has netted zero
benefits for him.
The prospect of a trade deal with China remains as elusive as ever, despite Trump's
increased tariffs to pressure China to come to the negotiating table with the list of
concession that he wants. It is highly unlikely that China will grant Trump the concessions
he wants. China remembers clearly the deal that Tokyo concluded with Washington in the 1990s
that caused Japan to slip into economic stagnation for many years. That period has now been
dubbed Japan's "lost decade."
China is not dumb and it will not concede to Trump.
Worse still, the move to increase tariffs took place while Chinese Vice-Premier Liu He was
in Washington to negotiate with the Trump administration.
It is a blunder by Trump and will be perceived by the Chinese as a cheap shot against
President Xi Jinping. The tariffs hike came despite Xi's
"beautiful letter" to Trump, and it is a massive loss of face for the Chinese leader to
see his group of officials return home from Washington with no deal to conclude the trade
war.
Xi could not afford to look weak in front of his people and he knows that millions of
Chinese netizens access information about the outside world by using virtual private networks
(VPNs) to circumvent the Great Firewall. Many ordinary Chinese know about the trade war's
latest developments and should any deal with Trump infringe on China's core interests, it
will be political suicide for Xi.
One of the main reasons the US-China trade talks broke down was that Washington's demands
were unpalatable to China. Some of the demands from the US, such as an end to government
support for state companies in specific industries and a streamlined approval process for
genetically engineered US crops, are a direct challenge to the Communist Party of China's
control of the economy.
Since Xi took office, he has extended the party's reach into every corner of Chinese
society, and every businessman in China who aspires to reach the top of the hierarchy knows
that they must receive the blessing of the party. It is not surprising that even Jack Ma, who
is one of China's most internationally recognizable figures, has been revealed to be a member
of the CPC after years of denial.
Hence in the face of renewed pressure from Trump, Xi and the Chinese government have
reached the conclusion that it is better to bear the consequences of increased tariffs than
to concede to US demands.
Xi is in for the long haul and can well afford to ride out the storm. And based on Trump's
past negotiations such as his failed bid to pressure House Democrats to fund his wall on the
Mexican border, which led to the longest government shutdown in US history, Xi knows that the
chances are good that Trump will blink first.
Trump uses his regular bulling style, but for him there are no mechanism out or this deadlock. China can't retaliate dollar to dollar but they
can encourage boycott of US goods that are replaceable with Chinese models such as Apple phones
In any cases there will additional unemployment in China and an additional stress on Chinese economy, which probably two
factors the Trump is counted on.
Notable quotes:
"... China should ban Boeing products for its compromise on aviation safety. Hit where it hurts with consumer power. ..."
"... When the 25 percent hits 345 billion dollars of additional untaxed imports Americans will just buy less. After this next round of taxes we will be on the road to bankrupting China and Iran. Europe's turn comes next. ..."
"the Chinese won't do us
the courtesy of saying hey this is because of your detention of madam Meng" actually this is
poorly understood by this professor. it's not a discourtesy, it is the opposite. it is a
courtesy to give Canada an opportunity to save face. that is, Canada frees madam Meng and can
claim they did so for OTHER reasons than bowing to Chinese pressure. It is a face-saving
measure for Canada's benefit. Come on, more cultural understanding is needed.
Western fools have learned one lesson : the CHINESE are NOT SOFT or like the JAPANESE in
the 80's.
The CHINESE have their mightiest WILL to stand against the demonic tyranny of the
US - the whole world know US is descending as US itself is struggling like one mad dog for
its prestigious status of world domination - refusing to acknowledge the country the nation
"in the last days of Rome".
When the 25 percent hits 345 billion dollars of additional untaxed imports Americans will
just buy less. After this next round of taxes we will be on the road to bankrupting China and
Iran. Europe's turn comes next.
"... "The most important thing is that in the China-US trade war, the US side fights for greed and arrogance ... and morale will break at any point. The Chinese side is fighting back to protect its legitimate interests," the nationalist, state-owned Global Times tabloid wrote . ..."
"... The Global Times also accused the Trump administration of misleading Americans about the victims of US tariffs. It singled out Larry Kudlow's interview on "Fox News Sunday" in which Trump's top economic advisor said that US consumers would also suffer from the trade war, contradicting Trump's claim that China would foot the bill. ..."
"... More than just a retaliation to "unprovoked" US aggression, China now sees its response as a crusade against the western style of life. During a prime time broadcast on Monday, CNN reported that the state broadcaster CCTV also aired a statement saying that China would " fight for a new world." ..."
"... The editorial also hinted that more retaliations are coming, saying that "China has plenty of countermeasures" and telling its readers that "the US tariff moves are very much like spraying bullets. They will cause a lot of self-inflicted harm and are hard to sustain in the long term. China, on the other hand, is going to aim with precision, trying to avoid hurting itself." ..."
"... The conclusion: "the Chinese side is obviously more realistic while the US is falsifying. This will, to a large extent, influence how the two countries digest the trade war impacts." ..."
China Calls For "People's War" Against The US, Vows To "Fight For A New World"
by
Tyler Durden
Tue, 05/14/2019 - 15:50
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While market mood has shifted diametrically from yesterday, with stocks sharply higher on Tuesday following what has
widely been interpreted as conciliatory comments from both president Trump and various members of China's ruling elite,
one would be hard pressed to find any de-escalation amid the Chinese press commentaries written in the aftermath of the
latest escalation in trade war between the US and China.
In a series of editorials and op-ed articles published Monday
and Tuesday, Chinese state media slammed what it labeled the Trump administration's "
greed and arrogance
",
called for a "
people's war
" targeting the US "
with precision
" as China begins a "
fight
for a new world
."
"The most important thing is that in the China-US trade war, the US side fights for greed and arrogance ... and
morale will break at any point. The Chinese side is fighting back to protect its legitimate interests," the nationalist,
state-owned Global Times
tabloid wrote
.
Urging indirect boycott of US goods and services, the editorial slammed Trump and suggested a nation-wide uprising
against the US aggression: "The trade war in the US is the creation of one person and one administration, but it affects
that country's entire population.
In China, the entire country and all its people are being threatened. For us,
this is a real 'people's war.'"
Whether this means a renewed collapse in Chinese iPhone sales remains to be
seen - for confirmation, watch for a new guidance cut from Apple in the coming days.
The
Global Times
also accused the Trump administration
of misleading Americans about the victims of US tariffs. It singled out Larry Kudlow's interview on "Fox News Sunday" in
which Trump's top economic advisor said that US consumers would also suffer from the trade war, contradicting Trump's
claim that China would foot the bill.
More than just a retaliation to "unprovoked" US aggression, China now sees its response as a crusade against the
western style of life. During a prime time broadcast on Monday, CNN reported that the state broadcaster CCTV also aired
a statement saying that China would "
fight for a new world."
"As President Xi Jinping pointed out, the Chinese economy is a sea, not a small pond," anchor Kang Hui said on his 7
p.m. news show. "A rainstorm can destroy a small pond, but it cannot harm the sea. After numerous storms, the sea is
still there." Hui concluded echoing a popular refrain, that "China doesn't want to fight, but it is not afraid to
fight."
The Global Times also mocked Trump's suggestion that the tariff hike would "force companies to leave China", stating
that "the consumption capabilities and market consumption potential driven by demand are what foreign companies value
most when they come to China." As a result,
"the White House might as well try to call on American companies such as General Motors, Ford,
Apple, McDonald's and Coca-Cola to leave China. Will any of them follow?
"
The editorial also hinted that more retaliations are coming, saying that "China has plenty of countermeasures" and
telling its readers that "the US tariff moves are very much like spraying bullets. They will cause a lot of
self-inflicted harm and are hard to sustain in the long term. China, on the other hand, is going to aim with precision,
trying to avoid hurting itself."
In an amusing twist, China then accused Trump of spinning and "seeking to beautify the trade war", while
Beijing has been "blunt about the difficulties and losses that the trade war will bring to the Chinese economy."
The conclusion: "the Chinese side is obviously more realistic while the US is falsifying. This will, to a large
extent, influence how the two countries digest the trade war impacts."
Whatever side of the ideological divide one finds themselves, this is hardly the rhetorica that will allow China to
reach a quick and painless compromise.
Right or wrong, the Chinese will fight as one for China. As well,
they have allies and resources, but the main thing is they are
homogenous and patriotic.
America is controlled from Jerusalem,
who will exit at the first sign of the gravy-train slowing, not to
mention *****-hat American snowflakes, a treacherous media and
politics. Etc.
Beware, Americans, about what you are getting into. You have
turned trade negotiations into a war and you will not win this
long-term. Just like all the others.
The Giant has awoken. Good job Trump. I guess it was all fake
news when you were telling us gullible Americans we were
winning. Any other wars you would like to start? Oh yea, Iran
and perhaps Venezuela first. Must stick with the
Israel
First
agenda.
The real issue is intellectual property. If the Chinese can't
steal our IP, they got nothing and they know it. Also we should
send home all their undergrad and graduate students. Let them
learn all this sh## on their own.
China is calling for a war, they've been engaged in for decades
via their technology, patent, forced technology transfers, and
copyright theft. And we should probably include their
subsidies of politically connected firms exporting products,
but at least in that case, the Chinese taxpayers are paying for
the subsidies.
If China wants a 'new world', they need to put on their big boy
pants and DEDOLLARIZE. You can't beat an opponent when you play by
the opponent's rigged rules!
The USA can't abolish neoliberalism. And the logic of neoliberalism is to use low cost labor oversees. Which means china.
Notable quotes:
"... If Trump wants to slow China's ascent as a superpower, a trade war might be an effective way to do it. If the harm to the U.S. is modest and the costs for China are severe and lasting, Trump might conclude that the former are acceptable losses. Geopolitical primacy, not maximum prosperity for Americans, might be the president's true objective. ..."
Trump is doubling down. He's
raising
tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese imports from 10 percent to 25 percent, and imposing new tariffs on almost all of the
remaining $325 billion or so. China today said it would retaliate and starting next month would impose tariffs on $60 billion of
U.S. goods. This is the biggest trade war in modern American history.
... ... ...
If Trump wants to slow China's ascent as a superpower, a trade war might be an effective way to do it. If the harm to the U.S.
is modest and the costs for China are severe and lasting, Trump might conclude that the former are acceptable losses. Geopolitical
primacy, not maximum prosperity for Americans, might be the president's true objective.
Unusually shallow take from Noah. The real reason for the trade war is China's subsidizing SOEs. They subsidize them until
the SOEs outcompete all other manufacturers so much that competition dies, and then take over the market. See Moly Corp and rare
earths as an example.
Such dumping is pretty easy to catch, and pretty easy to stop. Perhaps a more focused but more severe tariff structure on things
like steel, tires etc would make more sense as an enforcement mechanism.
Note that the Chinese are willing to give lip service to things that they supposedly agree to, but cannot actually put the
mechanisms in place without "losing face". Gimme a break. If Xi hadn't crowed about China's intent for dominance by means of mercantilism,
we would still be bending over. Now the only face being lost is his.
The Chinese will never give up their use of administrative barriers to impede trade internally. But at least they could have
said they would. But they couldn't even do that. So again, tariffs are about the only thing they will listen to.
The flaw there is that the SOEs may generate a lot of employment in China, but they don't actually generate as much economic
growth. And the govt knows this. The support for the SOEs isn't about giving them market share, but to keep them from collapsing
precipitously, with all the resulting unemployment. It's China's version of the auto bailout, just on an extended basis. They
make up only 25% of China's economy today, down from 50% in 2000.
If Trump wants to slow China's ascent as a superpower, a trade war might be an effective way to do it. If the harm to the
U.S. is modest and the costs for China are severe and lasting, Trump might conclude that the former are acceptable losses. Geopolitical
primacy, not maximum prosperity for Americans, might be the president's true objective.
Are we living on the same planet? Coherent, long-term strategic thinking and geopolitical calculus are about as foreign to
Trump as marital fidelity.
Except the Chinese have fewer cards to play. They are in the mother of all bubbles that they desperately want to deflate with
a soft landing. And they were well on their way to doing it. Until Xi crowed about it, and basically rubbed the world's nose in
his ass with the SCS and OBOR, on top of the trade issues.
That soft landing is now in serious jeopardy. And we all will pay, so I take no satisfaction from China's troubles, now and
imminent. But don't blame trump for it happening. It was all those thousand vauted people whose hubris you worship.
Whatever China's economic problems are, and why wouldn't a country with such enviable rapid growth into the (soon to be) world's
largest economy with the worlds' most internet connected population, have some problems, but they at least seem to study and plan
for their future in an intelligent and rational way.
I don't blame Trump for being a pathological liar and a narcissist, but the spineless Republican Party and "conservatives"
who have done nothing to thwart his idiotic behavior. The Chinese have a word for those without a backbone, it translates as "folding
chair". My sources tell me a different story about Public Opinion in China.. fwit.. No, they've seen this Trump in action long
enough to know he's unreliable as a trading pardner and unbelievable as a leader... He'll fold and the OBOR will proceed more
or less as envisioned... Too bad America (trump) has "poisoned" many allies in Asia.
The sky is falling and it's all Donald Trumps fault!
The problem is not tariffs or Donald Trump (specifically with China)
The problems are state sanctioned intellectual property theft and cheating on international trade agreements by the Chinese dictatorship.
Producers can shift their supply chains away from China to countries that do not view/treat the USA as an adversary and those
products will not have tariffs on them. Problem solved. A few years of extra prices from supply-chain resourcing is a very small
price to pay to address a dictatorship that seeks to undermine democratic values and human rights.
If you are looking for cheap labor, the labor you find will be unskilled and without technical resources. It means they must
be brought up to today's standards, technically, with your IP. It is the US CEO's that gave away the farm, looking for cheap labor.
Apple taught them how to make iPhones, guess what happened? Regardless where they go, US CEO's must give up IP for technical competence.
This time the United States has all the cards. We buy $500 billion per year from them. They only buy $100 billion a year from
us. We have 5x leverage. All we have to do is play the hand according to economic game theory.
If our long run goal is to have a larger economy (and with it all the benefits of being the largest economy, including military
security by being able to afford capital ships and planes), we must stop paying China $400 billion extra more than they take from
us.
If China wants to trade, its trade -- $500 billion for $500 billion. If they simply want to use our consumers to build more
factory capital we should not allow it. And because of the asymmetry in the balance of trade, we hold all the cards.
This is Trump's hand to lose by caving in. The optimal move in this game is to raise tariffs and hold until China increases
its purchases.
(And -- tariffs might actually raise S&P 500 earnings long run as additional manufacturing is diverted to old and new U.S.
factories -- no one knows and the prognosticator "economists" here have as much empirical evidence as the Austrian School, i.e.
they really have no idea other than how they think tariffs ought to cause a recession.)
There were much better ways to do this. Trump only knows his unilateral tariff way. But it is an improvement over "lead from
behind" Obama, who did nothing.
The West normalizing relations with China is apt to go down as the biggest blunder in all of human history. China needs to
be isolated and cut off at the knees.
Chinese trade policies have always been predatory to the US across Republican and Democrat administrations since Reagan was
President. The cost of labor in China is cheap at about $4/hour. Add to that there are few environmental or OSHA-like standards
and the pollution is so obvious that at the 2008 Beijing Olympics industry was shut down so that the smog might clear. No US manufacturer
without tariff protection can compete with that for unskilled labor. That is a fact. If the US wants to keep some semblance of
manufacturing in this country, then tariffs are necessary. And that goes for the countries in the New Nafta and the proposed TPP.
The hypocrisy on tariffs is maddening because California's agricultural and Maine and Massachusetts' shoe industry for just a
few examples survive only because of the tariffs. Getting tough with China is long overdue, and the political outrage over trying
to protect US interests is just Trump Derangement from educated people who should know better.
Buying "made in China" was far too easy, although quality usually suffered (and sometimes dangerously so). Tariffs will force
our purchasing agents to look around for better deals...Not a bad idea.
We need to stop allowing Chinese Nationals into our STEM programs!
Look at any graduate program at a top US University's comp sci program, physics, math or any engineering department and you
will see that it is heavily filled -- if not dominated -- by Chinese Nationals.
China has a well organized program to send students to IS STEM programs and US jobs at tech firms and steal the technology.
I mean...same plan forever?
That plan is to soak the middle class to make life better for the working class. The theory is mfg will return to the US, because
we'll have 9-billion percent tariffs on all imports.
The net middle-class life goes downhill, the net working-class life goes up.
then next software and robots will be outlawed.
Washington & Wall Street want to stay top dog as long as possible. If that means most Americans are poorer than they might
be, their attitude is, too bad for them. The power base only looks out for itself. That isn't too surprising, since most people
are selfish.
The rise of China would be no big deal if it wasn't a totalitarian state. That makes it extremely dangerous, depending on the
wishes of the man at the top. Fortunately, the US is protected from invasion by large oceans, and democratic neighbors with close
trade and cultural ties. And then there are all the nukes. No sane person would risk using them first.
Mr. Smith writes about the 'why' of trumpy's trade war:
"It's also possible, of course, that the trade war is a purely populist endeavor, and that maintaining tariffs is simply
a way for Trump to look tough. "
Reality TV show for trumpy... that will hurt millions of Americans... and trumpy and his cronies will never feel it. Just like
his business partners that he cheated.
You hit the nail right on the head! Good report. Pres Trump main goal is to cripple and contain the rise of China. The trade
war is his strategy. As to whether it will succeed or not, only time will tell....The rest of the reasons are just "red herrings"
and surprisingly, most Americans felled for it hook line and sinker. But the rest of the world knows all along because US is a
hegemonic nation and there are abundant examples of countries that were destroyed by the US for challenging her dominance all
over the world. That's why US keep changing the "goal post" from trade deficits to stealing of intellectual property and force
technology transfers and now state subsidies. Just as China agrees to US demands, the latter now up the ante and is now insisting
that China has to change her laws so that the US can enforce them. Very soon it will be regime change. It will be interesting
to see what happen next because to me war is never easy to win. Both sides will suffer and so will the rest of the world. To even
think that the US economy is immune to it because it is strong and the numbers are good and it will be able withstand the perfect
storm is hubris. Maybe Pres Trump and his neocons can prove history and the Smoot Haley Tariff Act wrong...?
If you know anything about Narcissists, this is most likely Trumps way of getting you to focus on something other than his
deplorable Mueller report, his son DonJr, his huge losses as a business man and his impending Tax returns exposed.
After vowing over the weekend to "never surrender to external pressure",
Beijing has defied President Trump's demands that it not resort to retaliatory tariffs and announced plans to slap new levies
on $60 billion in US goods.
CHINA SAYS TO RAISE TARIFFS ON SOME U.S. GOODS FROM JUNE 1
CHINA SAYS TO RAISE TARIFFS ON $60B OF U.S. GOODS
CHINA SAYS TO RAISE TARIFFS ON 2493 U.S. GOODS TO 25%
CHINA MAY STOP PURCHASING US AGRICULTURAL PRODUCTS:GLOBAL TIMES
CHINA MAY REDUCE BOEING ORDERS: GLOBAL TIMES
CHINA ADDITIONAL TARIFFS DO NOT INCLUDE U.S. CRUDE OIL
CHINA RAISES TARIFF ON U.S. LNG TO 25% EFFECTIVE JUNE 1
CHINA TO RAISE TARIFFS ON IMPORTS OF U.S. RARE EARTHS TO 25%
China's announcement comes after the White House raised tariffs on some $200 billion in Chinese goods to 25% from 10% on Friday
(however, the new rates will only apply to goods leaving Chinese ports on or after the date where the new tariffs took effect).
Here's a breakdown of how China will impose tariffs on 2,493 US goods. The new rates will take effect at the beginning of next
month.
2,493 items to be subjected to 25% tariffs.
1,078 items to be subject to 20% of tariffs
974 items subject to 10% of tariffs
595 items continue to be levied at 5% tariffs
In further bad news for American farmers, China might stop purchasing agricultural products from the US, reduce its orders for
Boeing planes and restrict service trade.
There has also been talk that the PBOC could start dumping Treasurys (which would, in addition to pushing US rates higher, could
also have the effect of strengthening the yuan). Though if China is going to dump Treasuries, will they also be dumping US stocks
and real estate?
China may stop purchasing US agricultural products and energy, reduce Boeing orders and restrict US service trade with China.
Many Chinese scholars are discussing the possibility of dumping US Treasuries and how to do it specifically.
"It's not China that pays tariffs. It's the American importers, the American companies that pay what in effect is a tax increase
and oftentimes passes it on to U.S. consumers," Wallace said.
As we
noted earlier , on Saturday, President Donald Trump said in tweets that it would be wise for China to "act now" to finish a trade
deal with the U.S., warning that "far worse" terms would be offered after what he predicted would be his certain re-election in 2020.
* * *
And so, as attention turns to China's "countermeasures", Bloomberg notes that while the Communist Party hasn't yet announced what
steps it would take, "the commentaries are probably the first part of its response, since state media in China is tightly controlled
and the government dictates what can be covered."
"If they weren't being seriously provoked, the Chinese people would not favor any trade war. However, once the country is strategically
coerced, nothing is unbearable for China in order to safeguard its sovereignty and dignity," the Global Times said in the editorial.
If the U.S. is to play a roller-coaster-style thriller game, it will bear the consequences."
In an earlier editorial, the Global Times said the U.S. has made a fundamental misjudgment, that is, believing China is unilaterally
benefiting from China-U.S. economic and trade relations."
"The U.S. has misunderstood the interests of both sides, and seriously underestimated China's endurance," the Global Times warned.
So to summarize the current state of the talks that on Friday were described as "constructive" helping send the Dow soaring by
over 500 points intraday, here is a
quick recap courtesy
of Mish Shedlock :
Trump demands China put commitments into law.
China replied that "no one should expect China to swallow bitter fruit that harms its core interests".
Trump ordered Lighthizer to begin the process of imposing tariffs on all remaining imports from China This would impact an
additional $300 billion worth of goods.
China said it would retaliate.
On Saturday, Trump warned China not to retaliate or it would face worse terms. Trump Tweeted "Love collecting BIG TARIFFS!"
Kudlow said on Sunday he expected retaliatory tariffs to kick in but that it had not happened yet.
China warned Trump on Sunday not to underestimate China's endurance and that China is not afraid to fight.
China posted its own set of demands for further talks including the removal of all extra tariffs.
As Mish concludes, "This dialog is what's known as "constructive". It's so constructive that further talks between Trump and have
been pushed back until the end of June, subject to change of course."
Meanwhile, as the market's hope for quick resolution fades, keep an eye on Apple and other Chinese consumer-reliant companies,
for the market's snap reaction - if Beijing plans to engage in "soft retaliation", it is those corporations that derive much of their
revenue from China that will be hit first and hardest. And if there is indeed a shift in sentiment, it will first appear in US equity
futures and Chinese stocks, both of which open for trading in just a few hours.
The idea behind imposing tariffs is to discourage buying, but 10-25% doesn't really make an impact on that front. It only proves
that the gubbermint wants to squeeze more out of the little people. Unfortunately, it will backfire (if not already) as shortsighted
policies (especially ones that are carried out over Twitter) usually do.
The verdict is not in on that yet. A corporation like Cummins can pay the tariff and deduct it as a business expense same with
a importer that is a corporation. LCC now have been destroyed by RINOTAX so they must pass that on to consumers or change to corporations.
Bottom line the consumer and or Taxpayer will eat the Tariffs.
Large multinationals are livid at Trump for this. The GOP is comatose, It has the feeling of a George Bush Subprime moment.
The GOP is going to take a big hit for this. Trump is mentally ill and out of control. Congress will have to rescind the section
232 delegation and remove that power from Trump.
The us trades with 102 nations and China has factories and banks in virtually all Asian countries. So there is a logistical
fix for this too. And as I have said before HONG KONG has its own treaty with the USA so it is immune to Trump Tariffs. All tariffs
are based on shipping origins and destinations so that's a pretty easy fix. Attacking 1 country out of 102, just makes the other
101 countries nervous about the arbitrary and capricious conduct of Trump.
China as you yourself stated is a heavyweight not some small outfit that can be pushed around by Trump. China is the largest
manufacturer in the world. 1000 metric tons of steel etc. Trump is harming US multinationals in China so Trump's days are numbered.
Corporations will be hamming republicans tomorrow. Trump is not smart, he's mentally ill and very sick. He had a breakdown when
he closed the gov and this is similar in that his mental illness responses are the same paranoia. The threats are similar etc.
Same disease different circumstance. And China knows this. They put the hammer down with their three demands. They will not budge.
China gets a bad rap because they were once very poor. But Gen MacArthur said that if the Chinese Army had not held off the
Japanese and fought to the death, the US Marines could not have taken the Japanese islands.
One other point. Part of the Asian culture is restraint. If China wanted to bust TRUMP hard they would cancel all Boeing Aircraft
orders. Mao would have done that. China is now very focused on business and trade and will only retaliate in small measured ways.
America's character went to **** in Vietnam. Then Bush family war criminals got into power. The only thing good about Obama
was he distanced America from the Jooz. But along came Trump and his joo daughter and son of a crook in law Kushner and then Trump
was antagonizing Iran, Jerusalem with the US embassy and put a US military base in Israel. So Trump is Bibi's houseboy. Then to
enforce this Trump appoints bolton, pompeo and Abrams, arms Saudi and signs on for year 17 in Afghanistan. Yet all this is just
fine with the TRUMPTARDS as long as they can chant built the wall. Absolutely astonishing how this Orange Tyrant is never held
accountable by his Trumptards.
Trump sounds terrified. His 60 tweets a day are indicative of someone suffering from fear. I have seen this in battle and thats
why everyone else gets clear of the yapper. His number is up.
I wonder if the Chinese media will show all the factories owned by the communist party cadres chugging along with free money
from the government, while millions of workers in privately owned factories are losing their jobs. All Trump wanted was for these
government run industries to go private, but the communist party needs to give jobs to friends and relatives. Because if you're
not a friend or relative of the communist party, you don't really matter in China.
what about the factories of Lockheed martin, Boeing, rayteon, churning along along with free money from the US government,
while millions of workers in privately owned companeis such as SEARs, Toys R US are losing their jobs?
Correction, Trump wants China to open up their markets to western exploitation which is not happening. If you understand history
about China it is mired in exploitation from European powers in the region. I don't blame China for its protectionism and their
ambitions to become an independent country.
The Orange Swine cut taxes for big corporations and multi millionaires and now lets middle class consumers pay the trade war
with China. And then orders the Fed to cut rates by 1% to destroy the Dollar. What's next? Value added tax anyone?
North American includes the USA and Canada. China exports 438 Billion and imports 180 billion from North America.
So if you look at it intelligently, US Tariffs have very little leverage but do harm the US supply chain enormously. When China
applies retaliatory tariffs to the US and Canada, they can hurt you badly. The US farmer is the prime example.
But the most important thing to look at is not your silly protectionism but the size of the ASIAN markets. China has been consolidating
all of Asia. They have companies and banks in all of those countries and their Asia Trade alone is over 2 trillion annually. Trump
screams about applying tariffs to 380 Billion in goods with no comprehension of how much he loses in access to Asia.
So as Bill O'Neil said, the only thing that matters for the next 100 years is the Asian Consumer. Nothing else matters. Asian
growth is exploding.
The chief export of the USA is aircraft 130 Billion a year. That will change drastically with Boeing. China is building its
own narrow body aircraft. Russia is also getting into the narrowbody aircraft space. The US doesn't want to be cultivating enemies
in Asia.
Many go directly to Washington coffers. But maney will be taken mostly from the US consumers
of Chinese goods. Also it is unclear what sanctions China will introduce in return, if any.
Notable quotes:
"... But the prolonged trade war — and Friday’s tariff hike — serves as ammunition for hawks on both sides, who see a more confrontational struggle for global dominance unfolding. ..."
"... In China, there is a growing belief that the U.S. motive in the talks is not to balance trade relations, but to undermine China, slow its rise and hamper its ability to best America in strategic high-tech fields. ..."
"... Hu Xijin , editor of the Communist Party-owned Global Times , has tweeted in English that China was “fully prepared for an escalated trade war.” He argued there is increased popular support in Beijing for a confrontational approach to the U.S. ..."
"... “The real intention of the U.S. is to squeeze China’s space in new technologies,” the editorial said. ..."
"... “Things will continue to slide downward into deeper competitive tensions,” Gill predicted, “including on the economic front because trade is not the problem. The deeper problem … is the question of economic and technological competition. ..."
"... Chinese President “Xi Jinping is not a forgiving man, so I think we can see that Xi Jinping will take a more robust stance against the U.S. if and when he feels that the Chinese government is able to do so successfully,” Tsang said. ..."
"... The United States faces a possibility that in decades, China could overtake it as the world’s largest economy. China’s economy is already ranked No. 1 in terms of purchasing parity power, a measure that adjusts GDP to account for price differences in countries. ..."
Even if the two sides can break through the stalemate and strike a deal on trade, the larger
message of the week is that U.S.-China relations have changed fundamentally, and there is
probably no going back.
Although their business relations are deeply entwined, the White House and China view
themselves as aggressive rivals jostling for global influence and geopolitical power.
The trade war launched by Trump is just one manifestation of this. Military friction in the
South China Sea, a string of espionage scandals, China’s rising military strength and the
Trump administration’s battle against Chinese tech giant Huawei are all signs of an
ominous chill in relations.
Although a trade deal seemed at hand in recent weeks, Trump administration officials have
accused China of reneging on agreements that had been made over months of negotiations. To
pressure Beijing to return to its previous commitments, Washington ratcheted up tariffs on $200
billion in products from China from 10% to 25%. China announced immediately that it would
retaliate.
Some experts said last-minute revisions from China are typical of its negotiating strategy,
as with Trump’s mercurial bargaining style.
If trade negotiators do not reach a deal in coming weeks, the U.S., Chinese and global
economies will be hurt, say analysts, who assume both sides will find a way to end the
impasse.
“My baseline scenario is that both leaders still need a deal for political reasons,
so we are likely to get one in the next few weeks, but it won't be this week,” said
Arthur Kroeber of Gavekal Dragonomics , a
financial research firm headquartered in Hong Kong. “The maneuvering right now is
mainly end-of-negotiation stuff. But both sides are playing brinkmanship pretty hard so there
is material risk (say 20 to 25%) that we don’t get a deal.”
But the prolonged trade war — and Friday’s tariff hike — serves as
ammunition for hawks on both sides, who see a more confrontational struggle for global
dominance unfolding.
In China, there is a growing belief that the U.S. motive in the talks is not to balance
trade relations, but to undermine China, slow its rise and hamper its ability to best America
in strategic high-tech fields.
Tariffs already have prompted some U.S. firms in China to shift their supply chains
elsewhere. China hawks in the Trump administration believe that applying heavy taxes on imports
can be one way to “decouple” from China.
U.S. legal charges against Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou, and Secretary of State Michael R.
Pompeo’s blunt efforts to dissuade European nations from using Huawei in 5G telecom
networks by threatening not to share intelligence, have hardened suspicions in China, as have
harsh criticisms and rhetoric from other senior officials in the Trump administration.
“None of the news of the past year or two has been very positive in terms of the
geopolitical direction of this relationship. It’s gone from tense to worse, and while the
trade relationship seems to get a lot of the headlines, a lot more problematic, even dangerous
elements are unfolding in other areas of the relationship particularly around security and
military affairs,” said Bates
Gill, China expert and professor at Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia.
“A so-called resolution of the current trade war is not going to remove or resolve the
fundamental structural problems in the economic relationship,” he said.
U.S. business has long favored engagement with China, arguing that external pressure from
the United States and others has pushed China to open its economy. More recently, however, that
assumption has been called into question by many in the West, giving Trump more political space
to go after China on trade and other areas.
Still, Jacob Parker , vice
president of China Operations at the U.S.-China Business Council , warned that if the Trump
administration confronts China too aggressively, it could backfire. He said that instead of
persuading China to open up more to American companies and ending its insistence that they
share their technology in return for market access, aggressive new tariffs could have the
opposite effect.
Parker also warned that Friday’s tariff hike on $200 billion of Chinese imports
— and Trump’s threats to slap tariffs on an additional $325 billion in Chinese
goods in the near future — has undermined economic reformers in the Chinese system and
strengthened the voices of hard-liners.
“That hardens those voices domestically and reinforces the perspective that the U.S.
is trying to contain China,” he said. “If we push the Chinese too far, I think
there’s a concern in the business community that we may go beyond what China can accept
and that things could start to fall apart. If that happens, I think we can at the least expect
that the Chinese economic reform process would come to an end.”
And in Washington, the lack of a deal would result in “increased tensions between the
national security wing of the U.S. administration, who will be happy with this result, and the
business-tech community, who are anxious to expand their participation in China and will be
pretty mad,” said Kroeber, of the Hong Kong financial research firm.
Stephen K. Bannon , former
chief strategist to Trump, is among a group of hawks who formed the Committee on the Present
Danger: China, an organization that sees its role as warning
Americans and political and business leaders of the “existential threats” to
America posed by China.
Meanwhile, Hu Xijin ,
editor of the Communist Party-owned Global
Times , has tweeted in English that China was “fully prepared for an escalated trade
war.” He argued there is increased popular support in Beijing for a confrontational
approach to the U.S.
“More and more Chinese now tend to believe the current US government is obsessed
with comprehensively containing China,” he tweeted Thursday.
A Global Times editorial Thursday said trade was “only a sideshow” in the
confrontation between the U.S. and China and the real issue was the U.S. fear that China would
catch up to it in high-tech fields.
“The real intention of the U.S. is to squeeze China’s space in new
technologies,” the editorial said.
Many analysts, including Australian professor Gill, share the view that relations are in
long-term decline.
“Things will continue to slide downward into deeper competitive tensions,”
Gill predicted, “including on the economic front because trade is not the problem. The
deeper problem … is the question of economic and technological competition.
“Ultimately at the bottom of all of this, the problem abides that the two countries
don’t trust each other and see each other as long-term strategic competitors.”
Steve Tsang ,
director of the SOAS China Institute
at the University of London, said regardless of who is president, the U.S. and China will
become increasingly competitive in the next two decades.
Chinese President “Xi Jinping is not a forgiving man, so I think we can see that
Xi Jinping will take a more robust stance against the U.S. if and when he feels that the
Chinese government is able to do so successfully,” Tsang said.
As relations decline, both Washington and Beijing are likely to compete to draw countries
into their orbit, he predicted.
He said European countries and the U.K. would drift toward the U.S. “because
ultimately this is what we believe in more. You will have a whole bunch of other countries that
will drift towards the Chinese because they remain fundamentally authoritarian
states.”
China’s global Belt and Road Initiative — in which it projects its international
power through soft loans for infrastructure — would also draw some nations to China, he
added.
Underscoring frictions are U.S. fears that China may overtake it in a range of high-tech
fields including space exploration, artificial intelligence, surveillance technology,
driverless cars and even military hardware.
Huawei’s emergence as the global leader in 5G technology — with no American
rival — was a shock to U.S. policymakers.
Parker, of the U.S.-China Business Council, said that although the U.S. and China face a
challenging security relationship, it is important to ensure that trade is not affected.
“I think there’s definitely a competitive dynamic between the U.S. and China,
and that will continue into the future. The twist is to ensure that the national security
issues don’t get entwined with the businesses’ side.”
The United States faces a possibility that in decades, China could overtake it as the
world’s largest economy. China’s economy is already ranked No. 1 in terms of
purchasing parity power, a measure that adjusts GDP to account for price differences in
countries.
“It would be a major milestone. It would send a lot of shock waves and shivers
certainly in the United States and much of the rest of the world and I think would be seen as a
major turning point, not unlike the United States overtaking the United Kingdom as the
world’s largest economy back in the late 19th century,” Gill said. “It would
certainly be the end of an era and the beginning of a new one.”
Trump's misguided tariff/trade war policies are straight out of the 19th century. They are
tearing apart relations with our allies and playing straight into Putin's hands. They will
cost U.S. consumers and businesses billions in tariff fees and higher prices on goods. They
are squeezing American farmers to the breaking point. Nobody wins a trade war.
Trump bravado is probably unwarranted. Here the train already left the station: the USA can do a damage to Chine economy only
by talking considerable damage to the empire and probably to the status of the dollar as well.
Notable quotes:
"... Commenting on this list, the Editor in Chief of the Global Times, Hu Xijin, who has become a real-time translator for Chinese unspoken intentions on twitter, explained that "from perspective of China's politics, there is little room for compromises. They will insist. This political logic won't be changed no matter how much additional tariffs the US will impose." ..."
"... Trump responded immediately on Twitter when he made it clear on Saturday that the US would not relent, stating that the Chinese may have felt they were "being beaten so badly" in the recent talks that it was better to drag their feet in hopes he would lose the 2020 election and get a better deal from the Democrats. Trump then said that "the only problem is that they know I am going to win (best economy & employment numbers in U.S. history, & much more), and the deal will become far worse for them if it has to be negotiated in my second term. Would be wise for them to act now, but love collecting BIG TARIFFS!" ..."
Following some soothing words from both the US and Chinese sides on Friday that while talks
to avert a tariff hikes had failed, they were "constructive" and there was grounds for
"cautious optimism" for the future, the standoff between the U.S. and China abruptly escalated
over the weekend when China's vice premier Liu He said that China is planning how to retaliate
and listed three core concerns that must be addressed, and on which it wouldn't make
concessions, ahead of any deal including:
i) the complete removal of all trade-war related tariffs,
ii) set targets for Chinese purchases of goods in line with real demand and
iii) ensure that the text of the deal is "balanced" to ensure the "dignity" of both
nations.
Commenting on this list, the Editor in Chief of the Global Times, Hu Xijin, who has become a
real-time translator for Chinese unspoken intentions on twitter, explained that "from
perspective of China's politics, there is little room for compromises. They will insist. This
political logic won't be changed no matter how much additional tariffs the US will impose."
Trump responded immediately on Twitter when he made it clear on Saturday that the US would not relent, stating that the
Chinese may have felt they were "being beaten so badly" in the recent talks that it was better to drag their feet in hopes he
would lose the 2020 election and get a better deal from the Democrats. Trump then said that "the only problem is that they know
I am going to win (best economy & employment numbers in U.S. history, & much more), and the deal will become far worse for them
if it has to be negotiated in my second term. Would be wise for them to act now, but love collecting BIG TARIFFS!"
Trade, however, doesn't represent the only U.S.-China economic activity whose profile has
lowered recently. For example, since 2016, two-way foreign direct investment (purchases of
so-called hard assets, like factories and real estate, as opposed to financial assets, like
government bonds) has cratered by fully 70 percent. Most of the drop is due to an 80 percent
decrease in Chinese investment in the United States, and the bulk of that decline came in 2018.
But American direct investment in China peaked back in 2008, as the recession struck, hasn't
come close to recovering since, and is also down slightly since 2012.
U.S.-China economic flows are still so great that they won't dry up completely. Nor should
anyone expect the current unwinding to continue at its current pace. After all, China still
boasts advantages in many manufacturing industries (which dominate bilateral trade) sure to
sustain sales to American households and businesses. Chief among them are the scale of existing
production complexes in China and the efficiencies that result, along with the wide range of
cost-reducing subsidies these sectors receive from Beijing. Further, China can't expect to find
foreign markets capable of replacing its sales to the United States, and therefore supporting
its own ability to grow and maintain the employment levels vital for political stability. Nor
will American businesses be able to totally blow off the enormous Chinese market and its own
still-impressive growth.
.... ... ...
Nonetheless, the days are over when the United States -- or at least its
political and business leaders -- saw mushrooming commerce with China as an expressway to
greater national prosperity and higher profits, not to mention a powerful contributor to global
well-being, security, and stability, and a means of democratizing China itself. With all these
hopes dashed, Washington and the American business community will find ample reasons to keep
looking for exits.
Alan Tonelson is the founder of RealityChek, a public policy blog focusing on
economics and national security, and the author of The Race to the Bottom.
I do not necessarily support his course of action...but I feel that sometimes, doing
the unexpected and unconventional thing can lead to new doors and new possibilities.
China's internal debt situation is so precarious that it can ill-afford a trade war
with US. China has a trade surplus of $325 billion with the US. This kind of skewed
number is totally unacceptable. By reneging on the provisional agreements over IP and
other hurdles, China is playing with fire.
I am not a Trump supporter but I think his policy on China is right on the money. No
other US president had the courage to address this issue.
Even if the two sides can break through
the stalemate and strike a deal on trade, the larger message of the week is that U.S.-China
relations have changed fundamentally, and there is probably no going back. Although their
business relations are deeply entwined, the White House and China view themselves as aggressive
rivals jostling for global influence and geopolitical power. The trade war launched by Trump is
just one manifestation of this. Military friction in the South China Sea, a string of espionage
scandals, China's rising military strength and the Trump administration's battle against
Chinese tech giant Huawei are all signs of an ominous chill in relations. Although a trade deal
seemed at hand in recent weeks, Trump administration officials have accused China of reneging
on agreements that had been made over months of negotiations. To pressure Beijing to return to
its previous commitments, Washington ratcheted up tariffs on $200 billion in products from
China from 10% to 25%. China announced immediately that it would retaliate. Some experts said
last-minute revisions from China are typical of its negotiating strategy, as with Trump's
mercurial bargaining style. If trade negotiators do not reach a deal in coming weeks, the U.S.,
Chinese and global economies will be hurt, say analysts, who assume both sides will find a way
to end the impasse. "My baseline scenario is that both leaders still need a deal for political
reasons, so we are likely to get one in the next few weeks, but it won't be this week," said
Arthur Kroeber of Gavekal Dragonomics , a
financial research firm headquartered in Hong Kong. "The maneuvering right now is mainly
end-of-negotiation stuff. But both sides are playing brinkmanship pretty hard so there is
material risk (say 20 to 25%) that we don't get a deal." But the prolonged trade war -- and
Friday's tariff hike -- serves as ammunition for hawks on both sides, who see a more
confrontational struggle for global dominance unfolding. In China, there is a growing belief
that the U.S. motive in the talks is not to balance trade relations, but to undermine China,
slow its rise and hamper its ability to best America in strategic high-tech fields. Tariffs
already have prompted some U.S. firms in China to shift their supply chains elsewhere. China
hawks in the Trump administration believe that applying heavy taxes on imports can be one way
to "decouple" from China. U.S. legal charges against Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou, and
Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo's blunt efforts to dissuade European nations from using
Huawei in 5G telecom networks by threatening not to share intelligence, have hardened
suspicions in China, as have harsh criticisms and rhetoric from other senior officials in the
Trump administration. "None of the news of the past year or two has been very positive in terms
of the geopolitical direction of this relationship. It's gone from tense to worse, and while
the trade relationship seems to get a lot of the headlines, a lot more problematic, even
dangerous elements are unfolding in other areas of the relationship particularly around
security and military affairs," said Bates Gill, China expert and professor at Macquarie
University in Sydney, Australia. Advertisement "A so-called resolution of the current trade war
is not going to remove or resolve the fundamental structural problems in the economic
relationship," he said. U.S. business has long favored engagement with China, arguing that
external pressure from the United States and others has pushed China to open its economy. More
recently, however, that assumption has been called into question by many in the West, giving
Trump more political space to go after China on trade and other areas. Still, Jacob Parker , vice president of China
Operations at the U.S.-China Business
Council , warned that if the Trump administration confronts China too aggressively, it
could backfire. He said that instead of persuading China to open up more to American companies
and ending its insistence that they share their technology in return for market access,
aggressive new tariffs could have the opposite effect. Parker also warned that Friday's tariff
hike on $200 billion of Chinese imports -- and Trump's threats to slap tariffs on an additional
$325 billion in Chinese goods in the near future -- has undermined economic reformers in the
Chinese system and strengthened the voices of hard-liners. "That hardens those voices
domestically and reinforces the perspective that the U.S. is trying to contain China," he said.
"If we push the Chinese too far, I think there's a concern in the business community that we
may go beyond what China can accept and that things could start to fall apart. If that happens,
I think we can at the least expect that the Chinese economic reform process would come to an
end." And in Washington, the lack of a deal would result in "increased tensions between the
national security wing of the U.S. administration, who will be happy with this result, and the
business-tech community, who are anxious to expand their participation in China and will be
pretty mad," said Kroeber, of the Hong Kong financial research firm. Advertisement
Stephen K. Bannon , former
chief strategist to Trump, is among a group of hawks who formed the Committee on the Present
Danger: China, an organization that sees its role as warning
Americans and political and business leaders of the "existential threats" to America posed by
China. Meanwhile, Hu Xijin ,
editor of the Communist Party-owned Global
Times , has tweeted in English that China was "fully prepared for an escalated trade war."
He argued there is increased popular support in Beijing for a confrontational approach to the
U.S. "More and more Chinese now tend to believe the current US government is obsessed with
comprehensively containing China," he tweeted Thursday. A Global
Times editorial Thursday said trade was "only a sideshow" in the confrontation between the U.S.
and China and the real issue was the U.S. fear that China would catch up to it in high-tech
fields. "The real intention of the U.S. is to squeeze China's space in new technologies," the
editorial said. Many analysts, including Australian professor Gill, share the view that
relations are in long-term decline. "Things will continue to slide downward into deeper
competitive tensions," Gill predicted, "including on the economic front because trade is not
the problem. The deeper problem is the question of economic and technological competition.
"Ultimately at the bottom of all of this, the problem abides that the two countries don't trust
each other and see each other as long-term strategic competitors." Steve Tsang , director of the SOAS China Institute at the University of
London, said regardless of who is president, the U.S. and China will become increasingly
competitive in the next two decades. Chinese President "Xi Jinping is not a forgiving man, so I
think we can see that Xi Jinping will take a more robust stance against the U.S. if and when he
feels that the Chinese government is able to do so successfully," Tsang said. As relations
decline, both Washington and Beijing are likely to compete to draw countries into their orbit,
he predicted. He said European countries and the U.K. would drift toward the U.S. "because
ultimately this is what we believe in more. You will have a whole bunch of other countries that
will drift towards the Chinese because they remain fundamentally authoritarian states." China's
global Belt and Road Initiative -- in which it projects its international power through soft
loans for infrastructure -- would also draw some nations to China, he added. Underscoring
frictions are U.S. fears that China may overtake it in a range of high-tech fields including
space exploration, artificial intelligence, surveillance technology, driverless cars and even
military hardware. Huawei's emergence as the global leader in 5G technology -- with no American
rival -- was a shock to U.S. policymakers. Parker, of the U.S.-China Business Council, said
that although the U.S. and China face a challenging security relationship, it is important to
ensure that trade is not affected. "I think there's definitely a competitive dynamic between
the U.S. and China, and that will continue into the future. The twist is to ensure that the
national security issues don't get entwined with the businesses' side." The United States faces
a possibility that in decades, China could overtake it as the world's largest economy. China's
economy is already ranked No. 1 in terms of purchasing parity power, a measure that adjusts GDP
to account for price differences in countries. "It would be a major milestone. It would send a
lot of shock waves and shivers certainly in the United States and much of the rest of the world
and I think would be seen as a major turning point, not unlike the United States overtaking the
United Kingdom as the world's largest economy back in the late 19th century," Gill said. "It
would certainly be the end of an era and the beginning of a new one." Trump's
tariff hike on Chinese goods takes effect as the two sides keep talking "
"... And if we don't protect manufacturing jobs in the US the whole damned car will be made in China and there won't be decent paying jobs here manufacturing them. ..."
"... I have worked with Chinese auto parts suppliers. They run from OK to horrible. ..."
"... In reality, the tariffs are 'cash in the bank' for the U.S. Treasury. If nothing else, tariffs will allow our politicians to spend more each year - perhaps we might even get to the point that our nation avoids 'deficit spending' for at least one year. ..."
John Murphy of Bank of America joins CNBC's "Closing Bell" to discuss the impact of new tariffs on the auto industry.
William 23 hours ago
And if we don't protect manufacturing jobs in the US the whole damned car will be made in China and there won't be decent paying
jobs here manufacturing them.
c craig f 21 hours ago
Cars that do not use Chinese parts will sell better and the world it will keep turning
P Park Slope 23 hours ago
Great. I'll keep my old one. Thanks for the savings.
BobBob, yesterday
I have worked with Chinese auto parts suppliers. They run from OK to horrible. I'd never buy from them - maybe as a LAST option
to avoid going belly up. The problem then becomes losing repeat customers due to quality and reliability problems....
GeorgeGeorge, 10 hours ago
Do not understand how the anti-Trump politicians and the media can be against these tariffs. In reality, the tariffs are
'cash in the bank' for the U.S. Treasury. If nothing else, tariffs will allow our politicians to spend more each year -
perhaps we might even get to the point that our nation avoids 'deficit spending' for at least one year.
In an unusual move, the Chinese delegation has come clean to the domestic press about
Beijing's remaining trade-deal related demands, exposing steep divides that could make it a
final deal impossible for Trump, who has repeatedly said he will only accept a "great"
deal.
Unsurprisingly, Liu He, the leading Chinese trade negotiator, confirmed what Beijing has
intimated time and time again :
That without the complete removal of all trade-war related tariffs, Beijing will not
remorse a deal.
The other two demands were related to American commitments to buy Chinese goods , something
that could also pose a problem.
In a wide-ranging interview with Chinese media after talks in Washington ended Friday,
Vice Premier Liu He said that in order to reach an agreement the U.S. must remove all extra
tariffs, set targets for Chinese purchases of goods in line with real demand and ensure that
the text of the deal is "balanced" to ensure the "dignity" of both nations.
China for the first time made clear what it wants to see from the U.S. in talks to end their trade war, laying
bare the deep differences that still exist between the two sides.
In a wide-ranging
interview
with Chinese media after talks in Washington ended Friday, Vice Premier Liu He said that in order to
reach an agreement the U.S. must remove all extra tariffs, set targets for Chinese purchases of goods in line with
real demand and ensure that the text of the deal is "balanced" to ensure the "dignity" of both nations.
Liu's three conditions underscore the work still to be done if an accord is to be reached between the world's
two largest economies. President Donald Trump's own negotiators told China it has a month to seal a deal or face
tariffs on all its exports to the U.S.
That threat was made during talks Friday in Washington, hours after Trump upped the ante by imposing a second
round of punitive duties on $200 billion in Chinese goods. China vowed retaliation, but hadn't announced any
details as of Saturday evening in Beijing.
U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer said the administration would on Monday release details of its
plans for tariffs on an additional $300 billion in imports from China, setting the process in motion for Trump to
deliver on the threat to hammer all Chinese trade.
U.S. officials insist they have been working on a deal that would bring an end to what they portray as China's
rampant theft of American intellectual property and rein in the industrial subsidies that have fueled the rapid
ascent of Chinese corporate giants.
Trump's move to raise tariffs on Friday came after China backed away from prior commitments to enshrine changes
promised at the negotiating table in Chinese law, according to U.S. officials. During his meetings in Washington
this week Liu said China was ready to commit to pushing reforms via State Council directives but again balked at
changing any laws, according to one person familiar with the discussions.
In his interview Liu said both sides agreed to keep talking despite what he called "some temporary resistance
and distractions,'' and to hold future meetings in Beijing. He dismissed the idea that talks had broken down.
"It's normal to have hiccups during the negotiations. It's inevitable."
Liu also struck a note of defiance. "For the interest of the people of China, the people of U.S. and the the
people of the whole world, we will deal with this rationally," the vice premier said. "But China is not afraid,
nor are the Chinese people," adding that "China needs a
cooperative agreement
with equality and dignity."
'Candid and Constructive'
In a series of tweets that cheered markets, Trump declared Friday that the talks with China had been candid and
constructive. "The relationship between President Xi and myself remains a very strong one, and conversations into
the future will continue," he said. Further talks are possible, but there's no immediate plan for the next round,
according to a person familiar with the negotiations.
Liu's comments, however, revealed yet another new fault line: a U.S. push for bigger Chinese purchases to level
the trade imbalance than had originally been agreed.
To Be Tariffed...Maybe
Top 10 U.S. imports from China which haven't been tariffed in current dispute
According to Liu, Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping agreed "on a number" when they met in Argentina last
December to hammer out the truce that set off months of negotiations. That "is a very serious issue and can't be
changed easily."
The amount of purchases by China should be "in line with reality," according to a commentary by state news
agency Xinhua on Saturday. China also sees the removal of all the extra tariffs that have been imposed since last
year as a precondition to a deal, whereas U.S. negotiators see retention of some duties as a key mechanism to
enforce a deal.
The lack of progress left major question-marks hanging over the search for a deal on trade -- just one source
of tensions in a
growing geopolitical rivalry
that's already shifting supply chains and testing established economic and
security alliances.
Trump, who is seeking re-election on the back of a booming U.S. economy, on Friday sought to justify his
decision to hike tariffs as well as to convince businesses and financial markets that he wasn't walking away from
a deal.
No Rush
"There is absolutely no need to rush," the U.S. president said. In another tweet, Trump
proposed a vast new plan
to use income from tariffs to buy up the crops of American farmers who've watched
their exports to China collapse, and send them to poor countries as aid.
The presidential good humor hid what people familiar with the discussions say has been an increasingly gloomy
mood around the negotiations in recent days.
Before a rebound late Friday, U.S. equity markets had posted their worst week of the year, as the trade truce
that had been in place for months was shattered by the new U.S. tariffs. The S&P 500 recovered from earlier losses
Friday, ending the day 0.4% higher.
Election Year
This week's tariff move is likely to have
significant
short-term consequences for retailers and other U.S. businesses reliant on imports from China. But
extending it to all trade would increase the economic and political stakes even further for Trump and American
businesses.
Such a step would see price increases on smartphones, laptops and other consumer goods -- the kind that Trump's
advisers have been eager to avoid, out of concern for the domestic fallout. It would
likely provoke further retaliation
, and some economists are predicting it could even tip the U.S. economy into
recession just as Trump faces re-election in 2020.
'Gets Harder'
This week's talks have also amplified the differences that remain between the two governments as they navigate
their own domestic politics as well as a growing international rivalry.
Liu's interview underlined the need for any agreement not to be seen as undermining Chinese sovereignty -- as
the U.S. demand to change domestic laws surely would be.
The text "must be balanced" for the dignity of a country, Liu said, repeating China and the U.S. are "trying to
meet halfway" despite different views on some crucial issues.
Securing a trade deal is likely to get harder from here unless outside factors, such as
an economic downturn
, force a compromise, according to Ely Ratner, a China expert who served in the
administration of President Barack Obama and is now director of studies at the Center for a New American Security
think-tank.
"The question is can the Chinese come back and offer enough such that Trump can sell it?'' he said. "It is
going to be hard for them to do that in the face of Trump escalating. I think it gets harder as this thing goes
on, and it gets harder politically for Trump.''
-- With assistance by Jennifer Jacobs, Ye Xie, Andrew Mayeda, Jim Jia, Natalie Lung, Saleha Mohsin, and Jenny
Leonard
Stephen K. Bannon served as chief strategist for President Trump from January 2017 to
August 2017.
Getting tough with China to bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States was the
linchpin of President Trump's electoral march through the Rust Belt during his 2016 victory.
Today, the goal of the radical cadre running China -- the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) -- is
to be the global hegemonic power. The president's threatened
tariffs on Sunday demonstrate the severity of this threat. But as Washington and Beijing
wrap up months of negotiations on a trade deal this month, whatever emerges won't be a trade
deal. It will be a temporary truce in a years-long economic and strategic war with China.
These are six "understandings" that highlight why it is futile to compromise with this
regime.
The first understanding : The CCP has been waging economic war against industrial
democracies ever since China joined the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001, and now China
has emerged as the greatest economic and national security threat the United States has ever
faced.
As a framework for the current trade talks, China must agree to end forced technology
transfers; intellectual property theft; cyberintrusions into business networks; currency
manipulation; high tariff and nontariff barriers; and unfair subsidies to state-owned
enterprises. However, if the CCP agrees to the United States' demands in an enforceable manner,
it would amount to a legal and regulatory dismantling of Chinese state capitalism.
The second understanding : The trade deal under negotiation this month is not a deal between
two similar systems seeking closer ties, as its cheerleaders on Wall Street and in the media
and academia argue. Rather, this is a fundamental clash between two radically different
economic models.
The best U.S. result is a detailed document in which China renounces its predatory,
confiscatory and mercantilist practices while providing ample means to monitor and promptly
enforce the agreement.
The best CCP result is to get the tariffs lifted by filing reams of paper with false,
unenforceable promises that will allow it to run out the clock on the Trump administration and
hope for a less antagonistic Democratic alternative.
The third understanding : Chinese state capitalism is highly profitable for its owners --
the members of the CCP. Stagnant state-owned enterprises gain a competitive edge through
massive government subsidies and the cost savings won by stealing the intellectual property,
technology and innovations of foreigners.
If China halted such grand theft, its enterprises would be rapidly outcompeted by the
Germans, South Koreans, Japanese and especially the United States.
This fact explains much about internal Chinese politics today. President Xi Jinping faces a
palace sharply divided between reformers led by chief trade negotiator Liu He and a swarm of
hawks who have profited and gained power from the status quo. Within China itself, it is both
gallows humor and even money as to whether Liu He will be celebrated as the next Deng Xiaoping
or end up in a Chinese gulag.
The fourth understanding : Trump advisers inside and outside the White House are playing on
the president's well-earned pride in a rising stock market and a fear he might lose the Farm
Belt to try to box him into a weak deal. But it is a decidedly false narrative that any failure
to reach a deal will lead to a market meltdown and economic implosion.
In fact, there is no better argument for Trump keeping his bold tariffs on China than the
latest report that the U.S. economy grew at an annualized rate of 3.2 percent
in the first quarter .
Anything less than a great deal will subject the president to relentless criticism from the
Charles E. Schumer and Bernie Sanders wings of the Democratic Party. In addition, Sens. Marco
Rubio (R-Fla.) and Ted Cruz (R-Tex.) might use it to get to the right of Trump on China --
potentially setting up a later primary challenge. For these reasons, the president's best
political option is not to surrender, but rather, to double down on the tariffs -- they have
been highly effective in pressuring the Chinese without harming the U.S. economy.
The fifth understanding : Even the toughest agreement needs effective monitoring, which is
difficult even with accommodating partners and perhaps impossible with China. The danger is for
the president to sign what appears to be a reasonable deal and find out several years later
that the United States was hoodwinked.
The United States failed to adequately monitor China's entry into the WTO in 2001. Instead
of access to a billion Chinese consumers, the United States lost more than 5 million
manufacturing jobs since 2000.
The sixth understanding : The world now bears witness to a rapidly militarizing totalitarian
state imprisoning
millions in work camps; persecuting Uighurs, Christians and Buddhists; and spying on, and
enslaving, its own population.
This is history in real time; and the world is a house divided -- half slave, half free.
Trump and Xi are facing off to tip the scales in one direction or the other. One way leads to
the benefits of freedom, democracy and free-market capitalism. The other leads to a
totalitarian and mercantilist power run on state capitalism with Chinese characteristics.
The United States' fight is not with the Chinese people but with the CCP. The Chinese people
are the first and continuous victims of this barbarous regime.
The central issues that must be faced are China's intentions on the world stage and what
those ambitions mean for U.S. prosperity. With our country at a crossroads, it is more
important than ever that Trump follow his instincts and not soften his stance against the
greatest existential threat ever faced by the United States.
1. China must agree to end forced technology transfers; intellectual property theft;
cyberintrusions into business networks; currency manipulation; high tariff and nontariff
barriers; and unfair subsidies to state-owned enterprises.
In the good 'ol USA, we refer to this as "corporate welfare", direct federal subsidies (eg
farm subsidies), MIC and government 'no-bid defense' contract, oil depletion allowance, tax
credits and other tax incentives such as accelerated depreciation, dividend tax, Advanced
Technology Program, federal land giveways, local & state land & tax "incentive"
giveways, carried interest, welfare and food stamp costs paid to employees of companies like
Walmart and McDonalds (because employee wages for full time employment fall below poverty
level), the clunker auto subsidy program to bail out US auto companies, the mortgage interest
deduction, and more. The cherry on top is, of course, the trillions of dollars in TARP and QE
given to giant banks to bail out Wall Street.
For all the hot air, it appears that reciprocity is not really what Steve has in mind.
2. The best U.S. result is a detailed document in which China renounces its predatory,
confiscatory and mercantilist practices while providing ample means to monitor and promptly
enforce the agreement.
Steve? Steve?? Are you aware that the U.S. is currently trying to economically strangle
countries all over the world with economic sanctions? Venezuela. Cuba. Syria. Iran.
Russia.North Korea. Lebanon. Yemen. And if economic sanctions don't work, we bomb them. Iraq.
Afghanistan. Libya. Syria.
3. by stealing the intellectual property, technology and innovations of
foreigners.
Libya's gold "disappeared". As did much of Iraq's gold. And the Bank of England, citing
U.S. sanctions as its legal fig leaf, confiscated $1.2 billion of Venezuelan gold. As to
stealing technology, no one does it better than Uncle Same: Vault 7 and Stuxnet are prime
examples of US spying on foreign technology companies.
4. But it is a decidedly false narrative that any failure to reach a deal will lead to
a market meltdown and economic implosion.
I dunno. I'm hearing a lot of very unhappy muttering in the rural Midwest, where I live. I
think we're facing the very real possibility of a large-scale Trumpian economic disaster, due
to his trade war, negative trending macoeconomic indicators, the unbelievable Trumpian debt
(the biggest debt in the history of the galaxy, putting Obama and Bush Jr., and even WWII
debt to shame), and the looming loss of the dollar's world reserve currency status. Toss in a
global recession, to boot. This feels like "implosion" to me.
5. Instead of access to a billion Chinese consumers, the United States lost more than 5
million manufacturing jobs since 2000.
Typical capitalist hypocrisy. We demand free markets for other people. Never for
ourselves. Many American companies have been doing fine selling to "a billion Chinese
consumers". The problem is, Americans participating in the free market often choose Chinese
goods.
Not only are you full of hot air, Steve-- you and Bolton and the rest of Trump's
Israel-first neocon apologists are effectively destroying our economy and our country. When
the very likely "implosion" does occur, watch the rats (hate to use that metaphor, since the
lowest mangy flea-bitten rat is better than any neocon) scurry for the exits, blaming
everyone but themselves.
Who is Steve Bannon going to blame? Ocasio-Cortez, who else?
Understanding the core nature of China is important to comprehend the lack of flexibility
ingrained in their system. This comes in the ideology that directs its actions. China is
still very much a communist country, and the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) controls
everything. While it may appear both State-owned and private firms operate within China's
economic system. This is mostly an illusion following economic reforms in the 1980s.
In reality, the communist system does not allow for true private ownership and views all
"tech innovation" as essential to its national interests. Thus, private and state-owned
Chinese firms act in the interest of the Chinese regime when it comes to foreign investments
in the high-tech sectors. Below is the second part of a part-two series which explores why
China is on a one-track path and blind to other options going forward. This is a recipe for
conflict.
What pisses me off is the fact that pretty much every western company has decided to
manufacture in China.
My Mrs bought me a coat today. A nice snazzy Italian brand. Then looking at the label it
says made in China. So it's not an Italian coat at all. It's a Chinese coat with Italian
branding.
Burberry do the same thing. They can basically charge whatever they want for coats, and as
a consumer you buy into that British heritage . Low and behold their stuff is made in
China.
Perhaps we should slap the tariffs (I'm not a fan of tariffs BTW,) on the western
companies that continue to outsource to China .
The ceding of national interests, without the wilful, knowing consent of both political
parties, and citizens believing they could simply vote their way out of this or that brand of
swamp, could never have been accomplished ..
The story of the scorpion, and the frog, crossing the river ..
After much pleading by the scorpion, the frog did give the scorpion a lift to safely cross
the river, and after being bitten during the crossing, frog crys out "but you promised you
would not bite me!!"
Scorpion replys, " you knew what i was when you picked me up .. "
The story of the American body politic, on steroids the last 40 -50 years ..
That is exactly what happened. The murican and other corporations moved to the larger
consumer markets for their products, Asia. China has moar than 3 times the population of
murica. Labour is plenty, wages are low, no benefits or overtime. 12 hour days or moar is the
norm there. It's not China that people should be blaming for the transition to manufacture
there. The corporations are all about profits. They care less about you and yoar family or
jobs for you. The corporations are making money like never before. GM sells 3 times as many
cars in China than in murica. It costs money to ship over seas, cheaper to move manufacturing
to where the demand is.
China also has a growing middle class that will be big consumers of goods, whereas murica
has a decling middle class and retiring baby boomers. Murica is in decay. Neglected
infrastructure, dying cities, NY, Baltimore, Seattle, Detroit, Chicago, SanFran, farms are
over producing and need social welfare from tax payers, high consumer debts, low consumption
of goods. Car manufacturers will be back at the Fed window for free tax payers money to avert
total bankruptcy. We've seen this play before and here we are again.
Murica is bankrupt. This is why the banks around the world are buying gold reserves. All
currencies eventually become worthless paper for fire starting or heating in winter. There is
no currency that ever exceeded 100 yrs. as money. Gold has been money for thousands of
years.
Economies work best when currencies are stable in value. Once we know what the goal is, we
then look for a way to achieve it and the best way has always been to base a currency on
gold. Nobody has found a better way, even in the form of a proposal and nobody has ever
needed to find a better way, because gold has always worked very well.
The fight is actually with America's own politicians and corporations. They sold out
America long ago. The Chinese trade differently. They don't have to bomb. It's really too bad
what American democracy stands for today around the world. Nobody wants anything to do with
it and gradually they're dumping it.
British and Roman empires were not much different towards the end of their rein. They
become complacent and arrogant towards other countries. Eventually they run out of friends,
then start woars to rape and pillage gold, silver and resources. An attempt to sustain the
costs of maintaining their exuberant life style and military around the globe. Rome at first
started debasing their gold and silver money. Once trading partners realized their coins were
not pure, they called the empire a fraud and didn't want to trade with the crooks. Woar
ensued.
what a dumbass. bannon represents the wacko christian wing of the zionazi party.
usa oligarchy greed did this to the american people. the chinese happily cooperated likely
wondering how they were being screwed because the usa policy was so stupid. the usa made the
mistake of thinking the chinese would roll over like the japanese and koreans did, once the
spice started flowing.
the chinese don't have to give anything because the usa screwed itself so badly they need
china to keep producing crap for the usa because there is no competitive alternative either
by other countries to fill the gap and certainly not with a built from scratch usa
manufacturing sector. the usa is so stupid it has foreign countries make critical military
tech parts to maximize profit for mic.
does bannon really think the chinese people won't riot if they are unhappy with .gov? does
he remember tianemen square? it's american people who won't do anything about .gov and the
oligarchs screwing them.
according to bannon it is okay for the usa to kill millions of muslims and christians in
the mid east for jewland and the zionazis but wrong for china to control their influence in
china?
bannon's calling is a homeless alchy. he fits the part with lunatic rants and his
appearance.
The problem here isn't the WTO, it's the WTC. Bannon says China entered the WTO in 2001
and have been criminals ever since. Also in 2001 the Neocons started their insane wars after
blowing up the WTC and have been criminals ever since. Eighteen years of pissing away cash
and not minding the store - and these lunatics are back in the White House. Anybody hoping
for a happy ending with China is just as nuts.
You fat ******* zio-slob/slut troll. It may have been a good idea if it were just about
trade and you are willing to actually seek a mutually beneficial compromise, but when you are
also poking them militarily it changes the dynamics of the successful negotiations and
cooperation. Who wants to do a deal with someone who continually sends warships up and down
your coastline in engaging in provactive actions
Bannon has got some screws loose in the head. Getting tough with China isn't going to
bring manufacturing jobs back to the United States for ten reasons:
1. Those jobs have nowhere in the U.S. to come home to. Most of the factories have been
shut down and demolished years ago.
2. American workers have been out of the loop for so long, that they are basically
unskilled and untrained at this point...... all 95.5 million of them!
3. The fight isn't against China, as it is against corporate America. Corporate America
doesn't want to pay the higher wages or benefits here. That is why they went hunting for the
cheap labor in China in the first place. It's not China's fault!
4. America's entire tax system stinks and its predatory. There is nothing that is going to
make those businesses in China go to America , particularly when China is offering those same
companies tax incentives to stay.
5. China's transportation infrastructure is far better than America's. America's road
system is now a full 40 years behind China's, and America's rail system is 75 years behind
China's. Air transportation is about the same as the U.S., but China has the better airports
for handling large number of passengers and freight. Maritime shipping is first rate all the
way, the U.S. can't hardly touch them in moving freight overseas.
6. The United States routinely blocks the World Trade Organization's appointments of
judges who could rule on tariffs, because the U.S. wants to load the dice in their favor at
the WTO. Companies are often used as captive hostages by the U.S.,. Not the case with
China.
7. The U.S. has a notoriety for not honoring any treaty it signs. The WTO has cited the
U.S. as undisciplined, and the decision of whether to comply with international legal
obligations varies depending on which domestic political actors are engaged in the policy
process. Some American institutions are more likely to supply compliance than others. Why
would any company want to come to America without any assurances in governing trade rules or
a hostile political environment that turns on a dime?
8. China is the ideal place for emerging markets. It has access to lots of different
manufacturing for emerging businesses, something the U.S. lacks these days.
9. China has economic free zones, like Shanghai, Hong Kong, Macau, etc.,. The U.S. has
nothing to compare.
10. China's main priority has been shifted from expansion to stability. By stability, what
is implied is demand that is internal, rather than external, and that requires a focus on the
consumer. This could represent an opportunity for businesses that invest in the opportunity
to sell goods in the country. As it stands now, there is really no reason for a company in
China to come to the U.S., because every American is maxed out on credit and doesn't have the
money to buy anything. Why set up a business in the U.S. when the U.S. economy is in imminent
danger of collapsing over night, and becoming a casualty???
This is another false (fraudulent non-existent choice) being presented by the global so
called but no longer existent elite. U.S. vs China. It doesn't make any difference whether it
is the corporations presenting the false choice or the so called deep state. Either way it
has no truth and therefore no value.
As I've provided extensive facts and evidence as details on both sides all governments are
full of traitors. Traitors both foreign, domestic and international. Any future global
attempt at government will never consist of any of these two places or any other since all
others continue to fail in their own right to take the appropriate actions in their own
governments or against those that are attempting to implement wholly criminal operations
internationally.
Very little of the Chinese technology was stolen by them. It was freely given by US
universities getting big bucks to fill seats and US corporations looking to boost executives
pay and perks, plus offloading the headaches they were getting paid big bucks to solve, by
offshoring to China. As evidenced by the recent tax cut for corporations and the funds they
brought back from overseas bringing back or creating jobs in the US is a pipe dream. Your
CEO's thought it was more important to feather their nests, and in many cases putting their
company into hock, to buy back their stock. Raises or funds for R&D? Fuggeddaboutit. With
China in the cross hairs the captains of industry are sailing to other shitholes for their
stuff rather than the US. Don't blame the Chinese for the "best and brightest" selling the US
down the drain to enrich themselves. One of the many reasons the US is circling drain due to
self inflicted hurt is the whole country from top to bottom wants **** and they want it now
no matter what it takes whether it be power, riches, or both.
Trump continued tweeting on the trade situation Monday. "The United States has been losing,
for many years, 600 to 800 Billion Dollars a year on Trade. With China we lose 500 Billion
Dollars. Sorry, we're not going to be doing that anymore!" he wrote.
"Risks of a full blown trade war are escalating," Chua Hak Bin, a senior economist at
Maybank Kim Eng Research Pte. in Singapore, said before the ministry's announcement. "Trump's
threat may backfire as China will not want to negotiate with a gun pointing at their
heads."
... ... ...
China was considering delaying a U.S. trip this week by a trade delegation led by Vice
Premier Liu He after Trump's tariff threat, according to people familiar with the matter. Liu
and about 100 other officials had been scheduled to arrive Wednesday for what was shaping up to
be the final round of negotiations.
The two sides have been locked in intense negotiations since last year for an agreement to
address U.S. concerns over China's trade surplus, alleged theft of intellectual property and
forced technology transfers. Trump and Xi agreed to a tariff truce on Dec. 1 to allow senior
officials time to negotiate.
... ... ...
White House economic adviser Larry Kudlow said on Fox News that the president was "issuing a
warning." While "great progress" has been made in the talks, structural and enforcement issues
remained, he said.
... ... ...
Trump imposed duties of 25 percent on an initial $50 billion of Chinese goods last year and
then 10 percent on an additional $200 billion in products in September. Those duties were set
to rise to 25 percent on Jan. 1 and then again on March 1, but Trump delayed that as talks
continued. China has imposed tariffs on $110 billion of U.S. exports in retaliation and
repeatedly warned it would counter tariffs with actions of its own.
That means there's a risk China would counter any extension of U.S. levies, though the
smaller size of its imports may constrain its ability to do so.
"China isn't likely to make concessions that the U.S. want with a big stick hanging over its
head," said Zhou Xiaoming, a former Ministry of Commerce official and diplomat. "If the tariffs
that Trump threatens are implemented on Friday, China has to respond."
So much for months and months of constant leaks, headlines, tweets, and press reports that
US-China trade talks are going great, and are imminent amid an ocean of "optimism" (meant
solely to sucker in amateurs into the most obvious bull headfake since 1987).
Just after noon on Sunday, President Trump tweeted that 10% tariffs paid by China on $200
billion in goods will rise to 25% on Friday, and that - contrary to what he himself and his
chief economist, Larry Kudlow has said for months, talks on a trade deal have been going too
slowly.
And, just to underscore his point, Trump also threatened to impose 25% tariffs on an
additional $325 billion of Chinese goods "shortly."
With the tariff rate on numerous goods originally set at 10% and set to more than double in
2019, Trump postponed that decision after China and the US agreed to sit down for trade talks;
following Trump's tweet it is now confirmed that trade talks have hit an impasse and that
escalation will be needed to break the stalemate.
It was as recently as Friday that Vice President Mike Pence told CNBC that Trump remained
hopeful that he could strike a deal with China (at the same time as he was urging for a rate
cut from the Fed).
Curiously, on Wednesday, the White House - clearly hoping to sucker in even more naive bulls
to buy stocks at all time highs - said the latest round of talks had moved Beijing and
Washington closer to an agreement. Press secretary Sarah Sanders said, "Discussions remain
focused toward making substantial progress on important structural issues and re-balancing the
US-China trade relationship."
In recent weeks there were multiple reports that China and U.S. were close to a trade deal,
and an agreement could come as soon as Friday. Major sticking points the U.S. and China have
been intellectual property theft and forced technology transfers. There has also been
disagreement as to whether tariffs be removed or remain in place as an enforcement
mechanism.
While it was not clear why Trump has decided to escalate his tariff policy, the most obvious
explanation is that for a White House, which has been obsessed with pushing the S&P to
record levels, this was the last lever it had at its disposal. And now that the S&P is back
at all time highs, the lies can end, if only for the time being.
Meanwhile, crickets about the border/invasion situation, even here on ZH articles. From an
off-duty, decompressing senior border patrol guy I happened to meet - El Paso alone has had
over half a million "migrants" come thru seeking "asylum". They are releasing about 2000 a
week into the US, leasing buildings, including a Las Cruces high school for the weekend to
stage them. he said unusual number of Cubans, maybe from VZ. Lots of sickness/disease, he
personally saw flesh-eating infections, dying AIDS patients, children accompanied by unknown
males. Already 90% who had court hearings were no-shows. They've found cutoff ankle monitors
at airports.Their hands are tied by archaic laws and a (((congress))) unwilling to do ****
about it. The **** governor of NM, Lujan-Grisham ****-blocking any effort to stem the tide.
But articles about giant meteors, James Woods, Russia-gate, China, etc, etc ad nauseum.
Sorry for the hi-jack. The globalists have mobilized their armies. Chinese **** I can live
without, except SKS in a pinch. Might need it when the in country migrant hordes are given
the sign and LE and mil stand down.
BTW< he said two more caravans are forming, one of about 30000.
Interesting to see how the stock market futures will react. If they dive, we can just
blame someone else. If it does good, we can give all the credit to Trump. And if we don't,
Trump will surely give himself credit for it and gloat.
When the U.S. taxes another country's goods, it puts downward pressure on that country's
currency. When China's yuan falls against the U.S. dollar, it makes Chinese goods cheaper,
canceling out some of the effect of the tariff. The yuan was at about 16 cents to the dollar
earlier this year, but as Trump imposed tariffs on Chinese goods and ramped up his trade-war
rhetoric, it fell to roughly 14 cents -- a decline of more than 12 percent:
In a few days we may be witnessing a massive game of "chicken" between the world's two
largest economies:
"If China does not cut Iran oil purchases to zero, the Trump administration may have to
make a decision on blocking Chinese banks from the U.S. financial system. That could have
unintended consequences for finance and business between the world's two biggest economies,
already in negotiations over trade disagreements.
The unnamed "senior official" consulted for this article is remarkably confident the
Chinese will blink on this matter, based on a what seems a limited understanding of what
constitutes their base interest. In previous times, foreign policy initiatives always
featured internal deliberation with advocates from all sides of an issue, so a complete range
of option and consequence could be anticipated. Such process seems to have been
abandoned.
The granting of a "permanent normal trading relationship" (PNTR) and then the subsequent
accession to the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 2001 have been a boon for China, but the
persistence of ongoing American trade deficits have led many,
including the current president, to judge the United States a loser in ongoing trade
negotiations with Beijing. It's not a totally irrational judgment: China's WTO accession
hasn't been
great for U.S. manufacturers .
Part of the problem stems from the extraordinary fact that Washington has seldom deployed a
negotiator who is actually well-versed in trade issues. Since the days of the Clinton
administration, it has been the U.S. Treasury Secretary, as opposed to the country's chief
trade representative, who has consistently directed trade negotiations, with the resultant (and
eminently predictable) impact that financial interests have superseded those of any other
economic sector. That pattern was briefly disrupted when President George W. Bush appointed
Alcoa's CEO, Paul O'Neill, to head the Treasury, and then CSX president John W. Snow, but
ultimately the " Wall Street uber alles " mentality again prevailed with the appointment
of Hank Paulson (to be followed by Tim Geithner, Jack Lew, and now Steve Mnuchin -- all of whom
have finance-centric backgrounds).
For all of the supposed financial sophistication of America's Wall Street-based Treasury
Secretaries, it is indeed ironic that China has consistently been able to play them for fools
with the implied threat of its so-called "nuclear option," a highly flawed
narrative that alleges that as a final resort, Beijing would dump its huge stockpile of
U.S. Treasuries, thereby driving up U.S. rates, and creating a catastrophic depression for the
U.S. economy. That so-called threat to the bond market is the traditional reason why successive
Treasury Secretaries have been hesitant to resort to the blunt trauma force of trade sanctions
or tariffs when it came to negotiating with Beijing. They were also comforted by the idea that
as it modernized, China would increasingly abide by traditional norms of free trade doctrine
against all
available evidence that shows that it has not played by the same rules.
Let's leave aside the internal incoherence of the nuclear option: China exiting
dollar-denominated assets could well create downward pressure on the external value of the
free-floating currency. But that would enhance U.S. export competitiveness, assuming, of
course, that America has anything left to export, an unfortunate legacy of the Treasury's
malign neglect of U.S. manufacturing. It's also operationally wrong (see here
for further detail), and mistakenly assumes (against all historical evidence to the contrary)
that Beijing would pursue an economic policy that is the functional equivalent of cutting its
own nose to spite its face, as Paul Krugman, among others, notes.
Even if Paulson, Geithner, Lew, Mnuchin, etc., didn't truly believe in the "nuclear option,"
they have been happy to tamp down the possibility of a trade war in order to keep the capital
markets stable. Each trade "deal" has therefore largely sustained the status quo, the price for
which sees Beijing usually offering up a few well-timed purchases of soybeans or Boeing
aircraft (although the latter will be more problematic in light of the 737 fiasco). But China's
policy makers have never been forced to deal with the economic consequences of their country's
mercantilism, which has resulted in the steady erosion of America's Rust Belt, as the U.S.
economy gave back the considerable employment gains it achieved during the 1990s, via
a
historic contraction in manufacturing employment .
Things have changed markedly since Trump seized the "China trade" portfolio from the
Treasury's Steve Mnuchin, and placed it under the control of Robert Lighthizer, the current
trade representative. Unusually for a member of the Trump administration, Lighthizer actually
knows his brief. He has had literally decades of experience in trade issues, dating from his
days as a deputy U.S. trade representative in 1983 (when Japan was widely perceived as the main
trade threat), to his current role as America's chief trade negotiator. As Trump's U.S. Trade
Representative (USTR), he has provided policy flesh and bones to the president's robustly
unilateral approach in trade.
If anything, Lighthizer's trade hawkishness has become even more pronounced over the years,
as he has shifted his attention away from Japan to China. In his 2010 congressional
testimony , he argued that U.S. policy makers gravely underestimated the threat posed to
American manufacturing by virtue of China's entry into the WTO, marshaling an array of evidence
to cast doubt on the idea that its entry had brought any significant economic benefits to U.S.
workers and businesses. He also highlighted the mercantilist nature of Beijing's state
capitalism and noted that the country's administrative complexity likely precluded it embracing
WTO rules, even if wanted to do so (which he doubted):
"As part of China's system, specific large companies receive government patronage in the
form of credit, contracts, and subsidies. The Chinese government, in turn, sees these
'national champions' as a means of competing with foreign rivals and encourages their
dominant role in the domestic economy and in export markets
{[S]cholars have questioned whether -- given its lack of institutional capacity and the
complexity of its constitutional, administrative, and legal system -- China is even capable
of complying with its WTO obligations.
No doubt in thrall to the prevailing free-trade ideology, Washington's "policy passivity"
made it loath to use available tools such as the WTO's "421" special safeguards to counter
the resultant trade shock. In that same testimony, Lighthizer also signaled that he was
uninterested in the niceties of WTO style multilateralism, more inclined to the use of "
aggressive unilateralism "
via executive orders, diplomatic pressure, and most importantly,
the use of Section 232 of the 1962 Trade Expansion Act to levy tariffs on various
products, premised on the notion that the targeted country (in today's case, China)
represented a national security threat.
Most significant from the Lighthizer perspective is an explicit rejection of the idea that
China needs to do more than just buy more U.S. goods before the two countries strike a
permanent trade deal, which in any case is highly problematic if the end objective is to bring
the bilateral trade balance between the two countries to zero.
"The scope for explosive growth in soybeans is actually fairly limited, as the pre-tariff
base for soybeans [the number one or two largest U.S. export to China] was quite high -- the
United States was supplying $12 billion of China's almost $40 billion in oil seed imports. A
huge tilt away from Brazil might cause U.S. beans exports to double, but getting much more
than that would be difficult (there is a natural seasonality to soybean trade that favors
alternating supply from the Southern and Northern Hemispheres).
"The real growth would need to come in sectors where China doesn't buy much now. Corn. Rice.
Perhaps pork and beef Getting really big numbers there though would risk pushing up U.S.
prices, and getting China to abandon its goal of self-sufficiency in basic grains."
So U.S. farm prices would be pushed up, which would hurt U.S. domestic consumers, even as it
cosmetically dresses up America's trade position vis a vis China.
"China has signaled it is willing to let foreign firms take majority stakes in a few more
sectors, and has reiterated its belief that technology transfer isn't a legal requirement for
entry into the Chinese market. There are likely to be settlements on some long-standing
disputes as well -- the rating agencies have gotten approval to enter the Chinese market; Visa,
American Express and Mastercard likely will
finally get approval too (
Mastercard through a joint venture not everything changes); and some tariffs introduced as
retaliation in the past may get dropped."
But how does the entry into China of consumer credit card companies or the ratings agencies
help Americans? Ironically, this looks precisely like the kind of sop to finance that Trump
said he would eschew. However, because of corporate/Wall Street pressure, the Trump agenda
pivoted a few months ago from selective decoupling and protection of American strategic
industries to opening up China for U.S. investment and pushing China to treat American
companies doing business in China more equally. That is why leading U.S. companies have become
friendlier and increasingly less critical of the president's trade policy, even as the economic
commentariat has continued to blast him.
Trump himself needs to understand that a third to a half of 'trade' is really transnational
production with inputs from suppliers coordinated by mostly third-party manufacturers in Asia
(notably in semiconductors). The purpose of modern mercantilism (particularly as it is
practiced in China today) is not just to sell more finished goods but to try to monopolize the
high value added rungs of supply chains. It is unclear that targeting China's bilateral trade
surplus with the United States will ultimately disrupt these entrenched supply chains. It
almost certainly won't bring semiconductor manufacturing back to America's shores.
In the end, therefore, pushing China's leadership to make structural changes to open up
China to American companies is probably an illusion. Beijing is unlikely to rip up the model
that has seen it create national champions that can now compete successfully with America's
biggest corporations. It may make token promises to curtail cybertheft, or the subsidies that
the administration complains create an uneven playing field for American companies. But, as
noted above, even Lighthizer himself has cast doubt that Beijing could enforce those promises,
given the administrative complexity of its system of governance. In his eagerness to claim a
win, therefore, Trump ironically might end up settling for the usual Faustian bargain: more
large Chinese purchases, selective decoupling of supply chains (as American companies
rethink
their reliance on China ), and increased domestic protection for certain sectors (such as
5G) on national security grounds, Lighthizer's considerable efforts notwithstanding. We may
have reached the peak as far as this particular tariff war goes, but the longer-term trade
tensions will almost certainly persist well beyond this hollow 'victory,' which Mr. "Art of the
Deal" will no doubt claim for himself when the negotiations do officially end.
Excellent assessment of the situation here. I suppose another factor for Trump is the fact
that as the US 2020 elections drew ever nearer, he will want some sort of win – any
sort of win – to take to the American people to show that he was tough on China and got
a better deal. His opponents will disagree with the deal. Hell, probably most economists will
disagree but Trump will only care what his supporters think as they are the ones that will
re-elect him.
But of course the interests of people like Robert Lighthizer may come into play here as he
may not care what Trump wants. He is the sort of person that might just blow up negotiations
in order to be tough on China to get it to buckle. I have seen this movie before. Let me
quote from a Salon article here-
"In the summer of 1941, before leaving for Placentia Bay, U.S. President Franklin D.
Roosevelt had ordered a freeze on Japanese assets. That measure required the Japanese to seek
and obtain licenses to export and pay for each shipment of goods from the United States,
including oil. This move was most distressing to the Japanese because they were dependent on
the United States for most of their crude oil and refined petroleum products. However,
Roosevelt did not want to trigger a war with Japan. His intention was to keep the oil flowing
by continuing to grant licenses. Roosevelt had a noose around Japan's neck, but he chose not
to tighten it. He was not ready to cut off its oil lifeline for fear that such a move would
be regarded as tantamount to an act of war.
That summer, while Roosevelt, his trusted adviser Harry Hopkins and U.S. Undersecretary of
State Sumner Welles were attending the shipboard conference off Newfoundland and Secretary of
State Cordell Hull was on vacation at the Greenbrier in West Virginia, the authority to grant
licenses to export and pay for oil and other goods was in the hands of a three-person
interagency committee. It was dominated by Assistant Secretary of State Dean Acheson, whom
one historian described as the "quintessential opportunist of U.S. foreign policy in
1941."
Acheson favored a "bullet-proof freeze" on oil shipments to Japan, claiming it would not
provoke war because "no rational Japanese could believe that an attack on us could result in
anything but disaster for his country." With breathtaking confidence in his own judgment, and
ignoring the objections of others in the State Department, Acheson refused to grant licenses
to Japan to pay for goods in dollars. That effectively ended Japan's ability to ship oil and
all other goods from the United States.
Acheson's actions cut off all American trade with Japan. When Roosevelt returned, he decided
not to overturn the "state of affairs" initiated by Acheson, apparently because he feared he
would otherwise be regarded as an appeaser. Once Roosevelt perpetuated Acheson's trade
embargo, the planners in Japan's imperial military headquarters knew that oil to fuel their
fleet, as well as rubber, rice and other vital reserves, would soon run out."
And we all know what happened next. So I would not be surprised if Robert Lighthizer could
very well be the re-encarnation of Dean Acheson and given half a chance, would seek to put
China under the gun if he thought that he would get away with it.
Rev Kev
I hope you are right. LIghthizer is actually one of the few beacons of hope in the Trump
Administration. But I fear he'll drink the Trump Kool-Aid and basically settle for less than
half a loaf. That's a fascinating historical precedent you have cited. Thank you for bringing
it to my attention.
Very interesting article. In the mean time Japans aim was land conquest. They raped,
murdered, and pillaged their neighbors so WWII USA/Japan was not avoidable to say the least.
They worshipped an emperor and thought they were superior ideologically and militarily. One
could argue that they should have addressed the Japan issue years earlier.
Trump has taken on 20+ years of terrible trade deals and is now stepping up to change it. He
should be applauded! Instead, everyone in the peanut gallery (news media) takes pot shots at
him. We are dealing with a "COMMUNIST" country here which says it all. We now have a business
man running the USA thank God. To make changes will take time!
Darn. When I read the headline, I hoped the article would explain what a victory in U.S.
trade policy with China would look like -- that is, what kind of trade relationship would
"rectify lingering structural problems that have devastated U.S. manufacturing (with genuine
enforcement provisions)." That's a tough question to answer! But all this article describes
is why Trump's policy won't achieve that result. Every policy tried so far has not achieved
that result, so it's not really surprising that this one won't either. In fact, the article
seems to suggest that China cannot play by reasonable trade rules. So what is victory?
Seriously, we need an answer to that one.
How can State Capitalism have caused that 'quantum leap' for China when everyone told us
Central Planning does not work?
If it does work, maybe the US should try it in a way other than the PPT, Fed bailouts, ag
subsidies, military industrial complex, mortgage subsidies, sanctions on rivals, military
action on rivals, etc they already do.
As I understand it, US manufacturing left the US for other countries because of the lower
cost of labour and the lower cost of doing business in foreign countries. What would bring
manufacturing back from foreign countries? Maybe when the cost of doing business in the US
(i.e., wages and salaries of the working class) are lower than those in foreign countries.
Maybe a labour contigent made up entirely of robots would bring back manufacturing to the
US.
While lower wage costs helped drive it, now they the ever rising cost of shipping their
wares. Course they have seen the Chinese boycotts work so well, they may think they will have
a US version to deal with, as so many dislike ok, hate globalization, that any that smacks of
it has a PR problem. Course its likely we will see a repeat of NKoroea too
different budget line probably, so can still be presented as cost-saving also factor in
the use of consultants before/during/after off-shoring – but again different budget
line!
I'm not sure at all what others think a "victory' would look like, but to me it would be
anything that finally raises the profile our (Western Nations) reliance (addiction?) on
supply chains emanating from CHina that impact, negatively, our National Security. If we
could even BEGIN to discuss this dilema I'd be satisfied. And it appears we are beginning to
question the dependence.
China has been at war with the United States for decades. It is an all domain,
unrestricted war. The Chinese do not play by any rules but their own. They have used the
West's strengths of an open political and market system against North American and European
industrialized democracies.
A win against China means re-industrializing the United States across all manufacturing
industries. Tariffs and regulations are the most efficient means to effect this result.
Negotiating is a fool's errand. China will not live up to its obligations under the
agreement anyway.
Perhaps, readers should ask themselves if China is beginning to resemble the Third Reich.
Dictatorship, concentration camps, military buildup, territorial expansion, religious
persecution, military aggression, economic warfare, racist ideology If so, then we should
determine what steps the West and its allies in the East should take to ensure its survival
and prosperity.
Probably we need tariffs to protect against the wage race to the bottom. Not at all clear
trumps 25% threat is high enough.
But spending big on overdue infra would employ lots of blue collars, some at union wages not
in competition w foreign labor, and focusing on higher unemployment regions first avoids
inflation.
Regarding changes in Chinese gov us has been warmonger for decades, assassinates foreign
leaders etc China so far not nearly as aggressive.
Our corporations which benefit from unlimited credit via our very own Military Industrial
Capitalism are no different from China's SOEs. China is protecting essential industries, so
are we. We have tried to force austerity on the rest of our economy – but China does
not. Why is that? And because we have succeeded in establishing the world's most unequal
society, we should be proud of our success. Mindless and shameful as it has been. China
doesn't think it would be politically beneficial to do that to 1.5 billion Chinese. They will
find their own way. Why should they now shoot themselves in the foot just because we did? For
them to bend to our demand that they stop being so mercantilist means they would have to
impose austerity on their people to some degree. It's an appropriate point for a showdown.
And I can't imagine we will win unless we are willing to continue our own ridiculous social
"structure" which is undemocratic and tyrannical. We're looking at a political revolution
because everyone is fed up. China is not. Who's right? We can only brag that we have the
"liberal" high ground because we haven't faced facts yet.
The latest Iran sanctions salvo, the claim that "waivers" for China and others will be
eliminated, is another complication. It will be perceived, with good reason, as deliberately
interfering with world trade under false pretenses. An aggressive follow-up and this could be
an effective way for team Trump to get out of whatever agreements they made in negotiations
so far. More drama
I would not say advantage US; for example China needs US semiconductors. To me if feels
like the US and China are two pilots locked in a kamikaze plane together; both nations are
floating on a sea of debt and IMO prone to massive downside risk during a recession (eg, US
corporate balance sheets are in very poor shape due to debt used to fund stock buybacks). The
US has the reserve currency, but China has sane leadership and doesn't have to carry around
other countries. Interesting times.
@ William Gruff
"Planned economies cannot have overproduction problems like market economies do" I don't
agree with that; look at China's empty cities (overproduction of everything in that city).
The recent book China's Great Wall of Debt went through China's massive overproduction of
certain items (do they really need that much cement?). The book's thesis is that China builds
what it knows how to build, whether it needs it or not.
Data Tells: China's BRI promotes global trade
By Zhang Xinyuan
As a development strategy proposed by China that focuses on connectivity and cooperation
on a trans‐continental scale, the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has significantly
boosted global trade and investment in recent years.
With a wave of trade protectionism sweeping across the world in recent years, causing
global economic turmoil, China still adheres to economic openness, actively pushing toward
economic globalization, and striving to build a more convenient and liberal environment for
international trade and investment.
BRI is one of the most important tools for China to achieve that goal. About 125 countries
and 29 international organizations have signed cooperation agreements with China on jointly
building the Belt and Road, according to data published in March on China's official Belt and
Road website.
The total trade volume of goods between China and countries along the Belt and Road
exceeded six trillion U.S. dollars from 2013 to 2018, according to a Ministry of Commerce
(MOFCOM) statement on Thursday.
The average annual growth rate of trade between China and countries along the Belt and
Road hit four percent during the 2013-2018 period, higher than the growth rate of China's
foreign trade during the same period, accounting for 27.4 percent of China's total trade in
goods, according to MOFCOM.
According to the Belt and Road Big Data Annual Report of 2018 from the State Information
Center, BRI in 2017 connected 71 countries around the world, spanning across Asia, Europe,
and Eastern Africa, and in total the BRI countries' foreign trade reached 9.3 trillion U.S.
dollars in 2017, 27.8 percent of the total world trade volume.
Among the BRI countries, South Korea ranks first in terms of foreign trade volume,
reaching over one trillion U.S. dollars in 2017, Singapore and India follows with 697 billion
U.S. dollars and 617 billion U.S. dollars, respectively, the report showed.
In terms of trade commodities, the top import and export commodities among BRI economies
fall in the same categories, including electronic machinery, sound recorder and reproducers,
and televisions, followed by nuclear reactors, boilers, and other heavy machinery, based on
the report.
Private enterprises in China have played a major role in trade with BRI economies. In
2017, China's private enterprises trade with BRI countries reached 619 billion U.S. dollars,
representing 43 percent of the total trade volume between China and BRI countries. Foreign
companies grabbed 36.6 percent of the trade pie, while state-owned enterprises got 19.4
percent of the market share.
BRI has greatly prompted the development of private economies in China and further opened
its market to foreign companies.
As Jimmy Carter observed....the US spread death and destruction investing in war and spending
on war to the tune of trillions, China is investing in the future.
Carter to Trump: While China has some 18k miles of high-speed rail, the US has wasted $3
trillion on military spending. "It's more than you can imagine. China has not wasted a single
penny on war, and that's why they're ahead of us. In almost every way."
China set a defense budget growth target of 7.5 percent in 2019, slower than last year but
still enough to fulfill President Xi Jinping's plans to build a world-class military.
Authorities made the announcement on Tuesday in a statement released ahead of the National
People's Congress, the annual gathering of China's legislature in Beijing. In 2018, before
the trade war started to affect China's economy, officials predicted an increase of 8.1
percent to 1.11 trillion yuan ($164 billion). ...
When the US economy was a larger share of the world economy, then access to the US market
meant more. For example, World Bank statistics say that the US economy was 40% of the entire
world economy in 1960, but is now about 24%. The main source of growth in the world economy
for the foreseeable future will be in emerging markets.
For a sense of the shift, consider this figure from the most recent World Economic Outlook
report, published by the IMF (April 2019). The lines in the figure show the trade flows
between countries that are at least 1% of total world GDP. The size of the dots for each
country is proportionate to the country's GDP.
In 1995, you can see international trade revolving around the United States, with another
hub of trade happening in Europe and a third hub focused around Japan. Trade between the US
and China shows up on the figure, but China did not have trade flows greater than 1% of world
GDP with any country other than the US.
The picture is rather different in 2015. The US remains an international hub for trade.
Germany remains a hub as well, although fewer of its trade flows now exceed 1% of world GDP.
And China has clearly become a hub of central importance in Asia.
[Graph]
The patterns of trade have also shifted toward greater use of global value chains--that
is, intermediate products that are shipped across national borders at least once, and often
multiple times, before they become final products. Here's the overall pattern since 1995 of
falling tariffs and rising participation in global value chains for the world economy as a
whole.
[Graph]
Several decades ago, emerging markets around the world worried about having access to
selling in US and European markets, and this market access could be used by the US and
European nations as a bargaining chip in economic treaties and more broadly in international
relations. Looking ahead, US production is now more tied into global value chains, and the
long-term growth of US manufacturing is going to rely more heavily on sales to markets
outside the United States.
For example, if one is concerned about the future of the US car industry, the US now
produces about 7% of the world's cars in 2015, and about 22% of the world's trucks. The
future growth of car consumption is going to be primarily outside the US economy. For the
health and long-term growth of the US car business, the possibility of unfair imports into
the US economy matters a lot less than the access of US car producers to selling in the rest
of the world economy.
The interconnectedness of global value chains means that General Motors already produces
more cars in China than it does in the United States. In fact, sales of US multinationals now
producing in China are already twice as high as exports from the US to China. Again, the
long-term health of many US manufacturers is going to be based on their ability to
participate in international value chains and in overseas production.
Although what caught my eye in this World Economic Outlook report was the shifting
patterns of world trade, the main emphases of the chapter are on other themes that will come
as no surprise to faithful readers of this blog. One main theme is that shifts in bilateral
and overall trade deficits are the result of macroeconomic factors, not the outcome of trade
negotiations, a theme I've harped on here.
The IMF report also offers calculations that higher tariffs between the US and China will
cause economic losses for both sides. From the IMF report:
"The starting point is a collapse in US–China trade, which falls by 25–30
percent in the short term and somewhere between 30 percent and 70 percent over the long term,
depending on the model and the direction of trade. The decrease in external demand leads to a
decline in total exports and in GDP in both countries. Annual real GDP losses range from
–0.3 percent to –0.6 percent for the United States and from –0.5 percent to
–1.5 percent for China ... Finally, although the US–China bilateral trade deficit
is reduced, there is no economically significant change in each country's multilateral trade
balance."
Some advocates of higher tariffs take comfort in noting that the estimated losses to
China's economy are bigger than the losses to the US economy. Yes, but it's losses all
around! As the 21st century economy evolves, the most important issues for US producers are
going to involve their ability to compete in unfettered ways in the increasingly important
markets outside the US.
Is Donald Trump
starting to look like a softie on the trade conflict with China compared to sections of the U.S. business and political
elite?
Dorian
Bon
explains the background.
WHEN DONALD Trump
launched
his
trade war on China
last spring, he had to drag the U.S. political and business establishment along with him.
Most elected
officials in both parties and a large majority of corporate execs cringed at the thought of a protracted trade war that
would disturb the ordinary flow of profits and investments between the world's two largest economies.
Now, as Trump and
his team seek a negotiated settlement with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Trump finds himself in the opposite position --
facing bipartisan pressures not to back down or compromise in any U.S.-China trade deal.
Even Trump's own
trade negotiator Bob Lighthizer -- who helped bend Japanese auto companies to the will of the Reagan administration in the
mid-1980s -- has
grown
frustrated with the president
, wanting him to take a harder line on Chinese telecom giant Huawei and keep the threat of
further tariff increases on the table.
Donald Trump and Xi Jinping meet during the 2018 G20 Summit in Buenos Aires
The context for this
strange turnabout is the new common sense across the political spectrum: the idea that China poses a threat to U.S. jobs,
security and technological dominance.
Trump's advisers
fully expect the eventual Democratic nominee in 2020 to try to outflank him to the right on China and the defense of U.S.
manufacturing. And the political competition over anti-Chinese toughness could very well throw a wrench into the continuing
bilateral negotiations with China.
Even big American
capital -- which, outside of the steel industry, has been almost universally opposed to Trump's tariffs -- is warming to the
administration's more aggressive stance toward China.
Most U.S. CEOs are
still hostile to the use of tariffs as an economic weapon, especially against their North American and European trading
partners. But they also have serious concerns about the rapid development of Chinese high-tech manufacturing, the transfer
-- by contract and by coercion -- of U.S. technologies to Chinese firms, and investment restrictions for U.S. companies in
China.
Somewhat to their
surprise, Corporate America sees Trump forcing Xi's hand on these issues more effectively than Barack Obama or George W.
Bush before him.
Josh Bolten,
president of the Business Roundtable -- an association of the U.S.'s largest companies, collectively worth $8 trillion and
employing 15 million workers --
put
it this way
during a recent interview with Washington trade experts Scott Miller and Bill Reinsch on their podcast
The
Trade Guys
:
The CEOs of the
Business Roundtable have found themselves in agreement...with the Trump administration on most of the objectives of the
very aggressive posture that the administration has taken with respect to China.
As both of you
also know, that is an evolution...of the business community's position. The Roundtable doesn't speak for the whole
business community, but I think there has been an evolution throughout the business community on this. And that is that
the posture of waiting for democratic, market-oriented capitalism gravity to have its effect on the Chinese has proven
not to be a viable approach.
Bolten went on to
lament the defeat of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) -- a major Obama-era economic agreement that Trump opposed on the
campaign trail and terminated once he took office -- as a missed opportunity to contain China's rise and secure crucial
markets where U.S. and Chinese companies are in direct competition.
Bolten and most of
the U.S. ruling class see -- somewhat in contrast to Trump -- the strengthening of a multilateral alliance of Western and
pro-Western countries as the best strategy to counter the threat of a growing Chinese rival.
But Bolten is
unambiguous and Trump-sounding about the goal of the strategy. "All of our interests are actually consistent with each
other in confronting the threat that an economically hegemonic China poses for the entire world," he explained.
HEARING A leading
representative of the American corporate elite talk about the threat of Chinese economic hegemony on "the entire world" is
alarming to say the least -- and demonstrates that Trump doesn't have a monopoly on anti-China discourse by any stretch of
the imagination.
That isn't to
underplay the serious disagreements over strategy between the Trump administration and most of the U.S. business world.
Many corporate
leaders are concerned about the fact that Trump is simultaneously in tense trade negotiations with the European Union and
brandishing
the threat of tariffs on car imports
(primarily impacting Germany and Japan), a move which virtually every single
American auto-company angrily opposes.
And they appear to
be signing on only half-heartedly to Trump's renegotiated NAFTA, now dubbed the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement -- which
contains some attractive updates on digital trade (mostly lifted from the TPP, ironically enough), but is broadly seen as a
step backwards for corporate profits and preferable only to a collapse of NAFTA altogether.
These raise question
for U.S. corporate rulers: If Trump is so concerned with the Chinese threat, why doesn't he focus his fire in that
direction, instead of toward allies?
This will be the
line of attack against Trump from much of the political and corporate establishment, including those who are Democrats or
support them, moving forward into the new election cycle.
To Trump and his
team, however, trade disputes and negotiations with Canada, Mexico, the European Union, Japan and China are all so many
elements of a larger plan to keep as much of global industry as possible within the continental U.S.
For the largest
American companies -- which have positioned themselves at the technological peak of a globalized network of supply chains,
markets and investments -- Trump's economic nationalism poses an opportunity to challenge China, but new problems in
relation to the rest of the world.
The biggest CEOs and
industry lobbies are still figuring out a response.
THE REVERBERATIONS
of the U.S.-China trade war have been felt across the corporate world, perhaps nowhere more starkly than in
telecommunications.
As geopolitical
tensions between the U.S. and China have deepened, telecom companies and state governments have been preparing for the
highly anticipated rollout of 5G cellular networks. 5G, or fifth generation, technology is expected to speed up data flows
(and increase data volumes) across cell phone and other digital communication systems.
Many analysts
predict the degree of change brought on by 5G will be similar to that of the 3G and 4G evolutions, which underpinned the
smartphone boom. This time around, however, most eyes are trained on what the new networks will mean for digitized and
computerized manufacturing, commerce and transportation more broadly.
For the leadership
of both main U.S. political parties, the excitement around 5G has been muted by hostility toward the world's largest
telecom equipment supplier (and second largest cell phone seller), the Chinese corporation Huawei.
With $7.55 billion
in profits in 2017 and the most cost-competitive telecom equipment in the world, Huawei has been widely predicted to be one
of the main beneficiaries of the 5G expansion.
But Congress has
been on an offensive against the company
since
2012
, and the Trump administration has escalated the attacks.
Trump has gone on a
global campaign with broad bipartisan support to persuade allied states to ban Huawei entirely from their domestic markets.
He has also planned to issue an executive order to bar the company from the U.S. economy as well, though he seems to have
now turned this threat into a bargaining chip in his dealmaking with Xi and China.
The justification
for bans is that Huawei could use its access to the cellular networks it builds overseas to spy on foreign governments. The
extraordinary hypocrisy of this claim coming from the main surveillance power in world history has not been lost on most
people following the debate.
Meanwhile, Trump
instructed the Canadian government to arrest and extradite Huawei's Chief Financial Officer Meng Wanzhou, daughter of
Huawei founder and President Ren Zhengfei, during a routine visit to Vancouver. The charges against Wanzhou stemmed from
alleged violations of U.S. sanctions on Iran.
Wanzhou's
extradition hearing
began this week and could drag on for months.
Wanzhou's arrest
could also be used as a bargaining chip by Trump, though most of Trump's staff is reticent to bring a separate legal
proceeding into a trade agreement for fear of discrediting the courts.
PART OF what is so
striking about the case of Huawei and 5G is how it flatly contradicts the whole logic of the current neoliberal world order
of free markets and free trade.
According to the
propaganda, under neoliberalism, any buyer should be allowed to make their purchases from any company that offers the best
products for the lowest prices. For many buyers, including national governments, that company is clearly Huawei.
Now, however, the
U.S. state is attempting to restrict the field and eliminate the Chinese option from the market. In other words, what we're
witnessing in this crucial sector of the global economy is an open attempt by the world's most powerful state to create
trade blocs in telecommunications that shut out one of China's most prominent companies.
While both
Republicans and Democrats in Congress are rallying behind the attacks on Huawei, the response from the U.S. and European
information technology industries has been much more conflicted.
The main lobby for
telecom and technology companies in the U.S., the Information Technology Industry Council, has been clamoring for Trump to
strike a deal with Xi and drop the tariffs. Chuck Robbins, CEO of the largest American telecom equipment maker, Cisco
Systems, insists Trump's tariffs and sanctions are unnecessary.
"We don't need
anything else to beat these guys or to beat any of our competition in the marketplace,"
Robbins
said in February
. Huawei competitors Ericsson and Nokia -- multinational companies based in Sweden and Finland,
respectively -- have claimed that
they're
ready to supply Europe's 5G infrastructures
in the event of a Huawei ban, indicating they may have some sympathy with
Trump's efforts.
AS OF now, the Trump
administration's campaign to block Huawei from the world's markets has had mixed results. Both
British
and
German
intelligence
agencies are leaning toward accepting Huawei as a legitimate business partner, as is the
French
Senate
.
In the Czech
Republic,
a
conflict has emerged
pitting President Miloš Zeman, who wants to strengthen ties with China, and the Czech
cybersecurity agency, which has labeled Huawei a threat to national security. Debates on the same topic are also underway
in
Italy
and
Canada
.
Australia's Foreign
Minister Marise Payne, staking out the most extreme anti-Huawei position, has
fully
embraced Trump's ban
and vowed to maintain it, even if Trump himself backs away from his current position. New
Zealand's Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, on other the hand,
rejected
the idea of a blanket ban
.
Despite ongoing
China-India tensions, the offer of cheap telecommunications equipment to expand India's cellular infrastructure seems too
attractive for Modi and his business allies to decline. The fact that the Trump administration is simultaneously
weighing
raising tariffs and restrictions
on Indian products is certainly not helping to convince Modi to further antagonize
Beijing.
However unsuccessful
the Trump White House has been in forcing the hand of other states, the president and congressional leaders are well aware
of the economic leverage they have against key Chinese companies.
Last year, the Trump
administration brought China's second telecom corporation, ZTE, to the brink of collapse when he issued
a
temporary ban on trade
between the company and American suppliers. ZTE is totally dependent on U.S. imports of advanced
communications equipment and might have been destroyed if Trump had not chosen to lift the ban before entering negotiations
with Xi.
Similar bans by the
Trump administration have nearly brought down the Chinese state-owned chipmaking company Fujian Jinhua, which has announced
it will have to
cease
production altogether in March
if it cannot buy more imports of crucial American equipment.
WITH ALL of these
variables at play, the next year in the U.S.-China economic relationship is impossible to predict.
The financial costs
of unraveling one of the largest state-to-state commercial relationships in modern history may prove too high for either
side to escalate the 2018-19 trade conflict any further, especially as the global economy passes the high point of the
business cycle and heads toward
another
likely recession
.
The two heads of
state plan to meet at the end of March, possibly at Trump's Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida, to sign a trade agreement.
For Trump to sell
the deal to an increasingly hawkish Congress, he will have to demonstrate "progress" on the goals he articulated at the
outset of the trade war: more Chinese purchases of American products, stronger intellectual property safeguards for U.S.
corporations and less state subsidies for Chinese companies. It remains to be seen whether Trump will decide to incorporate
a compromise on Huawei into the deal.
Whatever the outcome
of this round of negotiations -- and it is still possible that they could fall apart -- what is unfolding today is
undoubtedly just the first act in a long and tempestuous drama.
China is clearly a
growing geopolitical rival to the U.S., and Chinese corporations are quickly developing the capacity to compete with their
U.S. counterparts on a global scale in the most advanced areas of high-tech manufacturing.
This means that many
more economic confrontations between the two states are inevitable. And as politicians on both sides of the aisle have made
abundantly clear, Trump will not be the last president to stoke tensions with China.
Then there is the
question of how the perspectives of the largest American businesses will change as this conflict develops.
Josh Bolten, the
Business Roundtable president, claims that the CEOs he represents have been through an "evolution" in their views that
brings them closer to Trump's "aggressive posture" toward China. Yet at the same time, there continues to be near-universal
opposition to tariffs and trade wars within these elite strata.
So what kind of
"aggressive posture" do these leading American capitalists hope to adopt? With more money and power concentrated in their
hands than any other ruling class in the world, the stance that these elites take toward U.S.-China relations will be very
important.
If the American 1
Percent drifts any further toward the rising economic nationalism articulated by their political representatives in
Washington, future flare-ups between the two countries may be a great deal worse.
"... Face it. Mass production of consumer electronics in the USA is almost non-existent. An entire important industry has been lost forever based on wage arbitrage. But even if there were not a 10:1 wage disparity, the skill level and work ethic of Americans is pathetic compared to the diligent Asian worker bees. Reality is a cruel mistress ..."
"... Russia just passed up the U.S. in grain exports. Their economy in real terms grows year on year. Russia has more natural wealth available to exploit than USA that includes lands rich in minerals, timber, water, etc. ..."
"... With regards to traitorous fifth column atlantacists and oligarchy, Russia's shock therapy (induced by the Harvard Boys) in the 90's helped Russian's figure out who the real enemy is. Putin has marginalized most of these ((Oligarchs)), and they longer are allowed to influence politics. Many have also been stripped of their ill gotten gains, for example the Rothschild gambit to grab Yukos and to own Russia was thwarted. Dollar debts were paid off, etc. ..."
"... The Western European based US economy is fast draining out (along with people of Western European descent) and the days of US world manufacturing leadership (1950's) are a distant memory. ..."
"... Maybe the takeaway from US/Chinese history is that the US needs its own Maoist style Cultural Revolution. Nothing short of US Maoism is needed to root out every aspect of the current rotten system and get a fresh start from zero. ..."
War, in this model, begins when the first shots are fired.
Well, think again in this new era of growing great-power struggle and competition.
It all war, all the time and another point to remember is that there is always a war between
the .001% and the rest of us.
Another thing is that we proles, peasants and peons should give some serious thought to
having the "elite" fight their own battles, on their "own" (though mostly stolen) shekels for
once. Read More Agree: foolisholdman Reply
Agree/Disagree/Etc. More... This Commenter Display All Comments
Feb 15, 2019 Next Phase, Xi & Trump, Coordinate The Transition
US industrial production plunges, this doesn't mean that manufacturing jobs are not coming
back to the US this means the [CB] is deteriorating quickly as Trump brings back
manufacturing.
Feb 16, 2019 Pentagon Warns of Chinese Space Lasers | China News Headlines
A new Pentagon report says #China and Russia have developed #laser weapons to target US
satellites. Need a Space Force?
governing elites have developed other means of warfare -- economic, technological, and
covert -- to achieve such strategic objectives. Viewed this way, the United States is
already in close to full combat mode with respect to China.
Looked at this way, there are countless wars all the time as well as a huge gray area that
is debatable. I think there is merit in defining war as actual kinetic weapons firing in both
directions. Even then, there are gray areas, but at least they are minimized
"The time and investment required to rebuild/replace supply chains in a JIT world means
much of what's left of America's real economy would disappear within weeks.
American trade negotiators are apparently oblivious to this. I find that very weird."
Of course they're not oblivious, as you can see everytime the stock market goes down, some
US official came out to say a deal/talk is on the way. Both the negotiators and the market
know.
They're just betting on enough pressure will force China to surrender, like Japan did in
the 80s.
@Erebus In the distant past
there were at least 1000 PC Board manufacturers in the US .now there are only 2 or 3. Most US
PCB houses are actually a middleman with an iphone fronting for one of the many Chinese PCB
factories. You supply the Gerber Files and the payment, of course, and your finished PC
Boards come back by air the next day.
Now here is the kicker: our US PC Board supplier is
located in Illinois and owned by you guessed it Hindus. Half the staff are also Hindus. In
general, the Chinese PCBs are of higher quality than the Hindu .er US PCBs.
Face it. Mass
production of consumer electronics in the USA is almost non-existent. An entire important
industry has been lost forever based on wage arbitrage. But even if there were not a 10:1
wage disparity, the skill level and work ethic of Americans is pathetic compared to the
diligent Asian worker bees. Reality is a cruel mistress
Russia just passed up the U.S. in grain exports. Their economy in real terms grows year on
year. Russia has more natural wealth available to exploit than USA that includes lands rich
in minerals, timber, water, etc.
With regards to traitorous fifth column atlantacists and oligarchy, Russia's shock therapy
(induced by the Harvard Boys) in the 90's helped Russian's figure out who the real enemy is.
Putin has marginalized most of these ((Oligarchs)), and they longer are allowed to influence
politics. Many have also been stripped of their ill gotten gains, for example the Rothschild
gambit to grab Yukos and to own Russia was thwarted. Dollar debts were paid off, etc.
Russia could go further in their symphony of church and state, and copy Justinian
(Byzyantine empire) and prevent our (((friends))) from teaching in schools,bein control of
money, or in government.
With regards to China, they would be not be anywhere near where they are today if the West
had not actively transferred their patrimony in the form of transplanted industry and
knowledge.
China is only temporarily dependent on export of goods via their Eastern seaboard, but as
soon as belt and road opens up, she will pivot further toward Eurasia. If the U.S. factories
withdrew from China tomorrow, China already has our "knowledge" and will find markets in
Eurasia and raw materials in Africa, etc.
People need to stop whistling past the graveyard.
The atalantacist strategy has run its course, internal development of U.S. and linking up
with belt and road would be in America's best future interests. But, to do that requires
first acknowledging that money's true nature is law, and not private bank credit. Further,
the U.S. is being used as whore of Babylon, where her money is "Federal Reserve Notes" and
are international in character. The U.S is not sovereign. Deep state globalism does not
recognize national boundaries, or sovereignty.
@Alfa158 Alternatively, one
could examine a nations ability to rapidly expand their economy to meet wartime needs. In
this scenario, other factors such as access to raw materials come into play. In this
perspective, the equations would change dramatically.
I think there is merit in defining war as actual kinetic weapons firing
Why limit it to that? I'd say there's plenty of merit in the author's definition especially since it would tend
to shed some lights on the origins of major conflicts.
That US elites that are split on who to go after first compromised by going after both Russia
and China at the same time is a definition of insanity. The US doesn't have a chance in hell
of subduing or defeating the Russia/China alliance. The US is already checkmated. The more it
goes after some big win the worse will be its defeat.
So the question (for me) is not which side will win, the question is the scenario of the
decline of the US Empire. Someone here mentioned the EU turning East. At some point the EU
will decide that staying a US vassal is suicide and it will turn East. When that happens then
the virus of US insanity will turn inwards into itself.
The US has recently focused on South America by installing several fascist regimes and is
now trying to get Venezuela. But the US backed regimes are laying the groundwork for the next
wave of revolution soon to come. Wherever I look the US is its own worst enemy. The big
question is how much suffering before it ends.
@jacques
sheete The author's definition makes the term a purely rhetorical one tantamount to an
angry child saying "this means war!" to another angry child, or "The War on Drugs" or "The
Battle of the Sexes" etc.
Admittedly, this is all semantics, so have it your way if you want, as it is not worth the
time of further debate. As for me, I prefer to have terms as precise as possible.
Klare discovers the US crusade against China – 8 years after the Obama/Hillary "pivot"
to East Asia sending 2/3 of the US Navy there and putting together the TPP to excluded China.
As usual he is right on top of things.
And he begins with this gem: " "The media and many politicians continue to focus on
U.S.-Russian relations, in large part because of revelations of Moscow's meddling in the 2016
American presidential election and the ongoing Mueller investigation." Huh? Does he mean the
$4700 in Google ads or the $50,000 in Facebook ads traced to some alleged Russian sources? A
Russiagater from the start.
I remember some years ago before the shale revolution Klare was warning us about "peak oil."
I think we were supposed to have run out of it by now.
Klare is a hack who cycles things that any conscious person reading the newspapers would have
known long ago.
P.s. He says that Apple is the number one cell phone. No longer. He should improve his
Google search skills or his set of assumptions which have turned him into a Russiagater.
Huawei now sells more cell phones worldwide than Apple ( https://gearburn.com/2018/08/huawei-smartphone-sales-2018/
). And Huawei does this even though it is effectively excluded from the US market (You cannot
find it in stores) whereas Apple has unfettered access to the enormous Chinese market. You
find Huawei everywhere – from Italy to Tanzania. How would Apple fare if China stopped
purchases of its products? Not so well I am afraid.
Usa is at war against everyone , from China to Latinamerica , from Europe to India , from the
islamic world to Africa . Usa is even at war against its own citizens , at least against its
best citizens .
I don't think it's simple "Eastern" vs "Western" Europeans; my take is Protestants vs
Catholics vs Orthodox. In that order. The biggest difference is between Protestant and
Orthodox. Catholics are, sort of, in the middle.
Or, in practical terms, don't see much difference between Austrians and Slovenes.
That's for Europe.
When we speak of the culture war or the war on drugs or the war between the sexes or a trade
war we are misusing the word war.
War with China means exactly shooting and bombing and killing Chinese and American people.
Expanding the meaning of the word only makes it meaningless.
Admittedly, this is all semantics, so have it your way if you want, as it is not worth
the time of further debate. As for me, I prefer to have terms as precise as possible.
I agree on all four points.
However, if you didn't want a debate, or at least a response, then why did you bother
bringing it up? (That's a rhetorical question, since I neither expect nor really care what
the response would be; now I'm asking myself why I bothered !!!)
Russia under Putin is an exporter of non GMO grains where as the U.S. exports GMO grains
thatt the Chinese do not want as these GMO grains are a destuctive to humans and
animals.
I hope that's true. To Hell with that GMO crap!!! Anyone using it for farming ought to be forced to drink
glyphosate straight for breakfast.
As far as the war with China goes, we ain't seen nothing yet. It won't be pretty, especially
considering that the US is starting it with severe self-inflicted wounds.
Yes, and the ads were often absurd – one somehow featuring Yosemite Sam and gun rights
and another for a dildo, I believe. Great for click bait maybe but not real winners for a
campaign.
As the incomparable Jimmy Dore says on his show, which should be required watching for
everyone, if the Russians can swing an election with such modest resources against maybe $1-2
billion spent by the Donald and the Hillary together, then every candidate for offices high
and low should run not walk with $54,700 in hand to secure a cheap and easy victory from the
Russobots.
I don't think China stands the chance. As we all know diversity is strength and China is
mono-cultured rather than the obviously superior multi. So China will continue to decline,
while US goes from strength to strength thanks to its brilliant, brilliant multicultural
philosophy.
China was dumb enough to try real socialism, while obviously the fake one is the way to
go. You convince your domestic population of your humanitarian credentials – via the
phony socialism, plus you don't have to share a cent with them. How clever is that? Phony
socialism is the way to go – it eliminates the need for the real one.
At some point one must consider that this is all a fraud. In Washington Ocasio-Cortez and the
Democrats are proposing to eviscerate the US economy with their Green New Deal. While here we
find Washington launching a long term struggle for economic, political, and military
superiority over China.
As was once said in another context by an individual remembered in history, "What is
truth?" A question which either revealed his own puzzlement or was simply a rhetorical
dismissal of the question altogether. Likely both at the same time. One can be simply bemused
by the turn of events.
Is all this activity simply a song and dance to entertain, terrify, confuse, and amuse the
public while the real ordering of the world takes place behind closed doors? Put
Ocasio-Cortez together with the Pentagon and we have apparently a commitment by the US to
force the entire world to immolate itself. No state shall be superior to the US and the US
shall be a third world hellhole. Cui bono?
@joe
webb Russia and China are certainly not natural allies. However, deranged international
banditry of the US (called foreign policy in the DC bubble) literally forced them to ally
against a common threat: dying demented Empire.
As you call Chinese "Chinks", I suggest you stop using everything made in China, including
your clothes, footwear, tools, the light bulbs in your house, etc. Then, using your likely
made in China computer and certainly made in China mouse, come back and tell us how great
your life has become. Or you can stick to your principles of not using China-made stuff,
write a message on a piece of paper (warning: make sure that neither the paper nor the pen is
made in China), put it into a bottle, and throw it in the ocean. Be patient, and in a few
centuries you might get an answer.
In the halls of the Kremlin these days, it's all about China -- and whether or not
Moscow can convince Beijing to form an alliance against the West.
Russia's obsession with a potential alliance with China was already obvious at the
Valdai Discussion Club, an annual gathering of Russia's biggest foreign policy minds, in
2017.
At their next meeting, late last year, the idea seemed to move from the speculative to
something Russia wants to realize. And soon
Seen from Moscow, there is no resistance left to a new alliance led by China. And now
that Washington has imposed tariffs on Chinese exports, Russia hopes China will finally
understand that its problem is Washington, not Moscow.
In the past, the possibility of an alliance between the two countries had been hampered
by China's reluctance to jeopardize its relations with the U.S. But now that it has already
become a target, perhaps it will grow bolder. Every speaker at Valdai tried to push China
in that direction.
Another hurdle, reported in the journal Nature this week, is that China is cleaning up
its air pollution. That sounds great for pollution-weary Chinese citizens. But
climatologists point out that some of that air pollution had actually been cooling the
atmosphere, by blocking out solar radiation. Ironically, less air pollution from China
could mean more warming for the Earth.
@AnonFromTN Frankly, I
really don't give a damn about what you say. But do not use racial slurs FIRST. I use racial
slurs ONLY in RESPONSE to the comments that contain them, in retaliation. If you don't use
racial slurs, I wouldn't either.
@DB
Cooper DB,
Thanks for the PCB mfg video. Asian roboticized surface mount assembly plants are even more
impressive. At one time supplied specialized instrumentation to the FN factory in South
Carolina where the 50 cal machine guns are made, and received a tour. Crude by Asian
standards, but efficient in its own way. Base price on a 50 LMG at the time was $5k without
any of the extras: tripod, flash suppressor, water cooling, advanced night vision sights,
etc. Base price would be $10k by now. The US Guv does not allow this kind of production to go
offshore .but apparently cares not a jot about the production of consumer electronics, a
massive and growing worldwide market.
Have read the Chinese shops assemble $1000 I-pods for
as little as $5 each including parts sourcing, making domestic production here impractical.
Surprisingly, the Germans manage to produce high end electronics and their manufacturing
labor rates are even higher than North America. Says something about the skill and diligence
level of the US workforce ..where just passing a drug test and not having felonies or bad
credit is a major achievement.
@Anonymous Yes, it is quite
off putting, even though most of the article is quite sound. Possibly Klare was obliged to
add this bit of nonsense in order to get it published in TomDispatch but who knows.
@nsa
A good friend supplies hi-end PCBs to EU & RU electronics mfrs, particularly in DE.
Judging by the numbers I hear, hi-end electronics is still very much alive in Europe while
it's all but dead in NA.
It's a capital intensive business, and raw labour cost is a minor component in the total
cost of doing business. NA has put so many socio-political obstructions & regulatory
costs in the way that even at min wage it makes no business sense to locate there. I doubt it
would make sense even with free labour.
As Steve Jobs told Obama point blank, "Those jobs aren't coming back". NA's manufacturing
ecosystem (rather than mere infrastructure), which includes social-cultural aspects as well
as physical plant has been disappeared, and only dire necessity will build a new one. I
explicitly avoid the word "rebuild", as that train left the station years ago. NA still
"assembles" stuff, but it doesn't manufacture except on a small, niche scale.
Manufacturing is a difficult and very demanding business. 21st C manufacturing is not
simply an extension of the 20th's. It's a radically different hybrid of logistics, design
& production engineering, "smart" plant, and financial mgmt.
Not for the faint of heart. Much easier to flip burgers/houses/stocks/used
cars/derivatives/credit swaps/ until there's nothing left to flip.
Where a war begins – or ends – can be hard to define. Michael Klare is right,
'War' and 'peace' are not 'polar opposites'. We often look at wars in chronological
abstraction: the First World War started on the 28th July 1914. Or did it only become a
global war one week later when Great Britain declared war on Germany? The causes can be of
long duration. The decline of the Ottoman Empire, for which the other Great Powers were
positioning themselves to benefit, might have begun as far back as 1683 when the Turks were
defeated at the Battle of Vienna. It ultimately led to the events of 1914.
Great power rivalry has always led to wars; in the last hundred years world wars. Graham
Allison wrote that the US can 'avoid catastrophic war with China while protecting and
advancing American national interests' if it follows the lessons of the Cold War. History
shows that wars are caused by the clash of interests, that's always at some else's expense.
When core interests collide there is no alternative to war – however destructive. https://www.ghostsofhistory.wordpress.com/
The real conflict is a cultural/ideological war in which liberal democracy tries to apply
its system worldwide under the delusion that egalitarianism, freedom, your definition of
rights, is universal.
China will never accept this. Russia is already fighting back. Nor does any developing
country look like they will ever truly embrace western values. It's gonna be SWPLs + WEIRDs
vs The Rest of Humanity.
The new Cold War will last much longer than any trade issue and conflict over values will
always be the underlying motivation, until the west either ends its universalist crusade, or
abolishes liberal democracy within its own borders.
I would be more sympathetic with Klare's fear of cold war with China if he could just assure
me that Chinese writers are equally able to voice concern with their own government's side of
the equation.
History shows that wars are caused by the clash of interests, that's always at some
else's expense. When core interests collide there is no alternative to war – however
destructive.
Pretty much, BUT, with one little difference re "some else's expense" now. M.A.D.
scenario.
Even limited exchange of thermonuclear M.I.R.V.s could affect everyone (even if somebody
can define that "limited" in the first place).
My take: we haven't developed, as species, along our capability for destruction.
Cheerful thought, I know.
Pepe Escobar says:
'US elites remain incapable of understanding China'
That's B.S., Pepe should've known better .
They dont 'misunderstand', they'r simply lying thru their teeth.
The following are all bald faced lies,
Classic bandits crying robbery.
Lawmaker: Chinese navy seeks to encircle US homeland
[bravo, This one really takes the cake !]
US Accuses China Of Preparing For World War III
US accuses China of trying to militarise and dominates space
USN have to patrol the SCS to protect FON for international shipping..
tip of an iceberg
Those who uttered such nonsense aint insane, stupid or cuz they 'misunderstand'
[sic] China. They know we know they'r telling bald faced lies
but that doesnt stop them lying with straight face .
This is the classic def of psychopaths:
people who'r utterly amoral, no sense of right or wrong, there's no such word as
embarrassment in their vocab.
Is it sheer coincidence that all the 5lies have been ruled by such breeds ?
Ask Ian Fleming's fundamental law of prob .
but why couldnt they produce one decent leader
in all of three hundred years.
5lies have more than their fair share of psychopaths no doubt, but surely not everybody is
like joe web and co., I know this for a fact. ?
Trouble is .
Washington DC is a veritable cesspool that
no decent man would want to dip his foot into it.
They might as well put it in the job requirement, 'Only psychopaths need apply '
Thats why in the DC cesspool, only the society's dregs rise up to the top.
A case of garbage in, garbage out .
A vicious circle that cant be fixed, except to be broken.
1) People from China PRC has as a people on the whole become quite disgusting. But please
exclude ppl from Hong Kong, Taiwan, Tibetans, Uyghurs etc. I confirm that PRC China people by
and large are now locusts of the world. I am one of them by birth. how did it happen? Deep
question for philosophers. It wasn't like this 60 years ago. some poisonous element entered
the veins of the collective, infected at least 70 percent. I worry for Russia due to its
inflated self confidence when dealing with PRC. Lake Baikal deal was almost sealed before it
got shelved. Still, using racial curses don't hurt anyone but yourself. All the big internet
advocates for Russia such as Orlov and Saker and Karlin don'tunderstand The Danger of China
PRC. If you understand then you have a responsibility to keep yourself décent and
respectable.
2) USA aside from its liberals and Zionist Jews etc. Has become a slowly stewing big asylum
for psychologically infantile and demented big babies. How did it happen again is a big
philosophical myth to me. Western Europe is sinking primarily because they came to resemble
the US. especially French and Brits and Spanish.
3) Russia is ruled by a few individuals with brains and maybe a bit of conscience but the
elite ruling class behave in such a way that one would conclude that they share the China PRC
virus, just not as advanced. Your basic Russian people are in a state of abject degradation
dejection, not changed all that much since 1990s. Only slightly ahead of the Ukrainians. If
one cares about Russia then shove aside 19th century naive romanticism and face reality.
4) A sustained and massive war by USA against China maybe the only miniscule chance
Greek/Christian civilization can be saved. Otherwise descend of history into thousand year
dark age. The latter is more likely due to advanced stage of brain dead disease gripping the
entire West.
If you have observed cities like Detroit or Greater Los Angeles than you know that "white
flight" as oppose to sycophancy is the end result of black or Hispanic populations reaching a
certain level. Whites leave and the US then has another internal third world like Detroit or
East LA.
It is a game of musical chairs where the white move into remote hinterlands, which develop
into suburbs or exurbs, then of course as these become population centers the blacks and
Hispanics enter them and the whites flee again.
What you will see is white flight from the US with the wealthiest whites simply moving to
other developed countries. The 1% would move to New Zealand or Tasmania.
The handicap for the USA in the confrontation is twofold its élite are in conflict
(and afraid, and contemptuous of) at least half of their own populace.
Plus, all the resources of all kinds directed to enterprises in the Middle East, subtracted
thusly from other enterprises.
Furthermore, there is the occasional bullying of Europe, and the continuous bullying of
Russia, yet more resource drains.
The USA spreads itself too thin, perhaps.
@peterAUS Chinese are
neither for money nor for ethnic power, Chinese is for 5 principles of peaceful coexistence,
treating all nations large and small as equal with respect.
Chinese believes we are now living in a rapidly changing world Peace, development,
cooperation and mutual benefit have become the trend of our times. To keep up with the times,
we cannot have ourselves physically living in the 21st century, but with a mindset belonging
to the past stalled in the oldays of colonialism, and constrained by the zero-sum Cold War
mentality.
Chinese is determined to help the world to achieve harmony, peace and prosperity thru the
win-win approaches.
@Китайский
дурак 2) The riddle reads simply: democracy,
multiracialism, economic welfare (no-limit printing of currency made possible by uncontested
military "overmatch").
I lived in the Philippines and would chalk that up to fairly typical of a country run by
China since it is effectively controlled by a syndicate of Fujian family cartels.
First, you have a choke-hold on the economy and wages are depressed to near starvation
levels.
Second, Chinese will bring corruption to the nth degree by bribing whichever politician
will serve their own interests at the expense of the public.
Thirdly, those Chinese who cannot succeed in business will get into the drug trade and
China and Taiwan has created the Philippines drug war by making meth.
Fourth, there are fiery pogroms when the local population react with "burnouts" and
innocent Chinese are killed.
This is on the horizon in Africa. Probably.
In the West, Chinese were held in check by Jews and WASPS and to some degree by
Malaysians. I see Africa becoming like the Philippines once Chinese can become citizens
there, however.
@Biff The Romans create a
desert and call it peace; British Empire imitated Roman Empire, USA is born out of British
Empire; so only the White People particular the Anglo-Saxon is not ready for peace or
salvation. But rest of the world has been waiting for peace or salvation for a long long
time.
Chinese are neither for money nor for ethnic power, Chinese is for 5 principles of
peaceful coexistence, treating all nations large and small as equal with respect.
Peace, development, cooperation and mutual benefit have become the trend of our
times.
Chinese is determined to help the world to achieve harmony, peace and prosperity thru
the win-win approaches.
Three options here:
Preferably,you are just pulling our legs. Not bad attempt, actually. Got me for a second.
Most likely, you are simply working. Sloppy and crude but, well, "you get what you pay
for". 50 Cent Army. Retired but needing money. Sucks, a?
Crazy and the least probable, you really believe in all that. Ah, well
@jeff
stryker Obviously you are brain washed by the 'god-fearing' morally defunct evil
'Anglo-Saxon', blaming every of your own failure on the Chinese just like what the Americans
and their Five-Eyes partners are doing right now.
The Filippino, the Malay and all the SE Asia locals have the guns not the Chinese, if the
Chinese do not hand over their hard earned money they will use what their ex-colonial masters
taught them since Vasco da Gama discovered the East Indies, masscared the Chinese and took it
all. The Dutch, Spanish, English, Japanese and the American all have done it before in order
to colonized the East Indies.
Before WWII, the American is just one of the Western imperialists ravaged and wreaked
havoc of Asia with barbaric wars, illicit drugs like Opium, slavery, stealing, robbing,
looting, plundering, murdering, torturing, exploiting, polluting, culture genocide, 'pious'
fanaticism, unmatchable greed and extreme brutality. In fact it is hard to tell the
difference between the American and the unrepentant war criminal Japanese who is more lethal
and barbaric to Asians until the Pearl Harbour incident.
For over seventy years the US has dominated Asia, ravaging the continent with two major
wars in Korea and Indo-China with millions of casualties, and multiple counter-insurgency
interventions in Indonesia, Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines, Timor, Myanmar, Pakistan and
Afghanistan. The strategic goal has been to expand its military and political power, exploit
the economies and resources and encircle China.
USA is 10,000 miles away on the other side of the Pacific. USA is not an Asian nation, and
American is an alien to Asia. American is a toxin and a plague to Asian, They have done
enough damage to Asian already, they are not wanted, not invited and not loved in Asia, go
home Yankee.
@peterAUS You should know
the White man has some fallacies built into their culture, such as they believe that the
White man's words must be taken as given truth, only the White man can invent and the White
man can succeed, and the Whte man's culture is the final form of civilization.
The West (Europeans and their offshoots like the American, Aussie, etc.) is where is now,
because of those hundreds of millions of people all over the world who were robbed and
murdered, those who become victims of their very madness of colonialism and orientalism, of
the crusades and the slave and Opium trades. Cathedrals and palaces, museums and theatres,
train stations – all had been constructed on horrid foundations of bones and blood, and
amalgamated by tears.
The West squandered all the wealth they obtained thru stealing, looting and murdering
hundreds of millions of people all over the world in the scrabbling of a dog-eat-dog play
rough over the monopoly to plunder the rest of the world through two World Wars, one on the
edge of Armageddon, and on the verge of another Armageddon. It proves the West is incapable
of bringing peace and prosperity to the mankind because of their flawed culture, civilization
and religion. The chaos and suffering of the world in the last few hundreds of years under
the dominance the West proves they are a failure.
Human beings deserve better, we need to depart from the chaotic and harmful world order
and path established by the moronic West. China proposed a new way of life, a win-win
approach for the well-being of mankind like Belt-Road-Initiative to build and trade the world
into peace, harmony and prosperity. The West should not be the obstacle for achieving such
refreshing winner for all initiative. The West should embrace the new approach proposed by
China because the West will benefit from it. I call upon you, let go the old, obsolete,
failed and detrimental believe passed onto you by your colonialist forebears please, welcome
the new era.
As Steve Jobs told Obama point blank, "Those jobs aren't coming back". NA's
manufacturing ecosystem (rather than mere infrastructure), which includes social-cultural
aspects as well as physical plant has been disappeared, and only dire necessity will build
a new one. I explicitly avoid the word "rebuild", as that train left the station years ago.
NA still "assembles" stuff, but it doesn't manufacture except on a small, niche scale.
Manufacturing is a difficult and very demanding business. 21st C manufacturing is not
simply an extension of the 20th's. It's a radically different hybrid of logistics, design
& production engineering, "smart" plant, and financial mgmt.
Not for the faint of heart. Much easier to flip burgers/houses/stocks/used
cars/derivatives/credit swaps/ until there's nothing left to flip.
All true, leaving the question of what happens to North America before it reaches the
African street market economy (low tech, low investment, low trust, basic products, vibrant
and over each morning).
The Western European based US economy is fast draining out (along with people of Western
European descent) and the days of US world manufacturing leadership (1950's) are a distant
memory.
Maybe the takeaway from US/Chinese history is that the US needs its own Maoist style
Cultural Revolution. Nothing short of US Maoism is needed to root out every aspect of the
current rotten system and get a fresh start from zero.
If Chinese took over the world it would look like the Philippines.
Shabu labs everywhere? Corrupt politicians blowing away homeless squatters when some
Chinese guy wanted to build a shopping center or Chinese arsonists setting squats on fire?
Dictators living off wages Chinese don't want to pay exploited peasants?
No thanks, the whites don't want Chinese family cartels running our economies. We can see
the harm you have done in Burma, Philippines etc.
@jeff
stryker This Joe Wong is obviously a WuMao (professional trolls paid by Beijing to parrot
their government's pathological propaganda). Any mainland Chinese who can read will confirm
this fact. It is not worth your time to deal with folks like him.
@jeff
stryker Australians, Philippines, Singaporeans, Vietnamese, Taiwanese, Russians,
Italians, Japanese,Mongolians, Koreans, New Zealanders, a tiny anguished minority of mainland
Chinese themselves, everyone has gotten the mail, everyone has seen them on the streets,
everyone understood -- what a Beijing lorded world shall be like, coffee beans in the
morning. Americans are last in getting the news. Americans can be dim witted. Too many Nobel
winning economists and globalist bankers in America. And China is the gift of these white
people to the world.
@peterAUS thanks and if you
are a young man, congrats for your rationality. I am old, but probably have ten or 20 years
left, if not all those years real fit.
The young guys need to not fuc themselves up with regard to earning a living .keep your
mouth shut , sort of, and your name protected.
I hope a new generation of "White Nationalists" come along sans Hitlerism. Stay rational,
with just the facts M'am if you don't recall that line it was Dragnet and Detective Jack Webb
I think .you are young, Congrats.
Stick to the facts, keep your ego under control, keep a smile on your face .. Buddhist
wisdom to spread a little love around and it is essential for snaring a woman.
The Facts are with us. The Future is with us, including hard times, civil war, and so on.
The Sentimental Lie (Joseph Conrad) of race equality cannot stand for long.
@jeff
stryker Australian people nowadays are far less wrapped up in America than at any time
that I can remember but Australian politicians are just as bought and paid for as are those
in the US.
Australians generally are much more well travelled than most Americans and have been to
various places both in Asia and Europe, especially the UK. Despite having seen the longer
term results of "diversity" with their own eyes they overwhelmingly seem to think that things
will somehow work out differently in Australia. To even suggest that mass immigration from
the third world is a ticking time-bomb is to be branded a racist of the very worst kind.
"The best way for the US to win a war over China is not to outsource their labor
there."
Too bad you don't get to decide what "the best way for the US" is, no matter how many
times you vote America has owners, and the owners aren't the average Americans.
PS. Philippines is just the poor-man version of USA. Does the American capitalist class
have many concerns for their working class? The money class are all the same.
Your rant about Chinese of SE Asia is also quite similar with that of American Whites for
the Jews, or South African Blacks for the Whites, just only on economic side, not
politics.
Filipinos are nothing but semi retarded 85 IQ trying hard Americans, the vast majority who
are too stupid to copy the better parts of US high culture, and so ape and cargo cult the
trashiest and lowest of the low parts of US culture, or maybe low IQ Austronesians are just
prone to overall trashiness unless they are regulated by a somewhat draconian conservative
culture like Muslim Malays are.
@Китайский
дурак Perhaps some Russians like you are willing to live
under the Anglo-Saxon's dominance, submitted to Anglo-Saxon's zero-sum, beggar-thy-neighbour,
negative energy infested cult culture, and try to talk like them and walk like them, but not
everybody is like those feeble Russians. Other people has their long history, culture and
identity to protect. Please do not smear other people's integrity because you are lack of it.
If they turn on their radars we're going to blow up their goddamn SAMs [surface-to- air
missiles]. They know we own their country. We own their airspace We dictate the way they
live and talk. And that's what's great about America right now . It's a good thing,
especially when there's a lot of oil out there we need.
Comments about the bombing of Iraq in the late 1990s, which he directed. Interview
Washington Post (August 30, 1999); quoted in Rogue State, William Blum, Common Courage Press,
2005, p. 159.
William Blum,
RIP
Somebody should do an autopsy on him !
In korea, a UN coaliton force , bristling with bombers, jet fighters, complete air
superiority.no less. Tanks, artilleries, carbines, couldnt subdue the PLA fighting with ww1
vintage rifles.
There is never any UN coalition force in Korea war. Its a illegal US led aggression, known
as Unified/United Command, in violating of UNSC charter. US deceived UN by using 'United
Command' in its letterhead when communicating. And then go ahead to lie shamelessly using UN
name.
By acting before the Security Council could act, the US was in violation of Article 2(7)
of the UN Charter which requires a Security Council action under Chapter VII before there
is any armed intervention into the internal affairs of another nation unless the arms are
used in self-defense. (See Article 51 of the UN Charter. The US armed intervention in Korea
was clearly not an act of self defense for the US.) Also the actions of the UN have come to
be referred to as the actions of the "United Nations Command"(UNC), but this designation is
not to be found in the June and July 1950 Security Council resolutions authorizing
participation in the Korean War. (3) What is the significance of the US using the UN in
these ways?
The current US military command in South Korea claims to wear three hats: Command of US
troops in South Korea, Combined Forces Command (US and South Korean troops), and "United
Nations Command" with responsibilities with respect to the Armistice. The United Nations,
however, has no role in the oversight or decision making processes of the "United Nations
Command". The US Government is in control of the "United Nations Command". The use by the
US of the designation "United Nations Command", however, creates and perpetuates the
misconception that the UN is in control of the actions and decisions taken by the US under
the "United Nations Command".
The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (more commonly referred to as North Korea) has
called for disbanding the "United Nations Command"(UN Command). At a press conference held
at the United Nations on June 21, 2013, the North Korean Ambassador to the UN, Ambassador
Sin Son Ho argued that the actions of the US Government using the designation "United
Nations Command" are not under any form of control by the United Nations. (4) Since the UN
has no role in the decision making process of what the US does under the title of the
"United Nations Command", North Korea contends the US should cease its claim that it is
acting as the "United Nations Command".
Anyway, there is hardly a tree left in China and since 2006, China has been the world's
largest emitter of CO2 annually and though they pay lip service they accept no binding
target for reduction; quite the opposite.
Pls has slight decency to check before spewing nonsense.
According to Nasa, China has planted & expanded forest the size of Amazon,
contributing 1/4 of global greenery effort.
Its now working on massive irrigation projects in Tibet & Xinjiang, including dams
that will overshadow 3Gorges. These will convert arid Xinjiang into another green agriculture
pasture & food basket providing economic to it landlocked natives.
China's effort to roll back desertification is also very impressive, converting thousands
of hectares deserts into green forest using proprietary planting method.
It has built world most hydropower stations & dams in China, and help built in Asia,
Africa with grants & subsidized loan. Forefront in reusable energy, EV, solar.
And China is the staunchest supporter of CO2 emission control with solid actions, when US
write off Kyoto treaty in Paris as hoax.
what's about Spore that have 75% majority Chinese mainly come from Fujian too, HK,
Taiwan!? Do they fare well & very safe, or a shithole filled with drugs & crimes that
you projected to be?
And then compare with Chinese minority countries:
Msia with 25% Chinese contributing 70% economy, Indonesia 3% Chinese contributing 70%
economy.
Thailand, Myanmar, Laos, Cambodia, Philippines, .
It seems that the more Chinese % a country has, the more its prosperous & safe, vice
versa. So Chinese is in fact the main economic & safety contributing factor, instead of
the other way round you painted.
If Chinese are indeed as evil as you make out to be, then China will be worst than India,
dysfunctional like Philippines, completely crimes & drugs infested like Mexico. Yet China
today is biggest growing economy in real ppp, and world safest country well surpassing nearly
all whites countries. No?
Vietnam tried to purge Chinese ethics under Ho Chih Min anti-China policy, ended paralyzed
its entire economy until Chinese were brought back to help. Today its still the Chinese
ethics controlling its majority economy & ruling elites.
Indonesia Prez Suharto slaughtered million of Chinese ethics under Yanks CIA instigation
to coup pro-China Prez Sukarno, and their economy suffered. Suharto later brought back
Chinese to run 70% of economy, while his cronies suck off remaining.
Malaysia Mahatir had forthright admonished his disgruntled Malays complaining about 20%
Chinese controlling 70% economy. He famously said Malays race by inheritance is lazy and bad
in economic, screwing up every gov granted projects & handouts. So let the skillful
Chinese take care of all business, and Malays can tax on them to make Malaysia prosperous.
All subsequent leaders follow that policy, and the result is continuous economy growth.
Myanmar purged Chinese after independent, immediately encountered dysfunction economy.
Today its still relying on Chinese ethic to support the main economy behind.
Thailand, Cambodia, Laos didn't purge Chinese ethics, and Chinese are similarly their main
economy contributors.
There is one common observation in all these countries, where ever Chinese live, they are
mostly law obedient, work diligently and eventually established in businesses contributing to
most prosperity.
Whereas in majority Catholics Philippines, are literally controlled by Vatican appointed
bishops, who forbid contraceptive & divorce, directly causing its explosive population,
leading to grave poverty & crimes. These bishops are also colluding with corrupted
politicians to dictate election outcome using their churh influence.
When pro-China Prez Duerte declared war on drugs with China help is achieving good result,
these West-appointed bishops are leading their followers in full force to oppose, all in syn
with West govs 'human rights'. Dont that smell fishy?
So will Philippines be better off without Chinese? Im not sure, just like whites, some
Chinese are also ruthless crimals. But your sweeping statements & allegation certainly is
fundamentally flawed.
But CIA has been plotting anti-Chinese ethic riots in Asean for a long time as part of
China containment plan. Previously Denk posted one article on this.
@TT
Your description of Malaysians as lazy and stupid is why Indonesians kill ethnic Chinese and
not some CIA plot. That's the thinking right there that motivates Malays to dislike ethnic
Chinese.
China did not help Duterte. China makes the drugs there or in Taiwan. Duterte pleaded with
them to stop sending shabu to the Philippines but China does not care and so Filipinos
continue to stagger around like zombies in their squats.
Philippines has the additional post-colonial curse of Mestizo half-breed Spanish
landowning and political class of "Hacienderos" while Malaysians are unified under Islam.
Since these Spanish-blooded elite are part-white, some of the blame for the problems in the
Philippines can be attributed to whites.
As for CIA containment plans, you'll probably say that the reason Singapore immigration
allowed so many Indians in was because the US government wanted to import a competitive
ethnic group to prevent Chinese in Singapore from controlling all of Southeast Asia.
"An emboldened China could someday match or even exceed U.S. power on a global scale, an
outcome American elites are determined to prevent at any cost."
They will fail. The United States, like Carthage, is doomed to lose its struggle for
dominance; too many things are running against it. Not only does China have the far larger
population, but consider the following factors that run in their favor:
1. Like the US, China has a highly advanced and productive agriculture industry, making
them all but immune to nation-killing food blockades.
2. China has an average IQ that may approach Japan's before it levels out; Japan is
insanely outsized in terms of competitiveness, mainly due to its intelligent, group-oriented
population, so imagine how much stronger China could be.
3. China is geographically situated in the heart of the world's economic engine, Asia.
This puts China in prime position to break out from US dominance and, potentially, even
surround the Americans by making their trading partners their vassals.
4. The US is located far away and in a fairly unimportant region of the world. It will be
difficult for the US to get reinforcements to the Asian theater in the advent of a conflict.
American allies know this, so they will be predisposed to making peace with the Chinese as
the power balance continues to shift in China's favor.
5. Universalist dogma outsourced to American satellites Australia and New Zealand will
eventually make both countries Chinese vassals. Sometime in this century both countries will
have majority Asian populations due to immigration. Polls have repeatedly shown that Asian
immigrants have positive feelings towards the Chinese, despite the propaganda efforts of the
Americans. Take a look at what the Israel Lobby has accomplished and imagine what a future
China Lobby in those countries will do. Also, there is virtually no way to stop this from
eventually happening as this diversity dogma is spouted by the US at the highest level and is
now deeply ingrained in its future Chinese satellites. Before the end of the century, the
Chinese will have naval bases in both countries and the US will have none.
6. China is free from the social-trust killing, national ethos-sapping political
divisiveness seen in the US – no feminism, no attacks on its majority Han population.
America, on the other hand, is beset with hundreds of hate hoaxes targeted at its most
important demographic, white males – the group that disproportionately dies in its
wars, invents its best technology, and exports the best elements of its culture. If there is
a military conflict between China and the United States ten years hence, expect the critical
white male demographic to sit it out.
7. The Chinese are deeply patriotic and nationalistic. The US has experienced an
unprecedented decline in patriotism according to polls; that trend will continue. Therefore,
there is little appetite in the US for confrontation. This as a hungry China chomps at the
bit to show everyone who "the real ruler of the world is", a concept I sometimes see floated
on their social media.
8. The US is rapidly losing cultural influence due to a diminished Hollywood. The last
several American tent poll films, for instance, have crashed in Asia. Meanwhile movies like
Alita: Battle Angel (adapted from a Japanese anime) have done well in that market while doing
not so well in the US (and coming under immense fire from SJW gatekeepers for portraying a
female as something other than a weirdo). This means that tastes are diverging between the
two markets, a trend the Chinese can exploit in the future due to shared tastes across the
region and American inability to make anything other than low-quality superhero movies.
Hollywood is also now pretty much incapable of making the kinds of movies Asians (and
Europeans) used to see – science fiction, fantasy, and action/adventure movies –
due to rampant anti-white male hate and an industry focused on other demographics. Gone are
the movies like Robocop, Aliens, Jurassic Park, Die Hard, The Terminator, The Lord of The
Rings, and the Matrix. Gone because the white guys who made them are aging out of the
industry (or changing genders) and now all Hollywood wants to make are infantile superhero
movies for the Idiocracy demographic.
And did you see the Oscars this year? What an embarrassment. They actually nominated Black
Panther for Best Picture. I can't imagine anyone in Asia cares. They couldn't even get a
host.
9. The Chinese are primed to dominate influential cultural industries like video games in
a way that the Americans cannot due to checklist diversity requirements and the many
anti-male gatekeepers within the industry.
The video game industry is now three times the size of Hollywood and much more influential
than Hollywood for the youth. When technology and budgets are not a limiting factor,
politically-incorrect nations like Japan dominate over large American corporations like
Microsoft. The American video game industry, led by Microsoft, has effectively zero influence
in Asian nations due to American corporate greed, developer laziness, checklist diversity,
feminism, and a short-sighted strategy of broadly targeting low quality material to low
quality people (stupid FPS games).
Microsoft has been crushed so badly by the Japanese that they are now putting their
software on the Nintendo Switch; they simply cannot compete on any level. Meanwhile, Chinese
cultural influencers grow in power. They await only a maturation in Chinese taste and a
forward-thinking export policy but it will come. China's Tencent already owns a significant
stake in Epic Games, a streaming platform that will compete with America's Steam for
dominance of the huge online market.
One day, China will dominate their inferior American competition just as the Japanese and
Koreans have done. This bodes very badly for the US in the future, especially when you stop
to consider that all movies may be CGI in the future. The Chinese market is still immature,
but when it does mature, it will dominate – games, movies, music everything.
10. Divisive rhetoric promoted by the American elite and aimed at white European-Americans
– an effort to suppress white group solidarity – will eventually drive a wedge
between Europe and America that the Chinese, through their Russian ally, can exploit. You
already see a bit of this in Germany's refusal to cancel their gas pipeline (Nordstream 2, if
I recall), and Italy's defiance of the Empire over Venezuela. When racist American
politicians like Kamala Harris begin stealing money from European Americans and handing it to
blacks through reparations schemes, expect the Europeans to start thinking twice about their
relationship with this country.
After Trump loses in 2020, European elites will celebrate but not for long. Over the
following decade, both the far left (for economic reasons) and the far right (for ethnic
reasons) may unite against the United States. That will be made all the easier once the
United States is no longer able to elect a competent European as president. Europe isn't
going to want to be ruled over by someone of a different ethnic group that hates their
own.
11. China is unified in a way the US never can be again. China is 90% Han Chinese. The US
gets more diverse and divided by the day. Therefore, the Chinese public is more resilient to
conflict with rivals.
12. China's political model is far superior to their American counterpart. The Americans,
for instance, elect incompetent leaders through national popularity contests; said leaders
then rule only for favored interests. China, on the other hand, is run by smart people for
the benefit of all Chinese – the nation-state.
13. China's economic model is far superior to the corrupt, inefficient American corporate
model. Whereas China is a meritocracy not beset with crippling diversity requirements and
feminism. Tellingly, whenever the two models have gone head-to-head, such as in Africa, the
Chinese have won by a large margin. I see nothing that will change that in the future as that
would require a wholesale rethinking in the US of their basic philosophies, both on the left
and the right and that is impossible at this point.
The US is a proposition nation, so dogma lies at the heart of civic life. The Chinese, in
contrast, are free to pick and chose from the best of each ideology and apply it where
warranted because they are a blood and soil nation – group interest comes first, not
allegiance to dogma. Everyone in the US is an extremist of some sort – socialist,
corporatist, environmentalist, etc. That's no way to run a government.
14. The US will soon lose the moral high ground. As the US devolves into a police state,
as it continues kicking dissidents off the internet and silencing whistle blowers (and
attacking nations like Iran and Venezuela), nations around the world will cease to see a
difference between the US and China. At that point, they my either go independent (perhaps in
alliance with India or Russia) or openly start to flirt with a Chinese alliance. After all,
what does it matter if both states are authoritarian? At least the Chinese don't have a
history of invading their competition.
15. The divided American public may not support more military spending over social service
spending; this likelihood will only increase in the future due to demographic changes. They
see that China has a competent single-payer medical program and will want the same for
themselves, not pay for missiles and guns for other people.
16. The US cannot pursue relationships with vital nations like Russia due its anti-male
and anti-European dogma, now infused into society at the highest levels. It will take decades
to erase that and by then it will be too late.
"Someone here mentioned the EU turning East. At some point the EU will decide that staying a
US vassal is suicide and it will turn East. When that happens then the virus of US insanity
will turn inwards into itself."
True. One day someone like Kamala Harris or Stacey Abrams will be president. Will Europe
want to be ruled by non-Europeans who hate Europeans, want to tear down their monuments, and
steal their money for reparations payments?
"The USA has lost strategic air superiority, as well as strategic brain power. I wonder
how the USA would look after a week of retaliatory aerospace strikes?"
Like New Orleans after Katrina – a breakdown in the social order as all the diverse
groups start fighting each other and shooting at rescue efforts because they're morons and
thieves.
"Open the USA borders wide open and encourage 1 billion South Aemricans, Africans, SE
Asians and South Asians into the USA is the fastest and easiest way to close the human
resource gap between the USA and China."
How exactly is an efficient democracy supposed to work in that instance? Seems like
dysfunction, low social trust, and corruption would reign. Besides, the Chinese population
will still be far more intelligent overall, so no gap will be closed. The US should have
focused on immigration from Europe and increasing its white birth rate back in the 1970s.
They'd be in a far stronger position now if they had done that then.
@Anon Which West European
nations willing to move to dysfunctional disUnited States filled with crimes &
unemployment en masse?
May be some poor cousins of East European. But they will soon find US is worst than their
country, no good jobs, homeless without affordable accommodation, crime infested, their
whites is actually marginalized by diversification, LGBT conflict with their WASP value. Most
will want go back soon.
So its left with only choice of finest selection of 1.3B poor Indians, Latino, South
Americans, Africans & ME refugees willing to go anywhere just to get out of their
countries shithole.
When they arrived, hundreds of millions whites, Chinese & Asians will flee like been
no tomorrow.
Here it go, United States of Asshole is founded. Pls handover all nukes to UNSC before
implementing lest been exchange for food or use for heating in winter.
@jeff
stryker Its Malaysia PM Mahatir who said Malays are inheritingly lazy. Im just quoting.
Do educate yourself about CIA & Muslim politicians instigated riots against ethnic
Chinese before writing off in ignorant.
Spore was shielded from all these info distorted with West msm propaganda. I had only
learned about these details from Indonesian Chinese friends whose family had suffered these
trauma. After some readings, also Indonesia under current Chinese ethnic President Jokowi,
did all these CIA-Muslims Generals collision genocides been publicized. How about you, where
you got yours?
China did not help Duterte. China makes the drugs there or in Taiwan. Duterte pleaded
with them to stop sending shabu to the Philippines but China does not care and so Filipinos
continue to stagger around like zombies in their squats.
Why did you say China didn't help Prez Duerte in drugs war, your Chinese philippino
mistress told you? Pls cite your evidence.
Its widely publicized in our msm, West msm that China gov working with Philippines police
to track & dry up many drugs supply, even donated rehab centers as part of long term
solution. So you mean all these West msm are lying to help China.
In your word, these shabu are make & sold by China gov? Or they are part of global
drug syndicates that operated in every countries including all West?
As for CIA containment plans, you'll probably say that the reason Singapore immigration
allowed so many Indians in was because the US government wanted to import a competitive
ethnic group to prevent Chinese in Singapore from controlling all of Southeast Asia.
Let these unequal US FTA & India CECA speak itself. These were shoved into our PM LEE
ass to screw SG, allowing unlimited Indians of all kinds & their families to live &
work in SG, with their mostly internationally unrecognized qualifications mandatory to be
accepted.
Also both US & India nationals enjoy tax free in property investment, while Sporeans
& all foreigners subjected to 3% + 7% + 7% tax regimes, literally giving them a 10~17%
profits upfront.
Indians as " competitive " ethnic group to suppress SG Chinese, you are joking or
seriously think Indians IQ80 & its education is superior to Sg Chinese IQ107 that rank
consistently Top in SAT, PISA & Olympiad?
These are the dredge of India, violent drunkard, not those US get. Numerous are caught
with fake certificates when they simply could not even do the most basic task, near
illiterate. A documentary show was make to investigate how widespread & complex is it in
India, even there are someone stationed to pick up call as reference to certify everything.
These including medical MD cert, aka fake Indian Drs that India Health Ministry condemn
openly been so rampant up to 80% of India Drs(that was posted in one of Unz old discussion
2yrs ago)
@Erebus If both US &
China go on full trade war 100% tariff, to the brim of stop trading, who do you think can
last longer?
As you said, in mere wks, US will be paralyzed with every shelves empty & factories
shut down. Emergency declared with imports from other sources with much chaos. Frustrated,
nation wide civil riots may ensue with states like California, Texas, demanding
independent.
Whereas for China its life as usual with some restructuring, since it can live without
yanks useless financial services, msm & few chips easily replaced by EU/Jp or live
without. Airbus will be happy to replace Boeing.
China total export to US is ~$500B, 50% are imported components, so $350B damage is passed
back to US $250B(total US export to China) & global suppliers $100B.
That make China actual impact only $150B, $4T reserved, it can theoretically offset the
trade loss for >20yrs, while continue to expand its domestic consumption, BRI & global
trade to fuel growth.
But the world will be in chaos to get double impact of a totally collapsed US $21T GDP
& China import cut. With all economies stunt, global financial mkt burst, consumption all
dive, US allies turning to China for leadership & trade, a WW3 look imminent as yank is
left with only one product – weapons!
But not to worry, it should be very short one in yelling, as no yanks want to die with
empty belly, nor there are $ to pump vessels & bombers or resources to prepare long war.
Military is quickly paralyzed with desertion, & split between seperated states. There go
51 disUnited states of America.
So China is indeed discussing with yanks from great strength. But with farsight, they
prefer to settle yanks brinkmanship in Chinese humble & peaceful way.
I hope China can drag on until US can no longer conceal its pain with fake data,
screamming out loudly for truce to sign China dictates trade agreement. China need to teach
yank a painful lesson to humble it once & for all, including a WTO style unequal treaty
that yank shoved down china throat.
For all the refugees the US creates in the Mideast, it doesn't except many of them. Most
Iraqi and Afghani refugees have no hope of entering the US; European countries that protested
the war in Iraq end up absorbing the human cost.
As for the CIA cooperating with Muslims in anti-Chinese anything, I am skeptical. My
feeling about Indonesia is that a 3% minority owning everything and displaying contempt for
the natives as lazy savages is enough fuel ethnic hatred and Chinese backing of Suharto
didn't help things.
Indians don't represent job competition for Singapore, they are simply a basic menace to
your society. And it is possible that the US government, not wanting to see Singapore become
a vassal state of China, wanted your country's population to become more well,
diversified.
If both US & China go on full trade war 100% tariff, to the brim of stop trading,
who do you think can last longer?
China would take a hit, but not greater than the whole world could be expected to take.
Probably quite a bit less.
There's little doubt in my mind that China is in a much stronger position to both survive
and to be in a position to take advantage of the world's eventual recovery. As you note
$4T reserved, it can theoretically offset the trade loss for >20yrs
It also has the world's widest and deepest industrial infrastructure.
It's not only the $4T and the infrastructure. China also has a lot of gold within its
domestic system, which it can mobilize to make purchases from the the rest of the world's
staggered economies. Approx 20kT, by some quite carefully done estimates. Mobilizing that
gold, of course, is where things get tricky. The world would be awash with useless dollars
and how all that liability gets unwound would cause a lot of Central Bankers and their govts
a lot of sleepless nights.
"Which West European nations willing to move to dysfunctional disUnited States filled with
crimes & unemployment en masse?"
Quite a number of Europeans would have moved to the US circa 1965 – 1990 with the
countries then demographics, which was the point being made in the comment. The US is a huge
country with lots of space. In 1980, virtually all Eastern Europeans would have been better
off in almost any place in the US over where they were. The US Ruling Class had the chance
but cast it aside for lesser and more divisive groups so they could win elections and stiff
their workers. Even the US now is a mostly a better place to live than virtually any place in
Eastern Europe, and quite a number of places in overcrowded Western Europe – now filled
with Muslim invaders, rising crime, higher unemployment than the US, and yearly riots.
@Erebus One TV celebrity
went on crusade to expose Monsanto GMO toxicity impact in food chain few yrs ago.
He visited US & collected clinical evidences of GMO cancer causing from several US
professors, publicized them online. These force China gov to investigate, and their clinical
test too revealed mice & animals fed with GMO have huge tumors growing all over
shortly.
China agriculture minister was investigated, found to hold lucrative high pay job in
Monsanto taking bribery, and blanket approved all untested Monsanto GMO seeds, grains &
weed killer. Even those used as domestic animals feed but banned for wild animals in US were
introduced into food chain. Some also passed off as non GMO to plant in vast land not
approved for GMO.
About 30% of China food chain & vast agriculture lands contaminated, no longer
productive. That agri minister got arrested. No sure what China gov is doing about it. But
Prez Xi is hailing organic food. Tibets & Xinjiang have mega irrigation projects on going
now, might be to open up new agri lands to offset.
@jeff
stryker Tonnes of evidences on CIA-Muslim generals instigated riots & massacre since
1965. You choose to see otherwise.
A trove of recently released declassified documents confirms that Washington's role in the
country's 1965 massacre was part of a bigger Cold War strategy. https://www.theatlantic.com/amp/article/543534/
I couldn't find one article published in one unz comment by Denk?, where West msm
interviewing Indonesia biggest opposition party. Their chiefs had audacity to brag how they
will instigate another massive anti-Chinese riots to win next election.
The jews are much more vicious & open in controlling US, but you won't see CIA staged
riots & protest against their jewish masters Aipac.
Thailand Chinese ethnic are holding most economy too, but their politicians elites been
Chinese don't instigate riot against own ethnic to meddle election.
US government, not wanting to see Singapore become a vassal state of China, wanted your
country's population to become more well, diversified.
Its not diversification, its complete indianized with Weapon of Mass Migration, by jews
controlled US to push back China influence. As China refused to let jews control them!!! Its
also happening for Sri Lanka, Nepal, Bhutan, Mauritius now.
Its Top to bottom all indians now in SG, 9% Indians with India new migrants controlling
75% Chinese & 15% Malays. Since when Indians have turn so great well surpass all Chinese
capability, over a short span of 10yrs since Obama's new balance in Asia Pacific started. Its
a regime change, silent coup.
Starting from Indian Prez, Indian DPM(a ex-criminal for leaking state secret data, he was
highly touted as best future PM to test voter response, but a Chinese PM candidate was
eventually selected for coming election as voters brainwashing not yet complete), national
DBS bank CEO chairman Indian. Central bank MAS chief Indian. Law, Home Affair, Foreign
Minister all Indians. High court judges flooded Indians. Chief judge Indian. Top senior
counsels(equivalent to Queen Councils) many Indians. MPs also new india migrants. MSM
journalist & writers flooded Indians.
Some are India newly arrived Indians of no credential. Yet no msm reporting on that. Its
near complete regime change in stealth.
@Erebus In addition to the
herbicide and insecticide resistance some plants are modified to withstand prolonged dry
conditions, or to produce more of certain proteins or vitamins, or to increase yields.
The corn or maize we now have started from an indigenous plant in Central and South
America. Twenty plants would produce a tablespoon of grain. The native corn plant can still
be found. Over thousands of years these were bred for increased size and yields but probably
for other reasons as well like drought resistance. That's genetic modification over many
generations.
In this country the Food and Drug Admin. and Dept. of Agriculture have studied the
genetically modified plants extensively. Not that government agencies always get it right but
it would be interesting to see a real life example of these plants actually harming people,
or animals and insects. Sometimes the fear of Frankenfoods is related to a fear of lower cost
imports and a sop for the local farmers.
Having an interest in horticulture I produced greenhouse bedding plants for the most part.
One significant expense was pesticides. We took great pains to carefully watch the crops. If
the aphids, or other creatures, showed up we would strive to isolate the affected plants and
only treat the ones with aphids and some that were nearby. Lots of hours with a bright light
and magnifying glass. We didn't proactively apply these because of the expense. Sometimes an
entire greenhouse required several treatments and there goes much of the profit. On the other
hand refusing to use pesticides leads to total crop failures. Nobody applies pesticides if
there are no pests. Without pesticides the world population would be much smaller and the
remaining living people would know about famines.
In terms of space, most Europeans would immigrate to US cities. Chicago was popular with
Slavs, for instance. And of course Silicone Valley. Very few immigrants move to rural
wide-open areas. There is nothing to do there and Norwegians in 1990 were no longer
homesteading on the North Dakota plains.
By 1990, few Irish wanted to immigrated to Boston or Italians to New Jersey. Europe was
actually safer and more prosperous when I was young than the US.
Europeans prior to 1965 were attracted to the US middle-class standard of living and that
has shrunken precipitously.
The refugee crisis in Europe is relatively recent. As for unemployment, indeed this is
bad. But the social safety net is slightly better and there is less poverty overall in
Western Europe.
"Very few immigrants move to rural wide-open areas."
Sure, if you're talking Nevada or New Mexico desert. But there are areas considered
"rural" in the US that have relatively mid-sized cities nonetheless. Oklahoma City has a
population roughly equal to the population of Latvia's capital, for example. And I'm sure
that Eastern Europeans could have been coaxed to leave Europe for the US had America pursued
a deal with the Soviets – white South Africans, too. Certainly, this could have been
done with success post Soviet breakup. Some Western Europeans could also have been coaxed,
perhaps a few million, with the right financial incentives. Along with substantial efforts to
increase the native European birthrate and targeted, gender-imbalanced ~skills-based
immigration* from emerging market, high IQ countries, US demographics would be in a far
better place today. The country would be less divided and more rational on a global stage
(and probably friends with Russia, too).
*In other words, purposely encourage 2 to 1 female immigration from places like Korea and
China back when they were both poor and filled with people ready to emigrate and compliment
that with an equal but reversed ratio elsewhere (Vietnam, Laos). This forces interbreeding
and prevents formation of divisive ethnic communities, while also having the benefit of
harming your competitor's demographics down the road. Actor Keanu Reeves is something like
1/8th Japanese. But most people just think he's a white guy.
If that kind of policy had been adopted in 1965, along with my plan above (and a few other
things not mentioned), things would be better for the US now. The US would be overwhelmingly
white with a small admixture of smart Asian while leaving descendants who look European; the
kind of internecine racial strife we see now could have been avoided. However, that kind of
plan requires a competent, and rational, near-authoritarian to be in charge. As Fred Reed has
pointed out, that kind of plan is not capable in Western countries that choose their leaders
via popularity contest with a birthright citizenship voting base.
That's genetic modification over many generations.
One wonders how many fish genes made their way into corn over those generations, and how
they got in there.
it would be interesting to see a real life example of these plants actually harming
people, or animals and insects.
Pesticides of increasing toxicity are surely not good for insects. As for harming people,
I doubt we'd see any more harm than the fructose and aspartame etc, or the growth hormones
and rampant anti-biotic use in husbandry that those agencies approved have caused. Of course,
genetics is much more complex, and so who knows what will turn up in humans a few generations
from now.
Without pesticides the world population would be much smaller and the remaining living
people would know about famines.
I'm of the firm opinion that a smaller population would be a very, very good thing, and
we'll be seeing famines soon enough anyway, but on a scale that will dwarf all other
famines.
"Pesticides of increasing toxicity are surely not good for insects. As for harming people, I
doubt we'd see any more harm than the fructose and aspartame etc, or the growth hormones and
rampant anti-biotic use in husbandry that those agencies approved have caused. Of course,
genetics is much more complex, and so who knows what will turn up in humans a few generations
from now.'
The pests who feed on domesticated crops lived in nature before people were around. When
they stumble upon thousands of acres of corn or wheat they rapidly reproduce to exploit the
windfall. The pesticides will hopefully kill or drive off many of these insects but their
total number would probably be higher than in a pre-human environment. There is a balance of
power.
Utilizing the "precautionary principle" one could say any technical advance might have
some unanticipated detrimental effect in the near or distant future. Therefore let's stop all
new technology. For now we have the methods of physical science to guide us. These aren't
perfect but it's the best we have and more sensible than the precautionary principle, also
called the paralysis principle.
"..a smaller population would be a very, very good thing, and we'll be seeing famines soon
enough anyway, but on a scale that will dwarf all other famines.".
I'm hoping my family and I (and you) are not among the culled billions. Death by
starvation is not a pleasant way to go, so I've heard.
their total number would probably be higher than in a pre-human environment. There is a
balance of power.
Probably? Pre-human? Yours is the disingenuity of a pesticide salesman.
The insect world is in a massive die off, losing of ~75% its flying population over 3
decades, as attested by countless studies. The studies tell us what we already know. 40 yrs
ago, a 2 hr drive in the countryside at night meant 30 min spent scraping insects off your
windshield and headlights. Every lonely streetlight in the middle of nowhere had a cloud
around it. Screens to protect the radiator, or even the entire front of the car were sold by
every automotive shop and gas station. Seen one lately?
Utilizing the "precautionary principle" one could say any technical advance might have
some unanticipated detrimental effect in the near or distant future.
One could say it, and one would often be right for doing so. As the complexity of the
technological advance increases, so do its effects. Who considered 50 years ago that
pesticide use would devastate the insect world? Who knows with any level of certainty what
the effect of that will be on the ecosystem we live in? What we know is it ain't gonna likely
to be good, and may be devastating. They're now found in mother's milk with potential effects
we lack the tools and brain power to comprehend, never mind predict.
When it comes to playing with complex, chaotic systems that support our life on the
planet, humans are like a monkey with a hand-grenade. To borrow a phrase "If the planet's
ecosystem was simple enough to understand, we'd be too simple to understand it. " Our
myopia & hubris will kill us, if our stupidity and belligerence doesn't do it first.
The insect "die off" is an interesting occurrence. Puerto Rico lost a large percentage of
insects while at the same time they decreased pesticide use by 80%. This die off is observed
in a limited number of regions of the world. It isn't known exactly what caused the drop in
insect population. Some say pesticides, others say climate change (the theory that explains
all things), are killing the bugs.
Pesticides have been overused in the past but there have been impressive improvements in
the technology which reduces the amounts required. There are herbicides and pesticides
designed with chemical half lives. These kill the weeds or pests then break down into
harmless components and in 10-14 days can no longer be detected in the field. Unfortunately
for some any improvements will require some kind of technology.
We are all going to die eventually, hopefully later rather than sooner.
In his highly acclaimed 2017 book, Destined for
War , Harvard professor Graham Allison assessed the likelihood that the United States
and China would one day find themselves at war. Comparing the U.S.-Chinese relationship to
great-power rivalries all the way back to the Peloponnesian War of the fifth century BC, he
concluded that the future risk of a conflagration was substantial. Like much current analysis
of U.S.-Chinese relations, however, he missed a crucial point: for all intents and purposes,
the United States and China are already at war with one another. Even if their present
slow-burn conflict may not produce the immediate devastation of a conventional hot war, its
long-term consequences could prove no less dire.
To suggest this means reassessing our understanding of what constitutes war. From Allison's
perspective (and that of so many others in Washington and elsewhere), "peace" and "war" stand
as polar opposites. One day, our soldiers are in their garrisons being trained and cleaning
their weapons; the next, they are called into action and sent onto a battlefield. War, in this
model, begins when the first shots are fired.
Well, think again in this new era of growing great-power struggle and competition. Today,
war means so much more than military combat and can take place even as the leaders of the
warring powers meet to negotiate and share
dry-aged steak and whipped potatoes (as Donald Trump and Xi Jinping did at Mar-a-Lago in 2017).
That is exactly where we are when it comes to Sino-American relations. Consider it war by
another name, or perhaps, to bring back a long-retired term, a burning new version of a cold
war.
Even before Donald Trump entered the Oval Office, the U.S. military and other branches of
government were already gearing up for a
long-term quasi-war, involving both growing economic and diplomatic pressure on China and a
buildup of military forces along that country's periphery. Since his arrival, such initiatives
have escalated into Cold War-style combat by another name,
with his administration committed to defeating China in a struggle for global economic,
technological, and military supremacy.
This includes the president's much-publicized "trade war" with China, aimed at hobbling that
country's future growth; a techno-war designed to prevent it from overtaking the U.S. in key
breakthrough areas of technology; a diplomatic war intended to isolate Beijing and frustrate
its grandiose plans for global outreach; a cyber war (largely hidden from public scrutiny); and
a range of military measures as well. This may not be war in the traditional sense of the term,
but for leaders on both sides, it has the feel of one.
Why China?
The media and many politicians continue to focus on U.S.-Russian relations, in large part
because of revelations of Moscow's meddling in the 2016 American presidential election and the
ongoing Mueller investigation. Behind the scenes, however, most senior military and foreign
policy officials in Washington view China, not Russia, as the country's principal adversary. In
eastern Ukraine, the Balkans, Syria, cyberspace, and in the area of nuclear weaponry, Russia
does indeed pose a variety of threats to Washington's goals and desires. Still, as an
economically hobbled petro-state, it lacks the kind of might that would allow it to truly
challenge this country's status as the world's dominant power. China is another story
altogether. With its vast economy, growing technological prowess, intercontinental "Belt and
Road" infrastructure project, and rapidly modernizing military, an emboldened China could
someday match or even exceed U.S. power on a global scale, an outcome American elites are
determined to prevent at any cost.
Washington's fears of a rising China were on full display in January with the release of the
2019 Worldwide Threat Assessment of the U.S. Intelligence Community, a synthesis of the views
of the Central Intelligence Agency and other members of that "community." Its conclusion: "We
assess that China's leaders will try to extend the country's global economic, political, and
military reach while using China's military capabilities and overseas infrastructure and energy
investments under the Belt and Road Initiative to diminish U.S. influence."
To counter such efforts, every branch of government is now expected to mobilize its
capabilities to bolster American -- and diminish Chinese -- power. In Pentagon documents, this
stance is summed up by the term "overmatch," which translates as the eternal preservation of
American global superiority vis-à-vis China (and all other potential rivals). "The
United States must retain overmatch," the administration's National
Security Strategy insists, and preserve a "combination of capabilities in sufficient scale
to prevent enemy success," while continuing to "shape the international environment to protect
our interests."
In other words, there can never be parity between the two countries. The only acceptable
status for China is as a distinctly lesser power. To ensure such an outcome, administration
officials insist, the U.S. must take action on a daily basis to contain or impede its rise.
In previous epochs, as Allison makes clear in his book, this equation -- a prevailing power
seeking to retain its dominant status and a rising power seeking to overcome its subordinate
one -- has almost always resulted in conventional conflict. In today's world, however, where
great-power armed combat could possibly end in a nuclear exchange and mutual annihilation,
direct military conflict is a distinctly unappealing option for all parties. Instead, governing
elites have developed other means of warfare -- economic, technological, and covert -- to
achieve such strategic objectives. Viewed this way, the United States is already in close to
full combat mode with respect to China.
Trade War
When it comes to the economy, the language betrays the reality all too clearly. The Trump
administration's economic struggle with China is regularly described, openly and without
qualification, as a "war." And there's no doubt that senior White House officials, beginning
with the president and his chief trade representative, Robert
Lighthizer , see it just that way: as a means of pulverizing the Chinese economy and so
curtailing that country's ability to compete with the United States in all other measures of
power.
Ostensibly, the aim of President Trump's May 2018 decision to impose $60 billion in tariffs
on Chinese imports ( increased
in September to $200 billion) was to rectify a trade imbalance between the two countries, while
protecting the American economy against what is described as China's malign behavior. Its trade
practices "plainly constitute a grave threat to the long-term health and prosperity of the
United States economy," as the president put it when
announcing the second round of tariffs.
An examination of the demands submitted to Chinese negotiators by the U.S. trade delegation
last May suggests, however, that Washington's primary intent hasn't been to rectify that trade
imbalance but to impede China's economic growth. Among the stipulations Beijing must acquiesce
to before receiving tariff relief, according to leaked documents
from U.S. negotiators that were spread on Chinese social media:
halting all government
subsidies to advanced manufacturing industries in its Made in China 2025 program, an endeavor
that covers 10 key economic sectors, including aircraft manufacturing, electric cars, robotics,
computer microchips, and artificial intelligence; accepting American restrictions on
investments in sensitive technologies without retaliating; opening up its service and
agricultural sectors -- areas where Chinese firms have an inherent advantage -- to full
American competition.
In fact, this should be considered a straightforward declaration of economic war.
Acquiescing to such demands would mean accepting a permanent subordinate status
vis-à-vis the United States in hopes of continuing a profitable trade relationship with
this country. "The list reads like the terms for a surrender rather than a basis for
negotiation," was the way Eswar
Prasad, an economics professor at Cornell University, accurately described these
developments.
Technological Warfare
As suggested by America's trade demands, Washington's intent is not only to hobble China's
economy today and tomorrow but for decades to come. This has led to an intense, far-ranging
campaign to deprive it of access to advanced technologies and to cripple its leading
technology firms.
Chinese leaders have long realized that, for their country to achieve economic and military
parity with the United States, they must master the cutting-edge technologies that will
dominate the twenty-first-century global economy, including artificial intelligence (AI),
fifth-generation (5G) telecommunications, electric vehicles, and nanotechnology. Not
surprisingly then, the government has invested in a major way in science and technology
education, subsidized research in pathbreaking fields, and helped launch promising startups,
among other such endeavors -- all in the very fashion that the Internet and other American
computer and aerospace innovations were originally financed and
encouraged by the Department of Defense.
Chinese companies have also demanded technology transfers when investing in or forging
industrial partnerships with foreign firms, a common practice in international development.
India, to cite a recent example of this phenomenon, expects
that significant technology transfers from American firms will be one outcome of its
agreed-upon purchases of advanced American weaponry.
In addition, Chinese firms have been accused of
stealing American technology through cybertheft, provoking widespread outrage in this country.
Realistically speaking, it's difficult for outside observers to determine to what degree
China's recent technological advances are the product of commonplace and legitimate investments
in science and technology and to what degree they're due to cyberespionage. Given Beijing's
massive investment in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics education at the
graduate and post-graduate level, however, it's safe to assume that most of that country's
advances are the result of domestic efforts.
Certainly, given what's publicly known about Chinese cybertheft activities, it's reasonable
for American officials to apply pressure on Beijing to curb the practice. However, the Trump
administration's drive to blunt that country's technological progress is also aimed at
perfectly legitimate activities. For example, the White House seeks to ban Beijing's government
subsidies for progress on artificial intelligence at the same time that the Department of
Defense is
pouring billions of dollars into AI research at home. The administration is also acting to
block the Chinese acquisition of U.S. technology firms and of
exports of advanced components and know-how.
In an example of this technology war that's made
the headlines lately, Washington has been actively seeking to sabotage the efforts of
Huawei , one of China's most
prominent telecom firms, to gain leadership in the global deployment of 5G wireless
communications. Such wireless
systems are important in part because they will transmit colossal amounts of electronic
data at far faster rates than now conceivable, facilitating the introduction of self-driving
cars, widespread roboticization, and the universal application of AI.
Second only to Apple as the world's supplier of smartphones and a major producer of
telecommunications equipment, Huawei has sought to take the lead in the race for 5G adaptation
around the world. Fearing that this might give China an enormous advantage in the coming
decades, the Trump administration has tried to prevent that. In what is widely described as a "
tech
Cold War ," it has put enormous
pressure on both its Asian and European allies to bar the company from conducting business
in their countries, even as it sought the arrest in Canada of Huawei's chief financial officer,
Meng Wanzhou, and her extradition
to the U.S. on charges of tricking American banks into aiding Iranian firms (in violation of
Washington's sanctions on that country). Other attacks on Huawei are in the works, including a
potential
ban on the sales of its products in this country. Such moves are regularly described as
focused on boosting the security of both the United States and its allies by preventing the
Chinese government from using Huawei's telecom networks to steal military secrets. The real
reason -- barely disguised -- is simply to block China from gaining technological parity with
the United States.
Cyberwarfare
There would be much to write on this subject, if only it weren't still hidden in the shadows
of the growing conflict between the two countries. Not surprisingly, however, little
information is available on U.S.-Chinese cyberwarfare. All that can be said with confidence is
that an intense war is now being waged between the two countries in cyberspace. American
officials accuse
China of engaging in a broad-based cyber-assault on this country, involving both outright
cyberespionage to obtain military as well as corporate secrets and widespread political
meddling. "What the Russians are doing pales in comparison to what China is doing,"
said Vice President Mike Pence last October in a speech at the Hudson Institute, though --
typically on the subject -- he provided not a shred of evidence for his claim.
Not disclosed is what this country is doing to combat China in cyberspace. All that can be
known from available information is that this is a two-sided war in which the U.S. is
conducting
its own assaults. "The United States will impose swift and costly consequences on foreign
governments, criminals, and other actors who undertake significant malicious cyber activities,"
the 2017 National Security Strategy affirmed. What form these "consequences" have taken has yet
to be revealed, but there's little doubt that America's cyber warriors have been active in this
domain.
Diplomatic and Military Coercion
Completing the picture of America's ongoing war with China are the fierce pressures being
exerted on the diplomatic and military fronts to frustrate Beijing's geopolitical ambitions. To
advance those aspirations, China'sleadership is relying heavily on a much-touted
Belt and Road Initiative , a trillion-dollar plan to help fund and encourage the
construction of a vast new network of road, rail, port, and pipeline infrastructure across
Eurasia and into the Middle East and Africa. By financing -- and, in many cases, actually
building -- such infrastructure, Beijing hopes to bind the economies of a host of far-flung
nations ever closer to its own, while increasing its political influence across the Eurasian
mainland and Africa. As Beijing's leadership sees it, at least in terms of orienting the
planet's future economics, its role would be similar to that of the Marshall Plan that cemented
U.S. influence in Europe after World War II.
And given exactly that possibility, Washington has begun to actively seek to undermine the
Belt and Road wherever it can -- discouraging allies from participating, while stirring up
unease in countries like Malaysia and Ugandaover the enormous
debts to China they may end up with and the heavy-handed
manner in which that country's firms often carry out such overseas construction projects.
(For example, they typically bring in Chinese laborers to do most of the work, rather than
hiring and training locals.)
"China uses bribes, opaque agreements, and the strategic use of debt to hold states in
Africa captive to Beijing's wishes and demands," National Security Advisor John Bolton
claimed in a December speech on U.S. policy on that continent. "Its investment ventures are
riddled with corruption," he added, "and do not meet the same environmental or ethical
standards as U.S. developmental programs." Bolton promised that the Trump administration would
provide a superior alternative for African nations seeking development funds, but -- and this
is something of a pattern as well -- no such assistance has yet materialized.
In addition to diplomatic pushback, the administration has undertaken a series of
initiatives intended to isolate China militarily and limit its strategic options. In South
Asia, for example, Washington has abandoned its past position of maintaining rough parity in
its relations with India and Pakistan. In recent years, it's
swung sharply towards a strategic alliance with New Dehli, attempting to enlist it fully in
America's efforts to contain China and, presumably, in the process punishing Pakistan for its
increasingly enthusiastic role in the Belt and Road Initiative.
In the Western Pacific, the U.S. has stepped up its naval patrols and forged new
basing arrangements with local powers -- all with the aim of confining the Chinese military to
areas close to the mainland. In response, Beijing has sought to escape the grip of American
power by establishing miniature bases on Chinese-claimed islands in the South China Sea (or
even
constructing artificial islands to house bases there) -- moves widely condemned by the
hawks in Washington.
To demonstrate its ire at the effrontery of Beijing in the Pacific (
once known as an "American lake"), the White House has ordered an increased pace of
so-called freedom-of-navigation operations (FRONOPs). Navy warships regularly sail within
shooting range
of those very island bases, suggesting a U.S. willingness to employ military force to resist
future Chinese moves in the region (and also creating situations in which a misstep
could lead to a military incident that could lead well, anywhere).
In Washington, the warnings about Chinese military encroachment in the region are already
reaching a fever pitch. For instance, Admiral Philip Davidson, commander of U.S. forces in the
Pacific, described the
situation there in recent congressional testimony this way: "In short, China is now capable of
controlling the South China Sea in all scenarios short of war with the United States."
A Long War of Attrition
As Admiral Davidson suggests, one possible outcome of the ongoing cold war with China could
be armed conflict of the traditional sort. Such an encounter, in turn, could escalate to the
nuclear level, resulting in mutual annihilation. A war involving only "conventional" forces
would itself undoubtedly be devastating and lead to widespread suffering, not to mention the
collapse of the global economy.
Even if a shooting war doesn't erupt, however, a long-term geopolitical war of attrition
between the U.S. and China will, in the end, have debilitating and possibly catastrophic
consequences for both sides. Take the trade war, for example. If that's not resolved soon in a
positive manner, continuing high U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports will severely curb Chinese
economic growth and so
weaken the world economy as a whole, punishing every nation on Earth, including this one.
High tariffs will also increase costs for American consumers and endanger
the prosperity and survival of many firms that rely on Chinese raw materials and
components.
This new brand of war will also ensure that already sky-high defense expenditures will
continue to rise, diverting funds from vital needs like education, health, infrastructure, and
the environment. Meanwhile, preparations for a future war with China have already become the
number one priority at the Pentagon, crowding out all other considerations. "While we're
focused on ongoing operations," acting Secretary of Defense Patrick Shanahan reportedly
told
his senior staff on his first day in office this January, "remember China, China, China."
Perhaps the greatest victim of this ongoing conflict will be planet Earth itself and all the
creatures, humans included, who inhabit it. As the world's top two emitters of climate-altering
greenhouse gases, the U.S. and China must work together to halt global warming or all of us are
doomed to a hellish future. With a war under way, even a non-shooting one, the chance for such
collaboration is essentially zero. The only way to save civilization is for the U.S. and China
to declare peace and focus together on human salvation.
Michael T. Klare, aTomDispatch
regular, is the five-college professor emeritus of peace and world security
studies at Hampshire College and a senior visiting fellow at the Arms Control Association. His
most recent book isThe Race for What's
Left. His next book, All Hell Breaking Loose: Climate Change, Global Chaos, and
American National Security , will be published in 2019.
The genuinely expert panelists could not articulate America's demands beyond the familiar
'level playing field' that America created by shackling China with uniquely humiliating
conditions before admitting it to the WTO.
Today, China generates 20% of global GDP (the US 15%), its imports and exports are in
balance, its currency fairly valued, its economy one third larger and growing three times
faster than America's and it produces essential technology that America needs and cannot
provide.
It is almost impossible to imagine a war scenario that the US could win, short of China
invading America.
Excellent article Mister Klare, but would like to raise a few quibbles.
1) As far as "economic" war, China has been fighting one for decades. It's called competing
and trying to do the best to improve your people's lot. The US is finally starting to fight
back but some of it's measures are inappropriate and/or ineffective.
2) As far as the US trying to confine the Chinese military to its own region, I really
haven't seen that the Chinese military is particularly interested in operation outside their
own region anyway. It seems to be focused on protecting China and its own neighborhood and
interests, and the Chinese aren't stupid enough to bleed away their wealth and blood in
distant misadventures.
3) I'd gotten the impression from the Deep State's rhetoric that they are much hotter on
fighting a shooting war with Russia than with China. In an extended struggle, as long as it
doesn't go nuclear, US chances are much better against a Russia whose economy is only a
fraction of China's.
Keynes says this, "All trade is only barter." The Wall Street/China Gambit is key to
understanding today. Clinton signed MFN trade status with China, screwing over NAFTA. Those
Zenith TV's that were supposed to be made in Mexico became Chinese made electronics.
Balanced trade was also thrown out the window, as Wall Street was in on the gambit. Trade
in goods was unbalanced, and America supplied dollars to China to make up the difference.
China then recycled those mercantile won dollars back to the U.S. to buy Tbills, helping keep
interest rates low, and acting as a prime variable in forming U.S. housing bubble. Returning
dollars then spun out into the American economy, so American's could buy more Chinese goods
from transplanted American factories.
The wall street China gambit turned mainstreet American's into Zeros, while wall street
became heroes.
Any discussion of China current economic status cannot overlook the role of Wall Street
exporting of jobs, to then get wage arbitrage. Immigrating third world people into America is
also a function of this "finance capitalism" as it wants wage arbitrage from third world
labor as well.
Finance Capitalism in turn is part of Zion and Atlantacism. International credit "banking"
will send its finance capital anywhere in the world to get the lowest price. In the case of
China, overhang of communist labor in the mid 90's was available to make things, and then
export Chinese made goods back to U.S. (at the China price.)
China still uses Atlantic doctrine, where raw materials come in by ship, and finished
goods with increment of production value add leave by ship. (Value add is key element to
making any economy thrive. Just extracting raw materials turns a country into Africa, witness
the attempt at turning Russia into an extraction economy in the 90's.)
Note difference in American policy in the 90's: Russia was to become extraction, and China
was to become value add. As Tucker Carlson says, America is run by a ship of fools.
For China, "Eurasia" beckons, and raw materials can be had from China's interior and via
overland routes. This then is a pivot away from London/Zion Atlantacism (finance capital) and
toward industrial capitalism.
In other words, both U.S. and the West have hoisted themselves on their own petard. People
that wax poetic about China's gains overlook this important mechanism of "gifting" of our
patrimony to China. It is very easy to copy or be a fast follower, it is beyond difficult to
invent and create.
Wall Street and greed gave away our patrimony, which was hard won over the ages in order to
make wage arbitrage today, and gave away the future.
China uses state banks, and also forgives debts lodged in their state banks. This is
actually one of the secret methods used to rope-a-dope on the west. The Chinese economy is
not debt laden, and what public debts there are, are lodged in a State Bank, where they can
be jubileed or ignored.
The U.S. and the West had better take a long hard look at finance capital method, which
uses only "price signals" to make economic decisions, as pricing is main vector from which
jobs were exported, and which China cleverly used to climb up its industrial curve. Sovereign
money/Industrial Capitalism IS the American System of Peshine Smith and Henry Clay.
Atlantacism/Zionism/Finance Capital is not American – the parasite jumped to the U.S.
from London.
China is wisely in control of its money power via its state banks and is pivoting away
from Atlantacism now that it has served its purpose. The belt and road routes are mostly
overland, with some coastal sea routes, and there isn't a thing sea power (((atlantacists)))
can do about it.
China has played the game well, but don't overlook the gifting of Western patrimony caused
by a false neo-liberal finance capital economic ideology, which blinds Western adherents.
@joe
webb Yeah, so America can topple China and go after Russia immediately afterwards? I
don't think the Russians are so stupid.
There is only 1 way Russia survives the 21st century without being broken up and ruined,
and that is allying itself with China. The same is true for China.
The only way China can survive intact is to ally itself with Russia.
Pretty simple stuff I am sure each country understands.
China's real economy, of course dwarfs that of the US'.
The author touches on a nuclear trade option China holds over the US that I see little
mention of elsewhere. High tariffs are one thing, but a closure of trade in components and
raw materials would do far more than
endanger the prosperity and survival of many firms that rely on Chinese raw materials
and components.
Should China block exports of everything other than finished goods to the US, almost every
US factory would close due to lack of parts and materials. The time and investment required
to rebuild/replace supply chains in a JIT world means much of what's left of America's real
economy would disappear within weeks.
What then?
Unlike Russia, the US is highly vulnerable to targeted sanctions. American trade
negotiators are apparently oblivious to this. I find that very weird.
author Klare said: "The media and many politicians continue to focus on U.S.-Russian
relations, in large part because of revelations of Moscow's meddling in the 2016 American
presidential election and the ongoing Mueller investigation."
– What "revelations"? "What meddling"?
– He tipped his hand right off the bat. Klare is just another run of the mill
Communist with a case of the Trump Derangement Syndrome, complete with Communism's favorite
scam, 'global warming'.
Klare said: "Ostensibly, the aim of President Trump's May 2018 decision to impose $60
billion in tariffs on Chinese imports (increased in September to $200 billion) was to rectify
a trade imbalance between the two countries "
– No, the aim is to encourage China to removes it vastly more & extreme tariffs
on US goods & services.
Klare said: " continuing high U.S. tariffs on Chinese imports will severely curb Chinese
economic growth and so weaken the world economy as a whole, punishing every nation on Earth,
including this one. High tariffs will also increase costs for American consumers and endanger
the prosperity and survival of many firms that rely on Chinese raw materials and
components."
– Nonsense, all China needs to do is remove it's many times over more severe
tariffs.
– If the US's lesser tariffs on Chinese goods / services 'hurt the US', then why
don't China's massive tariffs on US goods / services hurt China?
And to think some take this fraud, Klare, seriously.
The media and many politicians continue to focus on U.S.-Russian relations, in large
part because of revelations of Moscow's meddling in the 2016 American presidential election
and the ongoing Mueller investigation.
It's not the economy stupid. According to many "experts" on this site, since the US economy
and military expenditures are 10 times bigger than Russia's, it seems "logical" to those
experts that the US army is 10 times better. I would argue that not only is not 10 times
better, it's not even equal to Russia's army. Again, according to the same types of "experts"
Russia's economy is the size of Italy. Why don't then someone break the good news to Italy
and encourage them to go to war with Russia? Since their economies are equal – it seems
that Italy stands a fair chance of beating Russia, thus eliminating the need of the 10 times
superior army to fight them. The moronity on this site, man – it's unbelievable.
China is not suffering from massive degeneration as the US is. Instead of trying to prevent
China from becoming a leading nation of the world, why could the US not accept China's coming
prominence and concentrate on strengthening its own population ? Unlike the US, China is not
interested in "ruling the world", it is only interested in expanding its economy. For the
rest, it is dedicated to stability and cooperation. No threat to the world at all, except for
some compulsive hegemonists in the Pentagon.
This article is pure propaganda and as such is based upon lies, misconceptions and pure
fantasy.
If there already is a war it is all in the minds of Anericans, and they have already lost
that war because America needs allies and can only create enemies amongst people that were
its friends.
Europe will join with Russia as soon as it can get away from the US bully. That means
550million Europeans will join 160 million Russians. 710 million people with Russian
technology and Chinese investment (China already runs Btitain's North Sea gas), will produce
an economic power that will humiliate the USA at every turn.
All of South America wants to break with the US, the entire Orient hates the US. America is
actually doing to Africa what the US accuses Russia and China of doing.
If there really is a war between the US and China then the US has already lost it. The rest
of the world wants only one thing: the absolute collapse of the entire US. Everyone hates the
US. No one will ever support you US dictators and bullies 100%.
You stab everyone in the back sooner or later and your only interest is supporting the
fascist and racist Israel that is genociding the true Semites, the Palestinians.
I'm amazed Fred Unz publishes this sort of trash. It is unadulterated lies, brainless
stupidity and total hog wash. Pure drivel.
It is often said that, had the Western and Eastern Europeans formed a coalition rather
than fight WW I, they would still be dominant.
And if I had wings, I could fly to the moon.
The Eastern Europeans had never accepted the Western Enlightenment (still haven't), and to
have done so would have destabilized their family structure -- the deep structure of their
society -- exactly as it has finally destabilized ours, today. The nature of authority and
organization in Eastern Europe differed considerably from that of Western Europe. Their forms
of organization were different enough to make integration impossible, and perhaps to make
formation of a coalition impossible.
China's organizational forms, family structure, and and social assumptions in general
differ even more from the present day form of the Western Enlightenment than did those of
East Europe c.a. AD 1900.
It's at times like these we get to test the assumption that reason and fear of death can
lead to agreement on a modus vivendi.
I will never believe the Zionist controlled U.S. will go to war with China as long as one
U.S. company remains in China and damn near all the major U.S. companies are in business in
China, this is a ploy for the zionist controlled MIC to loot the America taxpayer!
I didnt read the article but I dont think china needs the US for anything they are well on
their way to be the dominant world power the US and ist zionist occupied government are
losers the zionists want never ending wars which stupid USA has done,,china and all the rest
will eventually dump the rothchild banking system and form its own which will in all likely
hood benefit more than the zionist one does
No mention of an ideological battle, and no wonder, as "the Chinks" et al have apparently
already won that one, as evidenced by the fact that the last US general election was merely
yet another idiotic, meaningless [ yet highly entertaining], cat fight over blue socialism
versus red socialism.
The US vs China trade war is just another power/domination battle scam between two
competing, wholly criminal orgs, both totally against anything ever resembling truly free
trade ..nothing more.
"The US and China must work together to halt global warming or all of us are doomed to a
hellish future." Really? If this doesn't prove this guy is a lefty shill, nothing does. Even
the clowns raking in grants and trying to impoverish everyone with higher taxes have seen the
light and have been saying "climate change" lately. Many scientists are now arguing that we
may be headed into a new cooling period rather than a "hellish" warming period that brought
us so much prosperity. This "global warming" religion with its hockey stick icons and polar
bear mythology is worse than the Heaven's Gate religion.
"The rest of the world wants only one thing: the absolute collapse of the entire US.
Everyone hates the US. No one will ever support you US dictators and bullies
100%. You stab everyone in the back sooner or later and your only interest is supporting
the fascist and racist Israel that is genociding the true Semites, the Palestinians."
Well yes. As history has shown, occupation and rule by Jahweh's Chosen People tends to
bring this fate down upon the host country.
Oh, for Pete's sake:
1. It will always be China+Russia vs. the US. The EU, site of WWIII, will just soil
itself.
2. The Debt Bubble US economy will collapse. At some point. Changes every calculation.
3. The US will devolve into a state of civil war. Of some sort. Paralyze the place.
Momentum is with China and Russia. The US is sliding into history's toilet.
Just give it a few more years. And the whole world sees and knows it. The whole world can
get along very well without the US. And would very much like that to be.
Global warming my azz! But the rest of it rings pretty true. If nukes arn't used, Russia and
China will win this war simply because they have the gold now and the US has spread its fiat
petro dollar all over the world which will come back big time to bite them. That is if China
and Russia are smart enough to go on a gold exchange standard.
since the US economy and military expenditures are 10 times bigger than Russia's, it
seems "logical" to those experts that the US army is 10 times better. I would argue that
not only is not 10 times better, it's not even equal to Russia's army.
I would argue the same.
Russia is a land power. This means using a land army and area denial. Russia does not need
to power project with a blue water Navy and she does not follow Atlantacist doctrine.
Atlantacist doctrine got its start when our (((friends))) evolved the method during the
Levantine Greek City State period, where our tribal friends would be stationed in various
entrepot cities ringing the Mediterranean. They would use their tribal connections to Launder
pirated goods, and to push their "international" usurious money type, which in those days was
silver. Simultaneously they were taking rents on their secret East/West mechanism, whereby
exchange rates between gold and silver were exploited. Gold was plentiful in India and Silver
more plentiful in the West, so the Caravan's took arbitrage on exchange rates as silver
drained east and gold drained west.
The U.S. inherited Atlanticist method after WW2. The U.S. is not an island economy like
England – it does not need to go around the world beating up others to then extract raw
materials. The U.S. is actually more like Russia in that U.S. can afford to have economic
autarky and be independent. The U.S. does not need to power project with a blue water navy,
despite the false narrative (((inheritance))) passed down to us, especially after WW2. Nobody
likes being punked with false narrative.
U.S. military expenditures are so heavy because of this tendency of finance capital to
search the world for gains, and this means posting overseas military bases, which in turn are
expensive to operate. Russia only has a "close in" defensive posture of area denial. This is
far less expensive than power projecting.
Also, GDP figures are misleading. In the U.S. if housing prices go up it reflects in GDP
growth, when in reality – the house didn't improve. GDP figures are lies. If finance
takes 50% cut of the economy, they are only pushing finance paper back and forth at each
other this is not the real economy, but it shows up in GDP because finance paper is an
"asset".
Russia's economy is much larger than their GDP, probably it is closer to Germany's in real
terms. Real terms = real economy = the making of goods and services.
China is not America's natural ally, Russia is. Atlantacist doctrine sold America's
patrimony to China for cheap, and then the ((international)) will just jump to another
host.
America has been parasitized by false doctrine and the output is thus that of an infected
brain – an output that is crazy. Finance plutocracy typically will not let go
willingly, but has to be removed forcefully.
Russia is a country of vodka drunks and Dubai prostitutes run by a syndicate of Israel
oligarchs and ex-KGB who kill their journalists in foreign countries.
China is dependent on outsourcing and if the US factories were to withdraw tomorrow the
Chinese economy would take a huge hit.
@Erebus The US is vulnerable
in so many other ways too, see how fast the store shelves empty just on the news of an
approaching big storm. Panic buying is rife and some people keep minimal food available at
home. I know people who have to stop at an ATM to get $20. All kinds of vital distribution of
food, water, power, fuel and more seems to pass through a myriad of often vulnerable
bottle-necks real or virtual. Easy targets for low cost, low tech sabotage teams I'd think.
I'm inclined to think also that this threatening hysteria possibly is a deep state psy-op
designed to prime Americans prior to the enactment of some sort of "democracy"
modifications.
America is the most powerful country solely because it has the most powerful economy in the
world, and that was in no small measure due to America's abundance of arable land, navigable
waterways, natural resources ect ect. . In a few decades China has rocketed close to US level
and is in a global hegemon trajectory solely on the quality and size of its population .
There is not much doubt about the outcome of any competition between China and the West,
especially as much of the profits of the ruling class in the West has come from offshoring
and investment in China and their economy of scale production suppressing labour's power in
the West. The Chinese and their Western collaborators will just wait Trump out. Trump is a
populist not a creature of the Deap State alarmed at China's rise. The leading strategists of
America's foreign policy establishment still don't realise what they are dealing with in
China.
Perhaps the greatest victim of this ongoing conflict will be planet Earth itself and all
the creatures, humans included, who inhabit it. As the world's top two emitters of
climate-altering greenhouse gases, the U.S. and China must work together to halt global
warming or all of us are doomed to a hellish future.
Better to reign in hell. Anyway, there is hardly a tree left in China and since 2006,
China has been the world's largest emitter of CO2 annually and though they pay lip
service they accept no binding target for reduction; quite the opposite.
Even if their present slow-burn conflict may not produce the immediate devastation of a
conventional hot war, its long-term consequences could prove no less dire.
The manufacturing should be done in the most advanced regions of Earth ie the West,
because that is where the technology and will exists to protect the environment. China is
trying to churn out cheaper goods and does not care what damage they do in cutting
environmental corners.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_change_in_China
China still supports the "common but differentiated responsibilities" principle, which
holds that since China is still developing, its abilities and capacities to reduce
emissions are comparatively lower than developed countries'. Therefore, its emissions
should not be required to decrease over time, but rather should be encouraged to increase
less over time until industrialization is farther along and reductions are feasible
In other words the global environment is going to continue to be ripped apart like a car
in a wrecking yard by China. "Industrialization is farther along" is obviously Chinese speak
for "when China is able to dominate the world with enormous productive capacity and we do not
even have to pay lip service any more".
In today's world, however, where great-power armed combat could possibly end in a
nuclear exchange and mutual annihilation, direct military conflict is a distinctly
unappealing option for all parties. Instead, governing elites have developed other means of
warfare -- economic, technological, and covert -- to achieve such strategic objectives.
Viewed this way, the United States is already in close to full combat mode with respect to
China.
No, the appeal of a real war will increase precipitously for any clear loser in the
economic competition who has a rapidly declining military advantage (especially in
thermonuclear first strike capacity due to proximity fuses and sub location tech), and we all
know who that is going to be. A shooting war will come, and the sooner it comes the
better for the whole world. Reassuring Russia that it will not be subjected to the same
treatment by the West at some point in the future will be the main problem inhibiting the
coming military take down (and nuking if necessary) of China.
As to bringing in Hindoos and Pakis into to the America-China conflict with a singular
example of the demand for defense related technology transfer by the former
India is a mediocrity but Pakistan is a nightmare for all concerned, given that after
imbibing religious mumbo jumbo from moronic Arabs, with which havocs were created in
Afghanistan via neoconnish America, now they are fellating uncircumcised Chinese for crumbs
the ungodly Chinese will play the idiotic Pakis like a fiddle to the detriment of the
West!
Negotiations with Beijing to address structural economic reforms are taking place on
a track that's separate from the talks about the quantity of American products the Chinese may
agree to buy to reduce the U.S. trade deficit, one of the people briefed on the matter said.
The Chinese have offered to ramp up purchases of American goods by $1.2 trillion over six
years, according to the person. It's still unclear how Beijing would follow through on those
purchases if retaliatory tariffs remained in place and other trading barriers aren't removed, the
person added. China bought $130 billion in U.S. goods in 2017, according to U.S. figures.
After several rounds of face-to-face meetings between U.S. and Chinese officials since last
year, the sides are now in regular contact via phone and video-conference to hammer out the
details of a deal, according to the person.
The U.S. Trade Representative's office said Thursday it will publish a notice in the Federal
Register delaying the increase of tariffs on Chinese imports until further notice. Trump had
previously planned to raise tariffs on March 1, but on Sunday dropped the threat amid progress at
the negotiating table.
I watched Trump's Rose Garden session in which he announced that he would sign the
appropriation bill and also declare a national emergency under the National Emergencies Act.
IMO he will win whatever court challenges are made because his authority to do this is clear in
"black letter" law and the opposition will have to base their plaints on a judgment as to
whether or not there is an emergency. IMO there is nothing in the constitution or law that
makes the judgment or the courts competent to overrule his judgment in this case. If they don't
like the National Emergencies Law, let the Congress repeal it.
On the other hand, Trump also told the world that because of a personal appeal by a woman
from Idlib Province in Syria who came to see him in the Oval Office, he called Putin and argued
him into calling off the preparations for a massive Russo/Syrian/Iranian offensive that would
IMO have recovered Idlib for the SAG.
I am recalling here roughly what he said.
The lady's argument was that she believed that the millions who lived in the province would
be killed or maimed in the process and all the towns destroyed. Her parents lived in the
province. And, after all, she said, there are only 45,000 jihadis in the province. I was not
in the room, but would be willing to bet that she was; well spoken, well dressed, and
reasonably attractive. Trump was persuaded and Idlib remains a cancer in the side of the Syrian
state, the Russians, having listened to Trump, attempted to create a de-militarized zone around
Idlib Province within which the jihadis have consolidated power.
Some years ago I was asked to speak at a two or three day discussion of the Middle East at
Mississippi State University. This is a big school. Attendance was in the thousands. On the
program with me (or I with him) was, then TV personality, (later governor of Ohio) John Kasich.
At a pre-conference dinner, Kasich sought to dominate the table talk and me (his principal
competition) at this conference. There were numerous senior faculty present at table. Kasich
sought to belittle whatever knowledge I might have of the MENA region and of the peoples and
cultures there. In particular he said that I did not understand Islam at all because I said
that the jihadis were among the various forms of Islam, a religion which I foolishly claimed
had no central authority structure and in which the "true Islam" was not to be known except in
the consensus (ijma') of various groups of Muslims.
Having heard him out, I explained to him my background and experience. He grew more and more
sober, clearly unused to opposition. I asked him what the basis was for his opinion that the
various jihadis were not real Muslims at all.
He told us that a number of beauteous Muslim ladies had been brought to see him. He said
they were well spoken, well dressed (some in French couture clothing) and that they smelled
good. This last was said after I asked him about it having run into this phenomenon
before.
These ladies were all at pains to explain to him that the jihadis were outside Islam
because they did not accept the ijma' of the scholars of whatever "school" (mathab) of Sunni
Sharia these ladies adhered to.
The lesson - Beware of well dressed ladies who smell of Chanel #5. pl
Are you suggesting that President Trump could be influenced by an attractive, well spoken
woman with an exotic accent? Maybe the Iranian Mullahs need to change their UN representative
to get off Trump's s#*! list.
Great anecdote Colonel, interesting that Kasich's first instinct was to see you as
"competition" in such a setting. I don't suppose you told him that, despite your evident
ignorance, you were known by the name of a famous warrior poet in several ME countries - or
inquired as to his own sobriquet as in these places? My guess is the women folk of Idlib
province are not in the habit of frequenting the Oval Office, it would be interesting to know
who arranged her visit.
Machiavelli does not seem to have commented on the specific matter of wariness of
beauteous messengers. However, I'd expect his advice on such matters would echo your own, in
the importance of evaluating a message independently of its perfume.
That is very good. Antar thanks you. An Iraqi general once asked me how I came to be called
that. He said, "you are not Black." I said that was true but that I lived with a woman whose
sobriquet was Abla and after so much war my heart was black enough. He said that was true of
them as well.
Actually Abla and I were named by a Palestinian Arabic teacher who wanted his class to have
working names that began with 'ain. He was from Bethlehem and owned a night club in San
Francisco where he was occupied while not teaching Arabic at DLI in Monterey. The name stuck.
He was killed in Kuwait by the Kuwaiti resistance who said he was a collaborator with the
Iraqis. He was a marvelous 'oud player.
On the other side of the coin, I recall reading how HRC, when she was SecState, was convinced
by well-spoken, well-dressed Westernized and Western-educated men from Libya and Syria that
if only the U.S. would overthrow the "brutal tyrants" then ruling those nations, that then
democracy and freedom would reign in those lands.
In particular, she was lobbied by one such Westernized Libyan just before she persuaded BHO
to intervene in Libya, leading to the subsequent chaos.
BTW, for a reminder of who else pushed BHO to intervene in Libya,
see
"Fight of the Valkyries" by Maureen Dowd, 2011-03-23.
Is calling such women stupid about things that matter sexist?
Thinking about how popular the values of Westernized people from the Islamic world are back
in their native lands, there is the illustrative example of
Benazir Bhutto .
While not having the time nor energy at the moment to read much (even more post much), this
statement from DJT just stunned me. And i am not easily stunned.
Some ppl including me thought of this possibility, to be precise that Ivanka and Jared fed
him: You got to save those inocent people there! And he took the bait.
But then again i didnt truely want to believe that this is how the goverment of the
biggest world power works. With all those gazillions of analysts, SIGINT HUMINT etc. at hand,
briefings and what not..
Even more comically and tragic is, that he might just told the truth, and this is truly
what happend.
IMHO this is how the neocons influence him: By presenting selective "information", and
just like the MSM he falls for it. Be it his family or patriachic instincts or what ever the
psychologic motivation:
He admitted that he was influenced by the same MSM methods he claims to fight, and in turn
protecting the biggest gathering of international Jihahist in this century against their sure
defeat.
MAGA = Make AlQaida Great Again! ;)
AFAIK this is how DJT stopped the funding of the FSA, when he was shown the video of the
child the Zenki Jihadists beheaded. So it is not a single decision, but the M.O. of his style
of decision making.
Under all that narcissistic, egomanic and sociopathic behaviour seems to be a human being,
a quite emotional too. Too bad it seems to care more for single female Jihadists
propagandists than for his campaign promise of fighting Jihadists..
Maybe Assads wife should make a undercover visit to DJT? ;)
What is with the "EDIT:Typos" thingy? We are all plain folk here. Basma Asad? A beautiful,
well spoken creature. There is a certain strain of blond Syrian upper class woman who will
just knock your socks off. This what Italians call "the thunderbolt." I went to visit one in
the Maryland suburbs of DC. A relative asked me to go. She was that type. After she decided I
wasn't going to do whatever it was she thought I would want to do she took me out to the
garage where there were several big cats; tiger, leopard, puma, etc. in cages. I asked her
why. She just shrugged and went back in the house.
Dr Rim Al-Bezem is the president of the eastern chapter of the Syrian-American Medical
Society (SAMS), an organization that provides training, medical equipment and medicine for
a country decimated by the war.
From memory, SAMS only ever
worked in the rebel-held areas .
And again from memory, she has been economical with the truth, by ignoring the doctors in
west Aleppo and inflating the number of people in Aleppo. Yet again from memory, I think it
never reached much above 2 million, 1.5 million in the west and 0.5 million in the
east.
"Many of the doctors have left the country because they, too, have families. In Aleppo
alone, there are 35 doctors left to treat the population of 5 million people," she said.
No trade deal can dictate our relationship with China
By Lawrence H. Summers - Washington Post
As the United States and China continue to joust over trade and technology, the U.S.
policy debate contrasts two views of the primary problem.
A first view expressed often in President Trump's tweets locates the key issue in the
bilateral trade deficit that the United States chronically runs with China. On this theory of
the problem, a solution is relatively easy: The Chinese could rearrange their imports of
soybeans, fossil fuels and other products so more of them come from the United States, while
countries now supplying China could export instead to nations now importing from the United
States. This is what the Chinese keep offering since it means almost no real change in their
economy. Neither levels of employment, output or total trade deficits and surpluses are
likely to change much in either the United States or China.
A second view, held by more serious alarmists about the U.S.-China relationship, such as
U.S. Trade Representative Robert E. Lighthizer, emphasizes problematic Chinese practices in
key technological sectors. These range from theft of U.S. technologies to requirements that
U.S. firms wishing to do business in China -- chiefly in the development of key technologies,
such as artificial intelligence -- must form joint ventures with Chinese firms, especially
those with connections to the Chinese government.
Such technological alarmists in and out of the administration hold that we can wall off
U.S. technologies with sufficiently aggressive policies so China cannot steal them, or that
we can pressure China to the point where it will give up government efforts at industrial
leadership. Neither of these prospects is realistic.
In many ways, U.S. concerns over China and technology parallel concerns over the Soviet
Union in the post-Sputnik missile gap period just before President John F. Kennedy's election
in 1960. Or over Japan in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when it was often joked that "the
Cold War is over and Japan won."
When atomic weapons were our most sensitive military secret, their creation required
extensive sophisticated infrastructure. Yet the United States and Russia essentially had no
normal interchange, so we were able to maintain a lead of three or four years with respect to
both fission and fusion weapons.
Technology for artificial intelligence in development today, however, can be operated on
widely available equipment. And there are hundreds of thousands of Chinese citizens studying
in the United States or working for U.S. companies that develop such technology. Keeping U.S.
knowledge out of Chinese hands for substantial lengths of time is impracticable short of a
massive breaking of economic ties.
Nor is it likely for the Chinese government to halt its support of technology development.
How would the United States react if other countries demanded that we close down DARPA, the
Defense Department's advanced research agency, because it represented unfair competition? Or
if trading partners argued that U.S. support for private clean-energy companies, such as the
subsidies provided by the Obama administration, was an unfair trade practice? Much of our
current information technology and communications infrastructure comes directly or indirectly
out of Bell Labs, which was financed out of the profits of a government-regulated and
-protected monopoly. Would the United States have responded constructively to demands from
other countries to dismantle the Bell system?
A focus on resisting the Chinese economic threat will likely not only be ineffective but
may also be counterproductive if it diverts private and public energy from more productive
pursuits. I remember well from the early Clinton administration that the great symbol of
efforts to constrain unfair Japanese practices was Kodak's case against Fuji, the Japanese
photographic film company that attracted massive attention from Kodak's senior management and
U.S. policymakers. Perhaps if Kodak had instead focused on the digital photography ideas its
scientists had developed, it would still be a significant company.
Where we can mobilize international support, we should, of course, push China to live up
to its trade obligations and seek to modify rules in the World Trade Organization where they
do not cover problematic practices. But in reality, our competitive success over the next
generation will depend much more on what happens in our economy and society than at any
international negotiating table.
Will our national investment in applied scientific research continue to languish to the
point where even the most brilliant young scientists cannot get their first research grants
until they are in their 40s? Will public officials who surely know better continue to allow
creationism to be taught as serious science in U.S. public schools in a century with so much
progress in life sciences? Will public policy concern itself with the strength and
competitiveness of U.S. information technology companies as well as with their marketing
practices? Will a national effort be made to improve the dismal performance of U.S. students
at every level in international comparisons of mathematical and scientific achievement?
These questions and others like them, much more than any trade negotiation, will determine
how the United States competes over the next generation. The Russian and the Japanese
challenges pushed us forward as a nation in very constructive ways. So can the Chinese
challenge if we seize the opportunity it represents.
Lawrence Summers is a professor at and past president of Harvard University.
"... Sections of the Chinese regime responded belligerently to the accusations. An editorial in the state-owned Global Times ..."
"... The editorial asked: "Assuming China is so powerful that it has stolen technological information for over a decade that is supposedly worth over a trillion in intellectual property, as the US has indicated, then how is it that China still lags behind the US in so many fields, from chips to electric vehicles, and even aviation engines?" ..."
Further escalating its economic and strategic offensive to block China from ever
challenging its post-World War II hegemony, the US government yesterday unveiled its fifth
set of economic espionage charges against Chinese individuals since September.
As part of an internationally-coordinated operation, the US Justice Department on Thursday
published indictments of two Chinese men who had allegedly accessed confidential commercial
data from US government agencies and corporate computers in 12 countries for more than a
decade.
The announcement represents a major intensification of the US ruling class's confrontation
against China, amid a constant build-up of unsubstantiated allegations against Beijing by
both the Republican and Democrat wings of Washington's political establishment.
Via salacious allegations of "hacking" on a "vast scale," every effort is being made by
the ruling elite and its media mouthpieces to whip up anti-China hysteria.
The indictment's release was clearly politically timed. It was accompanied by a global
campaign by the US and its allies, accusing the Chinese government of an illegal cyber theft
operation to damage their economies and supplant the US as the world's "leading
superpower."
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen
immediately issued a statement accusing China of directing "a very real threat to the
economic competitiveness of companies in the United States and around the globe."
Within hours, US allies around the world put out matching statements, joined by
declarations of confected alarm by their own cyber-warfare and hacking agencies.
The Washington Post called it "an unprecedented mass effort to call out China for
its alleged malign acts." The coordination "represents a growing consensus that Beijing is
flouting international norms in its bid to become the world's predominant economic and
technological power."
The Australian government, the closest ally of the US in the Indo-Pacific region, was in
the forefront. Foreign Affairs Minister Marise Payne and Home Affairs Minister Peter Dutton
explicitly accused the Chinese government and its Ministry of State Security (MSS) of being
responsible for "a global campaign of cyber-enabled commercial intellectual property
theft."
Geoffrey Berman, the US attorney for the Southern District of New York, called the Chinese
cyber campaign "shocking and outrageous." Such pronouncements, quickly emblazoned in media
headlines around the world, destroy any possibility of anything resembling a fair trial if
the two men, named as Zhu Hua and Zhang Shilong, are ever detained by US agencies and brought
before a court.
The charges themselves are vaguely defined. Federal prosecutors in Manhattan accused the
men of conspiracy to commit computer intrusions, wire fraud and aggravated identity theft.
Zhu and Zhang acted "in association with" the MSS, as part of a hacking squad supposedly
named "APT1o" or "Stone Panda," the indictment said.
FBI Director Christopher Wray called a news conference to issue another inflammatory
statement against China. Pointing to the real motivations behind the indictments, he
declared: "China's goal, simply put, is to replace the US as the world's leading superpower,
and they're using illegal methods to get there."
Coming from the head of the US internal intelligence agency, this further indicates the
kinds of discussions and planning underway within the highest echelons of the US political
and military-intelligence apparatus to prepare the country, ideologically and militarily, for
war against China.
Washington is determined to block President Xi Jinping's "Made in China 2025" program that
aims to ensure China is globally competitive in hi-tech sectors such as robotics and chip
manufacture, as well as Beijing's massive infrastructure plans, known as the Belt and Road
Initiative, to link China with Europe across Eurasia.
The US ruling class regards these Chinese ambitions as existential threats because, if
successful, they would undermine the strategic position of US imperialism globally, and the
economic dominance of key American corporations.
Yesterday's announcement seemed timed to fuel tensions between Washington and Beijing,
after the unprecedented December 1 arrest of Meng Wanzhou, the chief financial officer of
Chinese telecommunications giant Huawei, in Canada at the request of the US.
Last weekend, US Vice President Mike Pence again accused China of "intellectual property
theft." These provocations came just weeks after the US and Chinese administrations agreed to
talks aimed at resolving the tariff and trade war launched by US President Donald Trump.
The Trump administration is demanding structural changes to China's state-led economic
model, greater Chinese purchases of American farm and industrial products and a halt to
"coercive" joint-venture licensing terms. These demands would severely undermine the "Made in
China 2025" program.
Since September, US authorities have brought forward five sets of espionage allegations.
In late October, the Justice Department unsealed charges against 10 alleged Chinese spies
accused of conspiring to steal sensitive commercial secrets from US and European
companies.
Earlier in October, the US government disclosed another unprecedented operation, designed
to produce a show trial in America. It revealed that a Chinese citizen, accused of being an
intelligence official, had been arrested in Belgium and extradited on charges of
conspiring to commit "economic espionage" and steal trade secrets.
The extradition was announced days after the Pentagon released a 146-page document, titled
"Assessing and Strengthening the Manufacturing and Defense Industrial Base and Supply Chain
Resiliency of the United States," which made clear Washington is preparing for a total war
effort against both China and Russia.
Trump, Pence and Wray then all declared China to be the greatest threat to America's
economic and military security. Trump accused China of interfering in the US mid-term
elections in a bid to remove him from office. In a speech, Pence said Beijing was directing
"its bureaucrats and businesses to obtain American intellectual property -- the foundation of
our economic leadership -- by any means necessary."
Whatever the truth of the spying allegations against Chinese citizens -- and that cannot
be assumed -- any such operations would hardly compare with the massive global intrigue,
hacking, regime-change and military operations directed by the US agencies, including the
National Security Agency (NSA) and its "Five Eyes" partners.
These have been exposed thoroughly by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and WikiLeaks
founder Julian Assange. Leaked documents published by
WikiLeaks revealed that the CIA has developed "more than a thousand hacking systems, trojans,
viruses and other 'weaponized' malware," allowing it to seize control of devices, including
Apple iPhones, Google's Android operating system, devices running Microsoft Windows, smart
TVs and possibly the control of cars and trucks.
In an attempt to broaden its offensive against China, the US government said that along
with the US and its Five Eyes partners, such as Britain, Canada and Australia, the countries
targeted by the alleged Chinese plot included France, Germany, Japan, Sweden and
Switzerland.
Chinese hackers allegedly penetrated managed services providers (MSPs) that provide
cybersecurity and information technology services to government agencies and major firms.
Finance, telecommunications, consumer electronics and medical companies were among those said
to be targeted, along with military and US National Aeronautics and Space Administration
laboratories.
Sections of the Chinese regime responded belligerently to the accusations. An editorial in
the state-owned Global Times branded them "hysterical" and a warning sign of a
"comprehensive" US attack on China.
The editorial asked: "Assuming China is so powerful that it has stolen technological
information for over a decade that is supposedly worth over a trillion in intellectual
property, as the US has indicated, then how is it that China still lags behind the US in so
many fields, from chips to electric vehicles, and even aviation engines?"
The Global Times declared that "instead of adhering to a low-profile strategy,
China must face these provocations and do more to safeguard national interests."
The promotion of Chinese economic and militarist nationalism by a mouthpiece of the
Beijing regime is just as reactionary as the nationalist xenophobia being stoked by the
ruling elite of American imperialism and its allies. The answer to the evermore open danger
of war is a unified struggle by the international working class to end the outmoded
capitalist profit system and nation-state divisions and establish a socialist society.
ANY rational person would think : a nation like USA TODAY which can name a different ENEMY
every other week is clearly SICK, led by sociopaths. China ? Russia, Iran, North Korea ?
Venezuela ? ( all fail to live up to the high moral standards of " OUR democracy " ?)
How are any of these countries a greater threat to YOU than the local Democratic or
Republican party hacks ?
If YOU think that so many people hate you , would it not make sense to ask if there is
perhaps something wrong with YOU ?
At this point, deja vu mind-set returns to teach a powerful lesson. Having once witnessed a
major historical reversal, one knows that historical determinism isan illusion -- opium for
people on the edge of a nervous breakdown.
Machiavelli insisted that surrender is a bad idea because we never know what surprises
fortune may have in store for us. In Machiavelli's view, there are "good times" and "bad times"
in politics, and the good ruler is not one who can fend off the "bad times" so much, as one who
has accumulated enough goodwill among citizens to help him ride out those bad times.
The argument of this short book is that European Union is going through a really bad time
today, torn apart by numerous crises that damage confidence in the future of the project among
citizens across the continent. So the disintegration of the union is one of the most likely
outcomes.
One of the most sought-after visa programs in the U.S., the H-1B, could see some significant
changes in 2019, according
to President Trump , including a potential path to citizenship for recipients of the
non-immigrant visa.
The H-1B visa program allows U.S. employers to hire graduate-level workers in specialty occupations, like IT,
finance, accounting, architecture, engineering, science and medicine. Any job that requires
workers to have at least a bachelor's degree falls under the H-1B for specialty
occupations.
Each year, the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) allots about 85,000 of the
H-1B visas -- 65,000 for applicants with a bachelor's degree or equivalent, and 20,000 for
those with a master's degree or higher.
As of April 2017, when Trump signed an executive order -- "Buy American and Hire American"
-- it's become more difficult for U.S. companies to hire people via H-1B. It directs the
Department of Homeland Security to only grant the visas to the "most-skilled or highest-paid
beneficiaries."
Here's a look at the American companies (and industries) that benefited the most from the
program in 2017.
Cognizant: The IT services business had a whopping 3,194 H-1B initial petitions approved in
2017, the most of any U.S. company by almost 600.
Amazon: In 2017, the e-commerce behemoth hired 2,515 employees via
the H-1B visa program, according to data compiled by the
National Foundation for American Policy . That was about a 78 percent increase from 2016,
or 1,099 more employees.
Microsoft: Microsoft hired 1,479 workers through H-1B in 2017, the second most of U.S.
companies -- an increase in 334 employees from the year prior, or close to 29 percent.
IBM: In 2017, IBM employed about 1,231 workers through the H-1B visa program.
Intel: The California-based company employed 1,230 workers through H-1B in 2017, 200 more
workers -- or a 19 percent increase -- compared to 2016.
Google: The search engine giant had 1,213 H-1B initial petitions approved for fiscal year
2017, a 31 percent increase of about 289 from 2016.
If China Is Suffering So Much Because of Trump's Trade War, Why Is Its Surplus Up So
Much?
By Dean Baker
Donald Trump has made his tariffs against China and other countries a big part of his
agenda as president. He even went so far as to dub himself "Tariff Man" on Twitter.
The media have been quick to assume that Tariff Man is accomplishing his goals, especially
with regard to China. It is standard for news articles, like this one, to assert that China's
economy is suffering in large part because of Trump's tariffs.
In fact, through the first ten months of 2018 China's trade surplus * with the United
States on trade in goods has been $344.5 billion. This is up 11.5 percent from its surplus in
the same months last year.
The tariffs surely are having some effect, and China's surplus would almost certainly be
larger if they were not in place. But it is difficult to believe that China's $13.5 trillion
dollar economy (measured at exchange rate values) could be hurt all that much by somewhat
slower growth in its trade surplus with the United States. (For arithmetic fans, the surplus
is equal to 2.5 percent of China's GDP. We are talking about slower growth in this
surplus.)
It is worth noting that we will not be getting new trade data until the government
shutdown is over since the Census Bureau is one of the government agencies without funding
for fiscal year 2019.
I posted an NYT piece the other day
that described an automobile-headlight
manufacturer in Michigan who was struggling
to get LED bulbs from China, where they were
usually in plentiful supply, So, he was just
*trying* to stockpile some inventory.
Trump Has Promised to Bring Jobs Back. His Tariffs Threaten to Send Them Away.
By Peter S. Goodman
For EBW Electronics, the biggest hit has come through increased costs for components,
including transistors, resistors and capacitors. Across the breadth of the factory, workers
in blue lab coats slot these nibs of metal into circuit boards and then attach LED lights,
most of these items imported from China.
These components are produced at enormous scale in China. Even with tariffs on Chinese
imports, American factories have no incentive to make them, because profit margins are tiny,
and the costs are vast.
"Nobody in this country wants to make these things," said Mr. Steeby, the EBW president,
echoing a contention heard widely here.
The company has filed for exemptions from the tariffs, but has yet to hear back from the
federal government. And EBW has encountered stiff resistance in passing on the extra costs to
its customers, though it is obliged to continue delivering lights to major auto manufacturers
at agreed-upon prices, or pay fines for interfering with production.
"We're the monkey in the middle," said Mr. LeBlanc, the EBW chairman.
If Mr. Trump follows through on threats to raise tariffs to 25 percent, EBW and its 230
employees could face dire circumstances.
"At 25 percent, we are not making money," Mr. Steeby said. "There's a threat that you
cease to exist, or there's a threat that jobs move to Mexico."
In an era of anxiety over global competition, EBW has engaged Chinese suppliers to produce
a crucial commodity -- American paychecks. Now, Mr. Trump's tariffs have put jobs at
risk.
"There's no intelligence to the way this is being done," Mr. Steeby said. "The tariffs are
designed to hurt China, but they are being paid by American companies."
Of course, the Mr. Steeby, President of EBW Electronics, is without question, honest and
trustworthy. Like a boy scout, he would never lie. What he said should be taken as the gospel
truth, not a grain of salt.
I posted an NYT piece the other day
that described an automobile-headlight
manufacturer in Michigan who was struggling
to get LED bulbs from China, where they were
usually in plentiful supply, So, he was just
*trying* to stockpile some inventory.
[ There is no indication the company is stockpiling LED bulbs, and there is no indication
there is stockpiling as yet through the economy. ]
[ No, the matter is important, and I am correct and do not care to be baited.
This is no data showing that American companies are stockpiling. American companies have
long operated with minimal inventory and a change would be dramatic. ]
"... Excessive financialization is the Achilles' heel of neoliberalism. It inevitably distorts everything, blows the asset bubble, which then pops. With each pop, the level of political support of neoliberalism shrinks. Hillary defeat would have been impossible without 2008 events. ..."
Barkley insists on a left-right split for his analysis of political parties and their attachment to vague policy tendencies
and that insistence makes a mess of the central issue: why the rise of right-wing populism in a "successful" economy?
Naomi Klein's book is about how and why centrist neoliberals got control of policy. The rise of right-wing populism is often
supposed (see Mark Blyth) to be about the dissatisfaction bred by the long-term shortcomings of or blowback from neoliberal policy.
Barkley Rosser treats neoliberal policy as implicitly successful and, therefore, the reaction from the populist right appears
mysterious, something to investigate. His thesis regarding neoliberal success in Poland is predicated on policy being less severe,
less "shocky".
In his left-right division of Polish politics, the centrist neoliberals -- in the 21st century, Civic Platform -- seem to disappear
into the background even though I think they are still the second largest Party in Parliament, though some seem to think they
will sink in elections this year.
Electoral participation is another factor that receives little attention in this analysis. Politics is shaped in part by the
people who do NOT show up. And, in Poland that has sometimes been a lot of people, indeed.
Finally, there's the matter of the neoliberal straitjacket -- the flip-side of the shock in the one-two punch of "there's no
alternative". What the policy options for a Party representing the interests of the angry and dissatisfied? If you make policy
impossible for a party of the left, of course that breeds parties of the right. duh.
Likbez,
Bruce,
Blowback from the neoliberal policy is coming. I would consider the current situation in the USA as the starting point of this
"slow-motion collapse of the neoliberal garbage truck against the wall." Neoliberalism like Bolshevism in 1945 has no future,
only the past. That does not mean that it will not limp forward in zombie (and pretty bloodthirsty ) stage for another 50 years.
But it is doomed, notwithstanding recently staged revenge in countries like Ukraine, Argentina, and Brazil.
Excessive financialization is the Achilles' heel of neoliberalism. It inevitably distorts everything, blows the asset bubble,
which then pops. With each pop, the level of political support of neoliberalism shrinks. Hillary defeat would have been impossible
without 2008 events.
At least half of Americans now hate soft neoliberals of Democratic Party (Clinton wing of Bought by Wall Street technocrats),
as well as hard neoliberal of Republican Party, which created the " crisis of confidence" toward governing neoliberal elite in
countries like the USA, GB, and France. And that probably why the intelligence agencies became the prominent political players
and staged the color revolution against Trump (aka Russiagate ) in the USA.
The situation with the support of neoliberalism now is very different than in 1994 when Bill Clinton came to power. Of course,
as Otto von Bismarck once quipped "God has a special providence for fools, drunkards, and the United States of America." and another
turn of the technological spiral might well save the USA. But the danger of never-ending secular stagnation is substantial and
growing. This fact was admitted even by such dyed- in-the-wool neoliberals as Summers.
This illusion that advances in statistics gave neoliberal access to such fine-grained and timely economic data, that now it
is possible to regulate economy indirectly, by strictly monetary means is pure religious hubris. Milton Friedman would now be
laughed out the room if he tried to repeat his monetarist junk science now. Actually he himself discarded his monetarist illusions
before he died.
We probably need to the return of strong direct investments in the economy by the state and nationalization of some assets,
if we want to survive and compete with China. Australian politicians are already openly discussing this, we still are lagging
because of "walking dead" neoliberals in Congress like Pelosi, Schumer, and company.
But we have another huge problem, which Australia and other countries (other than GB) do not have: neoliberalism in the USA
is the state religion which completely displaced Christianity (and is hostile to Christianity), so it might be that the lemming
will go off the cliff. I hope not.
The only thing that still keeps neoliberalism from being thrown out to the garbage bin of history is that it is unclear what
would the alternative. And that means that like in 1920th far-right nationalism and fascism have a fighting chance against decadent
neoliberal oligarchy.
Previously financial oligarchy was in many minds associated with Jewish bankers. Now people are more educated and probably
can hang from the lampposts Anglo-Saxon and bankers of other nationalities as well ;-)
I think that in some countries neoliberal oligarchs might soon feel very uncomfortable, much like Soros in Hungary.
As far as I understood the level of animosity and suppressed anger toward financial oligarchy and their stooges including some
professors in economics departments of the major universities might soon be approaching the level which existed in the Weimar
Republic. And as Lenin noted, " the ideas could become a material force if they got mass support." This is true about anger as
well.
After the US government elicited outrage from the Chinese due to its attempts to convince
its allies to bar the use of equipment made by telecoms supplier Huawei, President Trump is
apparently weighing whether to take another dramatic antagonistic step that could further
complicate trade negotiations less than two weeks before a US delegation is slated to head to
Beijing.
According to
Reuters , the White House is reportedly considering an executive order that would ban US
companies from using equipment made by Huawei and ZTE, claiming that both companies work "at
the behest of the US government" and that their equipment could be used to spy on US citizens.
The order would invoke the International Emergency Economic Powers Act to order the Department
of Commerce to prohibit the purchase of equipment from telecoms manufacturers that could
threaten national security. Though it wouldn't explicitly name Huawei or ZTE, the ban would
arise from Commerce's interpretation. The IEEA allows the president the authority to regulate
commerce in the face of a national emergency. Back in August, Congress passed and Trump signed
a bill banning the use of ZTE and Huawei equipment by the US government and government
contractors. The executive order has reportedly been under consideration for eight months,
since around the time that the US nearly blocked US companies from selling parts to ZTE, which
sparked a mini-diplomatic crisis, which
ended with a deal allowing ZTE to survive, but pay a large fine.
The feud between the US and Huawei has obviously been escalating in recent months as the US
has embarked on an
"extraordinary influence campaign" to convince its allies to ban equipment made by both
companies, and the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou in Canada has also blossomed into a
diplomatic crisis of sorts.
But the real reason issuing a ban on both companies' equipment is seen as a priority is
because Huawei's lead in the race to build 5G technology is making its products more appealing
to global telecoms providers. Rural telecoms providers in the US - those with fewer than
100,000 subscribers - are particularly reliant on equipment made by both companies. They've
expressed concerns that a ban would require them to rip out and scrap their equipment at an
immense cost.
Rural operators in the United States are among the biggest customers of Huawei and ZTE,
and fear the executive order would also require them to rip out existing Chinese-made
equipment without compensation. Industry officials are divided on whether the administration
could legally compel operators to do that.
While the big U.S. wireless companies have cut ties with Huawei in particular, small rural
carriers have relied on Huawei and ZTE switches and other equipment because they tend to be
less expensive.
The company is so central to small carriers that William Levy, vice president for sales of
Huawei Tech USA, is on the board of directors of the Rural Wireless Association.
The RWA represents carriers with fewer than 100,000 subscribers. It estimates that 25
percent of its members had Huawei or ZTE equipment in their networks, it said in a filing to
the Federal Communications Commission earlier this month.
As Sputnik
pointed out, the news of the possible ban followed questions from Defense Secretary Gavin
Williamson, who expressed serious concerns over the involvement of Huawei in Britain's 5G
network, suggesting that Beijing sometimes acted "in a malign way." But even if it loses access
to the US market, Huawei's global expansion and its leadership in the 5G space are expected to
continue to bolster profits and growth. Currently, Huawei sells equipment in 170 countries.
According to a statement from the company's rotating chairman, the company's full-year sales
are expected to increase 21% to $108.5 billion this year. The company has signed 26 contracts
globally to supply 5G equipment for commercial use, leaving it well ahead of its US rivals.
The hypothesis is that due to emergence of mutual funds and other financial instruments the capitalist class became more
homogeneous in its interests and more united with financial oligarchy.
Notable quotes:
"... In such a situation there were significant divisions within the capitalist class that attenuated its overall political clout. Industries divided according to policy preferences, and political parties, which were essentially interest group coalitions, attracted different segments of this class. (In the US the Republicans were just as much an interest group coalition as the Democrats, just different interests like small retail business, domestic mining, nonunion manufacturing, etc.) Public policy in this dispensation, whatever its ostensible justification, reflected sectoral influence. ..."
"... Since the early 1970s capital ownership has become substantially more fungible in every respect. Equity funds of various sorts established themselves as institutional players, allowing individual capitalists to diversify via investment in these funds. Regulatory restrictions on capital movements were dismantled or bypassed. New information technology dramatically reduced (but not eliminated!) the fog of all financial markets. ..."
"... The other side of the coin was political influence over ideas. Intellectuals who advanced the positions we now call neoliberal were rewarded with research funding, jobs and influence over government policy. ..."
"... Lending conditionality reproduced in developing countries the same incentives that had shifted the intellectual environment in the core capitalist world. ..."
"... This hypothesis -- and it's important to be clear that's what it is -- also gives us an explanation for why the 2008 crisis, while it did provoke a lot of reconsideration by intellectuals -- did not result in meaningful institutional or policy change: the underlying political economic factors were unaltered . And it implies that further intellectual work, necessary as it is, will not be enough to extricate us from the shackles of neoliberal political constraints. For that we need to contest the power that undergirds them. ..."
"... The alliance (in the US, the focus of my comments) of the monied interests, providing the financial resources and seeking the repeal of the social and fiscal policies of the New Deal, and the heavily Southern-based evangelical/religious right, providing the voting bloc and seeking to turn back the progress of minorities and women in achieving more equal social and political rights -- created the powerful political base from which the revisionist onslaught was mounted. Reagan then provided the smiling face to sell the proposition that "government isn't the solution to your problems; government IS the problem" that effectively neutered the one institution capable of regulating the monied interests. ..."
"... Neoliberalism is a dialectic between them more than it has been a fixed doctrine. The remarkable power and resistance to outside critique is attributable to the insular nature of that dialectic. ..."
"... Where we are -- neoliberalism triumphant albeit spent ..."
A standard narrative is that the Keynesian postwar order cracked up over the crisis of inflation during the mid-1970s. A conservative
alternative that trusted markets more and government less was vindicated by events and established its intellectual dominance. After
a lag of a few years, policy followed along. One can critique this on matters of detail: economic growth remained stronger during
the 70s than it would be thereafter, anti-Keynesians did not have a superior understanding of economic developments, and no intellectual
revolution was complete within the space of just a few years. But the deeper problem, it seems to me, is that this attributes vastly
exaggerated agency to coteries of intellectuals. Do we really think that the elections of Reagan and Thatcher, for instance, were
attributable to a shift in grad school syllabi in economics and related fields?
I propose an alternative hypothesis. From the end of WWII to the collapse of the Bretton Woods monetary system, a large portion
of capital was illiquid, its value tied to its existing use. The rich sought to diversify their portfolios, of course, but there
were limits. Stock market transactions were beclouded by large information costs, and share ownership tended to be more stable and
concentrated. Fortunes were rooted in specific firms and industries. In such a situation there were significant divisions within
the capitalist class that attenuated its overall political clout. Industries divided according to policy preferences, and political
parties, which were essentially interest group coalitions, attracted different segments of this class. (In the US the Republicans
were just as much an interest group coalition as the Democrats, just different interests like small retail business, domestic mining,
nonunion manufacturing, etc.) Public policy in this dispensation, whatever its ostensible justification, reflected sectoral influence.
Since the early 1970s capital ownership has become substantially more fungible in every respect. Equity funds of various sorts
established themselves as institutional players, allowing individual capitalists to diversify via investment in these funds. Regulatory
restrictions on capital movements were dismantled or bypassed. New information technology dramatically reduced (but not eliminated!)
the fog of all financial markets. And firms themselves became separable bundles of assets as new technology and business methods
allowed for more integrated production across ownership lines. The combined result is a capitalist class with more uniform interests
-- an interest in a higher profit share of income and greater freedom for capital in every respect.
The crisis in real returns to
capital during the 1970s, the true economic instigator, galvanized this reorganization of the political economy. (In the US the S&P
peaked in 1972 and then lost almost half its inflation-adjusted value by the end of the decade. This is not an artifact of business
cycle timing.)
Of course, all understanding of the world is mediated by the way we think about it. The wealthy didn't say to themselves, "Gee,
my assets are taking a hit, so the government needs to change course." They turned to dissident, conservative thinkers who explained
the "failures" of the 70s as the result of too little concern for the engine of growth, which (of course) was understood to be private
investment. Market-friendly policy would, it was said, reinvigorate investment and spur economic growth. Keynesianism was seen as
having failed because it took investors for granted, taxing and regulating them and competing with them for finance; politicians
needed to show respect. It's understandable why capitalists would interpret their problems in this way.
The other side of the coin was political influence over ideas. Intellectuals who advanced the positions we now call neoliberal
were rewarded with research funding, jobs and influence over government policy. When the World Bank and the IMF were remade in the
wake of the 1982 debt crisis, this influence was extended internationally. Lending conditionality reproduced in developing countries
the same incentives that had shifted the intellectual environment in the core capitalist world.
This hypothesis -- and it's important to be clear that's what it is -- also gives us an explanation for why the 2008 crisis,
while it did provoke a lot of reconsideration by intellectuals -- did not result in meaningful institutional or policy change:
the underlying political economic
factors were unaltered . And it implies that further intellectual work, necessary as it is, will not be enough to extricate us
from the shackles of neoliberal political constraints. For that we need to contest the power that undergirds them.
The alliance (in the US, the focus of my comments) of the monied interests, providing the financial resources and seeking
the repeal of the social and fiscal policies of the New Deal, and the heavily Southern-based evangelical/religious right, providing
the voting bloc and seeking to turn back the progress of minorities and women in achieving more equal social and political rights
-- created the powerful political base from which the revisionist onslaught was mounted. Reagan then provided the smiling face
to sell the proposition that "government isn't the solution to your problems; government IS the problem" that effectively neutered
the one institution capable of regulating the monied interests.
An interesting discussion of the roots, differences and similarities between neoliberalism and ordoliberalism. And believe it
or not, the many comments raise some interesting points. Only one real gaslighting comment.
One thing Barkley said should be repeated: neoliberalism has opposing poles quite a distance apart. Neoliberalism is a dialectic
between them more than it has been a fixed doctrine. The remarkable power and resistance to outside critique is attributable to
the insular nature of that dialectic. The neoliberal right has chosen its interlocutors, the centrist "left" very well, which
is an important reason that the non-neoliberal real Left is emerging now from the sojurn in the politics of cultural critique
where it went in the 1960's with no knowledge or interest in economics.
It does not take a genius to see that human civilization and the natural ecology can only survive if people somehow manage
to produce a rational architecture for political economy deliberately and on an unprecedented scale and level of sophistication.
Where we are -- neoliberalism triumphant albeit spent and a Left at peak consciousness -- is exactly the wrong place to be in
the political cycle.
Right now neo-fascism is the most probably scenario of the social system after the decline of
neoliberalism.
Notable quotes:
"... But, in Europe, there has always been a deep distrust of the Anglo-American celebration of "possessive individualism" and its repudiation of community and society. Remember Margaret Thatcher's contempt for the idea of "society"? So, it is unsurprising that neoliberalism's advocates dismiss recent European analyses of local, regional and global economies as the nostalgia of "old Europe", even as neoliberalism's failures stack up unrelentingly. ..."
"... The consequences of these failures are largely unseen or avoided by policymakers in the US and their camp followers in the UK and Australia. They are in denial of the fact that not only has neoliberalism failed to meet its claimed goals, but it has worked devastatingly to undermine the very foundations of late-modern capitalism. The result is that the whole shambolic structure is tottering on the edge of an economic abyss. ..."
"... If Streeck is correct, then we need to anticipate what a post-capitalist world may look like. He thinks it will be terrible. He fears the emergence of a neocorporatist state and close crony-like collaboration between big capital, union leaders, government and the military as the consequence of the next major global financial crisis ..."
"... Jobs will disappear, Streeck believes. Capital will be intensely concentrated in very few hands. The privileged rich will retreat into security enclaves dripping with every luxury imaginable ..."
"... Meanwhile, the masses will be cast adrift in a polluted and miserable world where life – as Hobbes put it – will be solitary, poor, nasty, brutish and short. ..."
"... As Piketty and Streeck are pointing out to us, the post-neoliberal era has started to self-destruct. Either a post-capitalist, grimly neo-fascist world awaits us, or one shaped by a new and highly creative version of communitarian democracy. It's time for some great imagining. ..."
It is unfashionable, or just embarrassing, to suggest the
taken-for-granted late-modern economic order – neoliberal capitalism – may be in a
terminal decline. At least that's the case in what former Australian prime minister Tony Abbott
likes to call the "Anglosphere" .
What was once known as the Chicago school of economics
– the neoclassical celebration of the "free market" and "small government" – still
closes the minds of economic policymakers in the US and its satellite economies (although
perhaps less so in contemporary Canada).
But, in Europe, there has always been a deep distrust of the Anglo-American celebration
of "possessive individualism" and its repudiation of community and society. Remember Margaret
Thatcher's
contempt for the idea of "society"? So, it is unsurprising that neoliberalism's advocates
dismiss recent European analyses of local, regional and global economies as the nostalgia of
"old Europe", even as neoliberalism's failures stack up unrelentingly.
The consequences of these failures are largely unseen or avoided by policymakers in the
US and their camp followers in the UK and Australia. They are in denial of the fact that not
only has neoliberalism failed to meet its claimed goals, but it has worked devastatingly to
undermine the very foundations of late-modern capitalism. The result is that the whole
shambolic structure is tottering on the edge of an economic abyss.
What the
consequences might be
Two outstanding European scholars who are well aware of the consequences of the neoliberal
catastrophe are French economist Thomas Piketty and German economist Wolfgang Streeck.
Piketty's 2013 book, Capital in the
Twenty-First Century , charts the dangers of socioeconomic inequality in capitalism's
history. He demonstrates how this inequality can be – and has been over time –
fundamentally destructive of sustained economic growth.
Most compellingly, Piketty documented in meticulous detail how contemporary neoliberal
policies have constructed the worst forms of socioeconomic inequalities in history. His
analysis has been underlined by the recent Oxfam report that showed a mere eight
multi-billionaires own the equivalent amount of capital of half of the global population.
Despite Piketty's scrupulous scholarship, Western neoliberal economies continue merrily down
the road to nowhere. The foundations of that road were laid by the egregiously ideological
policies of Thatcher and Ronald Reagan – and slavishly followed by Australian politicians
on all sides ever since.
Streeck's equally detailed scholarship has demonstrated how destructive of capitalism itself
neoliberal policymaking has been. His latest book, How Will Capitalism
End? , demonstrates how this neoliberal capitalism triumphed over its opponents (especially
communism) by devouring its critics and opponents, obviating all possible alternatives to its
predatory ways.
If Streeck is correct, then we need to anticipate what a post-capitalist world may look
like. He thinks it will be terrible. He fears the emergence of a neocorporatist state and close
crony-like collaboration between big capital, union leaders, government and the military as the
consequence of the next major global financial crisis .
Jobs will disappear, Streeck believes. Capital will be intensely concentrated in very
few hands. The privileged rich will retreat into security enclaves dripping with every luxury
imaginable .
Meanwhile, the masses will be cast adrift in a polluted and miserable world where life
– as Hobbes put it – will be solitary,
poor, nasty, brutish and short.
What comes next is up to us
The extraordinary thing is how little is known or understood of the work of thinkers like
Piketty and Streeck in Australia today.
There have been very fine local scholars, precursors of the Europeans, who have warned about
the hollow promises of "economic rationalism" in Australia.
But, like the Europeans, their wisdom has been sidelined, even as inequality has been
deepening exponentially and its populist consequences have begun to poison our politics,
tearing down the last shreds of our ramshackle democracy.
The time is ripe for some creative imagining of a new post-neoliberal world that will repair
neoliberalism's vast and catastrophic failures while laying the groundwork for an Australia
that can play a leading role in the making of a cosmopolitan and co-operative world.
Three immediate steps can be taken to start on this great journey.
First, we need to see the revival of what American scholar Richard Falk called "globalisation
from below" . This is the enlivening of international civil society to balance the power of
the self-serving elites (multinational managers and their political and military puppets) now
in power.
Second, we need to come up with new forms of democratic governance that reject the fiction
that the current politics of representative government constitute the highest form of
democracy. There is nothing about representative government that is democratic. All it amounts
to is what Vilfredo Pareto described as
"the circulation of elites" who have become remote from – and haughtily contemptuous
of – the people they rule.
Third, we need to see states intervening comprehensively in the so-called "free market".
Apart from re-regulating economic activity, this means positioning public enterprises in
strategic parts of the economy, to compete with the private sector, not on their terms but
exclusively in the interests of all citizens.
As Piketty and Streeck are pointing out to us, the post-neoliberal era has started to
self-destruct. Either a post-capitalist, grimly neo-fascist world awaits us, or one shaped by a
new and highly creative version of communitarian democracy. It's time for some great
imagining.
This article is based on an earlier piece published in John Menadue's blog Pearls
and Irritations.
At the same time, however, it seems fair to point out that Trump and López Obrador both represent what
the Times described as "a global repudiation of the establishment." Indeed, this fact could actually help to distinguish
between the two leaders (along with other populist leaders) and their competing worldviews. While they stand on opposite sides
of the political spectrum, both Trump and López Obrador are part of the global revolt against what critics call neoliberalism,
and this is important for understanding our current era.
The past 30-plus years has been defined by the
political
project
of neoliberalism, spearheaded by the U.S. government and international financial institutions like the
International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, with the utopian aim of creating a global capitalist economy perfectly guided
by the invisible hand of the market (for neoliberals and free-market fundamentalists, the invisible hand is an almost divine
concept, worshipped in economics departments around the country). The neoliberal era peaked in the 1990s, and in America it
was Democratic President Bill Clinton who accomplished neoliberal "reforms" that right-wingers had long dreamed of, including
financial deregulation, NAFTA and "ending welfare as we knew it" (he would probably have
privatized
Social Security too
had it not been for Monica Lewinsky).
Though the 1990s is often remembered as the beginning of our hyper-partisan age (demonstrated by the Clinton impeachment
scandal), the irony is that Democrats and Republicans became closer than ever before on economic issues during this decade.
The "Washington consensus" dominated this period, and it took a Democrat to pass a Republican trade deal and other
conservative economic policies. (Not surprisingly, the Democratic Party's shift to the right simply resulted in the GOP
shifting even further to the right.)
Neoliberalism was a global project advanced by economic elites. Not surprisingly, then, the neoliberal policies of the past
few decades have benefited those who pushed for them, creating enormous wealth for the richest individuals while leaving the
world grossly unequal. According to Oxfam, 82 percent of the wealth created in 2017
went
to the top one percent
, while the poorest half got nothing. In America alone, inequality is at historic levels and more
than 40 million people live in poverty; a
UN report
from
last month notes that the U.S. "now has one of the lowest rates of intergenerational social mobility of any of the rich
countries," and zip codes "are tragically reliable predictors of a child's future employment and income prospects."
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In Europe, Latin America, Asia and the United States, the status quo is no longer acceptable to a populace that has been
betrayed time and again throughout the neoliberal era. Leaders who represent this status quo are being thrown out of office
left and right. Those who have challenged the "establishment" have been labeled "populists" by the press, of course, and
thus are categorized more for what they stand
against
than what they stand
for
(this would be like
identifying the Soviet Union and the U.S. for their anti-fascism, rather than their communism or capitalism).
Some dispute the characterization of right-wing populists as anti-neoliberal, and correctly point out that most of the
Trump administration's economic policies have actually been neoliberalism on steroids (e.g., the GOP tax bill, deregulation,
etc.). Right-wing populism is purely about racism and xenophobia, these critics insist, and to make it about economics is to
ignore these ugly realities. But as Thomas Frank
pointed
out
in The Guardian back in 2016, "trade may be [Trump's] single biggest concern -- not white supremacy."
"It seems to obsess him," wrote Frank, who watched several hours of Trump's speeches. "The destructive free-trade deals our
leaders have made, the many companies that have moved their production facilities to other lands, the phone calls he will make
to those companies' CEOs in order to threaten them with steep tariffs unless they move back to the US."
Say what you will about Trump's tendency to lie and spew falsehoods, but on the issue of trade he has actually been pretty
consistent since entering the White House, and free trade is one of the staples of the neoliberal project. On the left, free
trade deals like NAFTA and TPP have also been major talking points, as we saw with Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign in
2016. There are other economic issues where some agreement exists, and right-wing populist parties in Europe are even more
likely to be anti-neoliberal on economic issues. Marine Le Pen's National Front, for example,
opposed
austerity cuts and promised to increase welfare for the working class
(at least for French citizens), while lowering the
retirement age and increasing tariffs to benefit French companies (and, the claim goes, workers too).
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Still, the left- and right-wing alternatives to neoliberalism are poles apart, and the differences between left-populists
like López Obrador and Sanders and right-populists like Trump and Le Pen are hard to overstate. To appreciate just how
different their worldviews are, it is worth considering how the left and right have historically understood themselves in
relation to the Enlightenment and modernity.
Throughout the modern era progressives and reactionaries have more or less rejected the status quo, with thinkers from both
sides offering critiques of the modern world. The fundamental difference was that the left considered itself a part of the
Enlightenment tradition, while the right was part of the "counter-Enlightenment" (this goes back to the French Revolution,
when revolutionaries sat on the left side of the Estates General and royalists sat on the right).
The left criticized modernity not because it rejected the modern world, but because it saw the Enlightenment project as
incomplete. Karl Marx praised the bourgeoisie and called capitalism a "great civilizing influence," considering it to be a
positive development in history. He also wrote the most influential critique of capitalism to date, and while he acknowledged
that capitalism was progress over feudalism, he also believed that it must eventually be replaced with socialism to
realize the goals of the Enlightenment. Put simply, Marx and other leftists believed in the idea of progress, long associated
with the Enlightenment.
On the right, criticisms of modernity came from a very different perspective. Reactionaries did not see the modern world as
progress over the pre-modern world; rather, they saw it as a decline. Driven by nostalgia and resentment, reactionaries
romanticized the past and believed that the ills of modernity could be cured by simply turning back the clock and restoring
the status quo ante.
In his classic book "
Escape from Freedom
," the psychiatrist and
social philosopher Erich Fromm attempted to make sense of the rise of fascism in the early 20th century, and in doing so
offered a penetrating analysis of modernity. While the modern world had liberated men and women from social conventions of the
past and various restrictions on the individual (i.e., "freedom from"), it had also severed what Fromm called "primary bonds,"
which gave security to the individual and provided meaning. Forced from their communities into urban and industrial
environments, modern men and women were left alienated and rootless, feeling powerless and purposeless in the new world.
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There were two ways that people could respond to this situation, Fromm argued; either they could reject freedom
altogether and embrace counter-Enlightenment movements like fascism, or they could progress to a "positive freedom," where one
can relate oneself "spontaneously to the world in love and work."
"If the economic, social and political conditions on which the whole process of human individuation depends, do not offer a
basis for the realization of individuality," wrote Fromm, "while at the same time people have lost those ties which gave them
security, this lag makes freedom an unbearable burden." Freedom, he continued, "becomes identical with doubt, with a kind of
life which lacks meaning and direction. Powerful tendencies arise to escape from this kind of freedom into submission or some
kind of relationship to man and the world which promises relief from uncertainty, even if it deprives the individual of his
freedom."
The reactionary impulse would be to "escape from freedom" and restore the conventions and "primary bonds" of the past,
while the progressive impulse would be to progress to a more complete and dynamic kind of freedom.
The reader may be wondering where all of this fits in with the current revolt against neoliberalism. Put simply, the
neoliberal age has left many people with the same kind of doubts and anxieties that Fromm discussed in his book almost 80
years ago. Numerous articles have been written in recent years about how the policies of neoliberalism have
worsened stress and loneliness
, exacerbated
mental
health problems
,
driven
rising rates of suicide
and the opioid crisis, and left people feeling desperate and hopeless in general. Globalization,
deindustrialization, consumerism and "financialization"; all these economic trends are contributing to the breakdown of our
democratic society, leading some to embrace authoritarian alternatives, as many did in Fromm's day.
From this point of view, the global rise of populism that continued with López Obrador isn't much of a surprise. The
popular rejection of neoliberalism around the world is undeniable at this point, but it is still unclear whether this
rejection of the status quo will lead to reactionary or progressive change in the long run. López Obrador represents
progressive change, as does Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's surprise primary victory in New York's 14th congressional district.
Trump and other far-right populists like Le Pen represent something very different.
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It will ultimately come down to which side can offer the more appealing alternative, and the left should recognize that the
more realistic and "pragmatic" approach isn't always the most politically persuasive. One of the most common criticisms of
populists has been that they are selling a pipe dream, which to an extent is true -- especially for right-wing populists who
base their entire worldview on falsehoods. If the left wants to stop reactionary populism, however, it will have to adopt an
unapologetically populist approach of its own, and reject the dogma of neoliberalism once and for all.
Captain
Nonobvious
Leader
21 Jul
Neoliberalism is nothing more than a set of excuses and fables for giving more wealth, power
and income to the rich and well off than they have at any given moment, and for distributing
the assets of ownership and governance across borders, out of reach and jurisdiction of the
people.
Which brings us to today.
But what next? Neoliberalism is ending because enough of society now is owned and run by the top end --completely in Russia,
and mostly, here in the US-- that the people no longer have enough to work with to compete
against oligarchy.
In the US there's no more need for the pretense, so we get the blatant language and behavior of a Trump, and public display
of the aggression against the people and the nation that neoliberalism has been practicing
out of view all along. (It's not actually been so much hidden as willfully ignored by
moderates and commentators since the Administration of the previous lying, delusional
national media star.)
What's next is rapid consolidation of oligarchy. The Supreme Court will be held by oligarchy
fanatics for the coming 40 years, and will be ruling every imaginable practice of liberal or
progressive governance to be unconstitutional. Even an economic collapse like the Great
Depression can't unseat a Court, and no voting majorities can legislate against their
Constitution.
Basho
Leader
21 Jul
No matter how much you pretty up neoliberalism with racial diversity, women' empowerment, and
homosexual rights, it still stinks. Neoliberalism has turned the Democratic Party into a
political-correct Republican Party. All the great accomplishments that came from the1930s to
the mid-70s are gone. Democrats have become the party of the oligarchs and the professional
elites who serve them. They have - as Thomas Frank has suggested - ceased to be the party of
the people. The whole point of neoliberalism is to please big money donors by dismantling all
that Democrats did to help and ordinary working Americans before the1980s. This had been what
Noam Chomsky called Amerca's Golden Age. America had become the finest country to live in in
the entire history of the world. That's gone. Today Democrats join with Republicans in
supporting a corporate oligarchy. If the Democratic Party is to have a future (and if I am to
be a part of it) they must turn to new voices like Tulsi Gabbard and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.
They need to make Bernie Sanders the Chair of the Democratic Party. And they need to quit
warmongering. The Democratic Party must model itself after Jeremy Corbyn in the UK and Andrés
Manuel López Obrador in Mexico. Neoliberalism is a plague. It is anti-democratic. It must
end. The Democratic Party must once again be a moral force for economic justice.
Mike Calcagno
Leader
Basho
23 Jul
Edited
nYes, things were great in American cities in the 60s and 70s. Those riots - how
wonderful? Almost 1000 murders a year in Chicago in the early 70s, more than 2000 a year
in New York. Major American cities looked like Dresden after WWII in many neighborhoods.
LBJ was a warmonger who got 57000 Americans and millions of Vietnamese and Cambodians
killed, and Kennedy won by running to the right of Nixon. You continue to peddle this
nonsense that there was this golden age of liberalism. There was a brief period where the
White working class did well as a result of unions, and because wealthier white men who
served with them during the war felt an obligation to their fellow servicemen. As usual,
you ignore the plight of non-White Americans. I'm not calling you a racist; I'm
challenging you on your myopia. n
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Basho
Leader
Mike Calcagno
23 Jul
Edited
Today we have police armed with military equipment harassing and killing people of color
in American cities. Driving while Black has become a crime. Our Golden Age (which ended in
the 1970s) saw the least economic inequality of any industrialized nation. FDR created an
excellent economic safety net. He essentially created our middle class. Today we have
greatest wealth inequality of any industrialized nation. In the Golden Age we had the
nonviolent Civil Rights Movement (in which I participated.) There was a major peace
movement in the Democratic Party (in which I participated.) We had the War on Poverty.
Unions were strong. Working people had a decent standard of living. The Democratic Party
was actually liberal (The word liberal today has been drained of all meaning.) Kennedy
ran, not to the right of NIxon but as a hawk like Nixon, but at the time of his death he
was working to get out of Vietnam. And he started pushing the Democratic Party towards
civil rights.Kennedy got rid of the evil Alan Dulles as head of the CIA. Today's Dulles's
techniques are a clear part of the Democratic Party's foreign policy. Our CIA is Murder
Incorporated. The Democratic Party that I once loved has gone to hell.
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FreeQuark
Leader
22 Jul
The social agenda of the left is entirely compatible with neoliberalism, and in fact certain
aspects of that social agenda - unrestricted immigration, for example - are fundamental
components of neoliberal economic ideology. Neoliberal politicians who are members of
center/left political parties thus run on a far left social platform and thereby win election
after election over economic progressives. The left has consequently neutered itself on
economics through its overemphasis on social issues. Most people on the left are totally
unwilling to acknowledge that reality, and that is why neoliberals will continue to dominate
center/left politics around the world. Even though "progressives" may manage to win an
election here or there, neoliberals will always be able to maintain overall control of
center/left parties by associating left-wing economics with opposition to immigration and
other alleged "right-wing" causes. For people on the left primarily concerned about
economics, alternative right politicians on the order of Trump or Le Pen are likely to remain
the only viable political options in most elections for a long time to come.
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Darren
Tomlyn
Leader
21 Jul
Edited
Humanity now stands at a crossroads, for there's a difference between reacting against the
corruption of civilization, and reacting against civilization itself... The latter is
unfortunately what Trump (and Brexit) truly represents. If the latter is what people vote
for, then they vote for DEATH... Unfortunately, as has been proven throughout the past few
thousand years, this usually ultimately results in their very own death at the same time.
Although neoliberalism has been about the corruption of capitalism - using economic power to
get one part of humanity to essentially wage war on the rest to further their own goals -
this particular underlying economic conflict (the rich and powerful vs everyone else) is
inherent to civilization, and is what government exists to manage. So again, the main problem
stems from people not learning from history and repeating many of the same mistakes, even it
the context and outcomes merely rhyme...
Todd
Dunning
Leader
22 Jul
Can someone here help me out to properly define "Neoliberalism"?
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FreeQuark
Leader
Todd Dunning
22 Jul
Neoliberalism is the idea that the removal of protectionist trade policies, government
regulations, immigration quotas, and other barriers to international commerce is the key
to economic growth and prosperity. It's safe to say I think that the adoption of the
neoliberal policy agenda by many governments around the world has not produced the outcome
that economists and globalist think tanks claimed it would produce. The problem now is
that mainstream political parties in Western countries have bought, hook, line, and sinker
into neoliberalism and are refusing to let it go regardless of its failings. The reason
they won't let it go of course is that most of those parties are controlled by wealthy
people who haven't been harmed by neoliberal policies. I'm guessing Justin Trudeau,
Emmanuel Macron, Angela Merkel, and the Clintons have never lost a night's sleep worrying
that the factory they work in may move overseas or that they will lose a job to some
upwardly-mobile immigrant.
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RobertSF
Leader
Todd Dunning
22 Jul
Is there no wiki in your internet? Or are you looking for an argument?
jak123
Leader
21 Jul
Excellent article. Trump and AMLO are similar in that both are insurgents. The question for
both is whether they can make real progress within their respective political systems. The
Russia issue is a test of that. On one side is Trump, who represents a break from the
neoliberal policies of the past (even if many of his policies are neoliberal, as Lynch says),
such as hostility toward Russia, and on the other hand are elements of his government, such
as the intelligence agencies, that backed Clinton and are part of the effort to undermine
Trump because they want to topple Putin to allow the US to plunder Russia. The hysterical
overreaction to the summit. Strzok's shocking testimony to Congress and Mueller's pretend
indictments of Russians who will never stand trial represent an escalation by the elements of
Trump's government who oppose him.
In his recent article "Averting
World Conflict with China" Ron Unz has come up with an intriguing suggestion for the Chinese
government to turn the tables on the December 1 st arrest of Meng Wanzhou in Canada.
Canada detained Mrs. Meng, CFO of the world's largest telecoms equipment manufacturer Huawei,
at the request of the United States so she could be extradited to New York to face charges that
she and her company had violated U.S. sanctions on Iran. The sanctions in question had been
imposed unilaterally by Washington and it is widely believed that the Trump Administration is
sending a signal that when the ban on purchasing oil from Iran comes into full effect in May
there will be no excuses accepted from any country that is unwilling to comply with the U.S.
government's demands. Washington will exercise universal jurisdiction over those who violate
its sanctions, meaning that foreign officials and heads of corporations that continue to deal
with Iran can be arrested when traveling internationally and will be extradited to be tried in
American courts.
There is, of course, a considerable downside to arresting a top executive of a leading
foreign corporation from a country that is a major U.S. trading partner and which also, inter
alia, holds a considerable portion of the U.S. national debt. Ron Unz has correctly noted the "
extraordinary gravity of this international incident and its potential for altering the course
of world history." One might add that Washington's demands that other nations adhere to its
sanctions on third countries opens up a Pandora's box whereby no traveling executives will be
considered safe from legal consequences when they do not adhere to policies being promoted by
the United States. Unz cites Columbia's Jeffrey Sachs as
describing it as "almost a U.S. declaration of war on China's business community." If
seizing and extraditing businessmen becomes the new normal those countries most affected will
inevitably retaliate in kind. China has already detained two traveling Canadians to pressure
Ottawa to release Mrs. Meng. Beijing is also contemplating some immediate retaliatory steps
against Washington to include American companies operating in China if she is extradited to the
U.S.
Ron Unz has suggested that Beijing might just want to execute a quid pro quo by pulling the
licenses of Sheldon Adelson's casinos operating in Macau, China and shutting them down, thereby
eliminating a major source of his revenue. Why go after an Israeli-American casino operator
rather than taking steps directly against the U.S. government? The answer is simple. Pressuring
Washington is complicated as there are many players involved and unlikely to produce any
positive results while Adelson
is the prime mover on much of the Trump foreign policy, though one hesitates to refer to it
as a policy at all.
Adelson is the world's leading diaspora Israel-firster and he has the ear of the president
of the United States, who reportedly speaks and meets with him regularly. And Adelson uses his
considerable financial resources to back up his words of wisdom. He is the fifteenth wealthiest man in America
with a reported fortune of $33 billion. He is the number one contributor to the GOP having
given $81 million in the last cycle. Admittedly that is chump change to him, but it is more
than enough to buy the money hungry and easily corruptible Republicans.
In a certain sense, Adelson has obtained control of the foreign policy of the political
party that now controls both the White House and the Senate, and his mission in life is to
advance Israeli interests. Among those interests is the continuous punishment of Iran, which
does not threaten the United States in any way, through employment of increasingly savage
sanctions and threats of violence, which brings us around to the arrest of Meng and the
complicity of Adelson in that process. Adelson's wholly owned talking head National Security
Adviser John Bolton reportedly had prior knowledge of the Canadian plans and may have actually
been complicit in their formulation. Adelson has also been the major force behind moving the
U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem, has also convinced the Administration to stop its criticism of the
illegal Israeli settlements on Arab land and has been instrumental in cutting off all
humanitarian aid to the Palestinians. He prefers tough love when dealing with the Iranians,
advocating dropping
a nuclear bomb on Iran as a warning to the Mullahs of what more might be coming if they don't
comply with all the American and Israeli demands.
Jana Bacevic
59
2 years ago
PhD researcher at the University of Cambridge, Department of Sociology; sociology of
knowledge, social theory, political economy of knowledge production.
This is an extremely interesting and important question. In the past years, critics are
increasingly proclaiming that neoliberalism has
come to an end
, or at least become too broad or
too vague
to be used as an explanatory term.
Yet, neoliberalism has proven to be remarkably resilient. This, as
Jamie Peck
has argued, may be due to its propensity to 'fail forward', that is, perpetuate
rather than correct or reverse the mechanisms that led to its failures in the first place – the
economic/fiscal policies following the
2008 economic crisis
are a good example. Or it may have to do with what
Boltanski and Chiapello
have dubbed 'the new spirit of capitalism', meaning its capacity to
absorb political and societal challenges and subsume them under the dominant economic paradigm –
as reflected, for instance, in the way neoliberalism has managed to coopt politics of identity.
But the success of neoliberalism has arguably less to do with its performance as an economic
philosophy (at least after 2008, that is patently not the case – even IMF
has admitted
that neoliberal policies may be exacerbating inequality), and more to do with
what seems to be the consensus of political and economic elites over its application.
Neoliberalism allows for the convergence of financial, governmental, military, industrial and
technological networks of power in ways that not only make sustained resistance difficult, but
also increasingly constrain possibilities for thinking about alternatives.
This is not to say that
heterodox economic
ideas are lacking. Alternatives to mainstream (or neo-classical)
economics range from Marxist and Keynesian approaches, to post-Keynesian, participatory, or
'sharing' economies, and the philosophy of
degrowth.
Yet, in the framework of existing system of political and economic relations,
successfully implementing any of these would require a strong political initiative and at least
some level of consensus beyond the level of any single nation-state.
In this sense, the economic philosophy to succeed neoliberalism will be the one that manages
to capture the 'hearts and minds' of those in power. While the Left needs to start developing
sustainable economic alternatives, it seems that, in the short term, economic policies will be
driven either by some sort of
authoritarian populism,
(as for instance in Trump's pre-election speeches), or a new version
of neoliberalism (what
Will Davies
has called "punitive" neoliberalism). Hopefully, even from such a shrunk space,
alternatives can emerge; however, if we are to draw lessons from the
intellectual history of neoliberalism
, they will require long-term political action to
seriously challenge the prevailing economic order.
This isn very important question that i try to answer in my books. I think
regulation and taxation are key, as well as moving toward a more local circular
economy. You can download the books for free at
So much for peace that neoliberal globalization should supposedly bring...
Notable quotes:
"... We face a world of multiple wars some leading to direct global conflagrations and others that begin as regional conflicts but quickly spread to big power confrontations. ..."
"... In our times the US is the principal power in search of world domination through force and violence. Washington has targeted top level targets, namely China, Russia, Iran; secondary objectives Afghanistan, North and Central Africa, Caucuses and Latin America ..."
"... China is the prime enemy of the US for several economic, political and military reasons: China is the second largest economy in the world; its technology has challenged US supremacy it has built global economic networks reaching across three continents. China has replaced the US in overseas markets, investments and infrastructures. ..."
"... In response the US has resorted to a closed protectionist economy at home and an aggressive military led imperial economy abroad. ..."
"... The first line of attack are Chinese exports to the US and its vassals. Secondly, is the expansion of overseas bases in Asia. Thirdly, is the promotion of separatist clients in Hong Kong, Tibet and among the Uighurs. Fourthly, is the use of sanctions to bludgeon EU and Asian allies into joining the economic war against China. China has responded by expanding its military security, expanding its economic networks and increasing economic tariffs on US exports ..."
"... The US economic war has moved to a higher level by arresting and seizing a top executive of China's foremost technological company, Huawei. ..."
"... Each of the three strategic targets of the US are central to its drive for global dominance; dominating China leads to controlling Asia; regime change in Russia facilitates the total submission of Europe; and the demise of Iran facilitates the takeover of its oil market and US influence of Islamic world. As the US escalates its aggression and provocations we face the threat of a global nuclear war or at best a world economic breakdown. ..."
We face a world of multiple wars some
leading to direct global conflagrations and others that begin as regional conflicts but quickly spread to
big power confrontations.
We will proceed to identify 'great power'
confrontations and then proceed to discuss the stages of 'proxy' wars with world war consequences.
In our times the US is the principal
power in search of world domination through force and violence. Washington has targeted top level targets,
namely China, Russia, Iran; secondary objectives Afghanistan, North and Central Africa, Caucuses and Latin
America.
China is the prime enemy of the US for
several economic, political and military reasons: China is the second largest economy in the world; its
technology has challenged US supremacy it has built global economic networks reaching across three
continents. China has replaced the US in overseas markets, investments and infrastructures. China has built
an alternative socio-economic model which links state banks and planning to private sector priorities. On
all these counts the US has fallen behind and its future prospects are declining.
In response the US has resorted to a
closed protectionist economy at home and an aggressive military led imperial economy abroad. President Trump
has declared a
tariff
war on China; and multiple separatist and propaganda war; and aerial
and maritime encirclement of China's mainland
The first line of attack are Chinese
exports to the US and its vassals. Secondly, is the expansion of overseas bases in Asia. Thirdly, is the
promotion of separatist clients in Hong Kong, Tibet and among the Uighurs. Fourthly, is the use of sanctions
to bludgeon EU and Asian allies into joining the economic war against China. China has responded by
expanding its military security, expanding its economic networks and increasing economic tariffs on US
exports.
The US economic war has moved to a higher
level by arresting and seizing a top executive of China's foremost technological company, Huawei.
The White House has moved up the ladder
of aggression from sanctions to extortion to kidnapping. Provocation, is one step up from military
intimidation. The nuclear fuse has been lit.
Russia faces similar threats to its
domestic economy, its overseas allies, especially China and Iran as well as the US renunciation of
intermediate nuclear missile agreement
Iran faces oil sanctions, military
encirclement and attacks on proxy allies including in Yemen, Syria and the Gulf region Washington relies on
Saudi Arabia, Israel and paramilitary terrorist groups to apply military and economic pressure to undermine
Iran's economy and to impose a 'regime change'.
Each of the three strategic targets of
the US are central to its drive for global dominance; dominating China leads to controlling Asia; regime
change in Russia facilitates the total submission of Europe; and the demise of Iran facilitates the takeover
of its oil market and US influence of Islamic world. As the US escalates its aggression and provocations we
face the threat of a global nuclear war or at best a world economic breakdown.
Wars by Proxy
The US has targeted a second tier of
enemies, in Latin America, Asia and Africa.
In Latin America the US has waged
economic warfare against Venezuela, Cuba and Nicaragua. More recently it has applied political and economic
pressure on Bolivia. To expand its dominance Washington has relied on its vassal allies, including Brazil,
Peru, Chile, Ecuador, Argentina and Paraguay as well as right-wing elites throughout the region
As in numerous other cases of regime
change Washington relies on corrupt judges to rule against President Morales, as well as US foundation
funded NGO's; dissident indigenous leaders and retired military officials. The US relies on local political
proxies to further US imperial goals is to give the appearance of a 'civil war' rather than gross US
intervention.
In fact, once the so-called 'dissidents'
or 'rebels' establish a foot hole, they 'invite' US military advisers, secure military aid and serve as
propaganda weapons against Russia, China or Iran – 'first tier' adversaries.
In recent years US proxy conflicts have
been a weapon of choice in the Kosovo separatist war against Serbia; the Ukraine coup of 2014 and war
against Eastern Ukraine; the Kurd take over of Northern Iraq and Syria; the US backed separatist Uighurs
attack in the Chinese province of Xinjiang.
The US has established 32 military bases
in Africa, to coordinate activities with local warlords and plutocrats. Their proxy wars are discarded as
local conflict between 'legitimate' regimes and Islamic terrorists, tribality and tyrants.
The objective of proxy wars are
threefold. They serve as 'feeders' into larger territorial wars
encircling
China, Russia
and Iran.
Secondly, proxy wars are 'testing
grounds' to measure the vulnerability and responsive capacity of the targeted strategic adversary, i.e.
Russia, China and Iran.
Thirdly, the proxy wars are 'low cost'
and 'low risk' attacks on strategic enemies. The lead up to a major confrontation by stealth.
Equally important 'proxy wars' serve as
propaganda tools, associating strategic adversaries as 'expansionist authoritarian' enemies of 'western
values'.
Conclusion
US empire builders engage in multiple
types of aggression directed at imposing a unipolar world. At the center are trade wars against China;
regional military conflicts with Russia and economic sanctions against Iran.
These large scale, long-term strategic
weapons are complemented by proxy wars, involving regional vassal states which are designed to erode the
economic bases of counting allies of anti-imperialist powers.
Hence, the US attacks China directly via
tariff wars and tries to sabotage its global "Belt and Road' infrastructure projects linking China with 82
counties.
Likewise, the US attacks Russian allies
in Syria via proxy wars, as it did with Iraq, Libya and the Ukraine.
Isolating strategic anti-imperial power
via regional wars, sets the stage for the 'final assault' – regime change by cop or nuclear war.
However, the US quest for world
domination has so far taken steps which have failed to isolate or weaken its strategic adversaries.
China moves forward with its global
infrastructure programs: the trade war has had little impact in isolating it from its principal markets.
Moreover, the US policy has increased China's role as a leading advocate of 'open trade' against President
Trump's protectionism.
ORDER IT NOW
Likewise, the tactics of encircling and
sanctioning Russia has deepened ties between Moscow and Beijing. The US has increased its nominal 'proxies'
in Latin America and Africa but they all depend on trade and investments from China. This is especially true
of agro-mineral exports to China.
Notwithstanding the limits of US power
and its failure to topple regimes, Washington has taken moves to compensate for its failures by escalating
the threats of a global war. It kidnaps Chinese economic leaders; it moves war ships off China's coast; it
allies with neo-fascist elites in the Ukraine. It threatens to bomb Iran. In other words the US political
leaders have embarked on adventurous policies always on the verge of igniting one, too, many nuclear fuses.
It is easy to imagine how a failed trade
war can lead to a nuclear war; a regional conflict can entail a greater war.
Can we prevent World War 3? I believe it
will happen. The US economy is built on fragile foundations; its elites are deeply divided. Its main allies
in France and the UK are in deep crises. The war mongers and war makers lack popular support. There are
reasons to hope!
I disagree. The parasitic terror regime that runs washington believe they can win a nuclear war, i have no
hope left for peace. They need a culling of the "useless eaters", we are stealing the food out of their poor
frightened children`s mouths by existing.
Eric Zuesse wrote a decent article yesterday at the Saker blog about the US nuclear forces and its owners
wet dream.
"The U.S. Government's Plan Is to Conquer Russia by a Surprise Invasion"
The actions of nato/EU/UK/ISR/KSA etc certainly supports his article, at least in my opinion.
The US, and the West, by instigating wars elsewhere, and selling weapons to
those, destroy countries and prosperity abroad. Those living in target countries find themselves miserable,
with loss of everything. It is only natural that they may try to escape a living hell by emigrating to the
West.
People in the US and the West in general will not want mass immigration, and with good reason; but if you
were in a war torn country or an impoverished country (as a result of western "help") you would also attempt
to move away from the bombs, etc.
If the West left the rest of the world alone (in terms of their regimes and in terms of their weapons),
they might prosper and no longer need to run away from their home countries.
The sanctions and embargoes have failed in the past, when China was much weaker, so we can be quite
confident that they will fail again, and quickly, as this timeline suggests:
September 3, 2018
:
Huawei unveils Kirin 980 CPU, the world's first commercial 7nm system-on-chip (SoC) and the first to use
Cortex-A76 cores, dual neural processing units, Mali G76 GPU, a 1.4 Gbps LTE modem and supports faster RAM.
With 20 percent faster performance and 40 percent less power consumption compared to 10nm systems, it has
twice the performance of Qualcomm's Snapdragon 845 and Apple's A11 while delivering noticeable battery life
improvement. Its Huawei-patented modem has the world's fastest Wi-Fi and its GPS receiver taps L5 frequency
to deliver 10cm. positioning.
September 5, 2018
. China's front-end fab capacity will account for 16 percent of the world's
semiconductor capacity this year, increasing to 20 percent by 2020.
September 15, 2018.
China controls one third of 5G patents and has twice as many installations
operating as the rest of the world combined.
September 21, 2018
. China has reached global technological parity and now has twelve of the
world's top fifty IC design houses (China's SMIC is fourth, Huawei's HiSilicon is seventh), and twenty-one
percent of global IC design revenues. Roger Luo, TSMC.
October 2, 2018
. Chinese research makes up 18.6 percent of global STEM peer-reviewed papers, ahead
of the US at 18 percent. "The fact that China's article output is now the largest is very significant. It's
been predicted for a while, but there was a view this was not likely to happen until 2025," said Michael
Mabe, head of STM.
October 14, 2018
. Huawei announces 7 nm Ascend 910 chipset for data centers, twice as powerful as
Nvidia's v100 and the first AI IP chip series to natively provide optimal TeraOPS per watt in all scenarios.
Available 2Q19.
October 7, 2018
: China becomes largest recipient of FDI in H1, attracting an estimated 70 billion
U.S. dollars, according to UNCTAD.
October 8, 2018:
Taiwan's Foxconn moves its major semiconductor maker and five integrated circuit
design companies to Jinan, China.
October 22, 2018
. China becomes world leader in venture capital, ahead of the US and almost twice
the rest of the world's $53.4 billion YTD. The Crunchbase report says the entrepreneurial ecosystem in the
world is undergoing a major transformation: it is now driven by China instead of the US.
Isolating strategic anti-imperial power via regional wars, sets the stage for the 'final assault' –
regime change by cop or nuclear war
good article.
Only idiot can believe that nuclear war can be won, IMHO. Elites aren't suicidal, oh no. On the contrary.
Can they make a mistake and cause that war, definitely.
Which brings us to the important part:
Can we prevent World War 3? I believe it will happen. The US economy is built on fragile foundations;
its elites are deeply divided. Its main allies in France and the UK are in deep crises. The war mongers
and war makers lack popular support.
Agree, but, that's
exactly
the reason I disagree with:
There are reasons to hope!
No need to be pedantic, of course there is always a reason for hope.
But, I see it as
so
fertile ground for making
The MISTAKE
.
Can we prevent World War 3? I believe it will happen. The US economy is built on fragile foundations;
its elites are deeply divided. Its main allies in France and the UK are in deep crises. The war mongers
and war makers lack popular support. There are reasons to hope!
It's when the elite war mongers' backs are up against the wall that they come up with a cleverly designed
false flag attack to rally public support for war. They are more dangerous now than ever.
Agree about Russia and China, however Iran needs to be viewed not as a play for oil or the Islamic crowd but
driven wholly and solely by Israel. Iran is not a threat to US in any context, only Israel.
question:
If the relatively small tariffs on Chinese goods amount to 'direct attacks on China', then what are the
massive tariffs by China on US goods?
The "Chess men" behind "The Wall Street Economy" have stated a few times that the only way to remain the
dominant economy is to first: convince rivals that resistance is futile, and second:
to atomize any
potential rival
(Ghaddaffi is a clear example).
Breaking up Russia has been on the to-do list for
decades, and I believe that the Chess Men have no idea what to do about containing China, and are clearly
flat-footed, and
desperate
kidnapping a Chinese business executive.
The Wall Street Economy depended on cheap Chinese labor it's own profits, and that was Ok until .?
Until the writing on the Wall became ledgible .
The smell of genuine fear is in the air.
" The war mongers and war makers lack popular support. There are reasons to hope! "
Is popular support
needed to get a people in a war mood ?
Both Pearl Harbour and Sept 11 demonstrate, in my opinion, that it is not very difficult to create a war
mood.
Yet, if another Sept 11 would do the trick, I wonder.
Sept 11 has been debated without without interruption since Sept 11.
After the 1946 USA Senate investigation into Pearl Harbour the USA government succeeded in preventing a
similar discussion.
Until now the west, Deep State, NATO, EU did not succeed in provoking Russia or China.
Each time they tried something, in my opinion they did this several times, Russia showed its military
superiority, at the same time taking care not to hurt public opinion in the west.
Is not it amazing that the morally miserable US, a "power in search of world domination through force and
violence," is officially governed by self-avowed pious X-tians. What kind of corruption among the high-level
clergy protects the satanists Pompeo, Bush, Rice, Clinton, Obama, Blair and such from excommunication?
"Washington does little to nothing to restore peace and help the devastated region to recover from the
long war, while its [US] airstrikes
continue to rack up civilian deaths
At the same time, the US
military presence at the Al-Tanf airbase and the "armed gangs" around it prevent refugees from returning
home."
– Nothing new. The multi-denominational Syria has been pounded by the US-supported "moderate" terrorists
(armed with US-provided arms and with UK-provided chemical weaponry) to satisfy the desires of
Israel-firsters, arm-dealers and the multitude of war-profiteers that have been fattening their pockets at
the US/UK taxpayers' expense.
"Timber Sycamore" [initiated by Obama] is the most important arms trafficking operation in History. It
involves at least 17 governments. The transfer of weapons, meant for jihadist organizations, is carried out
by Silk Way Airlines, a Azerbaïdjan public company of cargo planes."
@Godfree Roberts
Huawei can announce whatever, there are much more experienced adversaries(IBM, intel and ARM) who can`t beat
nV in computation, and especially in integration of silicon. Guess who`s running inference and computer
vision in all these car autopilots.
I think we could have an economic collapse like the Soviet Union had , or like Argentina had in 2001 with
the " corralito "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corralito
.
Being the complex and global society that we are , it would be a disaster , it would produce hunger ,
misery and all types of local wars .
"Notwithstanding the limits of US power and its failure to topple regimes "
Have to agree with that
statement. Seriously, wherein is this vaunted "superpower" that our American politicians always yap about?
All I've seen in my lifetime is our military getting its butt kicked in Cuba, Vietnam, Somalia, Iraq,
Afghanistan. What, besides insanity and hubris, makes them think they could win anything much less a war
against Iran, China or Russia?
Mostly accurate, but 'closed protectionist society' ! Hardly. It's still very difficult to buy any
manufactured goods made in this country. Of course this is part of the World economic circle countries use
the US Dollar for all trade. They need dollars. We can print them and receive real goods in return. This has
been going around and around for decades. It may come to an end in the not-too-distant future, but it has a
lot of inertia.
@jilles dykstra
"Naturally the common people don't want war: Neither in Russia, nor in England, nor for that matter in
Germany. That is understood. But, after all, IT IS THE LEADERS of the country who determine the policy and
it is always a simple matter to drag the people along, whether it is a democracy, or a fascist dictatorship,
or a parliament, or a communist dictatorship. Voice or no voice, the people can always be brought to the
bidding of the leaders. That is easy. All you have to do is TELL THEM THEY ARE BEING ATTACKED, and denounce
the peacemakers for lack of patriotism and exposing the country to danger. IT WORKS THE SAME IN ANY
COUNTRY."
The only threat to patriotic Americans is Zionism which has ruled the U.S. since it took control over the
money supply and the taxes via the privately owned Zionist FED and IRS and has given America nothing to wars
and economic destruction since the FED and IRS were put in place by the Zionist banking kabal in 1913 and
both are UNCONSTITUTIONAL!
The threat is not from China or Russia or Iran etc., the threat is from within
the U.S. government which is controlled in every facet by the Zionists and dual citizens and is as foreign
to the American people as if it were from MARS!
Until the American people wake up to the fact that we are slaves on a Zionist plantation and are used as
pawns in the Zionist goal of a satanic Zionist NWO and abolish the FED and IRS and break the chains of
slavery that the FED and IRS have place upon us, until then nothing will change and the wars and economic
destruction by the Zionist kabal will continue!
Read The Controversy of Zion by Douglas Reed and The Committee of 300 by Dr. John Coleman and The
Protocols of Zion, to see the Zionist satanic NWO plan.
Lost me at Kurd takeover of northern Iraq/Syria. The Kurds have defacto owned those areas since 1991, and
earlier. Saddam gassing the Kurds didn't accomplish anything except for making himself a target, no Arab
lived in those areas, the Kurds would kill them.
Nov 28, 2018 Belt & Road Billionaire in Massive Bribery Scandal
The bribery trial of Dr. Patrick Ho, a
pitchman for a Chinese energy company, lifts the lid on how the Chinese regime relies on graft to cut Belt
and Road deals in its global push for economic and geopolitical dominance.
I agree with Bob Sykes' commentary over on Instapundit:
Well, our "anti-ISIS" model in eastern Syria consists of defending ISIS against attacks by the Syrian
government, allowing them to pump and export Syrian oil for their profit, arming them and allowing them
to recruit new fighters. I suppose that means we should be arming the Taliban.
ISIS was created by the CIA to fight against Assad. But they slipped the leash and became the fighting
force for the dissident Sunni Arabs all along the Euphrates Valley. We only began to oppose them when
their rebellion reached the outskirts of Baghdad, and even then the bulk of the fighting was done by
Iraq's Shias and Iran. Now we are transferring them, or many of them, into secure (for ISIS) areas of
Iraq.
The three U.S. presidents, six secretaries of defense and five chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff are, in fact, war criminals, in exactly the same sense that Hitler, Goebels, Goering, Himmler et
al. were war criminals.
Those presidents, secretaries and generals launched wars of aggression
against Sudan, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Ukraine, Libya, Yemen not one of which threatened us
in any way. They engineered coups d'état against two friendly governments, Egypt and Turkey.
Now the
fake American, anti-American neocons want to attack Iran, Venezuela, North Korea and even Russia and
China.
Green needs to get his head out of his arse. We, the US, are the great rogue terrorist state. We are
the evil empire. We are the chief source of death and destruction in the world. How many hundreds of
thousands of civilians have we murdered in the Middle East, Africa and Central Asia? How many cities have
we bombed flat like Raqqa and Mosel. Putin is a saint compared to any US President.
Iran has always been at the center of the Great Game, the key square on the board to block
Eurasia.You must either control Afghanistan AND Pakistan or Iran.
With Pakistan now in the SCO, Iran is a US imperative.
Israels antipathy is secondary and a useful foil, not the primary motive.
Read MacKinder, the imperial power has changed, not the strategy.
How is it possible for anyone to write an article titled:
A World of Multiple Detonators of Global Wars
without mentioning the Principal Detonator of Global Wars?? The Elephant!
The United States of America is no longer a Sovereign Nation.
The Local Political Power Elite (C. Wright Mills term), serve, are Minions, of the Zionist Jewish
Financial Terrorist Initiators and Controllers of the Global New World Order.
I would express this point in stronger terms, but I have not yet finished my coffee. The "Mulitiple
Detonators" Petras discusses are useless unless Triggered by the Global Controllers.
A Slight Digression: maybe:
Petras may have written his exposé this way, understanding that he might safely avoid mention of the
anti-Semitic (they hate Palestinians and other Arabs – actual Semites), Zionist Land Thieves, because a
clueless Anarchist would appear and complete his article for him. If that is the case, I want half of the $
Unz is paying Petras for this article.
In Conclusion: and by the number###:
1. The American Power Elite and servile Politicians in America's Knesset in Washington DC, do not go to the
Bathroom, without permission from their Zionist Oligarch masters.
2. The American Gauleters, Quislings, (better known as Traitors), serve the Rothschild and other Foreign
Oligarchs. Recently, only 1, of 100 'Senators' demanded that there be a discussion of the Bill to send
another $35 Billion gift to the Zionist occupiers of Palestine. Poor
Senator Rand Paul
. How many ribs
of his remain to be broken?
We the American people, have one Senator. And he has a great father.
3. Textbooks, Entertainment from Hollywood (key to all mind control), even Dictionaries, have been
ruthlessly censored.
4.
Our elected Zionist slaves in Congress, and all State and local governing bodies, live in fear
of saying (accidentally), some truth, and ending up working at Walmart or 7-11, (if they are lucky).
5. Our young are effectively brainwashed in their schools; they have already been removed from their
parents.
6. Our politicians are bribed with our own tax money (re-routed by the Zionists AIPAC, etc.).
7.
The Zionist Entity has huge Financial Resources
. They should be giving us 'Financial $$ Aid,
not the other way around. Since NAFTA, we have entire cities & tons of infrastructure to rebuild.
Excuse me
: Girlfriend thinks I should go to work.
Petras, I just fleshed out your, otherwise, promising article. You must understand – that
the ethnic
cleansing – genocide, against the Palestinian Nation, by the Terrorist Zionist Oligarchs, is the greatest
single crime being committed on our Planet.
All other crimes stem from this one.
We Americans must Restore Our Republic!
John F. Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, M L King, Malcolm X. John Lennon; we are late, but we are coming.
The threat is not from China or Russia or Iran etc., the threat is from within the U.S. government
which is controlled in every facet by the Zionists and dual citizens and is as foreign to the American
people as if it were from MARS!
One comment:
Until the American people wake up to the fact that we are slaves on a Zionist plantation and are used
as pawns in the Zionist goal of a satanic Zionist NWO and abolish the FED and IRS and break the chains of
slavery that the FED and IRS have place upon us, until then nothing will change and the wars and economic
destruction by the Zionist kabal will continue!
In order to accomplish the above
, we American Citizen Patriots – must Restore Our Republic – that,
with our Last Constitutional President,
John F. Kennedy,
was destroyed by the Zionist Oligarchs and
their American underling traitors, in a hail of bullets, on November 22, 1963.
@Miro23
" same sense that Hitler, Goebels, Goering, Himmler et al. were war criminals. "
Why were they war criminals ?
Because of the Neurenberg farce ?; farce according to the chairman of the USA Supreme Court in 1945:
Bruce Allen Murphy, 'The Brandeis/Frankfurter Connection, The Secret Political Activities of Two Supreme
Court Justices', New York, 1983
Churchill and Lindemann in fact murdered some two million German civilians, women, children, old men. Not a
crime ?
Churchill refused the May 1941 Rudolf Hess peace proposal, not a crime ?
FDR deliberately provoked Pearl Harbour, some 2700 casualties, his pretcxt for war, not a crime ?
900.000 German hunger deaths between the 1918 cease fire and Versailles, the British food blockade, not a
crime ?
Will these wild accusations ever stop ?
I am all for the mother of all wars; however, it isn't going to come anytime soon, nay, not in our lifetime
but when it does appear on the next century's horizon, it would be cathartic to all concerned. Rejoice!
Europe is realigning. England leaving Euro. French population is in upheaval. Eventually France will leave
the Euro also.Most of German tourists now are going to Croatia. Italy is loosing tourists.
Italy living standard is declining. Germany is being pushed inevitably toward cooperation with Russia. Only
supporter of Ukraine will remain USA. Ukraine will be only burden.
Brussels power will evaporate. NATO will remain only on paper and will cease to be reality.
.
This will be great step toward peace in the world.
US is treating its allies as used toilet paper.
Obviously Kashogi was sentenced to death for high treason in absence. The sentence was carried out on Saudi
Arabia's territory. So in reality it is nobody's business.
All hula-buu did happen because he was a reporter working for warmongering Zionist New york times.
@Durruti
I agree with you partly, especially when it comes to the US regarding Zionism and the power of the Israel
lobby to influence US foreign policy and even domestic policy.
But when it comes to Global governance, you have a somewhat narrow minded approach.
Most of the ills today that happen in the world, is driven by the NEW WORLD ORDER OF NEOLIBERAL
GLOBALIZATION.
Unrelated phenomena, such as the destruction in the Middle East (Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, and Syria), the
destruction of Yugoslavia, the coup in Ukraine and the Greek economic catastrophe are a consequence of this
NWO expansion. NWO expansion is the phasing out of national sovereignty (through economic and/or military
violence) and its replacement by a kind of transnational sovereignty administered by a Transnational Elite.
This is the network of the elites mainly based in the G7 countries, which control the world economic and
political/ military institutions (WTO, IMF, World Bank, EU, European Central Bank, NATO, UN and so on), as
well as the global media that set the agenda of the 'world community'.
The US is an important part of this since it provides the Military Means to integrate countries that do not
"comply" with the NWO dictates.
The Zionists carry a lot of blame and are part of that drive for this NWO, but there are others, most of
them in the US and Europe.
Here's a good link to an article if you have time, with good info about NWO & Trasnational corporations
that are mainly to blame about all the worlds and misery in our world today.
@WHAT
back door Intel
,
embedded ARM
Open source Red Hat-IBM
Hummm?.
I am not so sure, Mr. What. Experience may not mean much to abused IAI consumers. even if IAI catches up
to the exponential fundamentals achieved by Huawei consumers might prefer back-door-free equipment and
Operating Systems.
Russian times reported a few weeks ago that Russia has a quite different new processor and an OS that
does not use any IAI stuff and is developing a backup Internet for Russians which it expects to expand
regionally,
"What we have then, are criminal syndicates masquerading as philanthropic enterprises
Norman Dodd, director of research for the (U.S.) REECE COMMITTEE in its attempt to investigate tax exempt
foundations, stated:
"The Foundation world is a coordinated, well-directed system, the purpose of which is to ensure that the
wealth of our country shall be used to divorce it from the ideas which brought it into being."
The Rothschilds rule the U.S. through the foundations, the Council on foreign Relations, and the Federal
Reserve System, with no serious challenges to their power. Expensive 'political campaigns' are routinely
conducted, with carefully screened candidates who are pledged to the program of the WORLD ORDER. Should they
deviate from the program, they would have an 'accident', be framed on a sex charge, or indicted on some
financial irregularity.
Senator Moynihan stated in his book, "Loyalties", "A British friend, wise in the ways of the world, put
it thus: "They are now on page 16 of the Plan." Moynihan prudently did not ask what page 17 would bring.
"Tavistock's pioneer work in behavioural science along Freudian lines of 'controlling' humans established
it as the world center of FOUNDATION ideology.
[MORE]
Its network extends from the University of Sussex to the U.S. through the Standford Research
Institute, Esalen, MIT, Hudson Institute, HERITAGE FOUNDATION, Centre of Strategic and International
Studies at Georgetown, where State Dept personnel are trained, US Air Force Intelligence, and the Rand
and Mitre corporations.
(at the time of writing, 1992) Today the Tavistock Institute operates a $6 billion a year network
of foundations in the U.S., all of it funded by U.S. taxpayers' money. Ten major institutions are
under its direct control, with 400 subsidiaries, and 3000 other study groups and think tanks which
originate many types of programs to increase the control of the WORLD ORDER over the American people.
The personnel of the FOUNDATIONS are required to undergo indoctrination at one or more of these
Tavistock controlled institutions.
A network of secret groups – the MONT PELERIN SOCIETY, TRILATERAL COMMISSION, DITCHLEY FOUNDATION,
and CLUB OF ROME is the conduit for instructions to the Tavistock network.
Tavistock Institute developed the mass brain-washing techniques which were first used
experimentally on AMERICAN prisoners of war in KOREA.
Its experiments in crowd control methods have been widely used on the American public, a
surreptitious but nevertheless outrageous assault on human freedom by modifying individual behaviour
through topical psychology.
A German refugee, Kurt Lewin, became director of Tavistock in 1932. He came to the U.S. in 1933 as
a 'refugee', the first of many infiltrators, and set up the Harvard Psychology Clinic, which
originated the propaganda campaign to turn the American public against Germany and involve the U.S. in
WWII.
In 1938, Roosevelt executed a secret agreement with Churchill which in effect ceded U.S.
sovereignty to England, because it agreed to let Special Operations Executive control U.S. policies.
To implement this agreement, Roosevelt sent General Donovan to London for indoctrination before
setting up the OSS (now the CIA) under the aegis of SOE-SIS. The entire OSS program, as well as the
CIA has always worked on guidelines set up by the Tavistock Institute.
Tavistock Institute originated the mass civilian bombing raids [against the German people] carried
out by [the ALL LIES] Roosevelt and Churchill as a clinical experiment in mass terror, keeping records
of the results as they watched the "guinea pigs" reacting under "controlled laboratory conditions".
All Tavistock and American foundation techniques have a single goal – to break down the
psychological strength of the individual and render him helpless to oppose the dictators of the WORLD
ORDER.
Any technique which helps to break down the family unit, and family inculcated principles of
religion, honor, patriotism and sexual behaviour, is used by the Tavistock scientists as weapons of
crowd control.
The methods of Freudian psychotherapy induce permanent mental illness in those who undergo this
treatment by destabilizing their character. The victim is then advised to 'establish new rituals of
personal interactions', that is, to indulge in brief sexual encounters which actually set the
participants adrift with no stable personal relationships in their lives – destroying their ability to
establish or maintain a family.
Tavistock Institute has developed such power in the U.S. that no one achieves prominence in any
field unless he has been trained in behavioural science at Tavistock or one of its subsidiaries.
Tavistock maintains 2 schools at Frankfort, birthplace of the Rothschilds, the FRANKFURT SCHOOL, and
the Sigmund Freud Institute.
The 'experiment' in compulsory racial integration in the U.S. was organized by Ronald Lippert of
the OSS (forerunner of CIA) and the American Jewish Congress, and director of child training at the
Commission on Community Relations.
The program was designed to break down the individual's sense of personal knowledge in his
identity, his racial heritage. Through the Stanford Research Institute, Tavistock controls the
National Education Association.
The Institute of Social Research at the Natl Training Lab brain washes the leading executives of
business and government.
Another prominent Tavistock operation is the WHARTON SCHOOL OF FINANCE.
A single common denominator identifies the common Tavistock strategy – the use of drugs such as the
infamous MK Ultra program of the CIA, directed by Dr Sidney Gottlieb, in which unsuspecting CIA
officials were given LSD and their reactions studied like guinea pigs, resulting in several deaths –
no one was ever indicted.
(Source of info: author Eustace Mullins "The World Order: Our Secret Rulers" 2nd ed. 1992. He
dedicated his book "to American patriots and their passion for liberty". note: No copyright
restrictions)
@Agent76
Excellent video. More people need to see this to understand how corrupt the China Totalitarian state works
behind the scenes along with the US as part of the Globalization NWO movement to enrich the few and
impoverish the rest of the world population.
"... The US rarely arrests senior businesspeople, US or foreign, for alleged crimes committed by their companies. Corporate managers are usually arrested for their alleged personal crimes (such as embezzlement, bribery or violence) rather than their company's alleged malfeasance. ..."
"... Meng is charged with violating US sanctions on Iran. Yet consider her arrest in the context of the large number of companies, US and non-US, that have violated US sanctions against Iran and other countries. ..."
"... The Trump administration is preparing actions this week to call out Beijing for what it says are China's continued efforts to steal American trade secrets and advanced technologies and to compromise sensitive government and corporate computers, according to U.S. officials. ..."
"... Multiple government agencies are expected to condemn China, citing a documented campaign of economic espionage and the alleged violation of a landmark 2015 pact to refrain from hacking for commercial gain ..."
"... Taken together, the announcements represent a major broadside against China over its mounting aggression against the West and its attempts to displace the United States as the world's leader in technology, officials said. ..."
"... The actions come amid mounting intelligence showing a sustained Chinese hacking effort devoted to acquiring sophisticated American technologies of all stripes. A number of agencies -- including the Justice, State, Treasury and Homeland Security departments -- have pushed for a newly aggressive U.S. response. A National Security Council committee coordinated the actions ..."
"... After three centuries of anglo-american imperialism the economic center of the world is moving back to the east . ..."
"... The U.S. is way too late to prevent this move. Its best and most profitable chance is not to challenge, but to accommodate it. That again would require to respect international laws and treaty obligations. The U.S. is not willing to do either. ..."
"... Nothing except a large scale war that results in the destruction of the industrial centers of east Asia, while keeping the U.S. and Europe save, could reverse the trend. Nuclear weapons on all sides and the principal of mutual assured destruction have made such a war unthinkable. What we are likely to see instead will be proxy conflicts in various other countries. ..."
"... The current U.S. strategy is to restrict China's access to foreign markets, advanced technologies, global banking and higher education. While that may for a moment slow down China's rise it will in the long run strengthen China even more. Instead of integrating into the world economy it will develop its own capacities and international systems. ..."
"... dh posted a link on the last thread to China banning import and sale of all iPhones in China (strange, I thought they were made in China? Must be exported and re-imported?). ..."
"... This is interesting. China hits a top US company manufacturing in China by granting an injunction in a case of one US company against another US company, in which one accuses the other of intellectual property theft. China was not expected to find in Qualcomm's favour, according to the article (perhaps in part because Apple manufactures in China therefore is a client of China, so it was expected China might favour Apple). If this decision was influenced by the arrest, the US can hardly point the finger at China! ..."
"... In my opinion, China should make these criminal actions of the US extremely painful indeed, and as quickly as possible ..."
"... With Trump's utterance, he also exposed how he/his government has abused Canada's extradition law for political purposes. Officially in this extradition procedure, the US now has 60 days to submit a complete extradition request which requires far more detail. Meng's court date is set for February. In any case, Canada's rubberstamping of extradition requests (90% are by the US) was already successfully challenged once in the Diab case with France, was criticized by Canada's Superior Court (extraditions are processed at the provincial judicial level), so Trudeau's hiding behind 'judicial process' is two-faced cowardliness. ..."
"... What's even more damning for the collective absolute stupidity of capitalist bigwigs is that I could see this coming more than 20 years ago, yet these idiots blindly charged as if short-term profits were all they wanted and would be enough to ensure their eternal dominance. ..."
"... What an empire does not control they destroy. ..."
"... The "own goal" was not outsourcing manufacturing to China but in not isolating China by bringing Russia into the Western fold. Instead, they kicked Russia while it was down via capitalist "Shock Doctrine" - hoping for total capitulation. Kissinger admits(*) this when, in his typical roundabout way, he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb pain. ..."
"... Does that moron Kissinger know nothing about WW2? That Kissinger projects an inability to absorb pain onto the Russians suggests that Kissinger knows the Americans have no ability to absorb pain themselves ..."
"... Maybe now Shell executives will be arrested for crimes against humanity in Nigeria. ..."
"... After all, as you stated, these maneuvers wrt Meng are emanating from John (I am the Eggman) Bolton's office and clearly evidence his trademarked hard-boiled belligerence which of course is heartily endorsed by Trump (as an "Art of the Deal" negotiating ploy by the master debater himself) who selected The Walrus in the first place. Or second place if you count Bolton's earlier appointment by that other intellectual giant of the GOP, GW Bush. ..."
"... "Kissinger admits(*) this when, in his typical roundabout way, he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb pain." Then Kissinger is a bigger fool than I thought. He's old enough to know about WWII, and previous wars as well. I mean, he did study the Napoleonic wars... ..."
"... She's not being accused of trading with Iran. She's being accused of bank fraud (providing false information to obtain a loan). ..."
"... The charges against Meng were brought by Richard P. Donoghue, the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York. Donoghue was appointed as Interim United States Attorney for the Eastern District by Attorney General Jeff Sessions on January 3, 2018, and as Attorney on May 3, 2018. ..."
"... The bottom line is that the bar for extradition from Canada is extremely low, which should worry Ms Meng. ..."
"... The historical West is still violently opposed to the objective rise of a fairer and more democratic polycentric world order. Clinging to the principles of unipolarity, Washington and some other Western capitals appear unable to constructively interact with the new global centres of economic and political influence. A wide range of restrictions are applied to the dissenters, ranging from military force and unilateral economic sanctions to demonisation and mud-slinging in the spirit of the notorious "highly likely." There are many examples of this dirty game...This has seriously debased international law. Moreover, attempts have been made to replace the notion of law with a "rules-based order" the parameters of which will be determined by a select few. ..."
"... We are especially concerned about the activities of the US administration aimed at destroying the key international agreements. These include withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action known as the Iran nuclear deal, the declared intention to withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty), an open line for revising the settlement principles in the Middle East, as well as sabotaging the Minsk Agreements on overcoming the internal Ukrainian crisis. The trade wars that have been launched contrary to the WTO principles are rocking the global economic architecture, free trade and competition standards. The US establishment, blindly believing in the idea of their exceptionalism, continues to appoint rivals and adversaries, primarily among the countries that pursue an independent foreign policy. Everyone can see that Washington is a loose cannon, liable to act incongruously, including regarding Russia where any steps taken by US President Donald Trump to develop stable and normal channels of communication with Moscow on the biggest current problems are promptly blocked by those who want to continue or even strengthen the destructive approach to relations with Russia, which developed during the previous US administration. ..."
"... Overall, it looks as if the Americans and some of our other Western colleagues have forgotten the basics of diplomacy and the art of dialogue and consensus over the past 25 years. One result of this is the dangerous militarisation of the foreign policy thinking. As RIAC Director General Andrey Kortunov recently pointed out at a Valdai Discussion Club meeting, the Clausewitz formula can be changed to a mirror image, "Politics is a continuation of war by other means. ..."
"... Unfortunately, the U.S. ruling class cares more about the psychic gratification it derives from dominating the world. ..."
"... The prosecutor's case against Meng is fundamentally weak. For instance, there is no identification of a "co-conspirator", necessary to a charge of conspiracy. It does not seem to have been developed much beyond the information developed in the 2013 Reuters investigation. At least half of that relies on unnamed "former employees" and unnamed persons who claimed to have dealt with Skycom in Iran. ..."
The United States issued an arrest warrant against the chief financial officer and heir apparent of Huawei, Meng Wanzhou. At issue
is a six years old
alleged violation of sanctions against Iran. Mrs. Meng was arrested in Canada. She has been set free under a
stringent $10 million bail agreement . An extradition trial will follow in February or March.
It is unprecedented
that an officer of a large company is personally indicted for the alleged sanction violations by a subsidiary company:
The US rarely arrests senior businesspeople, US or foreign, for alleged crimes committed by their companies. Corporate managers
are usually arrested for their alleged personal crimes (such as embezzlement, bribery or violence) rather than their company's
alleged malfeasance.
... Meng is charged with violating US sanctions on Iran. Yet consider her arrest in the context of the large number of companies,
US and non-US, that have violated US sanctions against Iran and other countries. In 2011, for example, JPMorgan Chase paid
US$88.3 million in fines for violating US sanctions against Cuba, Iran and Sudan. Yet chief executive officer Jamie Dimon wasn't
grabbed off a plane and whisked into custody.
The U.S. indicted dozens of banks for violating its sanction regime. They had to pay
huge fines (pdf) but none of their officers were ever touched.
U.S. President Donald Trump told Reuters on Tuesday he would intervene in the U.S. Justice Department's case against Meng if it
would serve national security interests or help close a trade deal with China.
The arrest of Meng is but one part of a larger
political campaign against China directed out of the office of National Security Advisor John Bolton:
The Trump administration is preparing actions this week to call out Beijing for what it says are China's continued efforts
to steal American trade secrets and advanced technologies and to compromise sensitive government and corporate computers, according
to U.S. officials.
Multiple government agencies are expected to condemn China, citing a documented campaign of economic espionage and the
alleged violation of a landmark 2015 pact to refrain from hacking for commercial gain.
In typical propaganda style the U.S. media depict the Chinese as enemies:
Taken together, the announcements represent a major broadside against China over its mounting aggression against the West
and its attempts to displace the United States as the world's leader in technology, officials said.
...
The actions come amid mounting intelligence showing a sustained Chinese hacking effort devoted to acquiring sophisticated
American technologies of all stripes. A number of agencies -- including the Justice, State, Treasury and Homeland Security departments
-- have pushed for a newly aggressive U.S. response. A National Security Council committee coordinated the actions.
One wonders what those "mounting aggressions" are supposed to be. Is the U.S. not constantly spying and hacking for economic or
political gain?
Other reports today of alleged
Chinese hacking are
obviously part of the concerted anti-China campaign. As usual no evidence is presented for the vague allegations:
U.S. government investigators increasingly believe that Chinese state hackers were most likely responsible for the massive intrusion
reported last month into Marriott's Starwood chain hotel reservation system, a breach that exposed the private information and
travel details of as many as 500 million people, according to two people briefed on the government investigation.
These people cautioned that the investigation has not been completed, so definitive conclusions cannot be drawn. But the sweep
and tactics of the hack, which took place over four years before being discovered, prompted immediate speculation that it was
carried out by a national government.
The new anti-China campaign follows a
similar push of anti-Russian propaganda three month ago.
China has taken first countermeasures against Canada's hostage taking on behalf of the United States. It
detained Michael
Kovrig, a former Canadian diplomat who now
works for the International Crisis
Group. Beijing suggest that the ICG is
operating illegally in China :
"The relevant organization has violated Chinese laws because the relevant organization is not registered in China," Foreign Ministry
spokesman Lu Kang said at a press briefing Wednesday.
China sharply tightened its rules on NGOs operating in the country last year, ..
This will not be the sole Chinese measure against Canada for its role in enforcing extraterritorial U.S. sanctions.
The string of U.S. accusations and measures against China are partly to protect the market share of U.S. companies against better
and cheaper Chinese products and partly geopolitical. Neither has anything to do with protecting the international rule of law.
After three centuries of anglo-american imperialism the economic center of the world
is moving back
to the east .
The U.S. is way too late to prevent this move. Its best and most profitable chance is not to challenge, but to accommodate
it. That again would require to respect international laws and treaty obligations. The U.S. is not willing to do either.
Nothing except a large scale war that results in the destruction of the industrial centers of east Asia, while keeping the
U.S. and Europe save, could reverse the trend. Nuclear weapons on all sides and the principal of mutual assured destruction have
made such a war unthinkable. What we are likely to see instead will be proxy conflicts in various other countries.
The current U.S. strategy is to restrict China's access to foreign markets, advanced technologies, global banking and higher
education. While that may for a moment slow down China's rise it will in the long run strengthen China even more. Instead of integrating
into the world economy it will develop its own capacities and international systems.
The U.S. can temporarily hinder the telecommunication equipment provider Huawei by denying it access to U.S. designed chips. It
will probably do so. But that will only incentivize Huawei to start its own chip production. With a few years delay it will be back
and out-compete U.S. companies with even better and cheaper products.
It is typical for the current U.S. to seek short term advantage while disregarding the long term negative effects of its doing.
It is a major reason for China's rise and its future supremacy.
Posted by b on December 12, 2018 at 07:07 AM |
Permalink
Comments
next page " The reason she is violating trade sanctions against Iran is because Trump suspended the Iran Nuclear treaty.
How short-sighted is that?
Well, all these sanctions are pushing target countries to be self sufficient. That's wonderful. Us are pushing countries for a
better production and decrease itself. Smart.
the King Liar has spoken...the boss of the mafia group U$A... The Chinese will interpret this as a kidnapping for blackmail and
act accordingly...this can only get much worse...
dh posted a link on the last thread to China banning import and sale of all iPhones in China (strange, I thought they were
made in China? Must be exported and re-imported?). This concerns a patent dispute between US company Qualcomm and Apple,
over which Qualcomm sued Apple in Chinese courts. The existence of the action in the courts must predate the Meng arrest, but
the court decision to support Qualcomm could be influenced by the arrest.
This is interesting. China hits a top US company manufacturing in China by granting an injunction in a case of one US company
against another US company, in which one accuses the other of intellectual property theft. China was not expected to find in Qualcomm's
favour, according to the article (perhaps in part because Apple manufactures in China therefore is a client of China, so it was
expected China might favour Apple). If this decision was influenced by the arrest, the US can hardly point the finger at China!
It gets better: The Apple executive states in the article that they have stocks of all models in China and sales will not stop.
How can this be, if sales are banned? Surely China can then arrest several Apple executives in China for breaking the injunction?
Would depend of course on the terms of the injunction, of which the article gave no details.
In my opinion, China should make these criminal actions of the US extremely painful indeed, and as quickly as possible.
One person arrested in China is not enough - it should be 10 Americans arrested for 1 Chinese, plus 5 Canadians. China should
make sure the US and Canada understand that the ratio will stay constant if the US/Canada respond to the arrests in China. China
should also take extremely painful action against US telecomms companies in China to compensate for the campaign against Huawei
- it could include denying access to comms links, forcing US telcom communications to go through very expensive route, ceasing
negotiations for investment consortia in favour of non-US companies, etc. The difficulty to navigate, of course, is the risk of
inciting escalating actions against Huawei; but the Chinese will find excellent startegies I am sure.
It may be the case that the Huawei equipment is very, very secure, has much better performance. Soon, China will be the tech leader,
hence the panic. I have a snippet below, but peruse the article in full on the 5G landscape.
"Huawei has been pouring money into research on 5G wireless networks and patenting key technologies. The company has hired
many experts from abroad as well to decide the technical standards for the next generation of wireless communication technology.
As of early 2017, 10% of 1450 patents essential for 5G networks were in Chinese hands in which majority belongs to Huawei and
ZTE.
Huawei spent around $12 Billion on R&D in 2017, which was threefold of Ericsson's spending of $4.1 Billion. This year, according
to estimates, it will spend $800 million in 5G research and development alone.
The company wants to involve AI in 5G which according to them is a much more integral element of Huawei's 5G strategy. The
company also plans to launch a full range of Huawei commercial equipment including wireless access networks, core networks, and
devices.
Huawei has also revealed its hopes to launch smartphones ready for supporting 5G networks by 2019 and starting selling in the
mid-2019. The company is also said to be working on developing a brand-new chipset for 5G services.
Huawei and Vodafone made the 5G call using non-standalone 3GPP 5G-NR standard and sub 6 GHz spectrum. The two companies built
a 5G NR end-to-end test network for the trial and used 3.7GHz spectrum. They also used Huawei Radio Access Network and core network
equipment to support the test with microservice-centric architecture, control plane/user plane separation, and unified access
and network slicing technology.
Huawei also started manufacturing products that provide 5G services. In Mobile World Congress, Huawei launched its 5G customer-premises
equipment (CPE), the world's first commercial terminal device supporting 3GPP standard for 5G. Huawei used its self-developed
chipset Balong 5G01 – world's first commercial chipset supporting the 3GPP standard for 5G, with downlink speed up to 2.3 Gbps."
With Trump's utterance, he also exposed how he/his government has abused Canada's extradition law for political purposes.
Officially in this extradition procedure, the US now has 60 days to submit a complete extradition request which requires far more
detail. Meng's court date is set for February. In any case, Canada's rubberstamping of extradition requests (90% are by the US)
was already successfully challenged once in the Diab case with France, was criticized by Canada's Superior Court (extraditions
are processed at the provincial judicial level), so Trudeau's hiding behind 'judicial process' is two-faced cowardliness.
Canada needs to amend its extradition law, become much more stringent, and arm this law against the bullying and abusive southern
neighbor who prefers to lord its own laws over others than abide by any kind of international law.
We've been at war with Eurasia long enough. Time for Eastasia! The main question is whether Putin will remain Emmanuel Goldstein
or if someone Chinese will get the honor.
China is set to introduce maximum residue limits (MRLs) of 200 parts per billion (ppb) or lower for glyphosate in all imported
final food products and raw materials including grains, soybeans and other legumes before the end of 2019, according to Sustainable
Pulse sources.....
It is expected that China will now import more grains from Russia, where glyphosate is not widely used as a desiccant. This
also enables China to use glyphosate as a political tool in the current U.S. / China trade war, as food and raw material imports
from the U.S., which often contain high levels of the weedkiller, will be put under major pressure.
That'll hit Monsanto's Roundup pretty hard. Of course China doesn't really have any problem with glyphosate - it's long been
a major producer and exporter itself. So this is obviously a trade war action.
"It is typical for the current U.S. to seek short term advantage while disregarding the long term negative effects of its doing.
It is a major reason for China's rise and its future supremacy."
Well, the economic and industrial rise of China is the ultimate
proof of this. Instead of making sure China would have a limited and purely internal development and would never become such a
fearsome rival, Western (specially US) capitalist fools decided to outsource their production there, creating the monster they
feared and fear even more nowadays.
I've never seen such a ridiculous and brilliant own goal in any World Cup. What's even more damning for the collective
absolute stupidity of capitalist bigwigs is that I could see this coming more than 20 years ago, yet these idiots blindly charged
as if short-term profits were all they wanted and would be enough to ensure their eternal dominance.
I think it's pretty clear to China, Russia, India, and many others, that trading in dollars is a losing strategy. Thus the dollar
is very fast losing its position as the world reserve currency. The EU is not using dollars for Iran's oil. India is not using
dollars for its purchase of Russia's S-400.
It's not only US anti-China strategy; but the US insistence to be the hegemon; the
rest of the planet will not have it, period. The US is done dictating what the rest of the planet will do/follow... Bye, bye,
American pie............
BM @4 I'm not sure where Qualcomm stands in relation to China. It could be a bargaining chip...excuse the pun. The Apple ban applies
to the older iPhone 8 & 7 not the new Xs & Xr......but that may change. Apple is already having trouble selling phones in China
and the Huawei dispute won't help.
What is the legal basis for Meng's arrest? What Canadian law is she alleged to have violated? Or is American wish fulfillment
now part of Canadian jurisprudence?
As a non-American I've got half a mind to find a way to purchase some Iranian products and then send the US State Department an
e-mail telling them to suck it.
Fernando Martinez , Dec 12, 2018 10:11:44 AM |
link
Posted by: Clueless Joe | Dec 12, 2018 9:14:45 AM | 10
The "own goal" was not outsourcing manufacturing to China but in not isolating China by bringing Russia into the Western
fold. Instead, they kicked Russia while it was down via capitalist "Shock Doctrine" - hoping for total capitulation. Kissinger
admits(*) this when, in his typical roundabout way, he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb pain.
* In his lunch interview with the Financial Times this past summer.
"What is the legal basis for Meng's arrest? What Canadian law is she alleged to have violated? Or is American wish fulfillment
now part of Canadian jurisprudence?"
As I understand it, the USA and Canada have an extradition agreement, and corporate fraud is also a crime in Canada.
This idiocy seems certain to increase curiosity in Huawei products by telcos worldwide. Business managers use technical experts
to evaluate available technologies when contemplating upgrades to their systems. They're certainly not swayed by MSM spin doctors.
This issue could soon be overtaken by a brand new reality. China is planning to launch a worldwide free wifi internet service
based on more than 100 satellites, which could be interpreted as a Commie scheme to undermine the profitability of telcos.
Not clear exactly which officials said, "Taken together, the announcements represent a major broadside against China over its
mounting aggression against the West... The actions come amid mounting intelligence showing a sustained Chinese hacking effort..."
but do know it's very unusual to repeat a verb in consecutive sentences. Mantra alert! Mounting... mounting... mounting... hear
the drums of war.
he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb pain
Does that moron Kissinger know nothing about WW2? That Kissinger projects an inability to absorb pain onto the Russians
suggests that Kissinger knows the Americans have no ability to absorb pain themselves
China is planning to launch a worldwide free wifi internet service based on more than 100 satellites, which could be interpreted
as a Commie scheme to undermine the profitability of telcos
cool. digital nomadism
and growing your own food will be the ticket.
The story I heard was that it was a screw up. Mira Ricardel was fired because she pissed off Melania about airplane seats. She
was fired before inter-agency coordination for the arrest but after the warrant for the arrest was issued - the warrant was issued
back in August. That and the fact that Trudeau hates Trump explains this idiocy. Trudeau was left to weigh up the US request against
the poor timing of the US request from the US point of view. No one from the WH got back to the Canadians to ask them to wait.
So Justin decided to go ahead to screw Trump. Fun, no?
ralphieboy | Dec 12, 2018 10:52:25 AM | 18: corporate fraud is also a crime in Canada.
More specifically, she's accused of inducing banks to provide financing that was illegal due to US sanctions. It appears that
as Huawei CFO, she certified that her company doesn't trade with Iran despite the fact that Huawei has an Iran-based subsidiary
(SkyCom Tech).
Is this an example of "US short term strategical thinking" or "Trump's-as-per-usual (non) thinking?"
After all, as you stated, these maneuvers wrt Meng are emanating from John (I am the Eggman) Bolton's office and clearly
evidence his trademarked hard-boiled belligerence which of course is heartily endorsed by Trump (as an "Art of the Deal" negotiating
ploy by the master debater himself) who selected The Walrus in the first place. Or second place if you count Bolton's earlier
appointment by that other intellectual giant of the GOP, GW Bush.
Please, the US voted less for Trump to be our trade representative then even the British voted for their own ridiculous "alt-right"
trade adventure wildride, AKA "Brexit."
And we now have another pretty solid election behind us illustrating even further that Trump's worldview doesn't represent
most of the US. He represents only a dwindling "base" of mostly old white male reactionary racist very scared supporters whose
presence within the GOP has terrified the GOP toadies into supporting most everything Trump wants because he delivers judges and
tax cuts to the rich.
But again,
the majourity
of the toadies don't support Trump on China. He has them by their shriveled up balls is all.
That Kissinger projects an inability to absorb pain onto the Russians ...
This is a misreading. Kissinger is not projecting but explaining. Look at the Financial Times interview for more clarity. Also,
they didn't fail to consider WWII. They miscalculated. And then they doubled down (as the neocons always do).
Jackrabbit 17 "Kissinger admits(*) this when, in his typical roundabout way, he says that no one anticipated Russia's ability to absorb
pain." Then Kissinger is a bigger fool than I thought. He's old enough to know about WWII, and previous wars as well. I mean,
he did study the Napoleonic wars...
You have to remember, this was economic warfare, not military. And the USA/West were pretending to be helpful. IIRC, Yeltsin
was happy for this "help" too.
"The government and us are cut from the same cloth." Sam Giancana, former Mob boss from Chicago. Deep State, you say? No way,
Jose. More like the Gambino (Democrat's) and the Genovese (Republicans). You don't need "colors" to identify yourself as a gang
member. You can wear double breasted suits and have the same bad intentions as any member of the Crips, Bloods, Mafia or Mexican
Cartels. The US government is one great big Tammany Hall. Nothing has changed since the days of Boss Tweed. Instead of being centered
in New York, it's now in our nation's capital. Mah Rohn! Forget about it!
Fidelios Automata , Dec 12, 2018 12:22:34 PM |
link
This is beyond outrageous. US law is not the law of the world. The Chinese may trade with whomever they choose.
According to the above article, American firms set up foreign subsidiaries to do business with sanctioned countries. So if
SkyCom is an Iranian subsidiary, what can be Sabrina Meng Wanzhou's crime? Or even if SkyCom is a Hong Kong-based subsidiary?
The city-state effectively maintains its own laws and financial architecture, as part of one country, two systems.
It's a bit OT but this thing of Russia absorbing pain - to be fair, I always thought that producing Putin at the last moment was
really stretching survival to a fine thread. The neocons almost won there. The country was almost done for. It took a man whose
father nursed life back into his wife when medics figured she was done for...
Russia's ultimate salvation was way too close to the edge of the cliff for my taste.
Ya'll know how the Chinese finger trap works, yes? Instead of his fingers, Trump's got his whole head inside, and he's stuck real
good. There're only two ways out: Trump admits China can't be beaten so its better to join them or he cuts off his head to free
his body--both are essentially suicide, although the former is merely political instead of actual.
There is zero chance she gets deported to the US because doing so would mean a Canadian court blessing the idea that the US is
the sole legal authority of every thing on planet earth. There isn't a a judge in Canada that is goin g to sign off on the idea
that US law trumps Canadian law and international law in Canada.
There is a strange ambiguous nature to the post. It seems there is a reluctance to address the issues. It has long been
claimed that China has a tendency to copy or steal intellectual property. Most "I/P" is horse shit anyway - e.g. Apple and the
rounded corners. Apparently there has been some actual espionage, but that is probably pretty common its just that China has used
it to good advantage (if we accept that they have used it - as I do).
It is quite odd to to make such a fuss in the absence
of smoking gun - maybe Mueller is in need of something to investigate?
I am baffeled by the whole Iran thing and the nations in terror of U.S. sanctions. What is this "international law" of which
we speak? The implication is that because Mr Trump (Bolton) does not approve of a treaty that now Iran and RoW has violated a
law and are subject to sanction by the U.S.? I find it hard to comprehend.
This first paragraph from a today's Global Times op-ed nicely summarizes the 21st Century:
For a long time in the future, the international situation will evolve around the rise of China, the decline of the US and
the uncertain development level of Russia.
No arrests among the Israelis. None. The loyalty to Israel by Israel-firsters (and their corrupting influence on the US Congress)
overpowers any loyalty to the US.
But to arrest a woman because of the illegal economic sanctions against Iran (on Israelis' prodding) is fine for US "deciders"
Thanks for assembling those links. That is a good compilation. I was vaguely aware of those stories but had forgotten most
of the details. It is so true. And you didn't even get to the Jonathan Pollard betrayal!
thanks b! and thanks to the many informative comments.. i encourage others to read the jeffery sachs article in b's article near
the top under the word 'unprecedented"...
@23 john.. thanks.. i will take a look..
@24 harry.. thanks.. that is an interesting conjecture..
@38 jared.. larvov made some comments on the use of the term 'rule of law' which is different from 'international law'.. i
can't find the article from yesterday that i read on this, but essentially he is saying the usa wants to toss international law
and replace it with 'rule of law', or 'law based rules' and do away with international law, as international law is not working
in the usa's favour at this point..'rule of law' or 'law based rules' is something that a country can make up as it goes along..
the usa wants to drop international law essentially.. if i find larvov's comments, i will post them...
Here's the
legal mumbo-jumbo from B.C. which includes details on the charges against Meng. The poor banks were "victim banking institutions."
The investigation by U.S. authorities has revealed a conspiracy between and among Meng and other Huawei representatives to
misrepresent to numerous financial institutions. . . .The motivation for these misrepresentations stemmed from Huawei's need
to move money out of countries that are subject to U.S. or E.U. sanctions--such as Iran, Syria, or Sudan--through the international
banking system. At various times, both the U.S. and E.U. legal regimes have imposed sanctions that prohibit the provision of
U.S. or E.U. services to Iran, such as banking services....
Because Meng and other Huawei representatives misrepresented
to Financial Institution 1 and the other financial institutions about Huawei's relationship with Skycom, these victim banking
institutions were induced into carrying out transactions that they otherwise would not have completed. As a result, they violated
the banks' internal policies, potentially violated U.S. sanctions laws, and exposed the banks to the risk of fines and forfeiture.
.
Very accurate. Yes of course the smart move would have been to welcome China into a multi-polar world, but it is too late now,
and I doubt the US could ever have managed that. Trade war and probable actual war has been inevitable for some time. An alien
visiting earth would want to view every event through the prism of imminent US-China war.
Right now we see a US circling of
the wagons, with threats against outsiders. In particular Iran, NK and Russia are villified because the message is "look what
happens if you don't come in on our side". We think the casual slanders about these countries are just vulgar Americans, but they
are really calculated warnings to other countries.
The charges against Meng were brought by Richard P. Donoghue, the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New
York. Donoghue was appointed as Interim United States Attorney for the Eastern District by Attorney General Jeff Sessions on January
3, 2018, and as Attorney on May 3, 2018.
Donoghue is one of five U.S. attorneys serving in a "working group" under the Justice Department's recently announced China
Initiative. Launched by then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions, the China Initiative is a broad-based strategy designed to counter
Chinese economic espionage and a range of other national security threats. Donoghue has been leading an investigation of Huawei
since 2016 for possible violations of U.S. sanctions against Iran.
The Eastern District serves over eight million residents through its Criminal Division, with approximately 115 Assistant U.S.
Attorneys, and its Civil Division, with approximately 60 U.S.Attorneys. But what the heck, forget New Yorkers, Donoghue has bigger
fish to fry.
If one has an interest on seeing how the war-mongers visualize the US-China standoff, check out this
blog where I
regularly get roasted. (roasted bacon?)
Hmmm... following the downfall of the drunkard Yeltsin (the first miscalculation of the Empire, hubris strikes again), they
put their money on Medvedev, the 'Atanticist'. Bad move! Putin was the response. Nationalism bad? I don't think so, it's what
enabled Stalin to win WW2 and it enabled Putin to pull the country, but as said, only just! Phew.
70 years of isolating the Soviet Union meant that they really didn't have a handle on the Western propaganda machine. In the
80s the North Koreans made the same mistake.
A slight aside: I and a bunch of other journos, activists were invited to a wonderful slap up meal held at the N.Korean UN
delegation HQ in Manhattan. Food great but the video they showed horrendous! Imagine 1 1/2hrs of the Great Leader and endless
displays in stadiums waving flags in unison. They then asked us what we thought of it (that was the purpose of 12 course meal).
When they were told it would go down like a lead balloon, they just didn't get it. They lived in a different world, ditto the
Soviets.
BTW, the video was made for US consumption.
On the other hand, Verso brought out a book (I have it somewhere) on the aesthetics of East European cityscapes during the
Soviet period and lamented on the loss of individuality, following the fall of socialism and the rise of McDonaldism. How ironic.
And we though (were taught) that E. European design and architecture was drab!
MBA ideology, which is narrowly focused on the next quarter results, bottom line, and bonuses for executives has devastated /
destroyed industrial base of the 5 eyes!
I saw the discussion thread at that BreakingDefense.com post you linked to, and I must say you should seek help for that masochistic
tendency that drives you to post there and risk being savaged by armchair generals whose idea of military strategy comes from
playing wall-2-wall computer games.
I should think a better example from Ancient Greek history that we should heed, rather than Thucydides' Trap (discussions of
which use very selective examples to "prove" its premise) is Athens' military expedition to Syracuse to conquer the city and all
of Sicily in 415 BCE. How did that turn out for Athens?
September 3, 2018: Huawei unveils Kirin 980 CPU, the world's first commercial 7nm system-on-chip (SoC) and the first to
use Cortex-A76 cores, dual neural processing units, Mali G76 GPU, a 1.4 Gbps LTE modem and supports faster RAM. With 20 percent
faster performance and 40 percent less power consumption compared to 10nm systems, it has twice the performance of Qualcomm's
Snapdragon 845 and Apple's A11 while delivering noticeable battery life improvement. Its Huawei-patented modem has the world's
fastest Wi-Fi and its GPS receiver taps L5 frequency to deliver 10cm. positioning.
September 5, 2018. China's front-end fab capacity will account for 16 percent of the world's semiconductor capacity this
year, increasing to 20 percent by 2020.
September 15, 2018. China controls one third of 5G patents and has twice as many installations operating as the rest of
the world combined.
I should add that the US put China under total embargoes on food, ag equipment, finance, technology for 25 years during Maos'
tenure. Yet he grew the economy by 7.25% annually, doubled the population, its life expectancy and literacy during that time.
[email protected] there is any question whether Canadian courts will side with American laws you only need to google Qmar
Khadr to answer the question.
@46 don bacon.. thanks for the link.. in it admiral Davidson says "I see a fundamental divergence of values that leads to two
incomparable visions of the future. I think those two incomparable visions are between China and the rules-based international
order."
there is that ''rules-based international order'' quote again - which i was mentioning to @38 jared in my post @42..
what the fuck is ''rules-based international order'' supposed to mean? you mean like - ignore international law and replace it
with ''rule-basd international order''??
i agree with jen... don, you must be a bit of a masochist!
I definitely second Jen's remark about BreakingDefense. Reading that post was very distressing and I can imagine they would
roast you and many who follow and admire b. But, as the saying goes, it is also good to know "how the enemy" thinks. Or in this
case how our gov + thinks.
Canada's rubberstamping of extradition requests (90% are by the US)was already successfully challenged once in the Diab
case with France
Not exactly. Diab was arrested in 2008 and, after a long series of legal proceedings (ending with the refusal of the Canadian
Supreme Court to hear his appeal), finally extradited to France in 2014. The case against Diab was flimsy to nonexistent to begin
with, but "good enough" to meet Canadian standards. In spite of the continued insistence by French prosecutors that they had a
legitimate case, multiple judges disagreed and Diab was finally released earlier this year and allowed to return to Canada.
The bottom line is that the bar for extradition from Canada is extremely low, which should worry Ms Meng.
The way the U.S. seems intent on punishing Australian Assange for exposing U.S. secrets exhibits the same determination to apply
U.S. law to everyone all over the world.
20 November 201815:24
Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov's remarks at the general meeting of the Russian International Affairs Council, Moscow, November
20, 2018
"The historical West is still violently opposed to the objective rise of a fairer and more democratic polycentric world
order. Clinging to the principles of unipolarity, Washington and some other Western capitals appear unable to constructively interact
with the new global centres of economic and political influence. A wide range of restrictions are applied to the dissenters, ranging
from military force and unilateral economic sanctions to demonisation and mud-slinging in the spirit of the notorious "highly
likely." There are many examples of this dirty game...This has seriously debased international law. Moreover, attempts have been
made to replace the notion of law with a "rules-based order" the parameters of which will be determined by a select few.
We are especially concerned about the activities of the US administration aimed at destroying the key international agreements.
These include withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action known as the Iran nuclear deal, the declared intention to
withdraw from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF Treaty), an open line for revising the settlement principles in
the Middle East, as well as sabotaging the Minsk Agreements on overcoming the internal Ukrainian crisis. The trade wars that have
been launched contrary to the WTO principles are rocking the global economic architecture, free trade and competition standards.
The US establishment, blindly believing in the idea of their exceptionalism, continues to appoint rivals and adversaries, primarily
among the countries that pursue an independent foreign policy. Everyone can see that Washington is a loose cannon, liable to act
incongruously, including regarding Russia where any steps taken by US President Donald Trump to develop stable and normal channels
of communication with Moscow on the biggest current problems are promptly blocked by those who want to continue or even strengthen
the destructive approach to relations with Russia, which developed during the previous US administration.
Overall, it looks as if the Americans and some of our other Western colleagues have forgotten the basics of diplomacy and
the art of dialogue and consensus over the past 25 years. One result of this is the dangerous militarisation of the foreign policy
thinking. As RIAC Director General Andrey Kortunov recently pointed out at a Valdai Discussion Club meeting, the Clausewitz formula
can be changed to a mirror image, "Politics is a continuation of war by other means."
Russia is a consistent supporter of the development of international life based on the principles of the UN Charter. We are
a serious obstacle in the way of different destructive undertakings." etc
Considering the eventual results of the Peloponnesian War for all combatants, Thucydides' Trap turned out to be a trap for everyone.
They all would have been better off peacefully settling their differences. Same goes for World War One. And the same goes for
a declining U.S. facing a rising China.
What the U.S. should do is to negotiate with China a deal which recognizes the status of China as a superpower in return for
an economic relationship that preserves the U.S. standard of living.
Unfortunately, the U.S. ruling class cares more about the psychic gratification it derives from dominating the world.
@ 52 james
re: "rules-based international order"
This is widely and repeatedly used by the Pentagon; I've also seen it used by the Australia government (no surprise there from
a US puppet). Of course we know that it's a code-phrase for. . .let's not change the current US-dominated world disorder with
its US-led wars, assassinations and torture.
Other pet phrases, taken from my blog link above:
... revisionist great powers like China and Russia
... China's state-led, market-distorting economic model
... democratic, liberal values that draws us together with our allies and differentiates us from China."
@ 57 Loz
Russia's Lavrov is a smart guy and gets it right, as a realist, but I prefer Iran's Khamenei who always looks on the bright side.
. . .from a
speech
delivered on November 3, 2018, by Ayatollah Khamenei
. . . the US waged military wars and military actions,
. . .There has also been an economic war in this 40-year challenge
. . .They have waged a media war as well.
Well, there is an important truth which is sometimes not seen by some people: its dazzling clarity makes it go unnoticed. This
truth is a bright and shining one, which is the fact that in this 40-year challenge, the side which has been defeated represents
the US and the side which has achieved victory represents the Islamic Republic. --This is a very important truth. What is the
reason behind America's defeat? The reason for their defeat was that it was they who began the attack. It was they who initiated
corrupt actions. It was they who imposed sanctions, and it was they who launched a military attack, but they have not achieved
their goals. --This is the reason why the US has been defeated.
And he's right, Iran has defeated the US, which is why Washington is so down on Iran. The defeats have come in Iraq, and Syria,
and next in Afghanistan . . .plus in Iran itself, which has stood up to the greatest world power for forty years full of sanctions
and assaults, and thereby served as a model and inspiration for other countries large and small.
The prosecutor's case against Meng is fundamentally weak. For instance, there is no identification of a "co-conspirator",
necessary to a charge of conspiracy. It does not seem to have been developed much beyond the information developed in the 2013
Reuters investigation. At least half of that relies on unnamed "former employees" and unnamed persons who claimed to have dealt
with Skycom in Iran.
If these persons cannot be produced then all that evidence cannot rise above hearsay. The coincidences left to the prosecutors
to suggest a shell corporation should be then overwhelmed by the perfectly legal offshore documentation, which represents common
corporate practice worldwide. If the US courts still nail Huawei, the precedent could put all large businesses and business persons
everywhere at criminal risk for currently accepted practices.
The exit door could be a finding by the Canadian court, tacitly ok'ed by the Americans, that the case lacks merit and Meng
is freed sometime in the spring to a chorus of self-congratulatory hurrahs over "rule of law". If the intent was to damage the
Huawei brand in the West, then mission already accomplished.
here is our canuck foreign affairs minister Freeland using the term as well.. "It, I think, is quite obvious that it ought to
be incumbent on parties seeking an extradition from Canada, recognizing that Canada is a rule-of-law country, to ensure that any
extradition request is about ensuring that justice is done, is about ensuring that the rule of law is respected and is not politicized
or used for any other purpose," she said." https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/china-missing-person-questioned-1.4943591
last paragraph in that link is even better - here.. ""I think in the world today, where the rule of law is under threat in some
parts of the world, being a rule-of-law country is more important now than ever," Freeland said. "And what I can commit to for
Canadians, and for our partners around the world, is that Canada will very faithfully follow the rule of law."
My suggestion in the previous comments thread was noticed only by one (James) but I'm sure it still holds up well.
Huawei could undertake to pay Sabrina Meng's bail or at least her security detail when she has to leave her house. Huawei then
sends the amount paid to Beijing and Beijing charges Ottawa for the amount paid ... and includes interest payment for each and
every day that Ottawa declines to pay the principal.
Tit-4-tat actions against US companies, however desirable, might have unfortunate long-term consequences especially if elements
in the US Deep State are expecting them and are prepared for them.
Thanks for reposting Lavrov's acute observations, thus revealing that Russia and China already know the what and why of the
Outlaw US Empire's doings. Frankly, I was surprised nobody commented about my Monopoly Game analogy from yesterday which illustrates
the situation the Outlaw US Empire finds itself in thanks to its unilateral and exceptionalisms. Indeed, for its opponents, moves
made by the Outlaw US Empire can fairly well be anticipated and thus quickly countered. And thanks to the desire by most nations
for multilateralism, Russia and China find receptive audiences and ready allies in their campaign to neuter the international
outlaw bully.
A Must Remember: The USA has never wanted to subordinate itself to any rules other than its own that it can change whenever
it suits itself. The key evidence of this is that while the Senate was ratifying the UN Charter in late July of 1945, the Executive
branch was embarking on its terroristic Anti-Communist Crusade by arming and facilitating the infiltration of former Nazi SS and
Gestapo agents into the Soviet-held regions of Eastern Europe thereby violating the newly negotiated international system of law
and its own Constitution, and making itself THE primary International Outlaw Nation, which it proudly continues to be to this
day.
Great article and I would say that you are getting the political implications, the hypocrisy and the rest of it pretty much spot
on.
I'll add this just for the heck of it.
This case started a while back when ZTE narked out Huawei for using third party cutouts to avoid the sanctions. The ZTE case
was in England. Because Hauwei is not the legal owner of these chips or code it makes it "theft by conversion". Using banks to
launder the money is bank fraud as well.
What a lot of people are missing, legally, is that this is not the same at all as violating sanctions by selling your own products.
They do not own the chips or proprietary software in any legal sense. The chips and code are still owned by the parent company
that developed them, China has what amounts to a licensing agreement with the parent companies. If Weng had violated the sanctions
by transferring her own code and her own chips then it would be out of our jurisdiction. However, once they violated the terms
and conditions of the contract they not only have committed fraud they have committed theft by conversion of a US owned product
and they used US banks to launder the money. This is why she is actually being charged with fraud and not sanctions violations.
I'd bet that if they go full hardball she would be charged with Bank Fraud as well. That's the one that comes with the most prison
time.
In short, violating sanctions doesn't usually get you arrested because it doesn't also include theft, fraud although money
laundering gets them sometimes. But of course we also know that the rest of the article is pretty much correct. She was actually
arrested as part of the entire back and forth over trade and all the rest. Our government normally would not pick a top dog to
do jail time, so why now and why her? 5G and access to markets are a big part but so is a real concern over the constant pirating,
malware, spyware, backdoor access to the Chinese government to all the encryption they use, etc. etc.
I'm only adding my comments to remind people that the US actually does have a rock solid case against her company, so don't
be at all surprised if she isn't eventually charged unless Trump does something to stop it. They were caught red handed committing
fraud by using third party cut outs and lying to the banks involved as well. If the US really wants to push it they are within
their legal rights under our laws to do it. She essentially stole US property and laundered the proceeds with US banks. Go ahead
and try that yourself and see if you get away with it.
Transferring a product you do not own to a third party in violation of a contract is theft by conversion. It's the same as
if I recorded a football game and then sold it against their wishes and then laundered the money. It's not the violation of the
sanctions per se that will get her in trouble, it's transferring stolen property, fraud and money laundering that they are actually
holding over her head. If they want to, they can send her away for a long time and they know it. This could get really ugly.
Don That breakingdefence seems as broken as other neo-lib sites such as Lawyers, Guns and Money.
BTW, we are coming up for the sixtieth anniversary of the the Cuban revolutionaries kicking out the dictator Batista. Cuba,
which then went on to impose massive defeats on Reagan and Thatcher by bringing down their beloved (Reagan and Thatcher's, that
is) apartheid in South Africa. We are repeatedly told that it was Russian MiGs which it did but they were operated and flown by
Cubans, and if Castro hadn't sent them to defeat the apartheid state in Angola, it's doubtful the conservatives in the Soviet
Union would have done so. So, Cuba has been in the trenches for twenty years more than Iran and still appears to be undefeated.
Sorry, but the readers here seem to have no clue whatsoever about Putin's past.
Putin was part of the group under the St. Petersburg mayor - it was because of this that he was put in power as Yeltsin's 2nd
in command. And equally it was because of Putin's position under Yeltsin which made him acceptable to foreign powers as Russia's
new head.
Medvedev has always been an Atlanticist; much like the 1% in the US, his background is global technocracy which naturally gravitates
him toward the US. Having a close relative on Gazprom doesn't hurt either.
Point is, Putin didn't come out of nowhere nor was he a nobody.
That he is a very articulate and thoughtful leader - that was the only surprise.
China just ordered a boatload or more of soybeans and says they wont let this interfere with trade talks.
Just the way Trump likes to deal. Meng will work out of her expensive Vancouver home as hostage until a trade deal is done.
Then she gets released w/o extradition
How many US corporations are guilty of doing the same do ya think? As for industrial espionage, I have just one word--ECHELON.
There's an excellent reason why the Outlaw US Empire wants to change the rules of the game that it initially designed: It can
no longer win using them; indeed, it can be defeated by what it emplaced. Reminds me of an old Sting hit
Fortress Around Your Heart ; in fact, it's quite
apt.
"The pretext for her arrest is that Huawei has violated US sanctions against Iran. But the "sanctions" imposed on Iran by the
US recently are illegal under international law, that is under the UN Charter that stipulates that only the Security Council can
impose economic sanctions on a nation..... There is, therefore, no law that she or Huawei is violating. ....
(Trudeau stated) that this arbitrary arrest was not politically motivated ...... Article 2 of the Treaty (with the US) requires
that Canada can only act on such a request if, and only if, the offence alleged is also an offence by the laws of both contracting
parties. But the unilaterally imposed and illegal sanctions placed against Iran by the USA, are not punishable acts in Canada
and even in the USA the "sanctions" are illegal as the are in violation of the UN Charter.
Article 4 (1) of the Treaty states:
"Extradition shall not be granted in any of the following circumstances:
(iii) When the offense in respect of which extradition is requested is of a political character, or the person whose extradition
is requested proves that the extradition request has been made for the purpose of trying to punish him (or her) for an offense
of the above-mentioned character.....
So, Prime Minister Trudeau cannot evade responsibility for this hostage taking, this arbitrary arrest and detention since his
government had to consider the US request and consider whether it was politically motivated. ....... It was a political arrest.
The rule of law in Canada has been suspended, at least in her case, and so can be in any case.
Trudeau's insinuation that extradition is a purely judicial process in Canada is simply wrong. The "International Assistance Group"
in the Department of Justice works actively with the requesting state against the person sought for extradition, and this can
be a hugely political process involved outright lies to the court, as the Diab case revealed. Extradition law in Canada is so
politicized that even when a judge commits someone for extradition, the matter is then referred to the Minister of Justice, who
has the ultimate say. All of this is to maintain Canadian political alliances at the expense of the rights of the accused. Extradition,
kidnapping and extraordinary rendition are almost indistinguishable in Canada.
@75 "Canadians should be angry about their nation being led by people whose loyalty is to Washington instead of to the Canadian
people whose interests they care nothing for."
So is Christopher Black suggesting Canada put Meng on a plane back to China and give Trump the finger? How would that be good
for the Canadian people?
Brad #69
She is being charged with bank fraud. That is why she is being threatened with up to 60 years in prison. But the attribution of
the cut out or shell company, Skycom, with Huawei is based on anecdotal evidence which can be effectively challengd. Alleging
that Meng herself knowingly conspired to make false representation is a huge stretch, and none of the evidence assembled comes
close to that. Also, the sanction violation involved less than $2 million of Hewlett Packard "gear", not high-end proprietary
tech.
Your opinion on this? How could China win a trade war since it is relying on its large trade surplus with the US? As Trump said,
trade-surplus countries suffer more in trade wars, as it is they who get hit with tariffs.
In Giant Trade War Concession, China Prepares To Replace "Made In China 2025"
Karlof1 I agree, it's damage control at this point in time.
And yeah they have wanted "total information awareness" for a while. I think that was the term they used in the "Project for
a new American Century" talking points wasn't it? They wanted to grab every bit of data produced in the entire world and store
it. TOTAL information awareness. And they published that plan right out in the open for everyone to read. Then they went right
ahead and built the facilities, infrastructure, hired all the people to man it and nobody did jack nothing to stop em either.
(dem terrorsts might get us if we complain too much)
Why we didn't run those neo-con fools out of town on a rail is beyond me but the reality is that people will put up with damn
near anything before they really demand change.
By the way which would you prefer, a phone with a backdoor by China or a backdoor by the US? Pretty lousy choice either way
if you ask me. I bet if Heuwei would give our "intel" agencies the backdoor key to their devices they would be just fine with
that as a "settlement".
"The US has increasingly been wielding its legal definitions and measures as if it is the world's judge and jury.
"In recent years, American lawmakers have created a slew of legal weapons, including the Magnitsky Act, the Global Magnitsky
Act, the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act, which give Washington the supposed power to penalize any country
it deems to be in breach of its national laws.
"The arbitrariness of US "justice" has got to the febrile point where Washington is threatening all nations, including its
supposed European allies, with legal punishment if they don't toe the line on its designated policy."
His conclusion:
"Washington's lawless pursuit of its nationalistic interests is turning the globe into a seething jungle of distrust and resentment.
The political chaos in Washington – where even the president is accused by domestic opponents of abusing democratic norms – is
fanning out to engulf the rest of the world.
"America's erstwhile claim of being the world's sheriff has taken on a macabre twist. Increasingly in the eyes of the world,
it is a renegade state which absurdly justifies its criminality with lofty claims of rule of law."
IMO, the world can do very well without the English-speaking nations of the Western Hemisphere. Containing them would be far
easier than Eurasia, even with bases strewn globally, for they must trade with the rest of the world to keep their current
standard of living whereas the rest of the world doesn't need to reciprocate. Yes, there's a very good reason why the USA called
its late 19th Century trade policy the Open Door--a policy that continues today. Trump seems to want autarky, so give it to him
by calling his massive bluff. Leave Uncle Scam sitting alone at his Monopoly Board masturbating while the rest of the world plays
Diplomacy and Go! Send an unmistakable message that he's the Bullying Misfit and shatter his exceptional ego. Hopefully if the
correct psychological approach is used, a planet devastating war can be avoided; but the latter cannot be feared when dealing
with the International Bully as it must be taught a lesson it will never forget.
@79 I'm not sure anybody will come out a clear winner....though Trump will claim victory for sure. A large order of soy beans
makes a nice gesture, so would buying a few airplanes from Boeing, but the Chinese still have a few red lines they won't cross.
All depends how hard Trump wants to push.
"Moreover, attempts have been made to replace the notion of law with a "rules-based order"
About time this was voiced publicly and Lavrov is the man to do it. It has been very noticeable over the last few years that
our western or five eyes "rule of law" narrative has been replaced by "rules based order" or so called "international norms".
@ james, in a snarky response to a warmonger at Breaking Defense, who misunderstood a previous james comment: --
. . ."thanks for yours as well.. usually the american trolls are always reminding others of how they abide by law, when in fact,
it is quite the opposite..."
...a classic put-down. kudos.
Thanks for your reply! I own the most fundamental of cell phones used for rudimentary texting and emergencies as I have no
need for further sophistication, and I had to be talked into buying that one! So, I'd prefer to have no backdoors anywhere near
my person at anytime and strive to establish that condition.
Indeed, this entire situation ought to bring governmental interference in citizen privacy to the fore so it can finally have
the debate it deserves--Constitutionally, the government is in violation, it knows it, but tries to circumvent Primary Law by
using the National Security canard. Should the citizen have an expectation of privacy within his/her own space or not? If not,
then the entire Bill of Rights is null and void.
@ 79 T
In Giant Trade War Concession, China Prepares To Replace "Made In China 2025"
The revised plan would play down China's bid to dominate manufacturing and be more open to participation by foreign companies,
these people said.
That's what the US has been complaining about, isn't it? The American manufacturers are invited in and then have to give up
all their trade secrets to be allowed to manufacture in China, until the locals take over with their newly acquired knowledge.
Regarding soybeans, China needs it to feed their hogs. Apparently Brazil didn't work out in the long term.
@Don, Thank you for the great brave job of posting on the out of realty redneck' site. A daily dose of reality comments should
really F*s the warmonger bastard' day.
I fail to see how exercising their sovereign right is giving Trump the finger, or bad for the Canadian people. However Canada
has basically become the US 51st state since NAFTA and the first Gulf War, so they follow orders
The new NAFTA will push up drug prices even more so they may soon join their brothers south of the border and enjoy declining
life expectancy due to unaffordable Drug prices
From ZeroHedge "Below we present some pertinent thoughts on the arrest of Huawei CFO Meng Wanzhou from former Fed Governor Larry
Lindsey and current head of the Lindsay Group."
.. Then along comes a story in the South China Morning Post about an October meeting with employees in which Meng said that
there are cases where, "the external rules are clear-cut and there's no contention, but the company is totally unable to comply
with in actual operations. In such cases, after a reasonable decision-making process, one may accept the risk of temporary non-compliance."
That statement is full of euphemisms, but it makes putting the corporate interest ahead of complying with the law the official
position of management. Put that in the context of a four-year anti-corruption campaign by Xi and a purge of top-level tech executives
who have gotten too big for their britches. In Xi's new world it may be one thing to have said that it was ok to put China's interests
first, but she is putting the corporate interests ahead of China's interests.
Also note that these comments were in quotes from an internal (and closed) Huawei meeting. How did the SCMP acquire these direct
quotes? The SCMP is one of the world's truly great papers, publishing candid news and commentary focused on getting to the truth
in a way that is only a distant memory in American newspapers. That said, it is also like Hong Kong – one nation, two systems.
If Beijing really wanted a story out, it would provide the sources and the reporters would do the rest. And if they really wanted
a story spiked it probably would be spiked. Those direct quotes obviously came from Chinese authorities and the story was printed
at a very inconvenient time for Meng – when she was protesting her innocence. Somebody in Beijing thinks Meng is a loose cannon.
Let's be a little conspiratorial or, more precisely, try and create a narrative that fits the facts. It arguably serves everyone's
interests for Ms. Meng to be taught a lesson. It is in Bolton's and the DoJ's interest to send a message that access to power
and connections does not buy you a get out of jail free card. It is in Xi's interest, or at least in the interests of major portions
of the Chinese government, to send a signal that even the extremely well-connected still have to toe the party line.
...The detention did not involve any surprises. The charges against Meng were leveled three months before her arrest. The market
reaction seemed to be based on the notion that this was a last-minute surprise. As for the Chinese, Xi and Company knows where
everyone is going and when. They certainly knew that Meng was traveling to Vancouver, that she had a warrant for her arrest outstanding,
and that Canada extradites to the U.S. They did nothing to warn her.
... Our conspiracy theory holds that she will be released when everyone thinks the lesson has been learned. America scores
a win in terms of signal value about enforcing Iran sanctions whether Meng spends two weeks, two months, or the rest of her life
behind bars. Xi will have signaled what he thinks about prioritizing corporate interests over national interests and bending regulations.
... One does not have to buy this conspiracy theory in all its detail to get at the essential truth that markets need to digest.
Meng's arrest is not going to affect the outcome of the trade talks. Xi (and China) have too much of a stake in this to let the
antics of a close friend's naughty daughter stand in the way of him getting what he wants. And once an example is made, America
also has too much to lose.
@88 "I fail to see how exercising their sovereign right is giving Trump the finger..."
ReallY? Then you haven't been watching Trump. He would go ballistic. He would probably renegotiate NAFTA ....again. He could
put thousands of Canadians out of work overnight if he felt like it.
@ 69 BS
". . .the US actually does have a rock solid case against her company,"
. . .to repeat from 43:
The investigation by U.S. authorities has revealed a conspiracy between and among Meng and other Huawei representatives to
misrepresent to numerous financial institutions. . . .The motivation for these misrepresentations stemmed from Huawei's need
to move money out of countries that are subject to U.S. or E.U. sanctions--such as Iran, Syria, or Sudan--through the international
banking system. At various times, both the U.S. and E.U. legal regimes have imposed sanctions that prohibit the provision of
U.S. or E.U. services to Iran, such as banking services....
Because Meng and other Huawei representatives misrepresented to Financial Institution 1 and the other financial institutions
about Huawei's relationship with Skycom, these victim banking institutions were induced into carrying out transactions that
they otherwise would not have completed. As a result, they violated the banks' internal policies, potentially violated U.S.
sanctions laws, and exposed the banks to the risk of fines and forfeiture.
So if Skycom belonged to Huawei, and the banks were "induced," there were problems --
1. violation of banks' internal policies
2. potentially violated US sanctions
3. exposed banks to US punishment
But if Skycom was an independent corporation the sanctions violations would have been okay? What am I missing. And why would the
US punish banks when they were knowingly duped.
" How could China win a trade war since it is relying on its large trade surplus with the US? As Trump said, trade-surplus
countries suffer more in trade wars, as it is they who get hit with tariffs."
Well, you do know tarrifs on imports are paid by the US importer and on to the consumer. China pays not a dime of US tarrifs
Now it could be hurt if US buyers could order from other countries. However, this is not an option for every import as there
are production capacity, quality and price constraints. In the short term orders to China would not be affected much since there
are not many good alternatives
China has some weapons of their own. US military required certain rate metals from China for weapons, China basically clothes
America and of course many electronics , furniture, tools and toys come from China. Witholding or taxing these exports is a weapon
they have yet to use.
Furthermore, much of the profits of US companies come from manufacturing or buying from China. Prices get marked up as much
as 10 times what China receives
18% of its exports go to US. With 20% of GDP based on exports that means US is responsible for 3.6% of Chinas GDP. Tarrifs
might affect 20% of exports meaning the hit on GDP would be 0.7%. With GDP growth over 6% they wont feel too much pain.
"hey do not own the chips or proprietary software in any legal sense. The chips and code are still owned by the parent company
that developed them, China has what amounts to a licensing agreement with the parent companies. If Weng had violated the sanctions
by transferring her own code and her own chips then it would be out of our jurisdiction. However, once they violated the terms
and conditions of the contract they not only have committed fraud they have committed theft by conversion of a US owned product
and they used US banks to launder the money. This is why she is actually being charged with fraud and not sanctions violations."
-
I've heard US government make this argument in courts before and historically US courts have generally agreed with it. However,
this legal argument ignores the huge practical consideration of this rule within the current international economic system (i.e.
the real world). Namely, for the last 70 years (post-WW2) the US has encouraged and promoted Liberal free market world economic
integration, that each country should focus on the specialization of their economies to produce a small number of goods at a low
production cost and then purchase all other goods they needed from other countries that specialized in that good (i.e. internal
economic self-sufficiency is bad). Generally people hear this and immediately think of how Germany specializes in mechanical engineering,
Japan specializes in high-tech computer and so on. However the realty in the world today is that is specialization goes much further
in that a single circuit board in a computer WILL contain transistors made in Korea, Inductors made in Japan, Capacitators made
in Taiwan, Transistors made in the US and then assembled in China. At each stage of the manufacturing / assembly process costs
are carefully analyzed to minimize costs based on the provider, transportation costs, etc... to produce the goods at the lowest
possible cost and maximize profits. This is what people call the Global Supply chain that has for the last 30 years underpinned
the entire world manufacturing economy. N(OTE: I'm not saying this is good or bad from a moral stance, merely that this is what
it is and the motive for it)
What the US is doing, by asserting that US law indefinitely applies to any component (including intellectual or financial)
that is made in or travels through the US and is then subsequently assembled or sold in a 3rd (or 4th or 5th or 6th....) country
that is subject to US sanctions is a direct attack on the Global Supply Chain economy and is extremely dangerous to standard of
living we've become accustom to in the Western world. Historically, when the US used sanctions like this against Cuba, North Korea,
Iran, China and the Soviet Union, these countries were relatively much weaker than the US and not integrated into the Western
World economy (nor were they well integrated with each other economically speaking), so the US was able to retard their economic
development. However after more than 40 years of increasing integration the Western world (US, Canada, Mexico, Europe) is totally
dependant on the Global Supply Chain, so now that the US is expanding their sanctions to everyone they are effectively sabotaging
their own economy and the economies of their allies/vassals. Conversely, the US rivals (Particularity Russia, China & Iran) are
become more economically integrated with each other and are already experienced with economic independence from the Western Market.
The two most likely outcomes from the US actions are 1) The non-western world becomes more integrated with each other and independent
of the Western market, effectively re-dividing the world like we saw during the Cold War, only now instead of Capitalist vs Socialist,
it will be Neo-Liberal Fascism vs National independence (i.e. a return to the pre-1914 concept of the state) 2) The Western World
will become more divided with their economies weakened as the US asserts more direct control over their vassals, impoverishing
their vassals' economies in order to consolidated wealth & power into their preferred elites who will ensure their control over
their vassal countries. As the quality of life of the average citizen declines and Western countries become more politically unstable
and economically stagnate, we may even see a "Prague Spring" type of event, where a Western government moves away from the US/NATO/EU
alliance only to suffer a US/NATO backed invasion similar to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968.
>> Well, you do know tarrifs on imports
>> are paid by the US importer and on to
>> the consumer. China pays not a dime of
>> US tarrifs
No, I don't know that. It depends.
If China's exporters have tiny margins and the consumer can afford to pay more, then yes.
If China's exporters have big margins and fear losing market share (not necessarily to domestic American manufacturers but
to other foreign manufacturers), they might choose to sell at a "lower but still profitable" price in order for the POS price
to remain nearly the same and for them to retain their market share.
>> With GDP growth over 6% they
>> wont feel too much pain.
Pft, I agree bigly there. (And thanks for doing the math.) Despite my prior post, I doubt China cares about "maintaining market
share" to ship real product to a nation that provides almost nothing but threats in payment.
>> we may even see a "Prague Spring" type
>> of event, where a Western government moves
>> away from the US/NATO/EU alliance only to
>> suffer a US/NATO backed invasion similar
>> to the Soviet invasion of Czechoslovakia
>> in 1968.
As a small step in that direction, someone mentioned a few French "police" vehicles bore EU insignia.
"18% of its exports go to US. With 20% of GDP based on exports that means US is responsible for 3.6% of Chinas GDP. Tarrifs
might affect 20% of exports meaning the hit on GDP would be 0.7%. With GDP growth over 6% they wont feel too much pain."
This 18 - 19 percent export number is not true, as in does not take into account exports to the US via Hong Kong. This is only
mainland exports. But China also "exports" a lot to HK, and then these goods are exported to the rest of the world. So exports
to the US are more than 18 percent.
And the US is waging the trade war via other means, for example it is urging allies to drop China's IT companies. New Zealand
and Japan are dropping Huawei and ZTE. EU is warning too. No doubt there will be other US allies following. So costs for China
will be substantial.
Japan sets policy that will block Huawei and ZTE from public procurement as of April
China's trillion dollar Belt & Road Initiative will change everything, so why get hung up on the past. The BRI provides China
with an opportunity to use its considerable economic means to finance infrastructure projects around the world.
"... "In this case, it is clear the Chinese government wants to put maximum pressure on the Canadian government," Guy Saint-Jacques, the former Canadian ambassador to Beijing , said. Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland went on to criticize statements by US President Donald Trump, who said in an interview on Tuesday that he was ready to intervene in the Meng affair if it helped seal a trade deal with the world's second-largest economy. ..."
Her case has angered Beijing and shaken Canada's relations with China, which is embroiled in
a trade war with Washington.
"In this case, it is clear the Chinese government wants to put maximum pressure on the
Canadian government," Guy Saint-Jacques, the former
Canadian ambassador to Beijing , said. Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland went on to criticize statements by US President
Donald Trump, who said in an interview on Tuesday that he was ready to intervene in the Meng
affair if it helped seal a trade deal with the world's second-largest economy.
"Our extradition partners should not seek to politicize the extradition process or use it
for ends other than the pursuit of justice and following the rule of law," she said at a press
conference.
"... this is a clear sign that Canada no longer exists as an independent nation, but is a colony of the USA/Israeli empire. ..."
"... This story is not about an ultra-wealthy Chinese heiress enduring an odd adventure in Canada. This story is about a complete loss of Canadian sovereignty, because detaining this lady is outright insane. Canada was conquered without firing a shot! Welcome back to the royal empire run as a dictatorship. ..."
"... If only America focused its attention inward, on growth and stability, instead of transcendent American Imperialism then the world may stand a chance. ..."
"... Western positions on climate, neoliberalism, migration, in my opinion point into the same direction: critical thinking, almost gone. ..."
"... Defrauding the nation into "war of aggression" is the supreme crime one can commit against the American People. The "SUPREME CRIME"! ..."
"... Every "penny" belonging to each and every Neocon Oligarch who CONSPIRED TO DEFRAUD US INTO ILLEGAL WAR should be forfeit until the debt from those wars is paid down .. IN FULL ! ..."
"... Canada may be the obvious criminal. But on consideration, isn't it rather like the low-level thug who carries out a criminal assignment on the orders of a gang boss? And isn't it the gang boss who is the real problem for society? ..."
"... and Ms. Meng was seized on the same day that he was personally meeting on trade issues with Chinese President Xi. Some have even suggested that the incident was a deliberate slap in Trump's face. ..."
As most readers know, I'm not a casual political blogger and I prefer producing lengthy research articles rather than chasing
the headlines of current events. But there are exceptions to every rule, and the looming danger of a direct worldwide clash with
China is one of them.
Consider the arrest last week of Meng Wanzhou, the CFO of Huawei, the world's largest telecom equipment manufacturer. While flying
from Hong Kong to Mexico, Ms. Meng was changing planes in the Vancouver International Airport airport when she was suddenly detained
by the Canadian government on an August US warrant. Although now released on $10 million bail, she still faces extradition to a New
York City courtroom, where she could receive up to thirty years in federal prison for allegedly having conspired in 2010 to violate
America's unilateral economic trade sanctions against Iran.
Although our mainstream media outlets have certainly covered this important story, including front page articles in the New
York Times and the Wall Street Journal , I doubt most American readers fully recognize the extraordinary gravity of
this international incident and its potential for altering the course of world history. As one scholar noted, no event since America's
deliberate 1999 bombing of China's
embassy in Belgrade , which killed several Chinese diplomats, has so outraged both the Chinese government and its population.
Columbia's Jeffrey Sachs correctly
described it as "almost a US declaration of war on China's business community."
Such a reaction is hardly surprising. With annual revenue of $100 billion, Huawei ranks as the world's largest and most advanced
telecommunications equipment manufacturer as well as China's most internationally successful and prestigious company. Ms. Meng is
not only a longtime top executive there, but also the daughter of the company's founder, Ren Zhengfei, whose enormous entrepreneurial
success has established him as a Chinese national hero.
Her seizure on obscure American sanction violation charges while changing planes in a Canadian airport almost amounts to a kidnapping.
One journalist asked how Americans would react if China had seized Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook for violating Chinese law especially
if Sandberg were also the daughter of Steve Jobs.
Indeed, the closest analogy that comes to my mind is when Prince Mohammed bin Salman of Saudi Arabia kidnapped the Prime Minister
of Lebanon earlier this year and held him hostage. Later he more successfully did the same with hundreds of his wealthiest Saudi
subjects, extorting something like $100 billion in ransom from their families before finally releasing them. Then he may have finally
over-reached himself when Washington Post columnist Jamal Khashoggi, a Saudi dissident, was killed and dismembered by a
bone-saw at the Saudi embassy in Turkey.
We should actually be a bit grateful to Prince Mohammed since without him America would clearly have the most insane government
anywhere in the world. As it stands, we're merely tied for first.
Since the end of the Cold War, the American government has become increasingly delusional, regarding itself as the Supreme World
Hegemon. As a result, local American courts have begun enforcing gigantic financial penalties against foreign countries and their
leading corporations, and I suspect that the rest of the world is tiring of this misbehavior. Perhaps such actions can still be taken
against the subservient vassal states of Europe, but by most objective measures, the size of China's real economy surpassed that
of the US several years ago and is now substantially
larger , while also still having a far higher rate of growth. Our totally dishonest mainstream media regularly obscures this
reality, but it remains true nonetheless.
Provoking a disastrous worldwide confrontation with mighty China by seizing and imprisoning one of its leading technology executives
reminds me of
a comment
I made several years ago about America's behavior under the rule of its current political elites:
Or to apply a far harsher biological metaphor, consider a poor canine infected with the rabies virus. The virus may have no
brain and its body-weight is probably less than one-millionth that of the host, but once it has seized control of the central
nervous system, the animal, big brain and all, becomes a helpless puppet.
Once friendly Fido runs around foaming at the mouth, barking at the sky, and trying to bite all the other animals it can reach.
Its friends and relatives are saddened by its plight but stay well clear, hoping to avoid infection before the inevitable happens,
and poor Fido finally collapses dead in a heap.
Normal countries like China naturally assume that other countries like the US will also behave in normal ways, and their dumbfounded
shock at Ms. Meng's seizure has surely delayed their effective response. In 1959, Vice President Richard Nixon visited Moscow and
famously engaged in a heated
"kitchen debate"
with Premier Nikita Khrushchev over the relative merits of Communism and Capitalism. What would have been the American reaction
if Nixon had been immediately arrested and given a ten year Gulag sentence for "anti-Soviet agitation"?
Since a natural reaction to international hostage-taking is retaliatory international hostage-taking, the newspapers have reported
that top American executives have decided to forego visits to China until the crisis is resolved. These days, General Motors sells
more cars in China than in the US, and China is also the manufacturing source of nearly all our iPhones, but Tim Cook, Mary Barra,
and their higher-ranking subordinates are unlikely to visit that country in the immediate future, nor would the top executives of
Google, Facebook, Goldman Sachs, and the leading Hollywood studios be willing to risk indefinite imprisonment.
Canada had arrested Ms. Meng on American orders, and this morning's newspapers reported that
a former Canadian diplomat
had suddenly been detained in China , presumably as a small bargaining-chip to encourage Ms. Meng's release. But I very much
doubt such measures will have much effect. Once we forgo traditional international practices and adopt the Law of the Jungle, it
becomes very important to recognize the true lines of power and control, and Canada is merely acting as an American political puppet
in this matter. Would threatening the puppet rather than the puppet-master be likely to have much effect?
Similarly, nearly all of America's leading technology executives are already quite hostile to the Trump Administration, and even
if it were possible, seizing one of them would hardly be likely to sway our political leadership. To a lesser extent, the same thing
is true about the overwhelming majority of America's top corporate leaders. They are not the individuals who call the shots in the
current White House.
Indeed, is President Trump himself anything more than a higher-level puppet in this very dangerous affair? World peace and American
national security interests are being sacrificed in order to harshly enforce the Israel Lobby's international sanctions campaign
against Iran, and we should hardly be surprised that the National Security Adviser John Bolton, one of America's most extreme pro-Israel
zealots,
had personally given the green light to the arrest. Meanwhile, there are credible reports that Trump himself remained entirely
unaware of these plans, and Ms. Meng was seized on the same day that he was personally meeting on trade issues with Chinese President
Xi. Some have even suggested that the incident was a deliberate slap in Trump's face.
But Bolton's apparent involvement underscores the central role of his longtime patron, multi-billionaire casino-magnate Sheldon
Adelson, whose enormous financial influence within Republican political circles has been overwhelmingly focused on pro-Israel policy
and hostility towards Iran, Israel's regional rival.
Although it is far from clear whether the very elderly Adelson played any direct personal role in Ms. Meng's arrest, he surely
must be viewed as the central figure in fostering the political climate that produced the current situation. Perhaps he should not
be described as the ultimate puppet-master behind our current clash with China, but any such political puppet-masters who do exist
are certainly operating at his immediate beck and call. In very literal terms, I suspect that if Adelson placed a single phone call
to the White House, the Trump Administration would order Canada to release Ms. Meng that same day.
Adelson's fortune of $33 billion ranks him as the
15th wealthiest man in America, and the bulk of his fortune is based on his ownership of extremely lucrative gambling casinos in
Macau, China . In effect, the Chinese government currently has its hands around the financial windpipe of the man ultimately responsible
for Ms. Meng's arrest and whose pro-Israel minions largely control American foreign policy. I very much doubt that they are fully
aware of this enormous, untapped source of political leverage.
Over the years, Adelson's Chinese Macau casinos have been involved
in all sorts of political bribery scandals
, and I suspect it would be very easy for the Chinese government to find reasonable grounds for immediately shutting them down, at
least on a temporary basis, with such an action having almost no negative repercussions to Chinese society or the bulk of the Chinese
population. How could the international community possibly complain about the Chinese government shutting down some of their own
local gambling casinos with a long public record of official bribery and other criminal activity? At worst, other gambling casino
magnates would become reluctant to invest future sums in establishing additional Chinese casinos, hardly a desperate threat to President
Xi's anti-corruption government.
I don't have a background in finance and I haven't bothered trying to guess the precise impact of a temporary shutdown of Adelson's
Chinese casinos, but it wouldn't surprise me if the resulting drop in the stock price of
Las Vegas Sands Corp would reduce Adelson's personal
net worth were by $5-10 billion within 24 hours, surely enough to get his immediate personal attention. Meanwhile, threats of a permanent
shutdown, perhaps extending to Chinese-influenced Singapore, might lead to the near-total destruction of Adelson's personal fortune,
and similar measures could also be applied as well to the casinos of all the other fanatically pro-Israel American billionaires,
who dominate the remainder of gambling in Chinese Macau.
The chain of political puppets responsible for Ms. Meng's sudden detention is certainly a complex and murky one. But the Chinese
government already possesses the absolute power of financial life-or-death over Sheldon Adelson, the man located at the very top
of that chain. If the Chinese leadership recognizes that power and takes effective steps, Ms. Meng will immediately be put on a plane
back home, carrying the deepest sort of international political apology. And future attacks against Huawei, ZTE, and other Chinese
technology companies would not be repeated.
China actually holds a Royal Flush in this international political poker game. The only question is whether they will recognize
the value of their hand. I hope they do for the sake of America and the entire world.
This is no surprise. Anyone who follows political events knows that John Bolton is insane, so no surprise that he devised this
insane idea. The problem will be corrected within a week, and hopefully Bolton sent to an asylum.
However, this is a clear sign that Canada no longer exists as an independent nation, but is a colony of the USA/Israeli empire.
Canada provides soldiers for this empire in Afghanistan even today, and in Latvia. Most Canadians can't find that nation on a
map, but it's a tiny unimportant nation in the Baltic that NATO adsorbed as part of its plan for a new Cold War.
This story is not about an ultra-wealthy Chinese heiress enduring an odd adventure in Canada. This story is about a complete
loss of Canadian sovereignty, because detaining this lady is outright insane. Canada was conquered without firing a shot! Welcome
back to the royal empire run as a dictatorship.
I hope someone in China is reading this article. I would love to see Adelson and his cohorts go down in flames. This would fit
right in with China's current anti-corruption foray. Xi has a reputation for hanging corrupt officials. Shutting down Adelson's
casinos would be consistent with what Xi has been doing and increase his popularity, not least of all, right here in the US.
If only America focused its attention inward, on growth and stability, instead of transcendent American Imperialism then the world
may stand a chance. The future will suffer once China's debt traps collapse and like America it begins placing military globally.
America would be the one country who could work towards a Western future but this will never be the case. Better start learning
Mandarin lest we end up like the Uyghurs.
@Anonymous Use your
brain. The Chinese elite want to use the political clout that Adelson and the other big casino Jews have with the US government.
To gain lobby power from a proven expert, Shelly Adelson, they are willing to allow him to make the big bucks in Macao. They expect
quid pro quo.
The Chinese are pussies and will always back down. The U.S. laughed in their face after they bombed and killed them in Belgrade
and got crickets from the Chinamen. China can't project much power beyond its borders. They can't punch back. The Chinese (and
East Asians) are only part of the global business racket because they are efficient worker bees facilitating the global financial
system. They have no real control over the global market. And if they start to think they do they'll get a quick lesson. Like
they're getting with Meng, who is being treated like coolie prostitute. LMAO.
I always enjoy fresh writing from Mr. Unz. Clarity of thought is a fine thing to witness in language. It should be stated, America
is not in any danger.the empire is and is in terminal decline. As Asia's economic might grows in leaps ad bound, so does the empire
scramble to thwart losing its global grip.
As Fred Reed once pointed out, declining empires rarely go quietly. Will America's leadership gamble on a new war to prevent asia's
ascendancy?
I think it's possible.
But what do I know. As my father once said, "I'm just a pawn in a game."
To his credit he had the wherewithal to see that. Alas, most Americans are asleep.
The call for Ms. Meng's arrest had to come from the US Treasury's Office of Foreign Assets Control. They enforce every thing related
to sanctions, which they claim is what Meng was arrested for– sale of phones and software to Iran.
But they also say they had been on her company's case since 2013 so their timing is rather suspect.
What else I don't understand is her company has research and offices in Germany, Sweden, the U.S., France, Italy, Russia, India,
China and Canada ..So if what they sold or attempted to sell to Iran wasn't outright 'stolen' intellectual property from the US
or even if it was why not transfer it to and or have it made in China or some country not signed onto the Iran sanctions and then
sell it to Iran. I haven't boned up on exactly what kinds of phone software they were selling but I think it has something to
do with being able to bypass NSA and others intercepts.
You are assuming Meng is not a sacrificial pawn in some larger game.
It would be priceless for Xi to shut down Adelson's operations in Macau for a few days or weeks, but I'm afraid Xi is very
much akin to Capitain Louis Renault in Casablanca , and after walking into a Macau casino and uttering the phrase, "I am
shocked- shocked- to find that gambling is going on in here!" might admit in the next breath, "I blow with the wind, and the prevailing
wind happens to be from Jerusalem."
Half a century or so propaganda like 'the USA policing the world' of course had effect.
Not realised is that in normal circumstances police is not an autonomous force, but has to act within a legal framework.
The illusion of this framework of course exists, human rights, democracy, whatever
She's out on bail. Agree that Bolton blindsided Trump. Trump is going to try to turn this into some sort of PR gesture when he
pardons her. No way he will let this mess up his trade deal. Which is beached until she exonerated.
What is true
of these stories of course cannot be known with certainty, but it is asserted that USA military technology is way behind China
and Russia.
Several examples exist, but of course, if these examples tell the truth, not sure.
PISA comparisons of levels of education world wide show how the west is intellectually behind the east.
Western positions on climate, neoliberalism, migration, in my opinion point into the same direction: critical thinking, almost
gone.
"I very much doubt that they are fully aware of this enormous, untapped source of political leverage".
I very much doubt whether that is the case. As far as I know, most Chinese people are distinguished by their intelligence,
thoroughness and diligence. What do the thousands of people employed by China's foreign ministry and its intelligence services
do all day, if they are unaware of such important facts?
However I also doubt if China's leaders are inclined to see matters in nearly such a black and white way as many Westerners.
Jewish people seem to get along very well in China and with the Chinese, which could be because both have high levels of intelligence,
culture, and subtlety. As well as being interested in money and enterprise.
It's certainly an interesting situation, and I too am waiting expectantly for the other shoe to drop.
Yes, whatever your bias is, China is a "normal" country. In the sense of being closer to the ideal than most countries – not of
being average.
You may bewail some of the "human rights" issues in China, although I believe they may be somewhat magnified for PR purposes.
But when did China last attack another country without provocation and murder hundreds of thousands of its citizens, level its
cities, or destroy the rule of law? (Like Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya )
The Chinese seem to be law-abiding, sensible, and strongly disposed to peace. Which is something the world needs a lot more
of right now.
@Dan Hayes "why hasn't
anyone before thought of it.. "
" WHY HASN'T ANYONE BEFORE THOUGHT OF IT !!"
You must be kidding me.
For over three years I have been issuing comment after comment after comment .Like a crazed wolf howling in a barren forest
.That the "number one" priority of the American people should be demanding the seizure of ALL the assets of Neocon oligarchic
class.
Why ?
Not because they are "oligarchs." ..or some might own "casinos" but because they "deliberately" Conspired to Defraud the American
People into illegal Wars of Aggression and have nearly bankrupted the nation in the process.
That's why.
And it is the worlds BEST REASON to seize the assets a thousand times better than "bribery charges." I have issued statement after statement to that affect ,on Unz Review, in the hope that at some point it might, at least subliminally,
catch on.
What I have witnessed over the past six years, is a lot of intelligent, thoughtful people "correctly diagnosing" the issues
which plague the nation But no one had any idea of what to do about it. I have been pointing out, that if people really want to do something about it then do whats RIGHT: Seize the assets of the defrauders.!
Of course we can. Of course we can Its the LAW! Defrauding the nation into "war of aggression" is the supreme crime one can commit against the American People. The "SUPREME CRIME"!
(If you don't think so, go ask your local Police Officer. He will tell you FLAT OUT ..it is the Worst crime "Conspiracy to Defraud
into Mass Murder! .Not good ! You can even ask him if there is a statute of limitations. He will probably say something like "
Yeah .When the Sun collapses!")
And they are GUILTY as charged There is no doubt , .. not anymore. We all know it and can "prove" it ! Every "penny" belonging to each and every Neocon Oligarch who CONSPIRED TO DEFRAUD US INTO ILLEGAL WAR should be forfeit until
the debt from those wars is paid down .. IN FULL !
The keys to the kingdom are right there, right in front of your noses. If you want to change things ."take action" the law is on YOUR side. We don't need China to do a damn thing ..We just need the American People to rise up,"apply the law" and take back their country
and its solvency.
Canada may be
the obvious criminal. But on consideration, isn't it rather like the low-level thug who carries out a criminal assignment on the
orders of a gang boss? And isn't it the gang boss who is the real problem for society?
An article with the identical take as Ron Unz, including the idea that China has its key lever via Sheldon Adelson's casinos,
was published on the Canadian
website of Henry Makow also noting that USA political king-maker Adelson, is a major force behind the anti-Iran obsessions
that partly grounded the arrest of Ms Meng, and so well-deserves consequences here...
In the Jeffrey Sachs article linked above, Sachs lists no less than 25 other companies which have been 'violating US sanctions'
and admitted guilt via paying of fines, but never suffered any executive arrests, including banks including JP Morgan Chase, Bank
of America, PayPal, Toronto-Dominion Bank, and Wells Fargo.
The principle against 'selective, arbitrary, and political prosecutions'
The principle that one state cannot take measures on the territory of another state by means of enforcement of national laws
- 'proportionality of law', which demands that penalty for any said 'crime' needs to be proportionate to the offence, and not
draconian, 'cruel and unusual' Ms Meng is threatened with decades in prison
This is also a significant humiliation of President Trump personally, his own advisors apparently colluding to render him powerless
and uninformed
The Meng case brings to mind the story of another sanctions-violating 'target' arrested at USA request, the great USA chess
master and non-Zionist Jew, Bobby Fischer (1943-2008).
Born in Chicago, Illinois, USA, Fischer impressed the world with his genius, but, like Ms Meng became criminally indicted by
the USA regime, for the 'crime' of playing chess in Yugoslavia when the Serb government was under USA 'sanctions'. Harassed across
the globe, Fischer was jailed in Japan in 2004-05 by embarrassed Japanese leaders, for this fake 'crime' which few people in the
world thought was wrong. Fischer had been using his celebrity voice to strongly criticise the USA & Israeli governments, making
him also a political target, much as Ms Meng is a political target due to her being a prominent citizen and quasi-princess of
China.
The Japanese, loath to be the instrument of Fischer's USA imprisonment, finally allowed Bobby to transit to Iceland where he
was given asylum and residency. Living not far from Iceland's NATO military base, Fischer became quickly and mysteriously struck
with disease, and Fischer died in Reykjavik, perhaps a victim of a CIA-Mossad-Nato assassination squad.
The Chinese government, I am told, directly understands the power and role of Sheldon Adelson here, and Chinese inspectors
are perhaps inside Adelson's Macau properties as you read this. Perhaps Chinese officials may show up soon in Adelson's casinos,
and repeat the line of actor Claude Rains' character in the 1942 film 'Casablanca' -
"I'm shocked, shocked, to find that gambling is going on in here!"
What we have to realize is that just as there is no real difference between Democrats and Republicans because they are both
owned by the same people, so must we realize that in reality there is little difference between the leaders of the worlds countries
because they are all owned by the same central banks. This is why Nate Rothschild famously stated "give me control of a countries
money supply, and I care not who makes its laws" . All the world's central banks are tied together by BIS, WB and IMF and
the US marines. This is the reason Syria, Libya, NK and Venezuela have been taken down: Rothchild central bank control.
So this Huaiwei arrest almost certainly has nothing to do with the "trade war", and is with certainly a hit by one side of
the Kabal against the other. Zionist Nationalists versus Chabad Lubbovitz perhaps?
Jared Kushner has been lying pretty low lately and recently was stripped of his security clearance. He was linked to Kissilev
the Russian ambassador, plus he was pushing Trump to help protect MBS in SA. I would bet that he is at the center of this storm.
I'm honestly shocked no one has stated the obvious: very, very few Americans would be likely to care if Sheryl Sandberg were arrested
on dubious charges in China. I cant say I would be one of those few people.
I also should note that the crown prince of KSA is Mohammad bin Salman. Salman is his father, the king. The crown prince is
Mohammad, son of (aka "bin") Salman.
@TheMediumIsTheMassage
In many ways China does deviate from international norms, but of course so does the United States. As Tom Welsh pointed out, Chinese
foreign policy is downright angelic compared to the US, even if you consider Tibet and Xinjiang to be illegitimately occupied
territories (an argument I'm sympathetic to). Perhaps China would act as belligerently as the US does if China were the sole global
superpower, but it's not, so it's fair to judge China favorably compared to the US.
@Craig Nelsen Trump
deserves it for hiring Bolton at all. Perhaps one might argue Trump was blackmailed into doing so but he doesn't seem to be acting
like a blackmailed man.
Mr. Unz, at no time since Ms. Wanzhou's arrest have I felt myself in a position to judge that this was a strategically unwise
or incautious act. It might be, but apparently I'm to be contrasted from so many of your readers, and you, simply for understanding
myself to have an inadequate handle on the facts to make the call. That would be true, that my handle on the facts would be inadequate,
even if I didn't have personal knowledge of Huawei's suspicious practices or their scale.
I worry that you don't seem to evidence the presence of someone trusted who will go toe to toe with you as Devil's Advocate.
Too often, on affairs of too great a consequence, you come across too strongly, when the data doesn't justify the confidence.
A confident error is still an error and Maimonides' advice on indecision notwithstanding, a confident error is a candidate for
hubris, the worst kind of error. All of this, of course, assumes you make these arguments in good faith because if not the calculus
changes mightily.
Too many of your readers evidence that they interpret this event and form an opinion of it based on nothing but this higher order
syllogism:
Because I distrust the US government
[or because I distrust those I believe to control the US government]
It follows that this was an unjustified act or else a dangerous strategic error
After this higher order syllogism is accepted without due critique, evidence is sought to justify it and no further consideration
of the possibilities is tallied.
At minimum you need to have run a permutation where you seriously consider that : it is well know to US operatives, if not
to US citizens, you, and your readers, that Huawei is actively, constantly and maliciously waging covert war on the USA. You should
at least consider this possibility. If true, this act may merely be a shot across the bow that notifies China of a readiness to
expose things China may not wished exposed, and might stop endangering US citizens, if it were made aware such things stand to
be exposed.
If that's true, not only are you a fishing trawler captain causing distraction with a loudspeaker yelling at the captain of
the destroyer that just fired the warning shot across the bow of a Chinese vessel that is likely covert PLA/N, but now you may
be positioning your trawler to block the destroyer.
Do you really have enough information to know this is wise? Do you really know as much as the destroyer captain?
I will be away today, in the off chance you reply and I don't immediately answer it is because I can't.
Superb, as always, Ron Unz!
For someone who says he has no background in economics you you put your finger dead center on the money nexus of this "puppet
run by another puppet controlled by another puppet dangling from the strings of a still bigger puppet" chain from hell.
I wish someone would read out the entire article, may be with photos of the culprits, on Youtube with subtitles in Chinese.
@Craig Nelsen Nobody
is suggesting that "the order" came from Bolton or that he could indeed give any such order. True his not telling Trump about
what was about to happen bears a sinister interpretation.
@TheMediumIsTheMassage
I think what he means by normal are countries whose leaders are interested in the well being of their nation and the people they
rule. No divided or corrupted loyalties to another nation.
By this standard the United States is clearly not a normal country.
One angle you did not mention, Cisco (U.S. company) of course until not too many years ago had a near-monopoly on the kind
of network systems Huawei is selling as number one now (actually, I did not know of Huawei's success there, thought of it as a
handset maker), that may be a factor here.
There are a few Chinese or U.S. people of that descent on this site, mainly PRC-sympathetic, it would be very amusing if they
were able to ignite a big discussion of your hypothetical reprisals
During the bombing of Belgrade a missile fell on the Chinese Embassy. A local tv reporter approached a Chinese Embassy official
and asked him. What are you going to do now? The answer was.
The Meng case brings to mind the story of another sanctions-violating 'target' arrested at USA request, the great USA chess
master and non-Zionist Jew, Bobby Fischer (1943-2008).
Fischer was another victim of Zionist controlled American imperialism. Yugoslavia, the child of Woodrow Wilson, became the
victim of the Imperialist war Against Russia. Russia's brother, and ally, Yugoslavia, was destroyed by the kind democrat gang
administration of Wm (that was not sex), Clinton.
Excellent article, and an ingenious suggestion regarding the Adelson casinos. But I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for a casino
shutdown. Having worked in the marketing end of the casino industry myself, I can tell you the most coveted demographic lists
were always the Chinese players, words like fanatical and obsessive don't even come close to describing their penchant for gambling.
I could literally see casino shutdowns in China causing a national Gilet Jaune moment followed by the overthrow of the Communist
Party LOL.
I would definitely welcome seeing more Ron Unz articles on current topics.
@Carlton Meyer Any chance
this is Democrat, Deep State types at State and Justice manufacturing this cluster-f in order to make Trump look unaware? This
is a President that respects casinos. And business. If Bolton and Company pulled this from behind the scenes without Executive
knowledge or authorization, is that even legal? More treason? But given the circumstances, how does all this even GET to Iran,
hurt Iran at all? What was supposedly illegal was done in 2010. Are we certain bags of cash from the Chinese and Russians and
Iran weren't traveling about Democrat-ruled DC back then? Grabbing this chick helps the case against Iran? I'm at a loss as to
how.
And so the thought of a more local political benefit/purpose, stirring a diplomatic shit-storm on Trump's watch, something
he'd have to take responsibility for. To start a near war, sort of like the Bay of Pigs. Operatives, pulling tricks, writing checks
the President then has to cover, looking like an unelectable mook throughout.
I'm happy to give the AIPAC kiddies full credit, I just don't see the damage to Iran in all this. For crying out loud, we carted
$500 billion cash over to Iran under Obama's watch, what, 2013 or 2014ish? I don't know how we skip over THAT, to get to trade
shenanigans in 2010, also taking place under Obama's watch. What was Holder doing when he was AG after all, why no action then?
If it's Israeli-driven today, why wasn't Israel pushing Holder to take action against Huawei back in 2010?
@TheMediumIsTheMassage
How is the USA a "normal" country in any sense of the word? It once was truly great among the nations of the world but that ship
sailed looooong back.
We invade for fake "freedom", inject the poison of homo mania into nations that do not do the bidding of the homos and/or bend
to the will of the chosen ones, pretend it's all for some good cause then invite the survivors to displace the founding stock
of this country. You call that "normal"??
We are nothing more than a vehicle for every kind of degenerate (((loser))) with cash to use our men and women as their private
mercenaries. We spread filth around the place, destroy nations and proclaim ourselves as the peace-makers with the shrill voice
of a worn out street prostitute on kensingtion ave (philly).
We are like that hoe, living out the last days of her aids infested body, with a grudge on the world for something that was
completely of our (((own))) making. Philly might have been the birthplace of this country but camden is where we are all headed.
And looking at China, we are dysfunctional beyond repair. Of course we still have quite a few things the Chinese might want to
emulate (no the SJW versions but the read deal) but looking at our other maladies, they probably won't who'll blame them?
@Anon Yes it was s Portuguese
colony. Interesting that Persian traders including Jews were in Macau going back st least to 500 AD probably more.
Ron, have you sent this article to the Chinese ambassador in DC yet?
Strange that the Chinese let Adelson in. The Macau casinos have thrived for a long time. The Portuguese left valuable casinos
and the Chinese let the Jews in soon after the Portuguese left.
It makes sense that foreign casino operators would want to move into Macau, but why would China let foreigners in?
Could it be that one of the largest investors in China since the mid 1970s Richard Blum husband of Dianne Feinstein has something
to do with it??
She's as much the Senator representing China as a Senator representing California.
Another interesting aspect of all this is the "suicide" of Physics Professor Zhang Shoucheng at Stanford just a few hours after
Meng was arrested on Dec 1. According to reliable Chinese sources and widespread reporting on social media Zhang was the conduit
to China from Silicone Valley. He was richly rewarded by Chinese investment in his US companies. IMHO the Chinese understand the
role of Israel and Adelson in US politics but are cautious in going this far. The Chinese are taking the light touch approach
with Trump and his Adelson selected neocons. A Chinese businessman Guo WenGui with the highest connections to the Chinese elites
and security services has sought political asylum in the USA. On the internet he daily speaks to the Chinese diaspora (in Mandarin)
on the complex developments in Chinese official corruption. The NY Times has now started to take him seriously (good idea ) and
reports that he and Steve Bannon have formed an alliance to expose Chinese government activities. You can read all this in the
NY Times. Unz should translate Guo Wengui into English and publish his commentaries. In my analysis he is usually right about
China and has shown remarkable predictive powers. He knows how and what the Chinese think, where the bones are buried and what
comes next. He and Bannon plan to reveal the facts about the recent suicide in France of another prominent Chinese businessman
Wang Jian who was Chairman of Hainan Airlines parent company.
This article by Mr. Unz is a good example of why people should read and support the Unz Review. No one is better equipped to shed
light on otherwise unmentioned interests behind mainstream news events like this one.
Kudos for making a smart suggestion that no doubt will be heard by people who could carry it out.
Good article, but it is only scratching the surface.
Many things would be explained if somebody would find out what is the volume of US investment in China, and what percentage of
it is Jewish.
That would shed light why the rabid Jewish press in US so bestially attacking Trump, after Trump started to impose tariffs on
Chinese goods.
I do not know, but I could guess that Trump reached deep into Jewish profits.
We have no choice than wait what will happen to tariffs after Trump will be replaced.
@Carlton Meyer Canada
declared an end to participating in combat operations in Afghanistan in July 2011 and withdrew its combat forces, leaving a dwindling
number of advisors to Afghan forces. The last Canadian soldier departed Afghanistan in March 2014. You are spot on regarding Bolton's
certifiability.
Trump has been totally phagocyted by the Neo-Cons in the foreign policy. The two pillars of the neocons foreign policy are now
Saudi Arabia and Israel. Trump is benefitting from the neo-cons intelligence and their powerful financial network that he is convinced
would help in his reelection.
Once he is re-elected then he may decrease his reliance on them but for the next few years the jewish lobby will prevail in Trump's
foreign policy. Unless they are not able to protect Trump from falling under the democrats assaults or been eliminated from power,
they are on for more wars, more troubles and more deaths. History will place Trump near Bush junior as neo-cons puppets responsible
for the largest destruction of countries since WWII.
@Brabantian Interesting
that she was arrested in the Chinese colony of Vancouver BC. Maybe the Canadian government is asserting sovereignty over Vancouver
at long last.
That must have been frightening. There she was sitting in the VIP lounge surrounded by deferential airline clerks as usual
and suddenly she's under arrest.
Since the end of the Cold War, the American government has become increasingly delusional, regarding itself as the Supreme
World Hegemon.
More delusional than when in 1957 the US government gave Iran a nuclear reactor and weapons grade uranium? In his latter years
Khashoggi 's relative, the weapons dealer Adnan Khashoggi, much later mused on what the US was trying to achieve by giving Iran
vast amounts of armaments, when all it did was set off an arms race in the region. America then switched to Iraq as its cop on
the beat and gave them anything they asked for, and were placatory of Saddam when he started talking crazy. This was under the
US government least attentive to Israel. Yes things should be more balanced as Steven Walt suggests
Averting World Conflict with China, by Ron Unz - The Unz Review If it wants to create the conditions for a final settlement
of the Palestinian problem, then America should be more even handed but it must also be very cautious about Iran. We don't know
who will be in power there in the future and history shows that once those ME counties are given an inch they take a mile.
Saudi Arabia seems quite sensible, its liking for US gov bonds that even Americans think offer too low a rate of interest is
easily explained as payment for US protection. Killing Khashoggi that way was a dreadful moral and foreign policy mistake from
someone who is too young for the amount of authority he has been given, but the victim did not beg for death like more than a
few Uygurs are doing right now. The CIA agent China rounded up with the help of it's network of double agents in the US were doubtless
glad to have their interrogation terminated.
Some sweeteners from Adelson are likely in the Tsunami of dirty Chinese money, which are amusingly being laundered in Canadian
casinos. As Walt points out the Chinese elite want bolt holes and bank accounts in north America. By the way most of the ill gotten
gains are from sale of opiates such as fentanyl.
Targeting Sheldon Adelson's Chinese Casinos
Yes that will work, especially when added to what China is already doing in targeting farmers who supported Trump, so he is
definitely not going to be reelected now you have explained all this to them, and you are also opening up Harvard to their children,
which can only redound to the detriment of white gentiles. Deliberate pouring of the vials of wrath or just accidentally spilling
them? I am begining to wonder.
Thank you, Ron, for a clear-headed and insightful article.
There are however, two tiny infelicities, which I would not want for them to distract from the article's merit.
First, I think the Saudi Arabian Prince you are referring to is Prince Mohammed bin Salman, not "Prince Salman". "Prince
Mohammed" would be the abbreviated form of his name. "Bin" is of course the Arabic equivalent of the Hebrew "ben" indicating paternity,
rather than a middle name, so "Salman" is not his surname. "Prince Salman" would refer to the current Saudi King before he was
King, rather than to the current Prince.
Second, maybe the hypothetical of China seizing Sheryl Sandberg of Facebook is not the best analogy since I, and I suspect
others who are aware of her key role in empowering and enriching a deceptive and parasitical industry, would not be terribly troubled
if China seized her. Indeed, we might consider it a public service. Admittedly, it is hard to find a good analogy for a prominent
female executive of a US national champion company since so many of our prominent companies are predatory rather than productive
and scorn their native country rather than serve it.
and Ms. Meng was seized on the same day that he was personally meeting on trade issues with Chinese President Xi. Some
have even suggested that the incident was a deliberate slap in Trump's face.
@Baxter"America
is not in any danger." America is in very great danger, but only from within.
Almost half of all millenials believe that Capitalism is evil and that the Socialism should be the guiding economic principle
of this nation. When you point out that it has failed for every nation in history that has tried it, notably the Soviet Union
and more recently Venezuela, they retort that it is because those countries "did it wrong" and that "we will do it right."
When you ask for specifics as what they "did wrong" that we will "do right" they stare at you wordlessly as if you
are the one who is an idiot.
It should also be pointed out that a vast majority of Democrats think that Ocasio-Cortez is brilliant and that we need more
legislators like her.
What if Ms. Meng, was giving Iranian dissidents phones and other equipment to undermine the Government of Iran, starting another
color revolution, that sucks in America and Israel? What if the Trump administration asked that this not be done in order to end
the endless "revolutions" that have been happening and bankrupting our country and threatening Israel? What if the sanctions are
benefiting Iran's government too? China was allowed to become so large at our expense when we opened up trade and moved businesses
over there, but this was to keep them from being too cozy with Soviet Russia, just ask Nixon.
Part of the Zionist plan for a Zionist NWO was laid by David Rockefeller when he sent Kissinger to China to open up Chinas slave
labor to the NWO types like Rockefeller and the Zionist controlled companies in the U.S. and part of the plan was the deindustrialization
of America thus bringing down the American standard of living while raising the standard of living in China.
I will never believe the fake disagreement between the Zionist controlled U.S. and the Chinese government as long as G.M and
Google and the other companies that have shut down their operations in the U.S. and opened operations in China, it is all a NWO
plan to bring down we Americans to third world status and then meld all of us into a Zionist satanic NWO.
The enemy is not at the gates, the enemy is in the government and its name is Zionism and the Zionist NWO!
"... It was Bolton who a week ago intentionally damaged U.S. relations with China. ..."
"... Meng Wanzhou is a daughter of the founder and main owner of Huawei, Ren Zhengfei, and was groomed to be his successor. The company is extremely well regarded in China. It is one its jewel pieces and, with 170,000 employees and $100 billion in revenues, an important political actor. ..."
"... The arrest on December 1 happened while president Trump was negotiating with president Xi of China about trade relations. Trump did not know about the upcoming arrest but Bolton was informed of it ..."
"... It was a trap. The arrest is a public slap in the face of China and to Xi personally. It will not be left unanswered. Whatever Trump may have agreed upon with Xi is now worthless. John Bolton intentionally sabotaged the talks and the U.S. relations with China. ..."
"... Having read this in context with the comments (especially those by Denk and others) previous on this topic, I would ask if anyone can provide a time line of US clandestine negative (and sometimes fatal) actions against high level Chinese engineers and telecoms. Again, the above summary is outstanding. ..."
"... The terrifying aspect is Bolton, Pompeo - puppets both for shadow power players - have no constraints whatsoever, and obviously operate without any constraint or regard for our severely (cognitively and emotionally) challenged president ..."
"... The timing of this arrest - while Trump and Xi are dining and Sabrina Meng is on her way to the G-20 conference gives a loud message that Trump is serves at the pleasure of his neocon staff - and son in law, the latter being instrumental in the firing of Rex Tillerson, the hiring of Bolton, Pompeo and the impending firing of Gen. Kelly. ..."
"... Trump is a global front for a different approach to maintaining global hegemony but make no mistake, Trump is not fronting for you ..."
"... Arresting US business execs by China is a mistake that would be cheered by Bolton and Navarro. The provocation of arresting Meng is designed by the Trump team to provoke China to arrest US business leaders and thus destroy their direct investment into China. ..."
"... The enemy of China is not US businesses but rather the neocon dominated US govt. To impact this group, China needs to cut off their drug supply(their financing) thru no longer buying their USTs to finance and enable their massive military spending and financial aggression. ..."
"... Canada's role in this is shocking. It is all of a piece with the surrender to the USA in the Trade negotiations whereby, inter alia, Canada is not allowed to enter into Trade agreements with 'non-market' economies. The non-market formulation being code for unapproved by Uncle Sam. No doubt the Nazi Freeland is running this show. In this she is ably seconded by the 'opposition' Tories and the social fascist NDP which is as enthusiastic for war against China as it is for an attack on the Donbas. ..."
"... Those who talk about Trump, Pompeo, Bolton, Kelly, etc. direct our attention to a shell game. They are all in on the scam. How better to say it? There is one party: the war party. Trump is a member of TEAM USA. US political maestros dance to the tune of the Deep State/neolibcon. ..."
"... With respect to Foreign Policy, how much real difference is there between Clinton, Bush, Obama, and Trump? They have all supported MIC, Israel, and expanding the Empire - aka Job #1 ..."
"... Bolton works for Adelson probably Pompeo does too. So Trump can't fire their crazy asses any time he chooses. ..."
"... Adelson has made millions with his gambling dens. In some ways it's a bit like what the East India Company did with opium. ..."
"... I think we can assume that the arrest was not an unwelcome surprise for Trump, or he would have reversed it. He knew, and accepts it. It's total asymmetric war on China. The arrest was on December 1. Trump twitter, Dec 7 China talks are going very well! here ..."
"... Does the fact that Huawei recently passed Apple for the number 2 phone sales have anything to do with this ..."
"... CNN: A judge in the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York issued a warrant for Meng's arrest on August 22, it was revealed at the hearing Friday here . She was arrested on December 1. Meng didn't know about this "issued warrant?" How does this 'system of laws' work, anyhow? Perhaps the warrant issue was classified secret, for US national security? ..."
"... The problem with Iran is (as was with Iraq, Libya, Venezuela, and even Syria) that a country with an independent/non-aligned foreign policy has control of a large quantity of valuable natural resources for which there is a constant and relatively insatiable demand. If they cannot be controlled they they should be destroyed so they cannot pursue their own agenda and ignore the dictates of the west. China and Russia are this problem writ large, and they have nukes and a means of delivery to all corners of the globe... ..."
Neocons Sabotage Trump's Trade Talks - Huawei CFO Taken Hostage To Blackmail ChinaWilly2 , Dec 7, 2018 2:30:00
PM |
link
CNN reports that White House chief of staff John Kelly is
expected
to resign soon . There have been similar rumors before, but this time the news may actually be true. That is bad for Trump
and U.S. policies. Kerry is one a the few counterweights to national security advisor John Bolton. His replacement will likely
be whoever Bolton chooses. That will move control over Trump policies further into the hands of the neo-conservatives.
It was Bolton who a week ago intentionally damaged U.S. relations with China.
The U.S. Justice Department arranged for Canada to arrest the chief financial officer of Huawei, Meng Wanzhou, over alleged
U.S. sanctions violations with regards to Iran. The case is not over the sanction Trump recently imposed, but over an alleged
collision with the sanction regime before the nuclear deal with Iran. The details are still unknown.
Meng Wanzhou is a daughter of the founder and main owner of Huawei, Ren Zhengfei, and was groomed to be his successor.
The company is extremely well regarded in China. It is one its jewel pieces and, with 170,000 employees and $100 billion in revenues,
an important political actor.
The arrest on December 1 happened while president Trump was negotiating with president Xi of China about trade relations.
Trump did not know about the upcoming arrest but
Bolton was informed of it:
While the Justice Department did brief the White House about the impending arrest, Mr. Trump was not told about it. And the
subject did not come up at the dinner with Mr. Xi. Mr. Trump's national security adviser, John R. Bolton, said on NPR that
he knew about the arrest in advance, ..
Bolton surely should have informed Trump before his dinner with Xi, in which Bolton took part, but he didn't.
It was a trap. The arrest is a public slap in the face of China and to Xi personally. It will not be left unanswered. Whatever
Trump may have agreed upon with Xi is now worthless. John Bolton intentionally sabotaged the talks and the U.S. relations with
China.
Posted by b at
02:00 PM |
Comments (76) - I almost starting to feel sorry for D.A.A.D. Trump.
- We have seen in the last years that the US has been (deliberately) ratcheting up tensions in the Far East. And the summit between
Trump & Kim Jung Un was a severe threat for that (deliberate) increase of tensions. But the US & european media have told their
readers/listener/watchers that China was to blame for the increase of tensions.
The death of Shoucheng Zhang, by falling from a building, supposedly due to depression, reminded me of an incident I had read
about years ago, of another scientist's death in 1953 in vaguely similar circumstances. I had forgotten the fellow's name but
I remembered the incident had something to do with the CIA and the administration of LSD so I used those two terms along with
"fall" and "window" and was able to dig up the details.
In 1953, CIA researcher Frank Olson was administered LSD without his consent by researchers working in the Project MK Ultra
program. Olson became severely depressed and resigned from the CIA. He was later found dead, apparently after falling out of a
motel building through a window, and his death was ruled a suicide. In the 1970s, his family ordered an autopsy and the autopsy
showed that Olson had died from head injury trauma before falling through the window. A CIA agent was found to have been staying
at the same motel in a separate room at the time Olson died. The family sued the US government and received $750,000 in compensation
and an apology from the CIA. https://thoughtcatalog.com/jeremy-london/2018/08/mkultra-conspiracy/
One wonders if Zhang's death had been, ahem, "arranged" according to that template. The description of Zhang from the Stanford
University News website's obituary that B linked to in his post does not sound like a profile of someone who suffered depression
on and off.
This has to be embarrassing as hell to Trump - he should be absolutely furious with Bolton and Pompeo. And all this for violating
sanctions on Iran? I feel like on crazy pills. We live in interesting times.
So, if Bolton sabotaged Trump's efforts to do some sort of deal with China, in whose interest is Bolton working. You'd think that
a trade deal with China would be good for the US. Is Bolton working against US interest.
If we accept the Globalist/Nationalist
framework, then does this not mean that Bolton is helping the nationalists against US interests. And what are the implications
of that.
Trump's rapid departure from Argentina may well have been motivated by receiving the information about the arrest after the well
hyped dinner. If that is the case, Bolton should have been fired on the spot. The lack of any statement about this affair from
Trump is curious. There may be an element of blackmail at play here too, related to Mueller's machinations ahead of the G20. A
malignancy is loose, no doubt.
Thank you for this excellent column. Having read this in context with the comments (especially those by Denk and others) previous
on this topic, I would ask if anyone can provide a time line of US clandestine negative (and sometimes fatal) actions against
high level Chinese engineers and telecoms. Again, the above summary is outstanding.
The terrifying aspect is Bolton, Pompeo - puppets both for shadow power players - have no constraints whatsoever, and obviously
operate without any constraint or regard for our severely (cognitively and emotionally) challenged president, as this report
makes clear.
The timing of this arrest - while Trump and Xi are dining and Sabrina Meng is on her way to the G-20 conference gives a
loud message that Trump is serves at the pleasure of his neocon staff - and son in law, the latter being instrumental in the firing
of Rex Tillerson, the hiring of Bolton, Pompeo and the impending firing of Gen. Kelly.
I can't believe that Trump did not know about the detention of Meng Wanzhou before hand. Trump is a TV actor and he is apprenticing
for a higher spot for himself and family is the elite pecking order.
While we might want to give Trump credit for being who
he is, the elite that fronted him know exactly what his style and penchants are. Trump is a global front for a different approach
to maintaining global hegemony but make no mistake, Trump is not fronting for you nor I
From the perspective of China, their most appropriate response in this complicated situation IMO, should be to accelerate their
gradual reduction of USTs.
All those articles about how China will hurt itself if it gradually sells down USTs are nonsense articles placed into the media
to throw off attention to what is already happening. Russia and Turkey have alrdy done it on a smaller scale, it's a no-brainer
that China can do it also. Why should China finance the US govt to wage war on itself?
If China and other countries gradually stop buying USTs, actual demand will collapse and many other holders will sell or reduce
likewise. Mnuchin is fantasizing when he says there will still be strong demand. Any demand will be from the US Treasury buying
its own USTs, like a dog licking its own rear quarters.
Arresting US business execs by China is a mistake that would be cheered by Bolton and Navarro. The provocation of arresting
Meng is designed by the Trump team to provoke China to arrest US business leaders and thus destroy their direct investment into
China.
The enemy of China is not US businesses but rather the neocon dominated US govt. To impact this group, China needs to cut
off their drug supply(their financing) thru no longer buying their USTs to finance and enable their massive military spending
and financial aggression.
How to do that without crashing the markets n decreasing China's own assets? Sell and reduce USTs gradually. And pretend
u r not doing it. Eventually the lack of buying will force the Fed to raise rates or force the US Treasury to buy its own USTs,
further debasing the US dollar.
In history, all empires fall this way, they keep on printing or taking out the silver content until their currency gets debased
into nothing, and nobody wants it.
Looks like Bolton wants war with China. I recall he was hired during the North Korea talks to add a bit of muscle and now Trump
is stuck with him whether he likes it or not.
Re. Meng....apparently she faces fraud charges related to the Skycom affair. Of course that is just what we're told. Who knows
what kind of pressure she will come under once they get her in the US.
1959, CIA disobeyed Pres Eisenhower's ban on further overflights of USSR until after his summit meeting with Khrushchev. Then
the U-2 was brought down over USSR and the live pilot captured. The US officially denied it happened.
The USSR cancelled the summit meeting.
At first, Eisenhower claimed to have no knowledge of the operation and was outraged when the truth revealed. UN Ambassador
Stevenson made a vehement speech at the UN denying it happened, followed immediately with USSR producing both the plane's wreckage
and its pilot.
Then USSR showed the pilot and wreckage was publicly displayed. Pilot F G Powers had safely bailed-out and was put on-trial
in Moscow, convicted and then allowed to return to the US.
Mission Accomplished! by the unelected leaders of the US [who were certain their man Nixon would be the next President, followed
by quick re-capture of Cuba and then war in Vietnam. Both those operations already directly involved Nixon, who was fully "in"
on The Bay of Pigs and, earlier, plans for US "support" of Saigon leaders in "South" Vietnam with whom he established communications
during his 1953 visit as Ike's new Vice-President.]
...that data on this is more shocking then i realized.. the death of prof zhang - apparent suicide, is bizarre here..
i agree that the usa has been taken over by small minded neo cons that would try to use meng wanzhou as leverage.. the fact
Bolton knew and Trump didn't.. i am not buying that, or Bolton is more manipulative then i realized.. they are all that stupid
though.. i hope Canada doesn't allow this, but under the wuss Justin Trudeau, i am not holding my breath..
@ 12 dh... wanted for ignoring us sanctions on iran from 2009 to 2014... what the fuck has that to do with canada?? is canada
now doing book keeping, and everything else for the usa? the usa can go fuck themselves.. if Canada wasn't a 2 bit vassal state,
that is what we would tell the usa..
Today is Dec.7, a day in 1941 that Pres. Roosevelt aptly called "A Day of Infamy," as the Japanese military attacked Pearl
Harbor.
We now know that the very top echelons of US government first correctly anticipated and then knew precisely when and how the
attack would occur. The 3,000 (+/-) GI's who were sacrificed were considered "acceptable losses." (The 3,000 civilians who were
sacrificed on 9/11 were also considered "acceptable losses.") "Infamy" is an accurate word for US .gov conduct.
(Pls, do not comment to this OT. Wait for the next open thread, if you must.)
Looks like Trump was out of the loop. Trudeau is mainly photo-op material only. This would have been Chrystia Freeland, the
Nazi grand-daughter's file.
In Australia - endless media trumpeting the closed door to Chinese telcos from Australia and New Zealand but one has to go out
of one's way to discover our neighbor Papua New GUINEA has continued using HuaHwei products albeit under U S pressure not to do
so
1/ "... the rise first of Communism and then of Islam as world forces opposing imperialism."
Has Islam, in fact, been in opposition
to imperialism? For the most part, as in India/Pakistan, it has been a very useful imperialist foil against nationalism and socialism.
There have been sincere and effective muslim campaigns against imperialism but equally there have been imperialist financed 'islamic'
campaigns against enemies of the Empire.
2/ Canada's role in this is shocking. It is all of a piece with the surrender to the USA in the Trade negotiations whereby,
inter alia, Canada is not allowed to enter into Trade agreements with 'non-market' economies. The non-market formulation being
code for unapproved by Uncle Sam. No doubt the Nazi Freeland is running this show. In this she is ably seconded by the 'opposition'
Tories and the social fascist NDP which is as enthusiastic for war against China as it is for an attack on the Donbas.
I used to be a member of this, once mildly socialist party. I am proud to say that I was expelled.
Washington has asked Ottawa to arrest Meng Wanzhou and to extradite her. The motive for the war undertaken by Washington against
Huawei is deep-rooted and spurious are the justifications.
The heart of the problem is that the Chinese firm uses a system of encryption that prevents the NSA from intercepting its communications.
A number of governments and secret services in the non-Western world have begun to equip themselves exclusively with Huawei materials,
and are doing so to protect the confidentiality of their communications.
The covers/excuses for this war are theft of intellectual property or in the alternative, trade with Iran and North Korea,
and violating rules of competition by benefitting from national subsidies.
The Five Eyes is a system of electronic espionage by Australia, Canada, the United States, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.
They have begun to exclude Huawei from their auctions.
Those who talk about Trump, Pompeo, Bolton, Kelly, etc. direct our attention to a shell game. They are all in on the scam.
How better to say it? There is one party: the war party. Trump is a member of TEAM USA. US political maestros dance to the tune
of the Deep State/neolibcon.
Fine distinctions between senior US govt officials make me want to tear my hair out. In US
govt only whistle-blowers are white knights. Everyone else is engaging in good guy/bad guy bullshit and controlled opposition.
With respect to Foreign Policy, how much real difference is there between Clinton, Bush, Obama, and Trump? They have all
supported MIC, Israel, and expanding the Empire - aka Job #1.
- Bolton was appointed under pressure from one Sheldon Adelson, who was a (large) donor to the Trump campaign. In that regard,
it was (nearly) impossible for Trump to fire Bolton.
In terms of Frank Olsen, there is a very good six part documentary series on Netflix called "Wormwood". Most important are
the interviews with Olsen's son. His search for the truth took many years (too many years) and he finally uncovered the final
levels of deceit. Worth the time.
@14 ".. wanted for ignoring us sanctions on iran from 2009 to 2014... what the fuck has that to do with canada?? "
Absolutely nothing james. I suspect they are using that charge, rather than getting into 5G backdoor whatever, to make the
extradition process go faster. They don't want it to drag on for years.
Surely it's Bolton who must go. That was an enormous betrayal. The one thing that Trump had going for him was the performance
of the stock market. His neocon enemies in the form of Bolton, managed to strike two blows simultaneously; increase conflict with
China and tank the market.
Too many posters letting Trump off the hook here. He's a brilliant 4D chess master but at the same time he's also a vulnerable
naif who lets neocons, ziofascists and other hostile entities keep hijacking his administration for their own ends? Bit of a problem
there. You can't have it both ways.
Occam's Razor says the Trump administration's foreign policy, possibly with Russia as an exception, is run with the full approval
of Donald John Trump. He's no friend of China, remember, and Steve Bannon's plan to befriend Russia was designed to keep it from
partnering with China against the United States.
It's almost 2019 and like the Obots of 2010 it's time to accept that your man is a busted flush, a fraud, an American exceptionalist
through and through.
The "fraud" charge goes back to 2009/10, and concerns an alleged misrepresentation over the relationship between a company called
SkyComm and Huawei. The alleged sanction violation by SkyComm had nothing to do with Iran's nuclear or military programs, and
may not have even proceeded beyond a negotiation phase. The alleged "fraud", or misrepresentation, rests on a technical interpretation
of complicated interlocking corporate structures. The prosecutors and the defence will likely both be correct in their presentations,
as it is a muddle, but the well has already been poisoned by the now well-publicized accusations that Huawei is a Communist trojan
horse. It's very thin gruel to proceed with such a high profile arrest.
The heart of the problem is that the Chinese firm uses a system of encryption that prevents the NSA from intercepting its communications.
A number of governments and secret services in the non-Western world have begun to equip themselves exclusively with Huawei
materials, and are doing so to protect the confidentiality of their communications.
And not only the governments and secret services, Huawei is widely popular all along EU amongst the common working class user
( which means millions and millions of users....) especially because of its advantageous price and great capabilities.... I myself
own a Huawei device, my friends own Huaweis....Glad to hear that "Five Eyes" can not spy on us....I am very fidel to marks/services
who do not deceive me, but after knowing this new "capability", I am thinking in keeping Huawei as my header mark....Just waiting
for them to launch the laptop "Five Eyes" waterproof and I will be throwing this old one to the trash bin....
@32,36
I wonder how Adelson would react to a Chinese boycott of his casinos in Macau and Singapore? A lot of his wealth has come from
Chinese gamblers. Given Adelson's connections to Bolton and Trump, it would seem like an obvious pressure point.
@38 lili... denk was discussing this on the open thread yesterday.. see his links @68 / 76 and etc
on this page.. no one is discussing
this..
@48 peter au.. it certainly appears that way.. funny thing how trump sold himself on a number of topics, but not that one..
meanwhile, i guess the loot from adelson is quite good... stick with me and you don't need any stickin russian oligarch.. what
is quite amazing is how blind the average amerikkkan is to all this.. they are still stuck on the mueller investigation which
has been running on empty for some time... they would never do an investigation on isreal, or zionists influence on us elections,
as it is too friggin' obvious for anyone looking... better to skip that and continue to serve israel.. thus the constant fixation
with iran..
or russia and china, as the case may be... the top 3 evil countries, according to obama, or was that north korea.. i guess trump
will have to revise it.. the usa is pathetic.. canada is not far behind..
Trump didn't know b/c the NYTimes said so?
I've got this bridge....
China's response may not be immediate, but it will come.
I'm reminded of the sudden death of Vice Adm. Scott Stearney, commander of the Navy's 5th Fleet, Persian Gulf, discovered inside
his home in Bahrain last weekend, a "suspected suicide."
Iran always gets even.
To those of us that understand that all/most of the politicians are working for the same team, it should be easy to see the good
cop/bad cop dynamic being used here.
If b thinks Trump is a good cop, as he presents him here (yes, b has written that he disagrees with all/most of what Trump
does) as do other commenters that post here, I would posit that "they" are being successful in working that meme at this time.
China will not back down and now will play hardball back, but in a globalist sense I expect them to continue to take the high
road as the West mires itself further in the muck of its religion of private finance.
Another commenter mentioned the strategy of China dumping its massive amount of US Treasuries. I think we are getting to that
moment and the response of the US is to default on whomever is holding its debt...............
and then the war we have been in for some time turns serious.
The problem the elite have is making the public have the fervor to slaughter themselves for the purpose of continuing a society
run by and only servicing the elite. I don't understand how they have managed all these centuries but here we are, a bit still
in the dark ages of a thousand years ago.
I think we can assume that the arrest was not an unwelcome surprise for Trump, or he would have reversed it. He knew, and
accepts it. It's total asymmetric war on China. The arrest was on December 1. Trump twitter, Dec 7 China talks are going
very well! here
This is a 100% neocon clusterfuck. It is vital to the success of Trump's Drain The Swamp strategy that The Swampers be given every
opportunity to put their anti-US influence on public display. At least now we know which weirdos are responsible for the US policy
of "Let's do SOMETHING, even it it's stupid."
I've been scouring the 'News' and the www for evidence that China agreed to uphold US sanctions on Iran to an extent that would
invite the US to punish China for disregarding US whims. No luck, so far.
What makes this story entertaining is that the US has not only surrendered its lead in Military Tech, from the Good Old Days,
but Computer and Communications Tech too. You have to be pretty desperate to admit a blunder of that magnitude, albeit obliquely,
as in this case.
Unlikely that few in Trump's cabinet or Senate Foreign Relations committee could even pass the physics section of a college entrance
exam, and have little idea what quantum encryption even is (Chinese published on it first a couple of years ago).
That presumption alone suggests Pompeo Bolton etc are just finger puppets ... which oligarch has all those cia contracts again?
They are in well over their heads. They can't even keep up with the Russians. They will likely get stung by Chinese scorpions
without even knowing what hit them!
Another 'unintended consequence' of the neocon gambit to embarrass Trump by by-passing him, will be renewed interest in something
Vlad said in one of Oliver Stone's Putin's Interviews.
In the context of Vlad's feelings about POTUS Trump, Vlad said words to the effect that it's too soon to say. Everyone knows
that AmeriKKKa has been run by the Permanent Bureaucracy (not the POTUS). A lot of people would have been 'too busy' to watch
the Putin Interviews but World Leaders, everywhere, would not have been among them. So as of December 1, 2018, that cat is well
and truly out of the bag and all eyes, as usual, are on Trump. Again.
CNN: A judge in the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York issued a warrant for Meng's arrest on August 22,
it was revealed at the hearing Friday
here . She was arrested on December
1. Meng didn't know about this "issued warrant?" How does this 'system of laws' work, anyhow? Perhaps the warrant issue was classified
secret, for US national security?
Actually, I fear, it's a conspiracy of intel agencies, security advisors and courts to conduct domestic and foreign policy.
It's a non-elected "government" which elected politicians can't touch. For those that doubt it, check out this important interview
with intel whistleblowers Shipp, Binney and Kiriakou which describes Washington corruption is
here . (h/t Carlton Meyer)
Politicians can't touch this secret government lest their security clearances be removed.
@70
In the two-hour interview John Kiriakou points out that the intel agencies have their favorite courts. His delayed case, resurrected
by Obama, was heard by a court in eastern Virginia, which had a 98% conviction rate. They got him for a couple years in prison.
General Petraeus, however, who did much worse, had his case heard in a court in western Virginia, and he got probation. It appears
that the US District Court for the Eastern District of New York is good for anti-China warrants.
D B@70 I read that she was aware of the warrant and avoided traveling to the USA because of it as she had been doing to ?" visit
her son who was in school here"? but likely thought Canada safe. Wrong.
So China seems fearful to me - detaining the head of INTERPOL for instance and re-educating the Uyghurs en mass, plus the heavy
internet censorship. But they cannot disengage from the west economically without risking social upheaval. Nor can the US afford
to disengage from China for roughly the same reason (unlike Russia from whom the US gets rocket engines but little else they cannot
obtain from other sources).
In a few years time (2, or perhaps 3) both Russia and China will have deployed weapons that can deter anything but a full on
nuclear attack, and their military capability will continue to advance. US strategy seems to be to disrupt, slow, and sabotage
both to the extent it is able using economic and political weapons and military posturing. I don't believe it can catch up and
this creates extra danger - the longer it waits the greater the gap will be - economic and military. Many of the responses seem
borderline hysterical to me - not a good thing.
The problem with Iran is (as was with Iraq, Libya, Venezuela, and even Syria) that a country with an independent/non-aligned
foreign policy has control of a large quantity of valuable natural resources for which there is a constant and relatively insatiable
demand. If they cannot be controlled they they should be destroyed so they cannot pursue their own agenda and ignore the dictates
of the west. China and Russia are this problem writ large, and they have nukes and a means of delivery to all corners of the globe...
This is about destruction of neoliberalism. Transnational financial elite under neoliberalism is above the law. the USA blatantly
breaches this convention now. And will pay the price.
This is Onion-style humor is no it : White House, Trudeau seek to distance themselves from Huawei move
Notable quotes:
"... The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, acknowledged that the arrest could complicate efforts to reach a broader U.S.-China trade deal but would not necessarily damage the process. ..."
"... Meng's detention also raised concerns about potential retaliation from Beijing in Canada, where Prime Minister Justin Trudeau sought to distance himself from the arrest. ..."
Huawei Technologies Co Ltd's chief financial officer, Meng Wanzhou, the 46-year-old daughter of the company's founder, was detained
in Canada on Dec. 1, the same day Trump and Chinese President Xi Jinping dined together at the G20 summit in Buenos Aires.
A White House official told Reuters Trump did not know about a U.S. request for her extradition from Canada before he met Xi and
agreed to a 90-day truce in the brewing trade war.
Meng's arrest during a stopover in Vancouver, announced by the Canadian authorities on Wednesday, pummeled stock markets already
nervous about tensions between the world's two largest economies on fears the move could derail the planned trade talks.
The arrest was made at Washington's request as part of a U.S. investigation of an alleged scheme to use the global banking system
to evade U.S. sanctions against Iran, according to people familiar with the probe.
Another U.S. official told Reuters that while it was a Justice Department matter and not orchestrated in advance by the White
House, the case could send a message that Washington is serious about what it sees as Beijing's violations of international trade
norms.
The official, speaking on condition of anonymity, acknowledged that the arrest could complicate efforts to reach a broader
U.S.-China trade deal but would not necessarily damage the process.
Meng's detention also raised concerns about potential retaliation from Beijing in Canada, where Prime Minister Justin Trudeau
sought to distance himself from the arrest.
"The appropriate authorities took the decisions in this case without any political involvement or interference ... we were advised
by them with a few days' notice that this was in the works," Trudeau told reporters in Montreal in televised remarks.
I think that America's act against China borders on military aggression. The US is saying,
"Don't deal with any country that we're imposing sanctions on. We want to grab Iran's oil.
That's why we overthrew Mossedegh. That's why we installed the Shah and his police state. We
want Saudi Arabia's money, and they told us we have to support the Sunni against Shi'ites, so
our foreign policy is that of Saudi Arabia when it comes to the fate of who can and who
cannot trade with Iran. China must follow our orders or we will do everything we can to stop
its own development. It need only look at how we treated Iran to see what may be in store for
it."
This raises the Cold Wa to a new dimension.
Yes, guilty as charged. I expect a major challenge to the illegality of the Outlaw US
Empire's attempts at Extraterritoriality which has yet to be attempted but now must be done.
China has a very distinctive history regarding such treatment and will not let it pass. The
Trade War will escalate and the Empire's top tier of oligarchs will lose billions.
Blue peacock Walrus must be Boltonnnn! He just parrotted exactly the same bull about stolen
property except with the caveat that it's not the reason for her arrest!!! 😉😎
It's about doing business with Iran! F.U. AMERICA!
ARREST MBS INSTEAD, DAMN YOU EFFING HYPOCRITES! I can't get over Trudeau was a pasty to
this woman's arrest! THIS IS INSANE.
"... The incident shows that the US and some other countries that follow the US didn't abide by the bottom line of international law at all. From now on, we should reduce or cancel important people's visits to the US, Canada and some other countries like the UK, Australia and New Zealand. The warning applies to not only Chinese citizens, but also citizens of any other country. ..."
"... Given the extreme risks of the political struggle in the US, Chinese scientists and technological experts in the West, particularly in the UKUSA countries (the US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand) are advised to make some risk prevention arrangements for their own sake and the sake of their children. ..."
"... Unlike China's State-owned enterprises, Huawei is a genuine private firm. But the severe political discrimination and repulsion from the US reflect an undeniable fact - the political gap between China and the US and a few other Western nations is too wide to bridge. ..."
Avoided a knee-jerk response, did some chores, read some other items, then went looking for
English language Chinese reactions, like this one provided by Global
Times , which said several different things to different audiences, although toward its
bottom we find this:
" The incident shows that the US and some other countries that follow the US didn't
abide by the bottom line of international law at all. From now on, we should reduce or cancel
important people's visits to the US, Canada and some other countries like the UK, Australia
and New Zealand. The warning applies to not only Chinese citizens, but also citizens of any
other country.
" Given the extreme risks of the political struggle in the US, Chinese scientists and
technological experts in the West, particularly in the UKUSA countries (the US, UK, Canada,
Australia and New Zealand) are advised to make some risk prevention arrangements for their
own sake and the sake of their children. "
Global Times also published this editorial with its emphasis on the
entire affair being an attack on Huawei's competitiveness, although suddenly in the middle it
says this:
" Unlike China's State-owned enterprises, Huawei is a genuine private firm. But the
severe political discrimination and repulsion from the US reflect an undeniable fact - the
political gap between China and the US and a few other Western nations is too wide to
bridge. "
A bit of a bombshell that seems to contradict what came before and after, which is an
exploration of how "the political gap" can be narrowed. This line says:
"Meanwhile, China needs to ease its geopolitical and ideological tensions with the US and
the West through expanding its opening-up to the world."
Unfortunately, the Outlaw US Empire has no interest in "eas[ing] its geopolitical and
ideological tensions" with China, Russia or any other nation as its unelected helmsmen want
everything for themselves a la Monopoly winners, thus rendering Chinese attempts at
appeasement vacuous--Real Men want it all; sharing--Win-Win--is for wussies.
Export restrictions, and threats of restrictions, are thus probably not just about sanctions
-- they're about making life harder for the main competitors of US tech companies
But the
startling arrest in Canada of a Chinese telecom company executive should wake people up to
the fact that there's a second U.S.-China trade war going on -- a much more stealthy conflict,
fought with weapons much subtler and more devastating than tariffs. And the prize in that other
struggle is domination of the information-technology industry.
The arrested executive, Wanzhou Meng, is the chief financial officer of telecom-equipment
manufacturer Huawei Technologies Co. (and its founder's daughter). The official reason for her
arrest is that Huawei is suspected of selling technology to Iran, in violation of U.S.
sanctions. It's the second big Chinese tech company to be accused of breaching those sanctions
-- the first was ZTE Corp. in 2017. The U.S. punished ZTE by forbidding it from buying American
components -- most importantly, telecom chips made by U.S.-based Qualcomm Inc.
Those purchasing restrictions were eventually lifted after ZTE agreed to pay a fine, and it
seems certain that Huawei will also eventually escape severe punishment. But these episodes
highlight Chinese companies' dependence on critical U.S. technology. The U.S. still makes -- or
at least, designs -- the best computer chips in the world. China assembles lots of electronics,
but without those crucial inputs of U.S. technology, products made by companies such as Huawei
would be of much lower-quality.
Export restrictions, and threats of restrictions, are thus probably not just about sanctions
-- they're about making life harder for the main competitors of U.S. tech companies. Huawei
just passed Apple Inc. to become the world's second-largest smartphone maker by market share
(Samsung Electronics Co. is first). This marks a change for China, whose companies have long
been stuck doing low-value assembly while companies in rich countries do the high-value design,
marketing and component manufacturing. U.S. moves against Huawei and ZTE may be intended to
force China to remain a cheap supplier instead of a threatening competitor.
The subtle, far-sighted nature of this approach suggests that the impetus for the high-tech
trade war goes far beyond what Trump, with his focus on tariffs and old-line manufacturing
industries, would think of. It seems likely that U.S. tech companies, as well as the military
intelligence communities, are influencing policy here as well.
In fact, more systematic efforts to block Chinese access to U.S. components are in the
works. The Export Control Reform Act, passed this summer, increased regulatory oversight of
U.S. exports of "emerging" and "foundational" technologies deemed to have national-security
importance. Although national security is certainly a concern, it's generally hard to separate
high-tech industrial and corporate dominance from military dominance, so this too should be
seen as part of the trade war.
A second weapon in the high-tech trade war is investment restrictions. The Trump
administration has greatly expanded its power to block Chinese investments in U.S. technology
companies, through the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States. CFIUS has already
canceled a bunch of Chinese deals:
The goal of investment restrictions is to prevent Chinese companies from copying or stealing
American ideas and technologies. Chinese companies can buy American companies and transfer
their intellectual property overseas, or have their employees train their Chinese replacements.
Even minority stakes can allow a Chinese investor access to industrial secrets that would
otherwise be off-limits. By blocking these investors, the Trump administration hopes to
preserve U.S. technological dominance, at least for a little while longer.
Notably, the European Union is also moving to restrict Chinese investments. The fact that
Europe, which has opposed Trump's tariffs, is copying American investment restrictions, should
be a signal that the less-publicized high-tech trade war is actually the important one.
The high-tech trade war shows that for all the hoopla over manufacturing jobs, steel, autos
and tariffs, the real competition is in the tech sector. Losing the lead in the global
technology race means lower profits and a disappearing military advantage. But it also means
losing the powerful knowledge-industry clustering effects that have been an engine of U.S.
economic growth in the post-manufacturing age. Bluntly put, the U.S. can afford to lose its
lead in furniture manufacturing; it can't afford to lose its dominance in the tech sector.
The question is whether the high-tech trade war will succeed in keeping China in second
place. China has long wanted to catch up in semiconductor manufacturing, but export controls
will make that goal a necessity rather than an aspiration. And investment restrictions may spur
China to upgrade its own homegrown research and development capacity.
In other words, in the age when China and the U.S. were economically co-dependent, China
might have been content to accept lower profit margins and keep copying American technology
instead of developing its own. But with the coming of the high-tech trade war, that
co-dependency is coming to an end. Perhaps that was always inevitable, as China pressed forward
on the technological frontier. In any case, the Trump administration's recent moves against
Chinese tech -- and some similar moves by the EU -- should be seen as the first shots in a long
war.
(This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.
Only the headline has been changed)
This is 'eight nations alliance' [1] mark2 no less. The military encirclement of China is
in place, to be sprung if necessary. The trade war targets the entire Chinese high tech
industry, especially the Made in China 2030 proj. Huawei is the crown jewel of emerging
Chinese high tech, its rise is nothing less than astounding. In less than 30 years it has
displaced CISCO as the world's no 1 network supplier, presently gunning Samsung for top spot
in mobile phone preeminence.
It makes lots of people scare. [2]
They use false pretext to wage wars OF terror, now they use false pretext to launch a
trade war, hyping up Huawei's 'security risk'. But nsa has been 'monitoring' Huawei since
2007, even hacked into its Shenzhen HQ, to look for incriminating evidence of CCP
collaboration, it turned out naught. There'r absolutely No Evidence Huawei Spies on
Americans, [3]
Just like the lack of evidence didn't prevent fukus attack on 'terrorist' countries, it
sure doesn't stop Washington from mounting a frontal assault on Huawei. Huawei is currently
shut out of the 5lies markets plus SK, JP, courtesy of Washington. The 'battle' has extended
to the Pacifics isles,
where Washington/Oz joint force to arm twist Solomon isle to drop a undersea cable contract
with Huawei.
They tried that again with PNG, asking them to renege on their contract with Huawei, but
the PNG PM is made of sterner stuff, lecturing fukus on the importance of integrity and law,
no less.
hhhhh
When the Meng kidnap news broke, my jaw dropped in amazement, ....They'r really getting
really desperate now.
[2]
Huawei's U.S. competitors among those pushing for scrutiny of Chinese tech firm
It was long thought that we were the number-one economy and China just supplied cheap
labor,"
Guthrie said. "Now it is clear that China has lot to offer in terms of innovation and
Industrial policy and state investment, and now people are scared
Games in US intelligence agencies are one thing, but the fact that this arrest is a severe
blow, almost knockdown for neoliberalism is another.
From comments: "Spot on with your comment. As you point out, this event will cast a dark
shadow over executive travel for a long time to come, including those American executives who
will now be fearful of countermeasures."
Moreover, John Bolton is the sort who'd love to collect a high profile scalp like the arrest
of Meng, so it's credible that he would find a way to go ahead whether or not the China trade
negotiation team was on board.
Meng has her bail hearing in Vancouver today, so we will probably learn more about the
expected process and timetable.
Wondering why US dollars would ever be involved in transactions between a Chinese
supplier, a UK bank, and Iranian customers Assuming usage of correspondent banks in NYC?
Would also be a reason for where the indictment was filed.
The conspiracy theorist in me says that transactions are being routed through the US not
for any practical reason, or due to customer wishes, but only to expose them to US
jurisdiction for potential prosecution. An alternative to SWIFT is desperately needed
The FCPA is extremely expansive: a non U.S. company doing business in the U.S. must not do
business with Iran directly or indirectly if it knows or has reason to suspect the business
is related to Iran. So if they have the evidence it all looks like a slam dunk.
As to SWIFT, doesn't the U.S. have access to all SWIFT transactions, even those not
touching U.S. banks? They'd certainly have the Five Eyes SWIFT data.
Plus apparently the U.S. has (or had) access to Huawei's email traffic.
Not correspondent banks. HSBC has a New York branch, as does pretty much every foreign
bank with an international business. Dollar transactions clear though the US because no bank
is going to run intraday balances with other banks without the end of day settlement
ultimately being backstopped by the Fed. That means running over Fedwire.
Ah, thanks for the technical detail on why it would be cleared through the US. The Masters
of the Universe really are unwilling to take any risk unless it's socialized in some way.
Still curious why they would ever let it touch US jurisdiction, but I guess the details of
the case will eventually reveal that.
"The heart of the problem is that the Chinese firm uses a system of encryption that
prevents the NSA from intercepting its communications. A number of governments and secret
services in the non-Western world have begun to equip themselves exclusively with Huawei
materials, and are doing so to protect the confidentiality of their communications."
"The struggle centred around Huawei illustrates the way in which economic and military
preoccupations inter-connect. Already, many States have observed that Washington is so far
unable to decode this technology. Thus, as they did in Syria, they have entirely re-equipped
their Intelligence services with Huawei material, and forbid their civil servants to use any
others."
Taking into account this story from Syria the following dismissal, by China's Foreign
Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying of a report in The New York Times, could be understood
differently than it was initially
"China on Thursday denounced a U.S. newspaper report that it is listening to Donald
Trump's phone calls as "fake news," and suggested he exchange his iPhone for a cellphone made
by Chinese manufacturer Huawei".
in AP, 2018-10-26, "China denies spying on Trump's phone, suggests he use Huawei".
So I turned on the local TV network to see how the story would be spun to find out what
the official line would be. There was no mention of the fact in the story that Meng was just
not the CFO of Huawei but also the daughter – the daughter – of the founder. More
to the point, nearly every scene showing Meng was when she was on-stage with Putin somewhere
so there is your guilt by association right there. They even used close-ups of the two
together though the stage was full of people seated there.
Something else in that story that I noticed. It featured the last day of the G-20 when the
American and Chinese delegation were facing each other over a conference table. On the right
was Trump and a bit further down was John Bolton. Now Trump has said he had no idea that this
arrest was taking place but Bolton said that he know beforehand. Does it not seem strange
that Bolton would not have pulled Trump aside beforehand and said 'Hey boss, we are going to
do something never done before and arrest a high-level Chinese citizen which could blow up
your whole agreement. You know, just so you know.'
With this is mind, it may be fairer to say that this was more a case of 'Huawei's Meng
Targeted using US Bank Sanctions'. The pity is that the US Justice Department finds no
trouble with targeting a corporation nearly 7,000 miles away but just can't seem to target
Wall Street which is only about 200 miles away from their headquarters. And I am afraid that
I am not too impressed with that internal Huawei memo as probably most international
corporations want to know where they can push the envelope. Personally I would be more
interested on a memo from the Clinton Foundation listing the amounts needed to gain access
the SecState and how much could be purchased for that amount. Both memos would amount to the
same thing.
This is new this development. The US has targeted individuals with sanctions but for the
first time they are attempting the extraterritorial rendition of a foreign citizen in
connection with sanctions violations meaning extraterritorial jurisdiction which means that
American laws apply all over the world. Could you imagine if this became standard practice?
The chill it would put on executive travel? The possibilities of tit for tat arrests? US tech
execs have already been warned on China travel. Do they really want to go there? This is
nothing less that a US declaration of war on firms competing with US business interests like
they have done with Russia.
I would be also wary of this massive 'coincidence' in the timing of her arrest. The US
Justice Department would probably know Meng's travel schedule better that she would –
Bolton with his contacts would see to that. It may be that events in her calendar were
pre-arranged for her. The Justice Department has a long history of setting up people.
Canada's involvement is simply another member of the Five Eyes group doing active
participation. It has not escaped my notice that all the countries rejecting Huawe's 5G
technology – Australia, the UK, New Zealand – are also members of the Five Eyes.
Not looking good.
This is not a rendition. Meng's extradition is all being done by the book. She is still in
Canada, and will have a bail hearing today. She will have the opportunity to contest her
extradition in Canada. Assuming she loses, she then goes to the US to face charges.
And I'm not keen about the CT. A top Chinese tech company like Huawei which knows it's on
America's shit list would have a very well protected Intranet. The US does not have access to
Chinese telcoms to locate or steal the data of Chinese citizens. Get real.
I'm not sure I embrace the notion of all this being done by the book as much as you Yves.
After all, even charades can have the appearance of procedural compliance and the following
of by the book rules, in fact, perhaps the incentive to create the appearance of following
the rules is even more pronounced in a high profile case such as this. As to whether she will
have a fair opportunity to defend herself, this is a watershed moment for Canada and she's is
in the spotlight here and no matter which way it goes, the decision to extradite or not will
have irrevocable implications on her international relations.
This is not a rendition. Canada isn't the UK. It's not going to bend its court processes,
particularly since Chinese have become big investors in Canada and Trump has been
astonishingly rude to Trudeau. And it has an independent judiciary.
I was pretty unimpressed by Trudeau's pusillanimity. He tried to give the impression that
Canada was just an innocent bystander in this whole process. Get real. If there's an
extradition treaty, the US has to make a formal request to the Canadian government. The idea
that the PM wasn't consulted on this is nonsensical. Justin engaging in his own version of
"cakeism". Wants to stay on the good side of both Beijing and Washington, which is an
impossible thing to do. Trudeau is already on Trump's sh*t list, and I'm sure Xi is taking
his measure of the man as well. Probably not terribly impressed with him either.
I have family and friends in Canada. Trust me, Canadians would be REALLY pissed if they
thought that the Canadian judiciary was rolling over for Trump and Bolton.Trump is not making
Canadian friends by running around throwing tantrums over NAFTA given that US-Canada trade is
one of the most balanced trade relationships in the world with very little net trade deficit
for either side.
I think this is very much being done by the book. Is there a viable law that is not, by
itself, a human rights violation? Is there credible evidence that this person broke this law?
Those are the basic questions that will need to be answered in a Canadian court room to have
an extradition move forward.
Canadians want the big powers to have coherent rational laws and treaties related to trade
etc. and then follow them. They also want to have rational, coherent international plans on
addressing conflicts and have historically been very strong supporters of the UN and
routinely have blue helmet troops all around the world on peace-keeping missions. Canada can
do this safely because it has balanced relationships with most countries around the world. It
will not do these types of arrests and extraditions on a whim because that would upset
Canada's role in the world.
Judging from what I've read, the US are claiming she committed fraud by alleging that a
company, Skycom that allegedly did business with Iran was not separate from Huawei. Here's
the BBC's take:
"On Friday, US prosecutors told the Supreme Court of British Columbia that Ms Meng had
used a Huawei subsidiary called Skycom to evade sanctions on Iran between 2009 and 2014 .
Spot on with your comment. As you point out, this event will cast a dark shadow over
executive travel for a long time to come, including those American executives who will now be
fearful of countermeasures.
Whose laws, one might ask? The US says ITS laws rule the world. ISDS says corporate right
to profit (by their accounting methods that discount externalities to zero) outweighs ALL
national and local laws.
And having spent some years as a lawyer, and observing several different kinds of courts
in operation, I would dare to challenge the assertion that "courts have to follow rules."
Like they have done in the foreclosure mess, maybe? Like the shenanigans displayed via
Chicago's "Operation Greylord" prosecutions? Or in traffic courts in small towns in Flyover
Country? how about the US bankruptcy courts, where shall we say "bad decisions" are endemic?
Remember Julius Hoffman? how about Kimba Woods, who sua sponte curtailed Michael Milken's
jail term for his junk bond racket? Even FISA, of course?
Good luck with that. It's almost impossible in the US never to break the law in some way.
It just takes a cop or prosecutors motivated enough. I find it hard to believe it's not the
same in China, let alone Russia or the UK, to name a few.
This law school lecture is 45mins long but really fun (it's got 2.5 million views). You
should never talk to the police – one reason being that, as Lynne says, there are SO
many possible offences, that you can never be sure you are not guilty of
something .
"Sounds like a good reason for executives not to break laws "
Yeah, I remember when all those HSBC executives were arrested, tried and thrown in jail.
Good times The U.S. government really believes in the rule of law. Remember when the Chief
Executive was sent to prison for life for committing "the supreme war crime" and shredding
the U.S. Constitution?
Rules are for little people Meng isn't big enough to be unprosecutable apparently.
So the US DOJ, according to "people familiar with the matter", has been investigating
Huawei for at least two years. My math tells me this is roughly since the signing of the deal
between Iran and the P5+1 countries in 2016, a deal subsequently incorporated into
international law by the UN. Now a bank that has run a laundry service for dirty money is
suddenly thrust into victimhood and (with Uncle Sam's boot on its neck no doubt) is
"cooperating" with the investigation? You couldn't make this more surreal if you tried.
If this isn't the final act in peeling off the rose tinted glasses from countries that
still consider the US a trusted friend and loyal ally, one wonders how much more evidence
they need to see it for what it really is, a duplicitous, hypocritical, tyrannical
imperialist. The irony of this charade being undertaken by the department of "justice" makes
this even more egregious. Expect development of an alternative system to Swift to go into
overdrive after this.
The point isn't "Is the US acting legally/by the book in enforcing the law", it's "Why is
the US legally enforcing the law in this case and not the million other cases equally
deserving of enforcement?" When the law isn't enforced evenly, then the law just becomes a
cover story for dishing out and withholding punishment by authorities.
Very interesting-actually mystifying. The powers that are- from their
pronouncements,haven't a clue about modern money, and in that framework the benefits of the
reserve currency they print. Maybe they do, but why, for what appears a minimal foreign
corporate compliance offence, would we want China, Russia, and a host of others to find
enough cause to continue their effort on a replacement reserve? Why are we so hell bent on
militarising the dollar? Save it for really big fish. Sure, its extremely difficult under the
current political framework for the world to organise and opt away from our dollar , but the
stability and leadership America has offered since the end of ww11, maybe appears
diminishing. Given Trump just made a deal with Xi, at the same time his vip citizen was being
targeted- obviously kind of humiliating-,as well as the administration turning a blind eye to
the murderous soprano fiefdom of Saudi Arabia; from any rational standpoint prioritising
human rights over crooked bank compliance issues , this looks keystone cop like! Sure we only
have a little info, but it still smells of hypocritical, imperialistic, one hand doesnt know
what the other hand is doing idiots in charge. Mike Hudson sees nefarious purposes,maybe hes
a bit hawkish, but this just seems so obtuse given the g20 hand shakes. Going to be very
interesting watching China's response. Then again maybe this lady is a criminal.
" the US Justice Department finds no trouble with targeting a corporation nearly 7,000
miles away but just can't seem to target Wall Street which is only about 200 miles away from
their headquarters "
This.
Having power over others seems to be a standard condition of our species. How one uses or
abuses power reveals the inner nature of the one(s) wielding the power. There need not be a
conspiracy of the powerful, just a consensus of how power should be used so that the sum
total exercises of the powerful reveal where their interests intersect. The rest of us just
got get out of the way.
If one wants to know what interesting times look like, well, we have front row seats. And
its in 3-D.
I must admit that President Trump is doing a better job than former President Obama in
ramping up a new theatre of economic warfare across the globe. Former President Obama was
rather crude, what with his drones. I'm thinking we have to update von Clausewitz's dictum:
"War is the continuation of politics by other means." to something along the lines of
"Economics is a continuation of war by other means."
The USA polity is certainly making it up close and personal.
Indeed. The possibilities for China to retaliate are seemingly endless though they won't
have the long arm the U.S. has.
Perhaps China should respond by trying to arrest and indicting some of the Wall Street big
wigs Obama never indicted. I'm sure China could come up with reasons why fraud Wall Street
committed violated Chinese law and damaged China.
Of course, being an exporter to the U.S. I'm sure China would much rather this go away,
than to retaliate.
Very interesting-actually mystifying. The powers that are- from their
pronouncements,haven't a clue about modern money, and in that framework the benefits of the
reserve currency they print. Maybe they do, but why, for what appears a minimal foreign
corporate compliance offence, would we want China, Russia, and a host of others to find
enough cause to continue their effort on a replacement reserve? Why are we so hell bent on
militarising the dollar? Save it for really big fish. Sure, its extremely difficult under the
current political framework for the world to organise and opt away from our dollar , but the
stability and leadership America has offered since the end of ww11, maybe appears
diminishing. Given Trump just made a deal with Xi, at the same time his vip citizen was being
targeted- obviously kind of humiliating-,as well as the administration turning a blind eye to
the murderous soprano fiefdom of Saudi Arabia; from any rational standpoint prioritising
human rights over crooked bank compliance issues , this looks keystone cop like! Sure we only
have a little info, but it still smells of hypocritical, imperialistic, one hand doesnt know
what the other hand is doing idiots in charge. Mike Hudson sees nefarious purposes,maybe hes
a bit hawkish, but this just seems so obtuse given the g20 hand shakes. Going to be very
interesting watching China's response. Then again maybe this lady is a criminal.
Why are we so hell bent? The U.S. hyper power status started in 1991. This is a generation
where they knew nothing else, coming off 45 years where allies did what they were told.
Whether its throwing around terms such as "American exceptionalism" or "indispensable
nation", there is a religious fervor around the U.S. among American foreign policy
elites.
Then there is imperial rot. The tenures in the U.S. Senate are longer than the Soviet
Politburo. At a practical level the Bushes and Clintons (not exactly great people) have been
responsible for who gets promoted in Washington and who develops marketable connections since
1986 with Reagan's alzheimers kicking in big time if not longer.
In many places in the US, if I jaywalk, I am a criminal. What corporate executive is not a
criminal, given the mass of laws that apply (until said criminals can bribe the legislatures
into de-criminalizing the bad behaviors)? Not to mention persuading the executive branch to
not prosecute, for all kinds of "political" reasons? Ask Wells Fargo and the other Banksters
how that works. Selective or non-prosecution for me, "the full weight of the law," that
fraudulent notion, for thee, I guess. And none of that is in any way new.
Speaking of Chinese criminals, I would add an anecdote. I have not been able to find the
episode, but one of the formerly investigative programs (20-20 or 60 Minutes, I believe) took
part in a sting of a Chinese corp that sells counterfeit medicines. This was maybe 8-10 years
ago. A very pretty if somewhat English-challenged young woman met with a bunch, maybe 10, men
and women who she thought were buyers for distributors and Pharma corps in the US and I
believe Canada. This meeting took place in a West Coast S city as I recall.
She offered that her company produced counterfeit meds using "latest technology" that from
the shape and color and texture and markings of the pills and package inserts, right down to
the packaging, holograms and all, could not be distinguished from the original. The products
were touted as being biologically inactive and "safe." She averred that her company could
deliver any quantity, from cartons to container loads, at very reasonable and attractive
price.
But that is a little different case from what appears at this point (barring correction as
the "case" develops) from the Huawei matter.
Not easy for another entity to take over the reserve currency.
China Germany etc want a trade surplus with us, so they must accept and store dollars. Very
similarly. Many individuals want to save dollars because they don't trust their own currency.
And some countries actually use dollars as their currency.
So the desire to accept or save dollars in exchange for their goods means the dollar is the
reserve currency. This won't change until something else becomes more attractive to savers
and mercantilists.
I agree that "done by the book" is irrelevant here. Selective enforcement is the issue.
Wall Street crooks have committed greater sins yet none of them is really punished.
Anyone could have written an "internal memo" like that. Proving its authenticity is a
different matter. After all, the biggest "smoking gun" I have ever seen in my life was the
"evidence" of Iraqi WMD.
Another interesting aspect of the case is that as I suspected, it might be difficult to
prove that Huawei sold Iran some specific American technologies that still have valid patents
in effect.
I personally know IBM and others breached the US arms control export laws by exporting
Cryptography to Apartheid South Africa, and believe that Shell Oil has broken nearly all
environmental laws in the Niger Delta for decades.
Is this what happens when a government is sliding rapidly down the slope of loss of
legitimacy?' We become acutely aware of the selective enforcement of its laws; a situation
that our poor and black and brown citizens have known for decades.
We have even become aware that the laws themselves are not always enacted for the public
good, but for the enrichment of certain small segments of the population.
This is not a good place to be. I mean this state of mind, not the NC site, which, as
always, provides the opportunity for much thoughtful and creative discussion.
Don't forget that the US ambassador to Germany threatened secondary sanctions against
Germany if they went ahead with Nordstream2. Trump then walked that back. But as for this
latest move, we know that Bolton at least was informed of the impending arrest so it's fair
to say that such a sensitive action would not have happened without some form of White House
approval–even if it wasn't Trump himself. It's probably not a CT therefore to say that
there's more going on here than a prosecutor making a routine request. The administration
hawks are firing a shot over the bow of anyone who defies them on Iran (the place "real men"
go to). Given what we know about Bolton's Iran obsession it may not even have much to do with
China.
And this bully boy approach to the rest of the world isn't only coming from Trump's
neocons since sanctions bills are a bipartisan favorite of our Congress. Apparently being
bribed on domestic matters isn't enough (unless you consider foreign policy to only be about
MIC profits). Doing the bidding overseas actors and their supporters taps a whole other
vein.
Flights that over fly US airspace are required to submit their manifests and passenger
names are bounced against the National Crime Information Center databases by CBP.
I would venture that her flight overflew Alaskan airspace and that is how they found out
she was on board.
So the USA decided to take hostages ;-) The key rule of neoliberalism is the financial
oligarchy is untouchable. This is a gangster-style move which will greatly backfire.
Now Russian financial executives would think twice about visiting UK, Canada, New Zealand or
Australia. and that's money lost. Probably forever.
Appearing in court wearing a green jumpsuit and without handcuffs, Meng reportedly looked to
be in good spirits in a Vancouver courtroom where the prosecutions' case was detailed publicly
for the first time. Specifically, the US alleges that Meng helped conceal the company's true
relationship with a firm called Skycom, a subsidiary closely tied to its parent company as it
did business with Iran.
Meng used this deception to lure banks into facilitating transactions that violated US
sanctions, exposing them to possible fines. The prosecutor didn't name the banks, but US media
on Thursday reported that a federal monitor at
HSBC flagged a suspicious transaction involving Huawei to US authorities, according to
Bloomberg. Prosecutors also argued that Meng has avoided the US since learning about its probe
into possible sanctions violations committed by Huawei, and that she should be held in custody
because she's a flight risk whose bail could not be set high enough. Before Friday's hearing, a
publication ban prevented details about the charges facing Meng from being released. However,
that ban was lifted at the beginning of her hearing.
Meng was arrested in Vancouver on Saturday while on her way to Mexico, according to reports
in the Canadian
Press.
Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Chrystia Freeland said Canada's ambassador in Beijing had
briefed the Chinese foreign ministry on Meng's arrest. The Chinese Embassy in Ottawa had
branded Meng's detention as a "serious violation of human rights" as senior Chinese officials
debate the
prospects for retaliation. Freeland said McCallum told the Chinese that Canada is simply
following its laws - echoing Prime Minister Justin Trudeau's claim that Meng's arrest was the
result of a legal process happening independent of politics.
Friday's hearing in Vancouver is just the start of a legal process that could end with Meng
being extradited to stand trial in the US. Even if prosecutors believe there is little doubt as
to Meng's guilt, the extradition process could take months or even years.
Anything involving Iran is inherently political. The US is abusing Interpol in no less
brazen fashion than Russia and China when seeking the extradition of dissidents. Canada
shouldn't accomodate this BS.
"Beijing is likely to react angrily to this latest arrest of a Chinese citizen in a third
country for violating U.S. law," Eurasia analysts wrote.
In fact, Global Times -- a hyper-nationalistic tabloid tied to the Chinese Communist Party
-- responded to the arrest by posting on Twitter a statement about trade war escalation it
attributed to an expert "close to the Chinese Ministry of Commerce."
"China should be fully prepared for an escalation in the #tradewar with the US, as the US
will not ease its stance on China, and the recent arrest of the senior executive of #Huawei is
a vivid example," said the statement, paired with a photo of opposing fists with Chinese and
American flags superimposed upon them.
U.S. President Donald Trump
and Chinese President Xi Jinping
met over a dinner during the G-20 summit in Argentina after months of increasing trade tensions
between the two countries. The U.S. has imposed tariffs on $250 billion worth of Chinese goods,
while Beijing has retaliated with duties on $110 billion of U.S. goods.
The White House's latest round of tariffs on $200 billion goods was set to rise to 25
percent from 10 percent on Jan. 1, 2019, but Trump agreed at the G-20 meeting not to do so.
The catch is, however, that Xi and Trump must find resolution on "forced technology
transfer, intellectual property protection, non-tariff barriers, cyber intrusions and cyber
theft, services and agriculture" within 90 days, according to the White House press secretary's
statement.
That gives the leaders until early March -- past Christmas, New Year's and Chinese New Year
-- to find a way to keep tariffs from rising.
However, official online statements about Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi's briefing on the
meeting did not discuss the technology transfers or the 90-day condition.
The timeframe and details on areas of disagreement also did not appear in online reports
from China's state news agency Xinhua , People's
Daily -- the official Communist Party paper -- and CGTN -- the
English-language version of state broadcaster CCTV.
The articles did note the U.S. and China agreed to work towards mutual benefits, and
generally indicated Beijing would increase purchases of U.S. goods. The state media also said
the two parties discussed North Korea denuclearization. The Chinese press also said Trump
upheld a "One-China Policy" regarding Taiwan -- something not mentioned in the White House
statement.
On top of that, Trump tweeted late Sunday evening that "China has agreed to reduce and
remove tariffs on cars coming into China from the U.S. Currently the tariff is 40%."
Prior to that Twitter post, there had not been any mention of such an agreement in Chinese
sources.
The arrest is related to violations of U.S. sanctions, a person familiar with the matter
said. Reuters was unable to determine the precise nature of the violations. Meng Wanzhou, who
is one of the vice chairs on the Chinese technology company's board and the daughter of company
founder Ren Zhengfei, was arrested on Dec. 1 and a court hearing has been set for Friday, a
Canadian Justice Department spokesman said.
The U.K.'s spy chief said that decisions still had to be made on China's role in building
Britain's 5G network.
... ... ...
Last week, New Zealand
banned Huawei from providing tech for its 5G rollout -- the third member of the Five Eyes
security alliance to do so. At the time, New Zealand's government said it had identified a
"significant network security risk."
Fellow members Australia and the U.S. have also excluded Chinese telecoms firms from
providing 5G equipment for their domestic networks, leaving Canada and the U.K. as the only
members not to rule out using the telecoms giant.
All three nations cited national security fears as the reason for excluding Chinese
companies from their 5G rollouts, with Younger's Australian counterpart
referring to them as "high-risk vendors."
... ... ...
Huawei and ZTE – another Chinese firm blocked from the U.S. 5G market – have
repeatedly denied that their involvement in the rollouts would give China's government access
to international networks. Warning to Russia China wasn't the only country raising
security questions for MI6. Younger told his audience the U.K. faced many adversaries who
regarded themselves as being in a state of "perpetual confrontation" with the nation --
including Russia.
"I urge Russia or any other state intent on subverting our way of life not to underestimate
our determination and our capabilities, or those of our allies," he said.
"I should emphasize that even as the Russian state seeks to destabilize us, we do not seek
to destabilize Russia. We do not seek an escalation. If we see a change in Russian behavior, we
will respond positively. But we will be implacable in defense of our people and our vital
interests."
How many alternative economic systems would you say have been given a fair trial under
reasonably favorable circumstances?
A good question. Answer: admittedly, not a huge number - but not none either. Feudalism
held sway in the middle ages and mercantilism in the 18th century, before both fell out of
fashion. In the 20th century Russia stuck with communism for 74 years, and many other
countries tried it for a while. At one time (around 1949-89) there were enough countries in
the communist block for us to be able to say that they at least had a fair chance to make it
work - that is, if it didn't work, they can't really blame it on the rest of the world
ganging up on them.
Lately, serious challengers to the global economic order have been more isolated
(Venzuela, Cuba, North Korea?) - so maybe you could argue that, if they are struggling, it is
because they have been unfairly ganged up on. But then again, aren't they pursuing a
version of socialism that has close affinities to that tried in the Soviet Union?
The problem with giving any novel political idea a really extended trial is that you have
to try it out on live human beings. This means that, once a critical mass of data has built
up that indicates a political idea doesn't work out as hoped, then people inevitably lose the
will to try that idea again.
So my question is: are critics of the current world economic order able to spell out
exactly how their proposed alternative would differ from Soviet-style socialism?
BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) - China and the United States have agreed to halt new tariffs as
both nations engage in trade talks with the goal of reaching an agreement within 90 days, the
White House said on Saturday after U.S. President Donald Trump and Chinese President Xi
Jinping held high-stakes talks in Argentina.
Trump agreed not to boost tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods to 25 percent on Jan. 1
as previously announced, as China agreed to buy an unspecified but "very substantial" amount
of agricultural, energy, industrial and other products, the White House said. The White House
also said China "is open to approving the previously unapproved Qualcomm Inc <QCOM.O>
NXP <NXPI.O> deal should it again be presented."
The White House said that if agreement on trade issues including technology transfer,
intellectual property, non-tariff barriers, cyber theft and agriculture have not been reached
with China in 90 days that both parties agree that the 10 percent tariffs will be raised to
25 percent.
US allies in Europe and Asia did not expect to be treated like vassal states, at least not
openly. Succumbing to Trump's demands is an admission of being a lapdog.
US allies in Europe and Asia have no choice but to push back against Trump's bullying and
condescending stances. They are elected by their citizens to protect the countries' sovereignty
and interests, after all. Too, these leaders must save face and protect their legacies.
One of the first European leaders having the courage to defy Trump is French President
Emmanuel Macron, calling for the establishment of a European Union army independent of the US
to defend itself against Russia, China and possibly America itself. His proposal is supported
by German Chancellor Angela Merkel.
Asian allies, particularly India, also seem to have pushed back , buying Iranian oil whether
the US likes it or not.
Washington's attempt to revive the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue comprising itself and
soulmates Australia, India and Japan may be losing support. Instead of joining with the US to
contain China, India and Japan are seeking rapprochement with the Asian giant. Even "deputy
sheriff" Australia is apparently having second thoughts, as one of its states is
officially joining China's Belt and and Road Initiative.
In short, these three allies might finally realize that joining the US in containing China
is harmful to their national interests. Fighting that nuclear power on their own soil might not
be a good idea.
No country treats the US 'unfairly'
The fact of the matter is no country treats the US "unfairly" or is "eating its lunch." On
the contrary, it could be argued that it is the other way around.
Having emerged as the world's strongest nation during and after World War II, US foreign
policies have one goal: Shape the world to its image. That process began at the 1944 Bretton
Woods Conference, insisting on using the US dollar as the world reserve currency and writing
the trade rules. In this way, the US has accumulated a very powerful tool, printing as much
money as it wants without repercussions to itself. For example, when a country wants to cash
its US Treasury holdings, all America has to do is print more greenbacks.
To that end, the US is clearly "eating other countries' lunch." Indeed, a major reason the
US can afford to build so many weapons is that other countries are paying for them.
US
trade practices
On trade, the US in 1950 rejected the UK's proposal of forming an International Trade
Organization (ITO) modeled after the International Monetary Fund and World Bank because it
feared the ITO might have harmed American manufacturing. In its place, the US proposed and
succeeded in forming the General Agreement on
Tariffs and Trade (GATT) framework to negotiate tariff rates on goods.
Being the world's most powerful economy and biggest trading nation at that time, the US
dominated the world trading system and wrote its rules. For example, it was the US that
invented and implemented non-tariff trade barriers such as anti-dumping duties and
national-security concerns to block imports. For example, the US imposed tariffs on Canadian,
EU, Mexican and other countries' steel and aluminum from entering its market for security
reasons.
It is laughable for the US to accuse Canada, the EU and Mexico of posing a national-security
threat. They are, in fact, America's most staunch allies.
US foreign direct investment
abroad
US companies bring with them ideas and technology (for which they charge exorbitant prices)
when investing in a foreign market such as China and elsewhere. The capital needed to build
factories is largely funded by the host country or other partners. For example, it is Taiwanese
and Japanese investors that built Foxconn factories in China to assemble American electronic
gadgets such as the iPad.
What's more, US companies charge huge prices for the products they make in China. According
to the Asian Development Bank and other research organizations, Chinese labor, for example,
receives a small percentage of the profits Apple takes in from gadgets it produces in China.
This lopsided profit distribution raises the question: Who is "eating whose
lunch?"
America has itself to blame
The US cannot blame China or any other country for its declining global influence and
dominance – America, particularly under Donald Trump, did that to itself. Chinese
President Xi Jinping, indeed, has advocated cooperation and dialogue as ways to defuse
conflicts and attain a better world.
No country has ever even hinted at attacking the US; it is after all the world's most
powerful nation, armed with enough conventional and nuclear weapons to blow up the world. The
"threats" are exaggerated or invented by US neoconservatives and vested interests to scare
Americans into supporting huge defense spending.
'Fake news' can only go so far
Using "fake news" to pressure countries into submission might work with those unable to
fight back, but could be extremely costly against powers such as China and Russia. For example,
Trump's escalating trade tensions with China are already adversely affecting the US economy, as
seen in falling GDP growth, decreasing stock prices, a huge agricultural inventory, and rising
poverty.
According to United Nations, the impoverished American population is being hit the hardest
under the Trump administration. The US Federal Reserve and others are projecting significant
economic decline in the foreseeable future if the trade war does not end.
One can only imagine what a nuclear war would bring.
Donald Trump is probably no less bullying than his predecessors (perhaps with the exception
of George W Bush), but he is more open about it. Bush's outburst, "You are either with us or
against us," earned America a bad reputation when he demanded that allies join him to invade
Iraq.
Trump has bullied or offended everyone, friends and foes alike. Unless he shifts gear, he
could alienate friends as well as foes, which could erode US geopolitical influence and
economic growth or might even bring the country down. He cannot threaten sovereign nations
without incurring huge costs to America.
"... The vote for Brexit and the election of protectionist Donald Trump to the US presidency – two momentous markers of the ongoing pushback against globalization – led some to question the rationality of voters. This column presents a framework that demonstrates how the populist backlash against globalisation is actually a rational voter response when the economy is strong and inequality is high. It highlights the fragility of globalization in a democratic society that values equality. ..."
"... See original post for references ..."
"... Aversion to inequality thus reflects envy of the economic elites rather than compassion for the poor. ..."
Posted on September 28,
2018 by Yves
Smith Yves here. Haha, Lambert's volatility voters thesis confirmed! They are voting
against inequality and globalization. This important post also explains how financialization
drives populist rebellions.
By Lubos Pastor, Charles P. McQuaid Professor of Finance, University of Chicago Booth
School of Business and Pietro Veronesi, Roman Family Professor of Finance, University of
Chicago Booth School of Business. Originally published at VoxEU
The vote for Brexit and the election of protectionist Donald Trump to the US presidency
– two momentous markers of the ongoing pushback against globalization – led some to
question the rationality of voters. This column presents a framework that demonstrates how the
populist backlash against globalisation is actually a rational voter response when the economy
is strong and inequality is high. It highlights the fragility of globalization in a democratic
society that values equality.
The ongoing pushback against globalization in the West is a defining phenomenon of this
decade. This pushback is best exemplified by two momentous 2016 votes: the British vote to
leave the EU ('Brexit') and the election of a protectionist, Donald Trump, to the US
presidency. In both cases, rich-country electorates voted to take a step back from the
long-standing process of global integration. "Today, globalization is going through a major
crisis" (Macron 2018).
Some commentators question the wisdom of the voters responsible for this pushback. They
suggest Brexit and Trump supporters have been confused by misleading campaigns and foreign
hackers. They joke about turkeys voting for Christmas. They call for another Brexit referendum,
which would allow the Leavers to correct their mistakes.
Rational Voters
We take a different perspective. In a recent paper, we develop a theory in which a backlash
against globalization happens while all voters are perfectly rational (Pastor and Veronesi
2018). We do not, of course, claim that all voters are rational; we simply argue that
explaining the backlash does not require irrationality. Not only can the backlash happen in our
theory; it is inevitable.
We build a heterogeneous-agent equilibrium model in which a backlash against globalization
emerges as the optimal response of rational voters to rising inequality. A rise in inequality
has been observed throughout the West in recent decades (e.g. Atkinson et al. 2011). In our
model, rising inequality is a natural consequence of economic growth. Over time, global growth
exacerbates inequality, which eventually leads to a pushback against globalization.
Who Dislike Inequality
Agents in our model like consumption but dislike inequality. Individuals may prefer equality
for various reasons. Equality helps prevent crime and preserve social stability. Inequality
causes status anxiety at all income levels, which leads to health and social problems
(Wilkinson and Pickett 2009, 2018). In surveys, people facing less inequality report being
happier (e.g. Morawetz et al. 1977, Alesina et al. 2004, Ferrer-i-Carbonell and Ramos 2014).
Experimental results also point to egalitarian preferences (e.g. Dawes et al. 2007).
We measure inequality by the variance of consumption shares across agents. Given our other
modelling assumptions, equilibrium consumption develops a right-skewed distribution across
agents. As a result, inequality is driven by the high consumption of the rich rather than the
low consumption of the poor. Aversion to inequality thus reflects envy of the economic elites
rather than compassion for the poor.
Besides inequality aversion, our model features heterogeneity in risk aversion. This
heterogeneity generates rising inequality in a growing economy because less risk-averse agents
consume a growing share of total output. We employ individual-level differences in risk
aversion to capture the fact that some individuals benefit more from global growth than others.
In addition, we interpret country-level differences in risk aversion as differences in
financial development. We consider two 'countries': the US and the rest of the world. We assume
that US agents are less risk-averse than rest-of-the-world agents, capturing the idea that the
US is more financially developed than the rest of the world.
At the outset, the two countries are financially integrated – there are no barriers to
trade and risk is shared globally. At a given time, both countries hold elections featuring two
candidates. The 'mainstream' candidate promises to preserve globalization, whereas the
'populist' candidate promises to end it. If either country elects a populist, a move to autarky
takes place and cross-border trading stops. Elections are decided by the median voter.
Global risk sharing exacerbates US inequality. Given their low risk aversion, US agents
insure the agents of the rest of the world by holding aggressive and disperse portfolio
positions. The agents holding the most aggressive positions benefit disproportionately from
global growth. The resulting inequality leads some US voters, those who feel left behind by
globalization, to vote populist.
Why Vote Populist?
When deciding whether to vote mainstream or populist, US agents face a
consumption-inequality trade-off. If elected, the populist delivers lower consumption but also
lower inequality to US agents. After a move to autarky, US agents can no longer borrow from the
rest of the world to finance their excess consumption. But their inequality drops too, because
the absence of cross-border leverage makes their portfolio positions less disperse.
As output grows, the marginal utility of consumption declines, and US agents become
increasingly willing to sacrifice consumption in exchange for more equality. When output grows
large enough -- see the vertical line in the figure below -- more than half of US agents prefer
autarky and the populist wins the US election. This is our main result: in a growing economy,
the populist eventually gets elected. In a democratic society that values equality,
globalization cannot survive in the long run.
Figure 1 Vote share of the populist candidate
Equality Is a Luxury Good
Equality can be interpreted as a luxury good in that society demands more of it as it
becomes wealthier. Voters might also treat culture, traditions, and other nonpecuniary values
as luxury goods. Consistent with this argument, the recent rise in populism appears
predominantly in rich countries. In poor countries, agents are not willing to sacrifice
consumption in exchange for nonpecuniary values.
Globalization would survive under a social planner. Our competitive market solution differs
from the social planner solution due to the negative externality that the elites impose on
others through their high consumption. To see if globalization can be saved by redistribution,
we analyse redistributive policies that transfer wealth from low risk-aversion agents, who
benefit the most from globalization, to high risk-aversion agents, who benefit the least. We
show that such policies can delay the populist's victory, but cannot prevent it from happening
eventually.
Which Countries Are Populist?
Our model predicts that support for populism should be stronger in countries that are more
financially developed, more unequal, and running current account deficits. Looking across 29
developed countries, we find evidence supporting these predictions.
Figure 2 Vote share of populist parties in recent elections
The US and the UK are good examples. Both have high financial development, large inequality,
and current account deficits. It is thus no coincidence, in the context of our model, that
these countries led the populist wave in 2016. In contrast, Germany is less financially
developed, less unequal, and it runs a sizable current account surplus. Populism has been
relatively subdued in Germany, as our model predicts. The model emphasises the dark side of
financial development – it spurs the growth of inequality, which eventually leads to a
populist backlash.
Who are the Populist Voters?
The model also makes predictions about the characteristics of populist voters. Compared to
mainstream voters, populist voters should be more inequality-averse (i.e. more anti-elite) and
more risk-averse (i.e. better insured against consumption fluctuations). Like highly
risk-averse agents, poorer and less-educated agents have less to lose from the end of
globalization. The model thus predicts that these agents are more likely to vote populist. That
is indeed what we find when we examine the characteristics of the voters who supported Brexit
in the 2016 EU referendum and Trump in the 2016 presidential election.
The model's predictions for asset prices are also interesting. The global market share of US
stocks should rise in anticipation of the populist's victory. Indeed, the US share of the
global stock market rose steadily before the 2016 Trump election. The US bond yields should be
unusually low before the populist's victory. Indeed, bond yields in the West were low when the
populist wave began.
Backlash in a booming economy
In our model, a populist backlash occurs when the economy is strong because that is when
inequality is high. The model helps us understand why the backlash is occurring now, as the US
economy is booming. The economy is going through one of its longest macroeconomic expansions
ever, having been growing steadily for almost a decade since the 2008 crisis.
This study relates to our prior work at the intersection of finance and political economy.
Here, we exploit the cross-sectional variation in risk aversion, whereas in our 2017 paper, we
analyse its time variation (Pastor and Veronesi 2017). In the latter model, time-varying risk
aversion generates political cycles in which Democrats and Republicans alternate in power, with
higher stock returns under Democrats. Our previous work also explores links between risk
aversion and inequality (Pastor and Veronesi 2016).
Conclusions
We highlight the fragility of globalization in a democratic society that values equality. In
our model, a pushback against globalization arises as a rational voter response. When a country
grows rich enough, it becomes willing to sacrifice consumption in exchange for a more equal
society. Redistribution is of limited value in our frictionless, complete-markets model. Our
formal model supports the narrative of Rodrik (1997, 2000), who argues that we cannot have all
three of global economic integration, the nation state, and democratic politics.
If policymakers want to save globalization, they need to make the world look different from
our model. One attractive policy option is to improve the financial systems of less-developed
countries. Smaller cross-country differences in financial development would mitigate the uneven
effects of cross-border risk sharing. More balanced global risk sharing would result in lower
current account deficits and, eventually, lower inequality in the rich world.
"rising inequality is a natural consequence of economic growth. " For which definition of
growth? Or maybe, observing that cancer is the very model of growth, for any definition?
Nice model and graphs, though.
What kind of political economy is to be discerned, and how is one to effectuate it with
systems that would have to be so very different to have a prayer of providing lasting
homeostatic functions?
The global overclass can hardly wait too. They think they are in position to guide the
change to their desired outcome. Targeted applied Jackpot Engineering, you know.
At some point if the majority dont think they get any benefit from the economy, they will
put a stake through it, and replace it with some thing that works?now that could be some
thing very different, but it will happen
I had the same thought – growth as defined in the current, neoliberal model. There
is nothing inevitable about inequality – it is caused by political choices.
It is painful to find these assumptions accepted at NC.
"the economy is strong"
Not from my perspective. Or from the perspectives of the work force or the industrial base
replacing themselves. Or the perspective of a 4 to 5 trillion dollar shortfall in
infrastructure funding.
"In our model, rising inequality is a natural consequence of economic growth."
Well, that simply did not happen 1946 to 1971.
"populist delivers lower consumption but also lower inequality to US agents."
REALLY? Consumption of WHAT? Designer handbags and jeans? What about consumption of mass
public transit and health care services? I'm very confident that a populist government that
found a way to put a muzzle on Wall Street and the banksters would increase consumption of
things I prefer while also lessening inequality.
Reading through this summary of modeling, it occurred to me that the operative variable
was not inequality so much as "high financial development."
Yes and also, let's not throw the baby out with the bath water. These days, just saying
that globalisation leads to inequality and people act rationally, when they push back –
even though choices are limited – is pretty revolutionary. We need other analyses along
those lines, maybe with a few corrections. Thanks for posting!
" In our model, a populist backlash occurs when the economy is strong because that is when
inequality is high. "
Yes to the above comments. This sentence really stuck in my throat. A strong economy to me
is one that achieves balanced equality. Somehow this article avoids the manner in which the
current economy became "strong". Perhaps a better word is "corrupt". (No 'perhaps' really;
I'm just being polite.)
I also didn't like that the anti-neoliberalists are being portrayed as not having sympathy
for the poor. Gosh, we are a hard-hearted lot, only interested in our own come-uppance and
risk-adversity.
A "strong" economy is one that is growing as measured by GDP – full stop. Inequality
looks to me like a feature of our global economic value system, not a bug.
I only read these articles to see what the enemy is thinking. The vast majority of
economists are nothing more than cheerleaders for capitalism. I imagine anybody who strays
too far from neoliberal orthodoxy is ignored.
the Trump/Brexit populist thinking has nothing to do with equality. it has do do with who
should get preferential treatment and why -- it's about drawing a tight circle on who get's
to be considered "equal".
not sure how you can pull a desire for equality from this (except through statistics,
which can be used to "prove" anything).
I'm confused – so the evidence of statistics should be discounted, in favor of more
persuasive evidence? Consisting of your own authoritative statements about the motives of
other people?
In the future, please try to think about what sorts of arguments are likely to be
persuasive to people who don't already agree with you.
If you consider yourself an "environmentalist," then you have to be against
globalization.
(From the easiest to universally agree upon) the multi-continental supply chain for
everything from tube socks to cobalt to frozen fish is unsustainable, barring Star Trek-type
transport tech breakthroughs.
(to the less easily to universally agree upon) the population of the entire developed
(even in the US) would be stablized/falling/barely rising, but for migration.
mass migration-fueled population growth/higher fertility rates of migrants in the
developed world and increased resource footprint is bad for both the developed world and
developing world.
The long, narrow, and manifold supply lines which characterize our present systems of
globalization make the world much more fragile. The supply chains are fraught with single
points of systemic failure. At the same time Climate Disruption increases the risk that a
disaster can affect these single points of failure. I fear that the level of instability in
the world systems is approaching the point where multiple local disasters could have
catastrophic effects at a scale orders of magnitude greater than the scale of the triggering
events -- like the Mr. Science demonstration of a chain-reaction where he tosses a single
ping pong ball into a room full of mousetraps set with ping pong balls. You have to be
against globalization if you're against instability.
The entire system of globalization is completely dependent on a continuous supply of cheap
fuel to power the ships, trains, and trucks moving goods around the world. That supply of
cheap fuel has its own fragile supply lines upon which the very life of our great cities
depends. Little food is grown where the most food is eaten -- this reflects the distributed
nature of our supply chains greatly fostered by globalization.
Globalization increases the power and control Corporate Cartels have over their workers.
It further increases the power large firms have over smaller firms as the costs and
complexities of globalized trade constitute a relatively larger overhead for smaller firms.
Small producers of goods find themselves flooded with cheaper foreign knock-offs and
counterfeits of any of their designs that find a place in the market. It adds uncertainty and
risk to employment and small ventures. Globalization magnifies the power of the very large
and very rich over producers and consumers.
I believe the so-called populist voters and their backlash in a "booming" economy are
small indications of a broad unrest growing much faster than our "booming" economies. That
unrest is one more risk to add to the growing list of risks to an increasingly fragile
system. The world is configured for a collapse that will be unprecedented in its speed and
scope.
Actually, the way I see it – if one considers oneself an environmentalist, one has
to be against capitalism, not just globalization. Capitalism is built on constant growth
– but on a planet, with limited resources, that simply cannot work. Not long term
unless we're prepared to dig up and/or pave over everything. Only very limited-scale,
mom-and-pop kind of capitalism can try to work long term – but the problem is, it would
not stay that way because greed gets in the way every time and there's no limiting greed.
(Greed as a concept was limited in the socialist system – but some folks did not like
that.)
" Given their low risk aversion, US agents insure the agents of the rest of the world by
holding aggressive and disperse portfolio positions."
That low risk aversion could be driven by the willingness of the US government to provide
military/diplomatic/trade assistance to US businesses around the word. The risk inherent in
moving factories, doing resource extraction and conducting business overseas is always there,
but if one's government lessens the risk via force projection and control of local
governments, a US agent could appear to be "less risk averse" because the US taxpayer has
"got their back".
This paper closes with
"If policymakers want to save globalization, they need to make the world look different
from our model. One attractive policy option is to improve the financial systems of
less-developed countries. Smaller cross-country differences in financial development would
mitigate the uneven effects of cross-border risk sharing. More balanced global risk sharing
would result in lower current account deficits and, eventually, lower inequality in the rich
world."
Ah yes, to EVENTUALLY lower inequality, the USA needs to "improve the financial systems of
less-well developed countries"
Perhaps the USA needs to improve its OWN financial system first?
Paul Woolley has suggested, the US and UK financial systems are 2 to 3 times they should
be.
And the USA's various financial industry driven bubbles, the ZIRP rescue of the financial
industry, and mortgage security fraud seem all connected back to the USA financial
industry.
Inequality did not improve in the aftermath of these events as the USA helped preserve the
elite class.
Maybe the authors have overlooked a massive home field opportunity?
That being that the USA should consider "improving" its own financial system to help
inequality.
I'm glad to see that issues and views discussed pretty regularly here in more or less
understandable English have been translated into Academese. Being a high risk averse plebe,
who will not starve for lack of trade with China, but may have to pay a bit more for
strawberries for lack of cheap immigrant labor, I count myself among the redistributionist
economic nationalists.
Right now I'm making raisins from the grapes harvested here at home .. enough to last for
a year, or maybe two. Sure, it's laborous to some extent, but the supply chain is very short
.. the cost, compared to buying the same amount at retait rates, is minuscule, and they're as
'organic' as can be. The point I'm trying to make is that wth some personal effort, we can
all live lighter, live slower, and be, for the most part, contented.
Might as well step into collapse, gracefully, and avoid the rush, as per J. M. Greer's
mantra.
The UK had become somewhat dependent on Switzerland for wristwatches prior to WW2, and all
of the sudden France falls and that's all she wrote for imports.
Must've been a mad scramble to resurrect the business, or outsource elsewhere.
My wife and I were talking about what would happen if say the reign of error pushes us
into war with China, and thanks to our just in time way of life, the goods on the shelves of
most every retailer, would be plundered by consumers, and maybe they could be restocked a few
times, but that's it.
I recently purchased a cabinet/shelf for 20 tubmans, from a repurposing/recycling
business, and, after putting a couple of hundred moar tubmans into it .. some of which
included recycled latex paints and hardware .. transformed it into a fabulous stand-alone
kitchen storage unit. If I were to purchase such at retail, it would most likely go for close
to $800- $1000.00 easy !!
With care, this 'renewed' polecat heirloom will certainly outlive it's recreator, and pass on
for generations henceforth.
Yes, thank goodness there was no mention of Canada's failure to negotiate a trade treaty
with our best friend. All of a sudden, Canadians seem to be the target of a lot of ill will
in other articles.
I think it's just ill- informed jealousy. Us US mopes think Canadians are much better off
than we Yanks, health care and such. You who live there have your own insights, of course.
Trudeau and the Ford family and tar sands and other bits.
And some of us are peeved that you don't want us migrating to take advantage of your more
beneficent milieu.
It's a different vibe up over, their housing bubble crested and is sinking, as the road to
HELOC was played with the best intentions even more furiously than here in the heat of the
bubble.
Can Canada bail itself out as we did in the aftermath, and keep the charade going?
Feel free to fill out that 8 inch high pile of Canadian immigration documentation, so
ya'all can come on up and join the party. Or just jump on your pony and ride North into the
Land of the Grandmother. Trudeau wants more people and has failed to offer proper sacrifice
to the god Terminus, the god of borders, so .
Just don't move to "Van" unless you have a few million to drop on a "reno'ed" crack shack.
When the god Pluto crawls back into the earth, the housing bubble will burst, and it's not
going to be pretty.
That's funny as our dam here is called the Terminus Reservoir, if the name fits
I'm just looking for an ancestral way out of what might prove to be a messy scene down
under, i'd gladly shack up in one of many of my relatives basements if Max Mad breaks out
here.
Great article, interesting data points, but besides placing tariffs on Chinese imports
there is nothing populist about Trump, just empty rhetoric. Highly regressive tax cuts for
the wealthy, further deregulation, wanton environmental destruction, extremist right-wing
ideologues as judges, a cabinet full of Wall Street finance guys, more boiler-plate Neo-Lib
policies as far as I can tell.
I fear Trump and the Brexiters are giving populism a bad name. A functioning democracy
should always elect populists. A government of elected officials who do not represent the
public will is not really a democracy.
Aversion to inequality thus reflects envy of the economic elites rather than
compassion for the poor.
That's ridiculous. Indeed, the Brexit campaign was all about othering the poor and
powerless immigrants, as well as the cultural, artistic, urban and academic elites, never the
the moneyed elites, not the 1%. The campaign involved no dicussion what's so ever of the
actual numbers of wealth inequality.
When deciding whether to vote mainstream or populist, US agents face a
consumption-inequality trade-off. If elected, the populist delivers lower consumption but
also lower inequality to US agents.
How can anyone possibly write such a thing? The multi-trillion tax cut from Donald Trump
represents a massive long time rise in inequality. Vis-à-vis Brexit, the entire
campaign support for that mad endeavor came from free-trader fundamentalists who want to be
free to compete with both hands in the global race-to-the-bottom while the EU is (barely)
restraining them.
Trump and Brexit voters truly are irrational turkeys (that's saying a lot for anyone who's
met an actual turkey) voting for Christmas.
Some of us mopes who voted for Trump did so as a least-bad alternative to HER, just to try
to kick the hornet's nest and get something to fly out: So your judgment is that those folks
are "irrational turkeys," bearing in mind how mindless the Christmas and Thansgiving turkeys
have been bred to be?
Better to arm up, get out in the street, and start marching and chanting and ready to
confront the militarized police? I'd say, face it: as people here have noted there is a
system in place, the "choices" are frauds to distract us every couple of years, and the
vectors all point down into some pretty ugly terrain.
Bless those who have stepped off the conveyor, found little places where they can live
"autarkically," more or less, and are waiting out the Ragnarok/Gotterdammerung/Mad Max
anomie, hoping not to be spotted by the warbands that will form up and roam the terrain
looking for bits of food and fuel and slaves and such. Like one survivalist I spotted
recently says as his tag-line, "If you have stuff, you're a target. If you have knowledge.
you have a chance–" this in a youtube video on how to revive a defunct nickel-cadmium
drill battery by zapping it with a stick welder. (It works, by the way.)He's a chain smoker
and his BMI must be close to 100, but he's got knowledge
The papers's framing of the issues is curious: the populace has 'envy' of the well-off;
and populism (read envy) rises when the economy is strong and inequality rises (read where's
my yaht?).
The paper lacks acknowledgement of the corruption, fraud, and rigging of policy that rises
when an overly financialized economy is 'good.' This contributes to inequality. Inequality is
not just unequal, but extremely disproportionate distributions which cause real suffering and
impoverishment of the producers. It follows (but not to the writer of this paper) that the
citizens take offense at and objection to the disproprtionate takings of some and the meager
receipts of the many. It's this that contributes to populism.
And the kicker: to save globalization, let's financialize the less developed economies to
mitigate cross-border inequalities. Huh? Was not the discussion about developed nations'
voters to rising inequality in face of globalization? The problem is not cross-border 'envy.'
It's globalization instrinsically and how it is gamed.
I'm with Olga. It's good to see that voting "wrong" taken seriously, and seen as
economically rational. Opposing globalization makes sense, even in the idiosyncratic usage of
economics.
The trouble, of course, is that the world of economics is not the world we live in.
Why does the immigrant cross the border? Is it only for "pecuniary interests," only for
the money? Then why do so many send most of it back across the border, in remittances?
If people in poor countries aren't willing to sacrifice for "luxuries," like a dignified
human life, who was Simon Bolivar, Che Guevara, or more recently, Berta Cáceres?
Seems to be a weakness of economic models in general: it's inconceivable that people do
things for other than pecuniary interests. In the reductionist terms of natural science,
we're social primates, not mechanical information engines.
If this model were a back patio cart, like the one I'm building right now, I wouldn't set
my beer on it. Looks like a cart from a distance, though, esp when you're looking for
one.
To the extent that the backlash has irrational aspects in the way it manifests, I would
suspect that it relates to the refusal of the self-styled responsible people to participate
in opening more rational paths to solutions, or even to acknowledge the existence of a
problem. When the allegedly responsible and knowledgeable actors refuse to act, or even see a
need to act, it's hardly surprising that the snake oil vendors grow in influence.
I'm always leery of t-test values being cited without the requisite sample size being
noted. You need that to determine effect size. While the slope looks ominously valid for the
regression model, effects could be weak and fail to show whether current account deficits are
the true source. Financialization seems purposely left out of the model.
"... Popularity of National Socialism in capitalist country like Germany was exactly due to that process of corruption of working class who embassy stoped to question system as long as provided them with goods. ..."
"... Henceforth, most goods manufactured for US consumption were to be produced abroad, from Mexico to China. Once US based multinationals started down this road, European and even Japanese ones followed. This did not mean an increase in productive forces but a substitution of one labour force for another. ..."
"... Thus the rise of Chinese industry was as much a part of this process as the deindustrialisation of formerly prosperous parts of the US and the UK. This has nothing to do with the evolution of our species and everything to do with the evolution of capitalism. This is what I mean by globalisation. ..."
"... It has not eradicated national borders but is a major factor in the recent development of far right nationalism in Europe. It is a strong contributor to the restructuring of western economies so that only a minority of British workers have full time permanent jobs. It is also used as leverage to drive down wages in western economies. ..."
"... I do not believe what I mean by globalisation is progressive at all. It has been pushed by the most reactionary political forces in western societies as an integral part of what the WSWS calls a social counter revolution. As the WSWS again points out it makes the preservation of national welfare states or a decent standard of living for working class people impossible. I am not calling for this to be reversed under capitalism. ..."
"... "...globalised production is the exploitation of lower wage rates in developing countries." ..."
"... As if domestic production were not the same thing. The author is essentially arguing for "lesser evil" exploitation in the interests of society as a whole. Reformists always do. ..."
"... "The crisis also exposed in full glare another of the central myths of the capitalist order -- that the state is somehow a neutral or independent organisation committed to regulating social and economic affairs in the interests of society as a whole." - Ten years since the collapse of Lehman Brothers ..."
"... "Keynes was a reformist and capable of formulating policies which, if followed, would make capitalism more amenable to the interests of the majority of people." ..."
"... The most important theoretical source of his thinking is his own work "The General Theory of Employment, Money and Interest" which is available to read or download free online. ..."
"... The US wants to reinforce it's declining global hegemonic position at any cost. Now they started with economic war against countries they see as not cooperating to their demands, but under current conditions this could easily transform into Global war at some point in future. ..."
In the aftermath of the global financial crisis ten years ago, the leaders of the world's
major powers pledged that never again would they go down the road of protectionism which had
such disastrous consequences in the 1930s -- deepening the Great Depression and contributing
to the outbreak of world war in 1939.
Yesterday US President Donald Trump announced tariffs on $200 billion worth of Chinese
goods in what the Washington Post described as "one of the most severe economic
restrictions ever imposed by a US president."
A levy of 10 percent will be imposed starting from September 24 and will be escalated to
25 percent in 2019 if the US does not receive what it considers to be a satisfactory
agreement. The new tariffs, which will cover more than 1,000 goods, come on top of the 25
percent tariff already imposed on $50 billion worth of industrial products. Trump has
threatened further measures on the remaining Chinese exports to the US totalling more than
$250 billion.
China has threatened retaliatory action including tariffs and other, as yet unspecified
measures, against the US, meaning that the world's number one and number two economies are
locked into a rapidly escalating trade war that will have global consequences.
Announcing the decision, Trump called on China to take "swift action" to end what he
called its "unfair trade practices" and expressed the hope that the trade conflict would be
resolved.
But there is little prospect of such an outcome because, while the US is demanding that
the trade deficit with China be reduced, the conflict does not merely centre on that issue.
China has made offers to increase its imports from the US, all of which have been rejected.
The key US demand is that the Chinese government completely abandon its program of economic
development and remain subservient to the US in high-tech economic sectors.
As the position paper issued by Washington in May put it: "China will cease providing
market-distorting subsidies and other types of government support that can contribute to the
creation or maintenance of excess capacity in industries targeted by the Made in China 2025
industrial plan."
In other words, China must completely scrap the foundational structures of its economy so
that it presents no threat to the economic dominance of US capitalism, a dominance which the
US intends to maintain, if it considers necessary, by military means. This was made clear
earlier this year when Washington designated China as a "strategic competitor," that is, a
potential military enemy. This is the inherent, objective, logic of the latest trade war
measures.
Their full significance can only be grasped when viewed with the framework of the
historical development of the global capitalist economy.
After the disastrous decade of the 1930s, and as the world plunged into war, leading
figures within the Roosevelt administration recognised that this situation was due in no
small measure to the division of the world into rival trade and economic blocs which tariff
and other trade restrictions had played a major role in creating.
Post-war planning centred on trying to overcome this contradiction between the global
economy and its division into rival great powers and blocs through the development of a
mechanism that ensured the expansion of world trade. This was the basis of the series of
measures set in place in the immediate aftermath of the war: the Bretton Woods monetary
system which tied major currencies to the dollar in fixed exchange rates, the General
Agreement on Tariffs and Trade that sought to bring down tariff barriers and the
establishment of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank to ensure international
economic collaboration.
These measures, however, did not overcome the inherent contradictions of capitalism, above
all between the global economy and the nation-state system. Rather, they sought to contain
and mitigate them within a system based on the overwhelming economic dominance of the US.
But the growth of the world capitalist economy and the strengthening of the other major
powers undermined the very foundations on which they were based -- the absolute dominance of
the US. Within the space of a generation, the weakening of the US position was revealed in
August 1971 when it scrapped the Bretton Woods monetary system declaring that the dollar
would no longer be redeemable for gold.
The period since then has seen the ongoing weakening of the position of the US, which was
graphically revealed in the financial meltdown ten years ago when the US financial system was
shown to be a house of cards based on rampant speculation and outright criminal activity.
This situation has continued in the subsequent decade, threatening, another, even more
disastrous, financial crisis.
The US is now not only confronted with the economic power of its European rivals but a
major new one in the form of China. It is striving to reverse this situation. As Leon Trotsky
explained some eighty years ago, the hegemony of the US would assert itself most powerfully
not in conditions of boom but above all in a crisis when it would use every means -- economic
and military -- against all rivals to maintain its position.
The trade war measures against China are only one expression of this process. The US has
already carried out protectionist measures against Europe and Japan through the imposition of
tariffs on steel and aluminium and has threatened tariffs on cars and auto parts, which will
be invoked unless they join its push on China.
And as the China tariffs are imposed, top officials of the European Union are meeting to
discuss how they might overcome the financial sanctions the US will impose against European
companies if they maintain economic ties with Iran after November 4 following the unilateral
abrogation of the Iran nuclear deal.
The deal was not overturned because Iran had breached the agreement -- international
agencies found that it had fully complied. Rather, the United States unilaterally abrogated
the treaty in order to strengthen the strategic position of the US in the Middle East by
countering the influence of Iran, and because European corporations stood to benefit from the
opening up of new economic opportunities in that country at the expense of their US
rivals.
Now the State Department has warned that European companies are "on the railroad tracks"
if they defy US sanctions and firms that deal with the "enemy" will be barred from access to
the US financial system.
Writing in the 1930s, Leon Trotsky explained that the interdependence of every country in
the global economy meant that the program of economic nationalism, of the kind now being
practised by the Trump administration, was a reactionary "utopia" insofar as it set itself
the task of harmonious national economic development on the basis of private property.
"But it is a menacing reality insofar as it is a question of concentrating all the
economic forces of the nation for the preparation of a new war," he wrote five years before
the outbreak of World War II.
This "menacing reality" is now once again expressed in the fact that the trade war
measures against China, as well as those against Europe and Japan, have all been invoked on
"national security" grounds. Just as the US prepares for war, so too do all the other major
powers. This drive does not arise from the heads of the capitalist politicians -- their
actions are only the translation into politics of the objective logic and irresolvable
contradictions of the capitalist system over which they preside.
But there is another more powerful logic at work. The very development of globalised
production, which has raised the contradiction of the outmoded nation-state system with its
rival great powers to a new peak of intensity, has laid the foundations for a planned world
socialist economy. And it has created in the international working class, unified at an
unprecedented level, the social force to carry it out.
The latest Trump trade war measures underscore the urgency for the political and
theoretical arming of the working class with the program of world socialist revolution,
fought for by the International Committee of the Fourth International, if civilisation is to
go forward and the plunge into barbarism averted.
Beams excellent piece included:
"As the position paper issued by Washington in May put it: "China will
cease providing market-distorting subsidies and other types of government support that can
contribute to the creation or maintenance of excess capacity in industries targeted by the
Made in China 2025 industrial plan."
This issue of "government support" in China is reflected in the U.S. but in a different
way. Nashville and Tennessee governments alone have given hundreds of millions of dollars
in "tax incentives," payment for worker training and outright "grants" to corporations in
"government support."
Hospital Corporation of America (HCA) got millions for, of all things, furniture for new
offices which included thousands of dollars for a guitar-shaped table.
Gaylord's Opryland Resort got almost $14 million from the city to build a $90 million hotel
Waterpark that would only be open to hotel guests!
The state and its capitol are prepared to give Amazon more than $1.5 billion to have the
corporation move is second U.S. headquarters here.
Like the Chinese government and oligarchs, neither state nor city will reveal the details
or total amount.
As the WSWS has so correctly observed before, "the hypocrisy is breathtaking."
I should say I do not agree that globalised production is a beneficial or positive economic
development. I accept that as a by product there is a positive political result namely the
creation and expansion of the international working class. But the only reason for
globalised production is the exploitation of lower wage rates in developing countries. If
the cost of labour, taking into account currency exchange rates as well as wage levels,
were the same in every country and region, there would be no advantage in producing most
commodities in Asia for sale in North America or Europe (or vice versa). Also, I do not
accept that free trade is in everyone's interest. The only argument ever advanced in it's
favour by economists, the comparative advantage argument, is spurious. Even its
originators, Adam Smith and David Ricardo, accepted that the benefits would only apply if
capital was immobile across national boundaries, which hardly applies today. The US
economy's industrial growth, though the result of several factors, was only possible
because the US rejected free trade in favour of protective tariffs which protected its
infant industries from foreign competition. What is the central fallacy in the comparative
advantage argument is that the prosperity of the majority of a country's citizens under
capitalism depends on a strong, capital intensive, manufacturing sector, but which also
requires a large labour input. Only those jobs can pay a sufficiently high wage to workers.
Their spending power also invigorates the whole economy.
Thy major point about this issue global or local is often completely missed namely that
this dispute have nothing to do with Workers Socialist Revolution but to perhaps see ways
how to save capitalism in a way of sharing more wealth with working class, how to suppress
class struggle with Bread and Games or War, an old Roman method of divide and conquer.
Hence, capital controls, tarrifs , barriers, subsidies are instruments of having any
possibility of real social policies in capitalism system making it more livable and longer
lasting than in case of intensified pressure on working class and class struggle of
globalism versus nationalism.
Popularity of National Socialism in capitalist country like Germany was exactly due
to that process of corruption of working class who embassy stoped to question system as
long as provided them with goods.
Little did they know, that they were in 1930 confronted with no permanent political
solution to their class issues via improvement of standard of living and importance of
their labor on the propaganda spectrum,but with dead end politics of submission to one
political sellouts or another since their forced unity was just subordinated to capitalist
imperative of ufettered economic and military growth via extreme exploitation.
And that is what's wrong with nationalism namely it is shutting down paths of class
struggle toward class liberation, as it neuters this struggle.
There is a difference between the growth of global productive capacity and globalisation.
Prior to the latter process, manufacturing capacity was increased including by western
investment in developing countries, especially in Latin America. But production in those
countries was for local regional and national markets.
The US accepted competition from the German economy as a price to be paid for avoiding
the postwar threat of socialism. But the Japanese export driven model of growth was
eventually unacceptable. The US demanded the Japanese destroy this model by raising their
own currency to a level which made their exports much less competitive. The Japanese rich
were given financial opportunities in the US as compensation.
However, when the South Koreans and other nations copied the Japanese model, the US
government and US multinationals radically changed their economic policy. A conscious
choice was made by the Reagon administration to export manufacturing jobs en masse to
developing countries as well as attacking the incomes of US workers who had jobs.
Henceforth, most goods manufactured for US consumption were to be produced abroad,
from Mexico to China. Once US based multinationals started down this road, European and
even Japanese ones followed. This did not mean an increase in productive forces but a
substitution of one labour force for another.
Thus the rise of Chinese industry was as much a part of this process as the
deindustrialisation of formerly prosperous parts of the US and the UK. This has nothing to
do with the evolution of our species and everything to do with the evolution of capitalism.
This is what I mean by globalisation.
It has not eradicated national borders but is a major factor in the recent
development of far right nationalism in Europe. It is a strong contributor to the
restructuring of western economies so that only a minority of British workers have full
time permanent jobs. It is also used as leverage to drive down wages in western
economies.
Of course in recent years the Chinese and Indian economies have grown under these
policies so that there is now an increase of global capacity. Nor do I believe this process
has led to a genuinely more efficient system of production and distribution. To produce
products in one part of the world for distribution to another part half way around the
world is very inefficient, if the product could be made nearer to the point where it would
be used. It however becomes profitable if the labour used to produce it is much cheaper
than that available where the the object is to be sold.
I do not believe what I mean by globalisation is progressive at all. It has been
pushed by the most reactionary political forces in western societies as an integral part of
what the WSWS calls a social counter revolution. As the WSWS again points out it makes the
preservation of national welfare states or a decent standard of living for working class
people impossible. I am not calling for this to be reversed under capitalism.
That seems impossible. Only the overthrow of capitalism offers the possibility of
positive change. But under international socialism, globalised production chains will
finally be seen for what they are, an unnecessary and inefficient encumbrance on
humanity.
I think you are largely confusing globalisation with imperialism. I think you are also
misunderstanding the wsws position. The wsws does not call for xenophobic or nationalist
policies to close borders and keep workers imprisoned in their home countries to be used as
a captive labor force by the domestic bourgeoisie. The wsws calls for an internationalist
and proletarian socialist movement in conformity with that advocated by the workers
movement ever since the publication of the communist manifesto.
I really could not care less what you call it. I just want people to start treating each
other better. What makes those with sticky fingers think that they are so G.D. better than
everyone else that they can condemn whole segments to poverty and even death, all for the
sake of their bits of imaginary ego-boosts?
ALL of the "isms" in the world have never worked out a justification for greed and the
lust for power. No matter what the system, crooked people always try to exploit others, and
blamejustify it all on their "good genes". (edited)
Capitalism is no better or worse because it just doesn't matter what the system is, the
crooks will always cheat that system to get more than everyone else.
An interesting theory to describe what is essentially creation of a world customs union
based on the model that created Germany in 1871, the Zollverein. Spreading the customs
union (Zollverein) worldwide was the reason for the two world wars--instead of maintaining
a world federation politically and economically. The United Nations was designed to be a
federation, but under post-1945 changes in the USA and subsequent pressures on the UN and
its member states, it began developing into a union, not a federation. This was accompanied
with creation of a global Zollverein, tariff free borders and free trade.
The difference politically between a union and a federation is that in a federation the
member states award limited operating powers to a central coordinating body which does what
the members want; in a union the central body holds all the powers and tells the members
what to do.
The United Nations "holds all the powers and tells the members what to do" ? That's news to
me. As far as I can tell, the members do what they damn well please. The UN is more like a
fractured federation with a nearly impotent central body - the so-called "Security Council"
- which issues edicts but has no enforcement power. Same with the World Court.
The UN was designed by the victors of WWII to be "crippled", mere window-dressing as a
calming salve for the developing nations. From the start, it was meant to be largely
ineffective as the world's policeman and justice system .
All the nation states with any significant power are still more interested in preserving
as much their own power and hegemonic control as possible.
"...globalised production is the exploitation of lower wage rates in developing
countries."
As if domestic production were not the same thing. The author is essentially arguing
for "lesser evil" exploitation in the interests of society as a whole. Reformists always
do.
"The crisis also exposed in full glare another of the central myths of the
capitalist order -- that the state is somehow a neutral or independent organisation
committed to regulating social and economic affairs in the interests of society as a
whole." - Ten years since the collapse of Lehman Brothers
"However my fundamental advocacy of policy would be that of international socialism the
result of which would be the handing of power to the working class to be exercised
democratically ."
The "handing of power" from whom exactly?
As it is now, the minority holds the power. So it's reasonable to think you mean they
would hand the power over to the majority.
Which would be silly. But whether or not that was your meaning, "the handing of power to
the working class to be exercised democratically" besides being exactly backwards, is an
opportunist "understanding" of Marxism. It implies a perspective where the state does not
need to be destroyed.
"The crucial question for Marx was what was the social material force -- the class --
created by capitalist society itself, which would be the agency, the driving force, of this
transformation." - A promotion of the "life-style" politics of the pseudo-left
It's a version of the frequently and historically repeated goal of replacing one petty
bourgeoisie minority with another, betraying the material interests of the working class
and the revolution every time.
It seems like you might have just mentioned that phrase as an aside but it might
indicate the deeper problem.
Before you start analyzing which policies might be recommended (which seems to be mainly
what interests you) you have to understand the class nature of the problem. That doesn't
come down only to understanding that there are two classes in struggle in society
and then applying your everyday petty bourgeois thinking to it.
Have you read David North's Lenin, Trotsky and the Marxism of the October
Revolution ? It was written back in March yet it's still posted on the wsws main
page--for a reason.
It provides a concise explanation of some of the fundamental ideas and way of thinking
you have to understand if you want to have any kind of intelligent conversation
about socialism.
Nick Beams did not say that "globalised production chains employed represent a genuinely
beneficial development in some deep sense." He said that such an outcome is impossible
under capitalism and the system of competing nation-states.
The only "deep sense" is that he said it would be possible for globalization to
have a positive effect for humanity if the international working class were able to abolish
capitalism, the pursuit of private profit, warring nation-states, and institute
socialism.
Thank you comrade Nick Beams. US's century is 20th and a bygone one. You finely point out
on the basis of Trotskysm the mortal danger that humanity faces resulting from the
inter-imperialist rivalry that is escalating by the day.
Besides, the US's taking up of its rival China, the second biggest economy, in trade war
pose a military confrontation to which Russia could be attracted on to China side.
Also Russia has been taken up by American imperialism independently as a target. Brexit
hard or soft would also confound economic nationalism that is gathering momentum hugely. US
sanctions on Iran is bound to sharpen the conflict between European imperialists. Also
India appears to be in crisis on whether to abide by US dictats as per its Iranian economic
connection especially on oil purchase. US's increasing protectionism has already gone out
of control as per its implications to global polity and military activity. In view of this
critical situation the role of the working class, national and international, should
determine the future of humanity. Role of the revolutionary triumvirate, ICFI/SEP/IYSSE, is
of paramount importance. I appeal to national working classes to build SEP as your national
party of the socialist revolution. I appeal to youth and students to build your national
chapters of the IYSSE in schools, universities etc. as quickly as possible. World war is
haunting. Very existannce of the humanity on this palnet is uncertain, if we unitedly as
workers, youth and students fail to empower the party of the world revolution, ICFI.
Victory to international socialist revolution. Death to protectionism whose major advocate
is US capitalism/imperialism. Down with the psudo left and the trade unions.
Keynes, who designed the Bretton Woods system, also proposed an international banking
system and currency (called the Bancor). The purpose was to prevent the kind of unbalanced
world trade which now dominates the global economy. Under his proposed system, countries
with chronic trade surpluses would be penalised, thus preventing a situation like the
present with some nations being massive exporters and others massive importers. Instead,
all countries would hover around balanced trade where their imports equaled their exports
in value. The US government told Keynes to shut up about this plan or they would cancel
their promised postwar loans to the UK. The reason was that at the time the US planned to
be a net exporter. Incidentally, Keynes warned that if the system of managed currency
exchange rates were abandoned, the financial markets would become a "virtual senate" which
would have the power to dictate economic policies to nation states.
"Keynes, who designed the Bretton Woods system, also proposed an international banking
system and currency (called the Bancor). The purpose was to prevent the kind of
unbalanced world trade which now dominates the global economy."
Perpetually caught in a "lesser evil" loop of some variety or another from which the
reformist never escapes, applying the same failed (ruling class) logic over, and over and
over and over...
"But this solves nothing because, as Marx's analysis showed, the crises of capitalism
cannot be overcome by reforms to the monetary system because, while they necessarily
express themselves there, they were rooted in the very foundations of the capitalist
economy, in its DNA so to speak -- that is, in the social relations based on profit and the
market system." -Ten years after Lehman: New financial crises in the making
Keynes' suggestion would have "solved" or rather prevented one problem, but not every
problem of capitalism. Keynes was a reformist and capable of formulating policies which, if
followed, would make capitalism more amenable to the interests of the majority of people.
He was consciously trying to save capitalism from itself and said so. But you rightly
point out there is a major problem with this thinking, namely that it ignores the self
interest of governments and capitalists alike, who ignore such concepts of "enlightened"
self interest in favour of short term advantage.
Political reality intruded in Keynes' well-intentioned designs immediately as I've
mentioned and the whole Bretton Woods edifice was knocked down as soon as it proved
inconvenient for US interests.
Similarly, I strongly suspect Keynes would have disapproved of financial deregulation,
but the underlying development of US capitalism led to unstoppable political pressure for
its implementation.
"Keynes was a reformist and capable of formulating policies which, if followed, would
make capitalism more amenable to the interests of the majority of people."
For the life of me I can't figure why you'd praise a policy that more effectively
persuades or controls the masses to their own detriment and to the economic benefit of a
minority--other than to conclude that like Keynes and the rest of the petty bourgeoisie,
you're a reformist.
The most important theoretical source of his thinking is his own work "The General
Theory of Employment, Money and Interest" which is available to read or download free
online.
I only recently learned of his Bancor proposal in an article by George Monbiot
originally published in the Guardian. I read it on the Znet website, but I can't remember
when.
As for his quote about the financial markets becoming a virtual senate, I read that in
some article about finance but don't remember the source. Sorry I can't be more helpful.
There could be other books on his theories but he is somewhat unfashionable as mainstream
economics has mostly reverted to a more ideologically driven right wing position.
"In January, while Trump was requesting Congress to allocate funds for the US-Mexico border
wall, China sent delegates to Chile, inviting Latin American leaders to participate in the
Belt and Road Initiative. Months later, as Trump bullied US allies at the NATO summit,
China was wrapping up the "16+1 summit" in Bulgaria, where Chinese investment and
diplomatic relations were marketed to Central and Eastern European leaders. And most
recently, Chinese President Xi Jinping wrapped up his travels throughout Africa, where he
was visiting with heads of state and deepening China's relationships with the continent of
the future, while America picks a one-sided trade fight with Rwanda."
The US "makes war" while China makes business deals. Pick your poison--two capitalists
countries controlled by oligarchs which can only offer the working-class continued
exploitation.
An Excellent piece of article that explains clearly the trajectory that got us into
US-China trade war, and what this means for the Global Capitalist System going forward. If
we remember when trade war topic was first brought into picture Trump administration
officials were saying imposing tariffs on China and Europe were the only way to correct the
unfair trade balances. However, as the months progressed it quickly became known that US
officials were using unfair trade practices of China as a scapegoat to demand further
concessions from the Chinese authorities. These concessions include complete dismantlement
of Made in China 2025 program and put a hold to their Silk Road initiative. In other words,
Donald Trump and the entire American ruling circles see China as an existential long term
threat and they are using trade war as a weapon to contain China's rising political and
economical ambitions.
For now Trump is increasing the tariffs so as to force the Chinese leadership to
acquiesce to his conditions. Of course, I would expect in the coming days Chinese
authorities to rebuff this latest round of sanctions and that they would retaliate their
own tariffs.
On the other hand, the Trump administration has put Iran under severe sanctions, and
they also warned all big European Multinational corporations like Total and others to stop
doing business with Iran after November. So as we can see we are in a very precarious
Global situation right now due to rising contradictions between the needs of Global economy
and nation states.
The US wants to reinforce it's declining global hegemonic position at any cost. Now
they started with economic war against countries they see as not cooperating to their
demands, but under current conditions this could easily transform into Global war at some
point in future.
the obligatory four freedoms of the EU are free movement of goods, services, persons and
capital throughout the Union. Open borders. That is the essence of the European Union, the
dogma of the Free Market.
The problem with the Open Border doctrine is that it doesn't know where to stop. Or it
doesn't stop anywhere. When Angela Merkel announced that hundreds of thousands of refugees were
welcome in Germany, the announcement was interpreted as an open invitation by immigrants of all
sorts, who began to stream into Europe. This unilateral German decision automatically applied
to the whole of the EU, with its lack of internal borders. Given German clout, Open Borders
became the essential "European common value", and welcoming immigrants the essence of human
rights.
Very contrasting ideological and practical considerations contribute to the idealization of
Open Borders. To name a few:
This combination of contrasting, even opposing motivations does not add up to a majority in
every country. Notably not in Hungary.
It should be noted that Hungary is a small Central European country of less than ten million
inhabitants, which never had a colonial empire and thus has no historic relationship with
peoples in Africa and Asia as do Britain, France, the Netherlands, and Belgium. As one of the
losers in World War I, Hungary lost a large amount of territory to its neighbors, notably to
Romania. The rare and difficult Hungarian language would be seriously challenged by mass
immigration. It is probably safe to say that the majority of people in Hungary tend to be
attached to their national identity and feel it would be threatened by massive immigration from
radically different cultures. It may not be nice of them, and like everyone they can change.
But for now, that is how they vote.
In particular, they recently voted massively to re
Like the Soviet Union, the European Union is not merely an undemocratic institutional
framework promoting a specific economic system; it is also the vehicle of an ideology and a
planetary project. Both are based on a dogma as to what is good for the world: communism for
the first, "openness" for the second. Both in varying ways demand of people virtues they may
not share: a forced equality, a forced generosity. All this can sound good, but such ideals
become methods of manipulation. Forcing ideals on people eventually runs up against stubborn
resistance.
There are differing reasons to be against immigration just as to be for it. The idea of
democracy was to sort out and choose between ideals and practical interests by free discussion
and in the end a show of hands: an informed vote. The liberal Authoritarian Center represented
by Verhofstadt seeks to impose its values, aspirations, even its version of the facts on
citizens who are denounced as "populists" if they disagree. Under communism, dissidents were
called "enemies of the people". For the liberal globalists, they are "populists" – that
is, the people. If people are told constantly that the choice is between a left that advocates
mass immigration and a right that rejects it, the swing to the right is unstoppable.
Orban's reputation in the West as dictator is unquestionably linked to his intense
conflict with Hungarian-born financier George Soros
And not only Soros, of course:
'I know that this battle is difficult for everyone. I understand if some of us are also
afraid. This is understandable, because we must fight against an opponent which is different
from us. Their faces are not visible, but are hidden from view; they do not fight directly,
but by stealth; they are not honourable, but unprincipled; they are not national, but
international; they do not believe in work, but speculate with money; they have no homeland,
but feel that the whole world is theirs.' --
Viktor Orbán
Watch the great Hungarian foreign minister repel attacks by the BBCs arrogant open borders
propagandist, rudely treating him like an ignorant child and calling him a racist for
defending his nation.
Economic liberals maintain that because Europe is aging, it needs young immigrant
workers to pay for the pensions of retired workers.
Not gonna happen. Their 80 IQ skills are uncompetitive and useless in Europe even before
Automation erases those low-skilled positions in the coming decade or two. Meanwhile, (real)
European youth unemployment rate is 20%. Young Europeans are not making babies because they
don't have a stable future. This can only get worse as the hostile invaders get preferential,
Affirmative Action treatment, in schools and workplaces. None of this is accidental.
There are, in my opinion, two reasons for letting the mass immigration happen:
- the Brussels belief, expressed in a 2009 official document, not secret, that the EU needs
60 million immigrants.
- a Merkel belief dat the Germans are bad, they caused two world wars and perpetrated the
holocaust, so the German people must be changed through mass immigration.
The Brussels belief seems to be based mainly on the increasing average age in the EU.
It is incomprehensible to me, at the same time fear that robots slowly will do all simple
jobs.
The Merkel belief, on the other side of the Atlantic, where few understand German, and
cannot or do not watch German tv, I wonder how many understand that the 20th century
propaganda of the victors still is decisive in German daily life and politics.
The danger of neonazi's and fascism is everywhere.
Nationalism, the equivalent of building gas chambers.
The EU also is based on the 20th century fairy tales, only the EU prevented wars in Europe
after WWII.
The idea that Germans were victims in two world wars, and, until Hitler became power in 1933,
also between the world wars, in unthinkable.
The idea that Endlösung meant deportation to Madagaskar, even more unthinkable.
That jews, as one Rothschild wrote to another around 1890, have and had but one enemy,
themselves, the world unthinkable is too weak.
Yet
'From prejudice to destruction', Jacob Katz, 1980, Cambridge MA
explains it, things as 'close economic cooperation, intermarriage, ostentious behaviour'.
In this respect
'Christianity and the Holocaust of the Hungarian Jewry', Moshe Y Herclz, 1993 New York
University press
also is a very interesting book, after jews in the thirties had been banned from many
intellectual professions not a single Hungarian newspaper could be published any more.
Soros trying to force Muslim immigrants on deeply catholic Hungary, he was born in
Hungary, experienced anti semitism, revenge ?
I was recently in Budapest on business and will likely be returning soon: It is the most
beautiful city I have ever seen, with stunning architectural restoration projects, almost
non-existent police and military presence, food and wines that rival those of Paris, and a
very friendly, non-bureaucratic and non-obsese (as opposed to the USA) population. I would
like to hear from others who have recently visited and have knowledge of the country.
Viszlát! -- John
When the fort of folly that Globalism is finally falls, Diana Johnstone's article will be
cited as exemplary in exposing its hidden grammar. That fall cannot be far off now given that
psy-ops can only work if people are ignorant of the manipulation afoot.
Great opening, Diana. For forty years the presstitude media have leaned on the use of
implication as argument to have the ninety-nine percent buy what they are selling. What was
not pointed out very well until now, is that their implications are all false. Now, only a
dummy among the dumbed-down cannot see it.
For those who have the patience to read the English subtitles, here is an excellent speech
given by Orbán in July. Here he outlines his thinking on the issues facing Hungary and
the world.
Viktor Orbán is a very intelligent leader, and he has the vast majority of the
Hungarian people behind him. History has taught those people many things, and they have had
enough. They are not fools. Look to them as an example for all of us.
@John Siman I was recently in Budapest on business and will likely be returning soon: It
is the most beautiful city I have ever seen, with stunning architectural restoration
projects, almost non-existent police and military presence, food and wines that rival those
of Paris, and a very friendly, non-bureaucratic and non-obsese (as opposed to the USA)
population. I would like to hear from others who have recently visited and have knowledge of
the country. Viszlát! -- John Wherever US influence is not yet overwhelming (and such
places are becoming fewer every day, unfortunately), you will still find "old-fashioned" ways
of interaction, few fatties, and decent food and drink.
People may become fat for many reasons, but most fatties these days in the Anglosphere
belong to the underclass. These wretches get fat from eating expensive trash at McDonald's
and other fast food outlets, and drinking Coca Cola and similar sugar-saturated garbage.
Their behavior may seem strange because their brains have largely withered away through
endless TV watching (mainly US or US-inspired visual trash), their hearing impaired by ear-
and mind numbing noise passing for music.
I am afraid the way out of that prison is long and tortuous for all victims of US
neoliberalism.
The usual anti-EU propaganda that Ms Johnstone has been peddling for at least a dozen years,
although she has recently moved from claiming to be a far-leftist to claiming to be a
far-rightest. Whatever pretext "proves" the EU to be evil is trotted out! However, she points
out very clearly Viktor Orban's dilemma. The choice for Hungary is between the EU and Putin's
tanks. After 40 years of occupation by a Soviet Union in which the ethnic Russians acted as
colonial overlords and the general contempt which Hungarians have for Slavs, choosing the
latter option would be political suicide for any Hungarian leader. Thus, Orban is stuck with
the EU whether he likes it or not and the other Member States are stuck with Orban whether
they like it or not. In addition, two of Ms Johnstone's factual claims need to be corrected.
The "EU" is taking no step whatsoever to strip Hungary of its political rights. The
(according to Ms Johnstone, "largely rubber stamp") European Parliament has adopted a
resolution calling on the Member States to sanction Hungary. The EP always does something
attention-grabbing in the run up to elections and since Ms Johnstone once worked for the
European Parliament (as a far-leftist!), I'm sure she knows that. Imposing sanctions, as
always in the EU, is a matter for the sovereign Member States and the decision has to be
unanimous. Poland has already said it will not vote for sanctions, so the whole thing is a
dead letter. Secondly, the claim that Hungary "never had a colonial empire" is untrue. It
never had a colonial empire outside Europe but before 1918, it ruled over Slovakia, most of
Croatia, Transylvania, now part of Romania, and the Vojvodina, now part of Serbia (so much
for Ms Johnstone's supposed "expertise" on ex-Yugoslavia!). In general, the frantic, almost
hysterical, tone of the article suggests that Ms Johnstone doesn't believe that Viktor Orban
is going to be the cause of the imminent and inevitable demise of the hated EU that she has
been predicting for as long as I have been reading her articles (and that goes back at least
14 years!).
@Michael Kenny The usual anti-EU propaganda that Ms Johnstone has been peddling for at
least a dozen years, although she has recently moved from claiming to be a far-leftist to
claiming to be a far-rightest. Whatever pretext "proves" the EU to be evil is trotted out!
However, she points out very clearly Viktor Orban's dilemma. The choice for Hungary is
between the EU and Putin's tanks. After 40 years of occupation by a Soviet Union in which the
ethnic Russians acted as colonial overlords and the general contempt which Hungarians have
for Slavs, choosing the latter option would be political suicide for any Hungarian leader.
Thus, Orban is stuck with the EU whether he likes it or not and the other Member States are
stuck with Orban whether they like it or not. In addition, two of Ms Johnstone's factual
claims need to be corrected. The "EU" is taking no step whatsoever to strip Hungary of its
political rights. The (according to Ms Johnstone, "largely rubber stamp") European Parliament
has adopted a resolution calling on the Member States to sanction Hungary. The EP always does
something attention-grabbing in the run up to elections and since Ms Johnstone once worked
for the European Parliament (as a far-leftist!), I'm sure she knows that. Imposing sanctions,
as always in the EU, is a matter for the sovereign Member States and the decision has to be
unanimous. Poland has already said it will not vote for sanctions, so the whole thing is a
dead letter. Secondly, the claim that Hungary "never had a colonial empire" is untrue. It
never had a colonial empire outside Europe but before 1918, it ruled over Slovakia, most of
Croatia, Transylvania, now part of Romania, and the Vojvodina, now part of Serbia (so much
for Ms Johnstone's supposed "expertise" on ex-Yugoslavia!). In general, the frantic, almost
hysterical, tone of the article suggests that Ms Johnstone doesn't believe that Viktor Orban
is going to be the cause of the imminent and inevitable demise of the hated EU that she has
been predicting for as long as I have been reading her articles (and that goes back at least
14 years!). Judging by your name, you are not a European, but an Englishman, or from
somewhere else in the Anglosphere. It is a good thing for England and especially the English
to be leaving the EuSSR, which is more of a prison than commonly realized. Ruled by a greedy
class of corrupt and, to make it worse, utterly mediocre, politicians, incompetent and stupid
bureaucrats (yes, I know this is an oxymoron) in the exclusive interest of ruthless big
corporations, human rights do not exist in the EuSSR.
Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, Europe has seen a wave of privatizations on a scale
only comparable to what happened in the former USSR. Nevertheless, taxation has increased to
a point where today, the average EuSSR "citizen" pays between 75% and 80% taxes on every Euro
he earns. The middle class is on its way to extinction. The judiciary is a joke, education
has been dismantled or stupidified, health care is a disaster, save in Southern Europe where
many doctors and nurses still have a sense of humanity.
The piece by Mrs. Johnstone may not be flawless, but it says what needs to be said.
70 years ago the Democrat party in the American South was the party of regular working
class White Southerners and promoted Southern heritage and Southern history including
Confederate history.
Then things change.
Now the national Democrat party and the Democrat party in the South hates Whites
Southerners, hates Southern heritage and Southern history and are promoting the desecration
of Confederate monuments and confederate graves.
60 years ago Hungarian was under Soviet Communist domination and Hungarian patriots looked
to the West – especially American and Great Britain to help them achieve some personal
freedom from Communism.
Now things have completely changed. It's the Wester (EU) UK BBC, American mass media that
restricts freedom and National Christianity in Hungary and pretty much everywhere else.
Russia is once again a health European Christian nation. Nobody in Hungary, Eastern Europe or
Russia wants to allow their countries to be invaded by millions of 3rd world Muslim
rapists.
So I living in Chicago IL (Obama was my neighbor) look to Hungary, Poland, Russia and
Eastern Europe for any small dose of freedom.
Not Pepe's best sauce, but always worth a read. He's best when he's reporting from the
field. His armchair geopolitics aren't that much better than anyone else's.
That said, Eurasian integration, Western Hemispheric energy independence, the populist
revolt against forced globalization/sovereignty elimination/kleptocracy and the outbreak of
global peace are all changing the chessboard profoundly. Most of the premises of traditional
imperialist power politics are simply blown away. Instead, a new 'Chinese Peace with Russian
Muscle' is the de facto hegemony in the vast bulk of the world, including parts of South
American and most of Africa. With the Brits and French too slow and stupid to react, the
Germans as weaselly and venal as ever, and the Japanese comatose, the hulk known as the G7 is
heeling over into full capsize mode. And, good riddance.
Now the G20 has to either stand up or collapse. Much depends on which outcome
develops.
However it works out, we can all stand and cheer that it is not a US dependent historical
course any more. We've ceded our moral and military leadership. Perhaps we can reform, even
if by bloody revolution, and re-emerge with something to give the rest of the world. Free
markets, liberty, democracy, freedom of thought......the future is now really a question of
whether any of these ideas will have a chance in a remade global order dominated, so far, by
dictatorship, corruption, and moral crime.
So, we tend to our own house now. Anyone got a pack of matches?
** We've ceded our moral and military leadership **
Kosovo, Iraq, Afghanistan, Benghazi, Libya, Syria, Ukraine, Georgia, NATO expansion, the
Clintoons, the Bush dynasty of mediocrity, our open border, offshoring, Muslim ass kissing,
free-ranging Antifa filth, media monopoly and lies, foreigners taking university slots,
sexual confusion, ass kissing homosexuals, groveling before bat shit crazy feminists,
destruction of our basic legal document through judicial usurpation, diseased leftists
spouting lies and delusion, excusing black dysfunction, fiscal incontinence, unaddressd
monopolies, attacks on free speech, criminal immunity for elites, a president who won't
exercise his authority and tolerates insubordination, an unaccountable bureaucracy, a loose
cannon prosecutor, Jewish political domination, slobbering over Israel as though Jerusalem is
our capitol not Washington, denigration of the white majority culture, celebration of
miscegenation, degradation of marriage, our diseased educational establishment, rampant vote
fraud, illegal and unconstitutional wars, chest beating about "exceptionalism," and a
generally crap culture all say you're right.
There will be no sudden and dramatic collapse. There will only be a slow, painful,
never-ending, degrading decay into nothingness, a death from one million pundits, a process
readily apparent (literally) all around us. Tune in to CNN, see for yourself.
I see your point, but I am not convinced bankers work independently. Bankers do not have a
monopoly on psychotics. The psychotics in gov have as much greed and craving for power as the
bankers and I believe they work around, with, and against each other for various reasons just
like everything else in the world works. Thus a one dimensional theory will not be complete -
and maybe that is what you are arguing: to include bankers in geopolitics. I agree the
bankers are a big part of the rotten problem but like when I am overseas - I watch the guys
with the guns.
Most of the planet has put up with a lot of shit from America It's good that it's finally
coming to an end.
"We have about 50% of the world's wealth but only 6.3% of its population... Our real task
in the coming period is to devise a pattern of relationships which will permit us to maintain
this position of disparity without positive detriment to our national security. To do so, we
will have to dispense with all sentimentality and daydreaming, and our attention will have to
be concentrated everywhere on our immediate national objectives. We need not deceive
ourselves that we can afford today the luxury of altruism and world benefaction... We should
cease to talk about vague and unreal objectives such as human rights, the raising of the
living standards, and democratization. The day is not far off when we are going to have to
deal in straight power concepts. The less we are then hampered by idealistic slogans, the
better."
George Kennan, State Department memo, 1948
America never gave up on the idealistic slogans -- the figleaf for the Empire of Chaos.
Finally shutting the fuck up after the game is over will be welcome.
"... No wonder one of the side effects of progressive Eurasia integration will be not only a death blow to Bretton Woods but also to "democratic" neoliberalism. ..."
Alastair Crooke took a great
shot at deconstructing why Western global elites are terrified of the Russian
conceptualization of Eurasia.
It's because "they 'scent' a stealth reversion to the old, pre-Socratic values: for the
Ancients the very notion of 'man', in that way, did not exist. There were only men: Greeks,
Romans, barbarians, Syrians, and so on. This stands in obvious opposition to universal,
cosmopolitan 'man'."
So it's Heraclitus versus Voltaire – even as "humanism" as we inherited it from the
Enlightenment, is de facto over.
Whatever is left roaming our wilderness of mirrors depends on
the irascible mood swings of the Goddess of the Market.
No wonder one of the side effects of
progressive Eurasia integration will be not only a death blow to Bretton Woods but also to
"democratic" neoliberalism.
What we have now is also a remastered version of sea power versus land powers. Relentless
Russophobia is paired with supreme fear of a Russia-Germany rapprochement – as Bismarck
wanted, and as Putin
and Merkel recently hinted at. The supreme nightmare for the U.S. is in fact a truly
Eurasian Beijing-Berlin-Moscow partnership.
The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) has not even begun; according to the official Beijing
timetable, we're still in the planning phase. Implementation starts next year. The horizon is
2039.
"... I was not sure whether Trump was controlled opposition or simply a useful scapegoat for the economic crisis that globalists are clearly engineering. Now it appears that he is both. ..."
"... Many businessmen end up dealing with elitist controlled banks at some point in their careers. But when Trump entered office and proceeded to load his cabinet with ghouls from Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, the Council on Foreign Relations and give Wilber Ross the position of Commerce Secretary, it became obvious that Trump is in fact a puppet for the banks. ..."
"... If one examines the history of fake coups, there is ALWAYS an element of orchestrated division, sometimes between the globalists and their own puppets. This is called 4th Generation warfare, in which almost all divisions are an illusion and the real target is the public psyche. ..."
"... the overall picture is not as simple as "Left vs. Right." Instead, we need to look at the situation more like a chess board, and above that chess board looms the globalists, attempting to control all the necessary pieces on BOTH sides. Every provocation by leftists is designed to elicit a predictable response from conservatives to the point that we become whatever the globalists want us to become. ..."
"... Therefore it is not leftists that present the greatest threat to individual liberty, but the globalist influenced Trump administration. A failed coup on the part of the left could be used as a rationale for incremental and unconstitutional "safeguards." And conservatives may be fooled into supporting these measures as the threat is overblown. ..."
At that time I was certain that the globalists would find great use for a Trump presidency,
more so in fact than a Clinton presidency. However, I was not sure whether Trump was controlled
opposition or simply a useful scapegoat for the economic crisis that globalists are clearly
engineering. Now it appears that he is both.
Trump's history was already suspicious. He was bailed out of his considerable debts
surrounding his Taj Mahal casino in Atlantic City in the early 1990s by
Rothschild banking agent Wilber Ross , which saved him from embarrassment and
possibly saved his entire fortune . This alone was not necessarily enough to deny Trump the
benefit of the doubt in my view.
Many businessmen end up dealing with elitist controlled banks at some point in their
careers. But when Trump entered office and proceeded to load his cabinet with ghouls from
Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, the Council on Foreign Relations and give Wilber Ross the position of
Commerce Secretary, it became obvious that Trump is in fact a puppet for the banks.
Some liberty movement activists ignore this reality and attempt to argue around the facts of
Trump's associations. "What about all the media opposition to Trump? Doesn't this indicate he's
not controlled?" they say. I say, not really.
If one examines the history of fake coups, there is ALWAYS an element of orchestrated
division, sometimes between the globalists and their own puppets. This is called 4th Generation
warfare, in which almost all divisions are an illusion and the real target is the public
psyche.
This is not to say that leftist opposition to Trump and conservatives is not real. It
absolutely is. The left has gone off the ideological deep end into an abyss of rabid frothing
insanity, but the overall picture is not as simple as "Left vs. Right." Instead, we need to
look at the situation more like a chess board, and above that chess board looms the globalists,
attempting to control all the necessary pieces on BOTH sides. Every provocation by leftists is
designed to elicit a predictable response from conservatives to the point that we become
whatever the globalists want us to become.
... ... ...
As this is taking place, conservatives are growing more sensitive to the notion of a leftist
coup, from silencing of conservative voices to an impeachment of Trump based on fraudulent
ideas of "Russian collusion."
To be clear, the extreme left has no regard for individual liberties or constitutional law.
They use the Constitution when it suits them, then try to tear it down when it doesn't suit
them. However, the far-left is also a paper tiger; it is not a true threat to conservative
values because its membership marginal, it is weak, immature and irrational. Their only power
resides in their influence within the mainstream media, but with the MSM fading in the face of
the alternative media, their social influence is limited. It is perhaps enough to organize a
"coup," but it would inevitably be a failed coup.
Therefore it is not leftists that present the greatest threat to individual liberty, but the
globalist influenced Trump administration. A failed coup on the part of the left could be used
as a rationale for incremental and unconstitutional "safeguards." And conservatives may be
fooled into supporting these measures as the threat is overblown.
I have always said that the only people that can destroy conservative principles are
conservatives. Conservatives diminish their own principles every time they abandon their
conscience and become exactly like the monsters they hope to defeat. And make no mistake, the
globalists are well aware of this strategy.
Carroll Quigley, a pro-globalist professor and the author of Tragedy and Hope, a book
published decades ago which outlined the plan for a one world economic and political system, is
quoted in his address ' Dissent: Do We Need It
':
"They say, "The Congress is corrupt." I ask them, "What do you know about the Congress? Do
you know your own Congressman's name?" Usually they don't. It's almost a reflex with them,
like seeing a fascist pig in a policeman. To them, all Congressmen are crooks. I tell them
they must spend a lot of time learning the American political system and how it functions,
and then work within the system. But most of them just won't buy that. They insist the system
is totally corrupt. I insist that the system, the establishment, whatever you call it, is so
balanced by diverse forces that very slight pressures can produce perceptible results.
For example, I've talked about the lower middle class as the backbone of fascism in the
future. I think this may happen. The party members of the Nazi Party in Germany were
consistently lower middle class. I think that the right-wing movements in this country are
pretty generally in this group."
Is a "failed coup" being staged in order to influence conservatives to become the very
"fascists" the left accuses us of being? The continuing narrative certainly suggests that this
is the game plan.
* * *
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"... For dessert today, I offer Russia's Grand Strategy Revisited published on the 24th. The Outlaw US Empire is in the midst of a Seldon Crisis but lacks the means to even recognize the spectacular mess its made for itself, much of which is quite visibly articulated in its NDS I linked to above. ..."
"... By every metric I've observed, the USA's citizenry from all political POVs wants a return to Reality for that's the only basis from which to address and solve the many domestic problems. ..."
Too Funny!
Trump whines, threatens pullout from WTO again! After decades of bullying
nations and impoverishing their people, other nations are using the Outlaw
US Empire's WTO as a weapon against it, so Trump cries Unfair! As I wrote
above, Big Money's trapped within its own web.
The "Softies" are yet another entity in the Smoke & Mirrors Fun House
designed to fool and gain citizenry's consent to be robbed blind.
Russians already went through that and are very wary as illustrated by
the very sensitive nature of the recent
Pension System Reform Debate and legislation that Putin had to solve
using his political capital.
As with all politicians, you won't know what you elected until you learn
how your rep votes issues, although some can be anticipated by examining
their past behavior as with our pseudo Democrat-Socialist.
For dessert today, I offer Russia's
Grand Strategy Revisited published on the 24th. The Outlaw US
Empire is in the midst of a Seldon Crisis but lacks the means to even recognize
the spectacular mess its made for itself, much of which is quite visibly
articulated in its NDS I linked to above.
By every metric I've observed, the USA's citizenry from all political
POVs wants a return to Reality for that's the only basis from which to address
and solve the many domestic problems.
Big Money refuses as its addicted to Smoke & Mirrors since that's what
was used to gain its power and will now double-down.
The powerful always want more power.
-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- –
June 26, 2016
"Brexit: Are The Serfs Finally Rebelling"?
The establishment are shocked that the ordinary people want out of the European Union
(EU). They just don't realize that people are fed up being used, abused, dictated to, lied
to, manipulated, and forced into an EU dictatorship by treacherous politicians.
These are some of the same politicians who scurry to the meetings of the so-called elites
in Davos, and also attend Bilderberg meetings. And many of them, when they leave politics,
finish up on the boards of banks and multi-national corporations with the rest of the
money-manipulating bandits that got bailed out with taxpayers' dollars, some of whom, I
believe, should be in jail .
"... But to an extent hardly imaginable in 2008, all the world's leading economies are locked in a perpetually escalating cycle of economic warfare. This global trade war is spearheaded by the Trump White House, which sees trade sanctions and tariffs, such as the onslaught it launched against Turkey, as an integral component of its drive to secure the United States' geopolitical and economic interests at the expense of friend and foe alike. ..."
"... But while they are deeply divided as to their economic and geo-political objectives, the capitalist ruling classes are united on one essential question. However the next stage of the ongoing breakdown of world capitalism proceeds, they will all strive by whatever means considered necessary to make the working class the world over pay for it. ..."
"... In 2008, capitalist governments around the world, above all in the US, derived enormous benefit from the decades-long suppression of the class struggle by the trade unions and the parties of the political establishment. The rescue operation they carried out on behalf of parasitic and criminal finance capital would not have been possible without it ..."
"But to an extent hardly imaginable in 2008, all the world's leading economies are locked
in a perpetually escalating cycle of economic warfare. This global trade war is spearheaded
by the Trump White House, which sees trade sanctions and tariffs, such as the onslaught it
launched against Turkey, as an integral component of its drive to secure the United States'
geopolitical and economic interests at the expense of friend and foe alike.
The character of world economy has undergone a major transformation in the past decade in
which economic growth, to the extent it that it occurs, is not driven by the development of
production and new investments but by the flow of money from one source of speculative and
parasitic activity to the next."
"But while they are deeply divided as to their economic and geo-political objectives, the
capitalist ruling classes are united on one essential question. However the next stage of the
ongoing breakdown of world capitalism proceeds, they will all strive by whatever means
considered necessary to make the working class the world over pay for it.
This is the lesson from the past decade which, in every country, has seen a deepening
attack on wages, social conditions and living standards as wealth is redistributed up the
income scale, raising social inequality to unprecedented heights.
In 2008, capitalist governments around the world, above all in the US, derived enormous
benefit from the decades-long suppression of the class struggle by the trade unions and the
parties of the political establishment. The rescue operation they carried out on behalf of
parasitic and criminal finance capital would not have been possible without it."
No matter how globalism is repackaged, it always smells the same way in the end.
For decades, the globalists have subtly (or sometimes not so subtly) been moving us toward a
world in which national borders have essentially been made meaningless . The ultimate goal, of
course, is to merge all the nations of the world into a "one world socialist utopia" with a
global government, a global economic system and even a global religion.
The European Union is a model for what the elite hope to achieve eventually on a global
scale . The individual nations still exist, but once inside the European Union you can travel
wherever you want, economic rules have been standardized across the Union, and European
institutions now have far more power than the national governments.
Liberty and freedom have been greatly restricted for the "common good", and a giant horde of
nameless, faceless bureaucrats constantly micromanages the details of daily life down to the
finest details.
With each passing day the EU becomes more Orwellian in nature, and that is why so many in
Europe are completely fed up with it.
"... Trump in fact was not the consensus candidate of the American capitalist class back to the 2016 election. So with respect to these economic policies, especially about his trade protectionist measures, these new tariffs imposed on the Chinese goods, let's put it this way: These are not, certainly not the traditional kind of neoliberal economic policy as we know it. So some sections of the American manufacturing sector [capitalists] may be happy about this. But I would say the majority of the American capitalists probably would not approve this kind of trade war against China. ..."
"... So on the Chinese part, ironically, China very much depends on these overall what Martin Wolf called liberal global order, which might better be called the model of global neoliberal capitalism. So China actually much more depends on that. ..."
"... despite whatever happened to the U.S., China would still be committed to the model of openness, committed to privatization and the financial liberalization. The Chinese government has declared new measures to open up a few economic sectors to foreign investment. ..."
"... for China to rearrange towards this kind of domestic consumption-led model of economic development, the necessary condition is that you have income, wealth redistribution towards the workers, towards poor people. And that is something that the Chinese capitalists will resist. And so that is why and so far China has not succeeded in transforming itself away from this export-led model based on exploitation of cheap labor. ..."
"... first of all, China is not socialist at all today. So income of economic sector, the [space] sector accounts for a small number, a small fraction of the overall economy, by various measurements. ..."
"... And so it's expected China will also become the world's largest importer of natural gas by the year 2019. So you are going to have China to be simultaneously the largest importer of oil, natural gas, and coal. ..."
"... let's say the Chinese government right now, even though is led by the so-called Communist Party, is actually much more committed to the neoliberal global order that the Trump administration in the U.S. ..."
"... The Trump administration of this trade protectionist policy, although not justified, it reflects fundamental social conflicts within the U.S. itself, and that probably cannot be sorted out by the Americans' current political system. ..."
"... So the overall neoliberal regime has become much more unstable. ..."
PAUL JAY: Welcome to The Real News Network. I'm Paul Jay.
The Financial Times chief economic columnist Martin Wolf has called Trump's trade wars with
Europe and Canada, but obviously the big target is China, he's called this a war on the liberal
world order. Well, what does this mean for China? China's strategy, the distinct road to
socialism which seems to take a course through various forms of state hypercapitalism. What
does this mean for China? The Chinese strategy was developed in what they thought would be a
liberal world order. Now it may not be that at all.
Now joining us to discuss what the trade war means for China, and to have a broader
conversation on just what is the Chinese model of state capitalism is Minqi Li, who now joins
us from Utah. Minqi is the professor, is a professor of economics at the University of Utah.
He's the author of The Rise of China and the Demise of the Capitalist World Economy, and the
editor of Red China website. Thanks for joining us again, Minqi.
MINQI LI: Thank you, Paul.
PAUL JAY: So I don't think anyone, including the Chinese, was expecting President Trump to
be president Trump. But once he was elected, it was pretty clear that Trump and Bannon and the
various cabal around Trump, the plan was twofold. One, regime change in Iran, which also has
consequences for China. And trade war with China. It was declared that they were going to take
on China and change in a fundamental way the economic relationship with China and the United
States. And aimed, to a large extent, trying to deal with the rise of China as an equal, or
becoming equal, economy, and perhaps someday in the not-too-distant future an equal global
power, certainly as seen through the eyes of not just Trumpians in Washington, but much of the
Washington political and economic elites.
So what does this mean for China's strategy now? Xi Jinping is now the leader of the party,
leader of the government, put at a level virtually equal to Mao Tse-tung. But his plan for
development of the Chinese economy did not, I don't think, factor in a serious trade war with
the United States.
MINQI LI: OK. As you said, Trump was not expected. Which meant that Trump in fact was not
the consensus candidate of the American capitalist class back to the 2016 election. So with
respect to these economic policies, especially about his trade protectionist measures, these
new tariffs imposed on the Chinese goods, let's put it this way: These are not, certainly not
the traditional kind of neoliberal economic policy as we know it. So some sections of the
American manufacturing sector [capitalists] may be happy about this. But I would say the
majority of the American capitalists probably would not approve this kind of trade war against
China.
Now, on the Chinese part, and we know that China has been on these parts, there was
capitalist development, and moreover it has been based on export-led economic growth model and
with exploitation of cheap labor. So on the Chinese part, ironically, China very much depends
on these overall what Martin Wolf called liberal global order, which might better be called the
model of global neoliberal capitalism. So China actually much more depends on that.
And so you have, indeed there are serious trade conflicts between China and U.S. that will,
of course, undermine China's economic model. And so far China has responded to these new
threats of trade war by promising that China, despite whatever happened to the U.S., China
would still be committed to the model of openness, committed to privatization and the financial
liberalization. The Chinese government has declared new measures to open up a few economic
sectors to foreign investment.
Now, with respect to the trade itself, at the moment the U.S. has imposed tariffs on, 25
percent tariffs on the worth of $34 billion of Chinese goods. And then Trump has threatened to
impose new tariffs on the additional $200 billion worth of Chinese goods. But this amount at
the moment is still a small part of China's economy, about 3 percent of the Chinese GDP. So the
impact at the moment is limited, but certainly has created a lot of uncertainty for the global
and the Chinese business community.
PAUL JAY: So given that this trade war could, one, get a lot bigger and a lot more serious,
and/or even if they kind of patch it up for now, there's a lot of forces within the United
States, both for economic and geopolitical reasons. Economic being the discussion about China
taking American intellectual property rights, becoming the new tech sector hub of the world,
even overpassing the American tech sector, which then has geopolitical implications; especially
when it comes to the military. If China becomes more advanced the United States in artificial
intelligence as applied to the military, that starts to, at least in American geopolitical
eyes, threaten American hegemony around the world.
There are a lot of reasons building up, and it's certainly not new, and it's not just Trump.
For various ways, the Americans want to restrain China. Does this start to make the Chinese
think that they need to speed up the process of becoming more dependent on their own domestic
market and less interested in exporting cheap labor? But for that to happen Chinese wages have
to go up a lot more significantly, which butts into the interests of the Chinese billionaire
class.
MINQI LI: I think you are right. And so for China to rearrange towards this kind of domestic
consumption-led model of economic development, the necessary condition is that you have income,
wealth redistribution towards the workers, towards poor people. And that is something that the
Chinese capitalists will resist. And so that is why and so far China has not succeeded in
transforming itself away from this export-led model based on exploitation of cheap labor.
PAUL JAY: You know, there's some sections of the left in various parts of the world that do
see the Chinese model as a more rational version of capitalism, and do see this because they've
maintained the control of the Chinese Communist Party over the politics, and over economic
planning, that do see this idea that this is somehow leading China towards a kind of socialism.
If nothing else, a more rational planned kind of capitalism. Is that, is there truth to
this?
MINQI LI: Well, first of all, China is not socialist at all today. So income of economic
sector, the [space] sector accounts for a small number, a small fraction of the overall
economy, by various measurements.
And then regarding the rationality of China's economic model, you might put it this way: The
Chinese capitalists might be more rational than the American capitalists in the sense that they
still use most of their profits for investment, instead of just financial speculation. So that
might be rational from the capitalist perspective. But on the other hand, regarding the
exploitation of workers- and the Chinese workers still have to work under sweatshop conditions-
and regarding the damage to the environment, the Chinese model is not rational at all.
PAUL JAY: My understanding of people that think this model works better, at least, than some
of the other capitalist models is that there's a need to go through this phase of Chinese
workers, yes, working in sweatshop conditions, and yes, wages relatively low. But overall, the
Chinese economy has grown by leaps and bounds, and China's position in the world is more and
more powerful. And this creates the situation, as more wealth accumulates, China is better
positioned to address some of the critical issues facing China and the world. And then, as bad
as pollution is, and such, China does appear to be out front in terms of developing green
technologies, solar, sustainable technology.
MINQI LI: OK. Now, Chinese economy has indeed been growing rapidly. It used to grow like
double-digit growth rate before 2010. But now China's growth rate has slowed down just under 7
percent in recent years, according to the official statistics. And moreover, a significant part
of China's growth these days derives rom the real estate sector development. And so there has
been this discussion about this growing housing market bubble. And it used to be that this
housing price inflation was limited to a few big cities. But for the first half of 2018,
according to the latest data, the national average housing price has grown by 11 percent
compared to the same period last year. And that translates into a pace of doubling every six
years.
And so that has generated lots of social resentment. And so not only the working class these
days are priced out of the housing market. Moreover, even the middle class is increasingly
priced out of the housing market. So that is the major concern. And in the long run, I think
that China's current model of accumulation will also face the challenge of growing social
conflicts. Worker protests. As well as resources constrained and environmental damage. And
regarding the issue of China's investment in renewable energy, it is true. China is the largest
investor in renewable energy development, in the solar panels. And although China is of all the
largest investor in about everything.
And so China is still the largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, accounting for
almost 30 percent of the total carbon dioxide emissions in the world every year. And then
China's own oil production in decline, but China's oil consumption is still rising. So as a
result, China has become the world's largest oil importer. That could make the Chinese economy
vulnerable to the next major oil price shock.
PAUL JAY: And how seriously is climate change science taken in China? If one takes the
science seriously, one sees the need for urgent transformation to green technology. An urgent
reduction of carbon emission. Not gradual, not incremental, but urgent. Did the Chinese- I
mean, it's not, it's so not taken seriously in the United States that a climate denier can get
elected president. But did the Chinese take this more seriously? Because you don't get the
same, any sense of urgency about their policy, either.
MINQI LI: Well, yeah. So like many other governments, the Chinese government also pays lip
service to the obligation of climate stabilization. But unfortunately, with respect to policy,
with respect to mainstream media, it's not taken very seriously within China. And so although
China's carbon dioxide emissions actually stabilized somewhat over the past few years, but is
starting to grow again in 2017, and I expect it will continue to grow in the coming year.
PAUL JAY: I mean, I can understand why, for example, Russia is not in any hurry to buy into
climate change science. Its whole economy depends on oil. Canada also mostly pays lip service
because the Alberta tar sands is so important to the Canadian economy. Shale oil is so
important to the American economy, as well as the American oil companies own oil under the
ground all over the world. But China is not an oil country. You know, they're not dependent on
oil income. You'd think it'd be in China's interest to be far more aggressive, not only in
terms of how good it looks to the world that China would be the real leader in mitigating,
reducing, eliminating the use of carbon-based fuels, but still they're not. I mean, not at the
rate scientists say needs to be done.
MINQI LI: Not at all. Although China does not depend on all on oil for income, but China
depends on coal a lot. And the coal is still something like 60 percent of China's overall
energy consumption. And so it's still very important for China's energy.
PAUL JAY: What- Minqi, where does the coal mostly come from? Don't they import a lot of that
coal?
MINQI LI: Mostly from China itself. Even though, you know, China is the world's largest coal
producer, on top of that China is either the largest or the second-largest coal importer in the
world market as well. And then on top of that, China is also consuming an increasing amount of
oil and natural gas, especially natural gas. And so although natural gas is not as polluting as
coal, it's still polluting. And so it's expected China will also become the world's largest
importer of natural gas by the year 2019. So you are going to have China to be simultaneously
the largest importer of oil, natural gas, and coal.
PAUL JAY: The Chinese party, just to get back to the trade war issue and to end up with, the
idea of this Chinese nation standing up, Chinese sovereignty, Chinese nationalism, it's a
powerful theme within this new Chinese discourse. I'm not saying Chinese nationalism is new,
but it's got a whole new burst of energy. How does China, if necessary to reach some kind of
compromise with the United States on the trade war, how does China do that without looking like
it's backing down to Trump?
MINQI LI: Well, yes, difficult task for the Chinese party to balance. What they have been
right now is that on the one hand they promise to the domestic audience they are not going to
make concessions towards the U.S., while in fact they are probably making concessions. And then
on the other hand the outside world, and they make announcement that they will not change from
the reform and openness policy, which in practice means that they will not change from the
neoliberal direction of China's development, and they will continue down the path towards
financial liberalization. And so that is what they are trying to balance right now.
PAUL JAY: I said finally, but this is finally. Do the Americans have a case? Does the Trump
argument have a legitimate case that the Chinese, on the one hand, want a liberal world order
in terms of trade, and open markets, and such? On the other hand are not following intellectual
property law, property rights and law, the way other advanced capitalist countries supposedly
do. Is there something to that case?
MINQI LI: Well, you know, let's say the Chinese government right now, even though is led
by the so-called Communist Party, is actually much more committed to the neoliberal global
order that the Trump administration in the U.S. - but I don't want to make justifications
for the neoliberal global order. But let's put it this way: The Trump administration of
this trade protectionist policy, although not justified, it reflects fundamental social
conflicts within the U.S. itself, and that probably cannot be sorted out by the Americans'
current political system.
PAUL JAY: So the crisis- you know, when you look at the American side and the Chinese side,
including the deep debt bomb people talk about in China, there really is no sorting out of this
crisis.
MINQI LI: So the overall neoliberal regime has become much more unstable.
PAUL JAY: All right. Thanks for joining us, Minqi. I hope we can pick this up again
soon.
MINQI LI: OK. Thank you.
PAUL JAY: Thank you for joining us on The Real News Network.
"... Gilbert Doctorow is an independent political analyst based in Brussels. His latest book, "Does the United States Have a Future?" was published on 12 October 2017. Both paperback and e-book versions are available for purchase on http://www.amazon.com and all affiliated Amazon websites worldwide. See the recent professional review http://theduran.com/does-the-united-states-have-a-future-a-new-book-by-gilbert-doctorow-review/ For a video of the book presentation made at the National Press Club, Washington, D.C. on 7 December 2017 see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ciW4yod8upg ..."
Tharoor quotes from New York Times columnist David Brooks who concluded that Trump's behavior was that "of a man who
wants the alliance to fail." He quotes extensively from Guy Verhofstadt, a former Belgian prime minister and leader of the Liberal
political fraction in the European Parliament fighting for a much more integrated EU, who sees Trump as the enemy of liberal internationalism
and ally of his own alt right enemies in Europe.
Tharoor also brings into play Martin Wolf of the Financial Times , who delivered a scathing attack on Trump for his rejection
of the West: " today the U.S. president appears hostile to core American values of democracy, freedom and the rule of law; he feels
no loyalty to allies; he rejects open markets; and he despises international institutions."
In the 23 July issue of "Today's World View," Tharoor takes advantage of the time gone by since Helsinki to refine the conclusions.
He offers a pithy commentary from Susan Glasser of The New Yorker : "We are witnessing nothing less than the breakdown of
American foreign policy."
In the same issue, Tharoor notes that public reaction to Trump in Helsinki is less pronounced than one might suppose from reading
the pundits. He offers the following remarks of colleagues on the results of a recent poll: "Most Americans do not feel Trump went
'too far' in supporting Puitn, and while more Americans say U.S. leadership has gotten weaker than stronger under Trump, his ratings
on this question are slightly improved from last fall."
If we go back in time to the days following Trump's visit to the NATO gathering in Brussels, we find in the headlines of the 11
July issue another take on what Trump is doing:
"Trump's NATO trip shows 'America First' is 'America Alone.'"
Here we read about Trump's insistence that America "stop footing Europe's bill" for its defense, namely his demand that all NATO
allies pay up 2% of GDP at once, not in the remote future; and that they prepare to double that to 4% very quickly. By intentional
abrasiveness, these moves by Trump are, Tharoor tells us, "undercutting the post-World War II order in pursuit of short-term, and
likely illusory, wins."
All of these comments address the question of what Trump opposes. However, Tharoor is unable to say what, if anything, Trump stands
for. There are only hints: continued US hegemony but without the ideological cover; might makes right; nationalism and the disputes
that lead to war.
Does this make sense? Or is it just another way of saying that Trump's foreign policy stance is an inconsistent patchwork, illogical
and doomed to fail while causing much pain and destruction along the way?
I fully agree with the proposition that Donald Trump is ripping up the post-Cold War international order and is seeking to end
NATO and the rest of the alliance system by which the United States has maintained its global hegemony for decades. But I believe
this destructive side is guided by a creative vision of where he wants to take US foreign policy.
This new foreign policy of Donald Trump is based on an uncompromising reading of the teachings of the Realist School of international
affairs, such as we have not seen since the days of President Teddy Roosevelt, who was its greatest practitioner in US history.
This is not isolationism, because Trump is acting to defend what he sees as US national interests in foreign trade everywhere
and in geopolitics in one or another part of the world. However, it is a world in which the US is cut free from the obligations of
its alliances which entail maintenance of overseas bases everywhere at the cost of more than half its defense budget. He wants to
end the risks of being embroiled in regional wars that serve our proxies, not core US national interests. And he is persuaded that
by a further build-up of military might at home, by adding new hi-tech materiel the US can secure its interests abroad best of all.
I reach these conclusions from the snippets of Trump remarks which appear in the newspapers of daily record but are intentionally
left as unrelated and anecdotal, whereas when slotted together they establish the rudiments of an integrated worldview and policy.
For example, I take his isolated remark that the United States should not be prepared to go to war to defend Montenegro, which
recently passed NATO accession, because Montenegro had been a trouble-maker in the past. That remark underwent virtually no analysis
in the media, though it could be made only by someone who understood, remarkably, the role of Montenegro at the Russian imperial
court of Nicholas II precisely as "troublemaker," whose dynastic family aided in their own small way the onset of WWI.
Donald Trump is not a public speaker. He is not an intellectual. We cannot expect him to issue some "Trump Doctrine" setting out
his Realist conception of the geopolitical landscape. All we get is Tweets. This inarticulate side of Trump has been used by his
enemies to argue he has no policy.
In fact, Trump is the only Realist on the landscape.
Going back to 2016, I thought he was being guided by Henry Kissinger during the campaign and then in the first months of his presidency,
I misjudged entirely. Trump is true to the underlying principles of Realism without compromise, whereas Henry K. made his peace with
the prevailing Wilsonian Idealism of the American Establishment a couple of decades ago in order to remain welcome in the Oval Office
and not to be entirely marginalized.
Trump's vision of Realism draws from the source in the Treaty of Westphalia, 1648 with its guiding concept of sovereign nation-states
that do not intervene in others' domestic affairs. It further draws on the notions of raison d'état or national interest
developed by the French court of Louis XIV and then taken further by "perfidious Albion" in the eighteenth century, with temporary
and ever changing combinations of states in balance of power realignments of competitors. The history of the Realist School
was set out magnificently by Kissinger in his 1994 work Diplomacy . It is a pity that the master himself strayed from true
and narrow.
In all of this, you have the formula for Trump's respect, even admiration for Putin, since that also is now Vladimir Vladimirovich's
concept of Russia's way forward: as a strong sovereign state that sets its own course without the constraints of alliances and based
on its own military might.
The incredible thing is how a man with such poor communication skills, a man who does not read much came to such an integrated
vision that outstrips the conceptual abilities of his enemies, his friends and everyone in between.
We are tempted to look for a mentor, and one who comes to mind is Steve Bannon, who is very articulate, razor-sharp in his intellect
and who provided Trump with much of the domestic content of his 2016 campaign from the alt right playbook. And though Bannon publicly
broke with Trump in their falling out over his ever diminishing role in the Administration, Bannon's ongoing project, in particular
his Movement to influence European politics and shift it to the Right by coordinating activities across the Continent during the
parliamentary elections of May 2019, very closely parallel what Trump's ambassador in Berlin seems to be doing in Trump's name.
It may well be that the President and his confidantes find it prudent for him to play the hapless fool, the clueless disrupter
of the global political landscape until he has the support in Congress to roll out the new foreign policy that is now in gestation.
The logical consequence of such a Realist approach to foreign policy will be to reach an understanding with the world's other
two principal military powers, Russia and China, regarding respective spheres of influence in their geographic proximity. But I do
not believe we will see a G-3 succeeding America's unipolar moment. Given the predispositions of both Russia and China, we are more
likely to see a broader board of governors of global policy in the form of the G-20, ushering in the multipolar age. In such a formulation,
regional conflicts will be settled locally by the interested parties and with the major powers involved only as facilitators, not
parties to conflict. That promises a much more stable and peaceful future, something which none of Donald Trump's detractors can
begin to imagine as his legacy.
trump has wrecked environmental policy, trade policy and domestic social policy....the
upshots will be: 1- a much more toxic environment & much higher level of respiratory
disease and cancerous related ailments; overall poorer health & health care for the
average citizen 2- higher prices for imported goods, lower level of trade exports, fewer US
based jobs and more off-shoring of US jobs 3- a substantial increase in the homeless
population in the urban areas of this country; increased rates of poverty for the poor, lower
economic prosperity for the lower and lower middle class income brackets; wage stagnation for
the middle & upper middle income brackets; less advanced education & lower worker
productivity and innovation to name just a few of the impacts created by this idiot....in
simple in English, Trump and his so-called initiatives are shafting this country in almost
every way possible
What part of international law is not just pissed on toiler paper strewn over the floors of a
urinal? Which post WWII president respected this law?
None.
International law, since WWII failed. It failed in '47 when no referendum was held in
Palestine - against Chapter 1, Article 1 paragraph 2 of the UN Charter. It failed in Crimea,
when the results of such a referendum was spat on by the previous war criminal to sit in the
Oval Office. It fails now as sanctions are used unilaterally - being equivalent to the use of
force in result, they should be
But then let's not stop at after the war. The US is the only country to nuke civilians.
6/7 US four star generals at the time said the action had no strategic or tactical purpose
whatsoever.
The US is what ISIS dreams to be, the sooner it falls into obscurity the better.
Pure nonsense. The Great Depression began on October 29, 1929. FDR was inaugurated on March
4, 1933 nearly 4 years after it began. Hoover had actually only been in office for just over
6 months before Black Tuesday. GDP began growing and unemployment began falling in 1933
shortly after FDR took office. The Depression officially came to an end in 1939 when GDP
returned to pre-Depression levels.
There is no long term US growth. There is a debt default after people realize the fact that
the top of the whole US government is incompetent. That it has chained itself to such
astronomic liabilities for useless wars (as the Empire has not succeeded in world hegemony),
is even sadder. It coould have spent the $5tn of Iraq and Afghanistan on building shit, but
instead it bombed shit.
Trump doesn't matter for US long run - in 5-10 years time the country will be only found
in history books.
Remember Kruschev's (sp?) last words on leaving office, and I'm paraphrasing: "Don't worry
about America, they'll spend themselves to death (just like we have)". Continued economic
growth is a wet dream of Wall Street origin. We are massively overpopulated and rapidly using
up earth's natural resources at an increasingly unsustainable rate. We must begin to reduce
our growth, not keep increasing it. Population density stress is killing us now and only
increasing every day along with the 220,000 new mouths to feed that we are turning out into a
world that has no room for 28,000,000 homeless migrants already. Just how crazy are we
really. If this article is to be believed, we are nuts. E.F. Schumacher is rolling in his
grave! Stress R Us
The contribution of a president to the national debt depends a bit on how you calculate it.
You could simply look at rhe dates of inauguration or go a step further and look at the
fiscal years. For the latter see :
In absolute terms Obama is indeed at the top of the list, percentagewise his predecessor
played a larger part. No matter how you look at it or what the causes were, under Bush and
Obama the U.S. debt seems to have spiralled out of of control and Trump is doing bugger all
to stop that trend.
For consider the fruits of free trade policy during the last 25 years : the frozen wages of
U.S. workers, $12 trillion in U.S. trade deficits, 55,000 factories lost, 6 million
manufacturing jobs gone, China surpassing the U.S in manufacturing, all causing a backlash that
pushed a political novice to the Republican nomination and into the presidency.
To maintain a belief in the superiority of free trade to economic patriotism, in the face of
such results, is to recognize that this belief system is impervious to contradictory proof.
The sad reality that I see all around is that Western civilization has been hijacked by
degenerate hyenas like Rome was sacked from within first before being sacked externally. The
institutions that once made the West a leader and a model, have been corrupted, tainted and
filled with anti-humanists and crony corporatists. Greed is out of control and "popular
culture" is spreading decay. The hollowing out will continue until these parasites find
another host to leech off. Will it be China? Will it be a global government? Will it be
another planet? Who knows.
Once upon a time figures like Rosenstein, Mueller, Brennan, Browder, Clapper, Clinton etc
would be just fucking taken out or punished. Instead of that, they get to wander their toxic
asses around like protected peacocks, all on tax payers dime, with their shitty agendas, and
their shitty handlers cheering on the degeneracy and assault on the truth and the people.
If this is what "civilization" has boiled down to, count me the fuck out of it. The 5000
year old human farming experiment is merely switching straight jackets. Its the same old
story that ever was, ever since we gave up the nomadic lifestyle. In a way, its probably an
inevitability, given our flawed human nature, and the size of the population....and average
intellect. The desire to be 'lead' by some ruling class, no matter what flavour of 'ism' it
is, eventually all turns to the same end result....shit. Unless this global awakening can
muster into a force to be reckoned with, and not be swayed by divide and conquer tactics,
nothing will change. So far with the toxic Left vs Right divide, and countless other divides,
the only beneficiaries of this are the ones at the top of the pyramid.
Pat Buchanan: Are Globalists Plotting A Counter-Revolution?
HopefulCynical : Is the sky blue? Is water wet? Is fire hot?
FFS, look at the goddamn purge on (((Social media))). Of COURSE the (((globalists))) are
attempting a counter-revolution.
We all need to move to alt-tech: Minds , Gab , Bitchute . Even if you don't have a
(((social media))) presence, consider getting an alt-media presence. We've been wondering
when the next phase would begin, whewn it would be time to take further action. Well, it's
here.
First step in this next phase is to set up multiple lines of communication not under
(((establishment))) control. Even if you seldom use them, set up accounts; advise those you
know to do likewise. Wanna see the establishment panic? If they see the subscriber count for
the alt-tech sites suddenly quadruple (or more) in response to their purge, they'll shit
themselves. They'll probably attempt to pull domain registrars and financial processing
services from those sites.
Then - the motherfucking games begin, bitchez.
[EDIT:] According to Styx, the alt-tech sites are already seeing a surge in membership.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZP1fwkdupg
Let the (((establishment))) diaper-filling begin!
But will "negotiations" and regulatory loosening on issues like the environment and worker
safety, which have gotten out of hand in the US to the disadvantage of underemployed
citizens, offset the extremely low wages offered to Asian and Latin American workers in the
countries where American-owned companies shipped over 6 million jobs, canceling out the
SS-retirement fund contributions that would have been made by American workers [and]
employers if the jobs had been kept here?
Cheap labor seems to TRUMP everything with US employers.
Running from the SS trust fund might be another reason for their abandonment of
America.
Cheap labor Trumps everything here in the USA, too, and the cheap-labor pool is aided and
abetted by the welfare system. That is why US employers prefer an often extremely absentee
welfare and progressive-tax-code-subsidized labor market, receiving .gov-financed monthly
bills and up to $6,431 in refundable child-tax-credit cash for US-born instant-citizen
kids.
Contrary to myth, hard work, daily and all-day attendance and even work productivity, like
every-month quota meeting, is NOT preferred by American employers for most of the jobs left
here in the USA.
The welfare-eligible 42 million are (on the books) not hard workers, but part-time
workers, staying under the income limits for welfare programs. I KNOW that from working at
the Department of Human Services, where single moms and the womb-productive girlfriends of
illegal and legal immigrants MUST submit proof of a single-breadwinner's part-time, traceable
earnings to get the free stuff.
The earnings must fall below the income limits for welfare programs that ALWAYS reward
part-time work in womb-productive single-breadwinner households of citizens and noncitizens.
You cannot work full time in a minimum-wage job while meeting the income limits. When I
worked at DHS, both the EBT and monthly cash assistance income limits were BELOW $900 per
month......
Even if Trump eventually lures US corporations back here with looser regulations and tax
cuts, rather than just unleashing a stock buy-back spree, it will not matter to the 101
million American citizens of working age who are out of the labor force and the 78 million
gig pieceworkers, not if this welfare-rigged labor market of citizens and noncitizens
continues to be the norm.
You cannot compete with a bigly labor market full of welfare-fetching citizens &
noncitizens who do not need pay sufficient to cover rent due to their womb production.
Only a Deplorables First immigration reform would address that issue, including a big
reduction in the number of welfare-eligible legal immigrants let in each year. The number 1.5
million is too many. This -- no more and no less than illegal immigration -- keeps wages
down, but the illegal immigration has the added bonus of making America more dangerous.
The impasse on the immigration issue is the reason why I am skeptical of the value of
current trade-war maneuvering, even though I am glad that Trump is addressing that general
issue.
The other thing that complicates this trade war is the way that globalist elites have sold
America out over the years, not just destroying the middle class with all of this offshoring
and welfare-supported illegal labor, but also getting the US economy 1) waist-deep in debt,
2) dependent on foreign investment and 3) subject to getting jerked around by Machiavellian
currency manipulation that non-math people, like me, really don't understand.
It sounds kind of dangerous, though, even just the argument that Stockman makes about
China being a house of cards that, if it came down, could have unintended consequences for
the US.
I have no idea. But I do know that many of the people who voted for Trump are pretty
adamant about the immigration issue, first and foremost, regarding it as an easier and less
risky thing to get done as well.
Maybe, the children-at-the-border Movie of the Week has convinced most Trump voters to
stay on the train, thinking something permanent has been done to contain the flow of
welfare-rewarded illegal immigration.
I think many of the teenagers, released into the country to live with extended family or
in foster care, will, in a few years, be entering the labor force as part-time workers,
producing instant-citizen kids and getting free monthly bills and refundable child-tax-credit
cash from .gov, while citizens like me will still face rent that eats up over half of our
monthly, earned-only income from low-wage churn jobs.
As much of an enthusiastic Trump voter as I have been, going back a long way, I am not
sure that I am going to vote in the mid-term general election. I am not going to vote for
this Tammany Hall II Democratic Party, but I may just stay home.
There are many populists out there, not just on the right either, who are disgruntled for
very real reasons, like this interesting article explains, so there will likely be wave after
wave of non-centrist populism until globalism's shoreline has been redefined.
Hmmm, weird, when I loaded the other link, it conformed to the format of this text box,
but then when I loaded the link above this last paragraph, it reverted to cutting off the
text on the side. Until I post it, I cannot see the full text after links are added.
"The few who understand the system, will either be so interested in its profits, or so
dependent on it favors that there will be no opposition from that class, while on the other
hand, the great body of people mentally incapable of comprehending the tremendous
advantages...will bear its burden without complaint and perhaps without suspecting that the
system is inimical to their best interests."
-Rothschild Brothers of London communique' to associates in New York June 25th, 1863.
The Difference.
J. Speer-Willams
June 16, 2010.
New-Cons. Love War & torture, increased regulations, tyranny and taxes; with our taxes
going to the plutocrats of the private banking community. They support governmental
destruction of our environment, under the pretender of protecting it. They, also, overtly
support corporatism (Fascism for Oligarchs) and any measures supported by the Republican
Party that enrich the private International Monetary / Banking Cartel at the expensive of
the. American People.
New- Libs. Love War & torture, increased regulations, tyranny and taxes; with our
taxes going to the plutocrats of the private banking community. They support governmental
destruction of our environment, under the pretender of protecting it. They, also, overtly
support corporatism (Socialism for Oligarchs) and any measures supported by the Democratic
Party that enrich the private International Monetary / Banking Cartel at the expensive of
the. American People.
The economics of the neoliberal era had a fundamental flaw.
The 1920s roared with debt based consumption and speculation until it all tipped over into
the debt deflation of the Great Depression. No one realised the problems that were building
up in the economy as they used an economics that doesn't look at private debt, neoclassical
economics.
I think Pat also gets this sentence wrong and if so I say he misses details we would like
to see
This is truly economics uber alles, economy before country.
The University Economist programs/studies were more oriented toward people in the old
days. Economics today is used to justify Wall Street type finance and ideology. Economic
study was hijacked to serve only those looking to get rich any way they can. CFR agenda comes
to mind. Globalism comes to mind also and is an attack on all nations constitutions.
The Americans have been discovering the problems of running an economy with bad
economics.
Economics was always far too dangerous to be allowed to reveal the truth about the
economy.
The Classical economist, Adam Smith, observed the world of small state, unregulated
capitalism around him.
"The labour and time of the poor is in civilised countries sacrificed to the maintaining
of the rich in ease and luxury. The Landlord is maintained in idleness and luxury by the
labour of his tenants. The moneyed man is supported by his extractions from the industrious
merchant and the needy who are obliged to support him in ease by a return for the use of his
money. But every savage has the full fruits of his own labours; there are no landlords, no
usurers and no tax gatherers."
How does this tie in with the trickledown view we have today?
Somehow everything has been turned upside down.
The workers that did the work to produce the surplus lived a bare subsistence
existence.
Those with land and money used it to live a life of luxury and leisure.
The bankers (usurers) created money out of nothing and charged interest on it. The bankers
got rich, and everyone else got into debt and over time lost what they had through defaults
on loans, and repossession of assets.
Capitalism had two sides, the productive side where people earned their income and the
parasitic side where the rentiers lived off unearned income. The Classical Economists had
shown that most at the top of society were just parasites feeding off the productive activity
of everyone else.
Economics was always far too dangerous to be allowed to reveal the truth about the
economy.
How can we protect those powerful vested interests at the top of society?
The early neoclassical economists hid the problems of rentier activity in the economy by
removing the difference between "earned" and "unearned" income and they conflated "land" with
"capital". They took the focus off the cost of living that had been so important to the
Classical Economists to hide the effects of rentier activity in the economy.
The landowners, landlords and usurers were now just productive members of society
again.
It they left banks and debt out of economics no one would know the bankers created the
money supply out of nothing. Otherwise, everyone would see how dangerous it was to let
bankers do what they wanted if they knew the bankers created the money supply through their
loans.
The powerful vested interests held sway and economics was corrupted.
Now we know what's wrong with neoclassical economics we can put the cost of living back
in.
Disposable income = wages – (taxes + the cost of living)
Employees want more disposable income (discretionary spending)
Employers want to pay lower wages for higher profits
The cost of living = housing costs + healthcare costs + student loan costs + food + other
costs of living
The neoliberals obsessed about reducing taxes, but let the cost of living soar.
The economists also ignore the debt that is papering over the cracks and maintaining
demand in the economy. This can never work in the longer term as you max. out on debt.
The problem is the US has lost citizenry-control. A shadow-government along with media
operatives work unseen to manipulate sentiment and events in-line with an overall globalist,
world-government objective (Neo-Marxism). The so-called elites behind the curtain are after
total control which is why we will continue toward totalitarian dictatorship. It will not be
a one-man show nor will it be readily recognizable as such, rather there will be a secretive
Cabal of select ultra-wealthy liberals who will negotiate with each other as to which levers
to pull and valves to turn in order to "guide" culture and civilization. But the tightknit
Cabal has more work to do to infiltrate deeper into US (and world) government. The EU's
Parliament is a proto-type test to tweak how they must proceed. As the Cabal coalesces their
power, more draconian rulership will become apparent. The noose will tighten slowly so as to
be un-noticeable and unstoppable. Certain events are planned that will cause citizenry to
demand totalitarianism (for safety reasons). For the Cabal, it'll be like taking candy from a
baby. This, in a nutshell, is the outline of how the US (and Western civilization) loses its
democracy.
Understanding how trillions of trade dollars influence geopolitical policy we begin to
understand the three-decade global financial construct they seek to protect.
That is, global financial exploitation of national markets. FOUR BASIC ELEMENTS :
♦Multinational corporations purchase controlling interests in various national
outputs and industries of developed industrial western nations.
♦The Multinational Corporations making the purchases are underwritten by massive
global financial institutions, multinational banks.
♦The Multinational Banks and the Multinational Corporations then utilize lobbying
interests to manipulate the internal political policy of the targeted nation state(s).
♦With control over the targeted national industry or interest, the multinationals
then leverage export of the national asset (exfiltration) through trade agreements structured
to the benefit of lesser developed nation states – where they have previously
established a proactive financial footprint.
Pat must suffer from some kind of cognitive dissonance. There is no free trade, nor there
was before Trump. In a world of flexible exchange rates and central banking
backed-inflationary credit trade wars are the status quo. He willfully ignores all the
effects of credit inflation, unsound money, tax structures, subsidies, regulatory burdens
created internally and by those "trade deals" and last but not least the reserve status of
the fiat dollar which basically turned the US in a huge nothing-for-something economy
relative to its imports.
Completing the latest round of tariffs pledged against China, the US Trade Representative
announced on Tuesday (after the close of course) it will impose 25% tariffs on $16
billion-worth of Chinese imports starting August 23. The new round of tariffs completes Trump's
previously disclosed threat to impose $50 billion of import taxes on Chinese goods. The first
$34 billion-worth went into effect on July 6th.
According to the USTR statement, customs will collect duties on 279 product lines, down from
284 items on the initial list; as Bloomberg notes, this will be the second time the U.S. slaps
duties on Chinese goods in about the past month, overruling complaints by American companies
that such moves will raise business costs, tax US consumers and raise prices.
On July 6, the U.S. levied 25% duties on $34 billion in Chinese goods prompting swift
in-kind retaliation from Beijing.
Of course, China will immediately retaliate, having vowed before to strike back again,
dollar-for-dollar, on the $16 billion tranche.
The biggest question is whether there will be a far bigger tariff in the near future: as a
reminder, the USTR is currently also reviewing 10% tariffs on a further $200 billion in Chinese
imports, and may even raise the rate to 25%. Those tariffs could be implemented after a comment
period ends on Sept. 5. President Donald Trump has suggested he may tax effectively all imports
of Chinese goods, which reached more than $500 billion last year.
Over the weekend, Trump boasted that he has the upper hand in the trade war, while Beijing
responded through state media by saying it was ready to endure the economic fallout. Judging by
the US stock market, which has risen by $1.3 trillion since Trump launched his trade war with
China, which has crushed the Shanghai Composite, whose recent drop into a bear market has been
duly noted by Trump, the US president is certainly ahead now, even if the market's inability,
or unwillingness, to push US stocks lower has led many traders and analysts to scratch their
heads.
Globalization is not a one-dimensional phenomenon, and some of its aspects are still intact.
Hollywood dominance, Internet, English language dominance, West technological dominance, will
not reverse any time soon.
What is under attack by Trump, Brexit, etc. is neoliberal globalization, and, especially
financial globalization, free movement of labor and outsourcing of manufacturing and services
(offshoring).
Neoliberal globalization was also based on the dollar as world reserve currency (and oil
trading in dollars exclusively). But this role of dollar recently is under attack due to the
rise of China. Several "anti-dollar" blocks emerged.
Trump tariffs are also anathema for "classic neoliberalism" and essentially convert
"classic neoliberalism" into "national neoliberalism" on the state level. BTW it looks like
Russia switched to "national neoliberalism" earlier than the USA. No surprise that Trump
feels some affinity to Putin ;-)
Attacks against free labor movement also on the rise and this is another nail in the
coffin of classic neoliberalism. In several countries, including the USA the neoliberal elite
(especially financial elite after 2008, despite that no banksters were killed by crowds) does
not feel safe given animosity caused by the promotion of immigration and resorts of
conversion of the state into national security state and neo-McCarthyism to suppress
dissent.
I think those attacks will continue, immigration will be curtailed, and "classic
neoliberalism" will be transformed into something different. Not necessarily better.
Several trends are also connected with the gradual slipping of the power of the USA as the
chief enforcer of the neoliberal globalization. Which is partially happened due to the
stupidity and arrogance of the USA neoliberal elite and neocons.
Another factor in play is the total, catastrophic loss of power of neoliberal propaganda
-- people started asking questions, and neoliberal myths no longer hold any spell on
population (or at least much less spell). The success of Bernie Sanders during the last
election (DNC was forced to resort to dirty tricks to derail him) is one indication of this
trend. This "collapse of ideology" spells great troubles for the USA, as previously it spells
great troubles for the USSR.
"Trumpism" as I understand it tried to patch the situation by two major strategies:
(1) splitting Russia from China
(2) Attempt to acquire dominant position in regions rick in hydrocarbons (Iraq, Iran,
Libya, Venezuela, etc)
But so far the decline of neoliberalism looks like Irreversible. It never fully recovered
from the deep crisis of 2008 and there is no light at the end of the tunnel.
Another powerful factor that works against neoliberal globalization is the end of cheap
oil. How it will play out is unclear, Much depends whether we will have a Seneca cliff in oil
production or not. And if yes, how soon.
This is the end of classic neoliberalism, no question about it, and the collapse of
neoliberal globalization is just one aspect of it
EDITOR'S NOTE: This article originally appeared at TomDispatch.com
.
Leaders are routinely confronted with philosophical dilemmas. Here's a classic one for our Trumptopian times: If you make enemies
out of your friends and friends out of your enemies, where does that leave you? What does winning (or losing) really look like? Is
a world in which walls of every sort encircle America's borders a goal worth seeking? And what would be left in a future fragmented
international economic system marked by tit-for-tat tariffs, travel restrictions, and hyper-nationalism? Ultimately, how will such
a world affect regular people? Let's cut through all of this for the moment and ask one crucial question about our present cult-of-personality
era in American politics: Other than accumulating more wealth and influence for himself,
his children
, and the
Trump family empire , what's Donald J. Trump's end game as president? If his goal is to keep this country from being, as he likes
to complain, " the world's
piggy bank ," then his words, threats, and actions are concerning. However bombastic and disdainful of a history he appears to
know little about, he is already making the world a less stable, less affordable, and more fear-driven place. In the end, it's even
possible that, despite the upbeat economic news of the moment, he could almost single-handedly smash that piggy bank himself, as
he has many of his own
business
ventures . Still, give him credit for one thing: Donald Trump has lent remarkable new meaning to the old phrase "the imperial
presidency." The members of his administration, largely a set of aging white men, either conform to his erratic wishes or get fired.
In other words, he's running domestic politics in much the same fashion as he oversaw the boardroom on his reality-TV show The
Apprentice . Now, he's begun running the country's foreign policy in the same personalized, take-no-prisoners, you're-fired
style. From the moment he hit the Oval Office, he's made it clear at home and abroad that it's his way or the highway. If only,
of course, it really was that simple. What he will learn, if "learning process" and "President Trump" can even occupy the same sentence,
is that "firing" Canada, the European Union (EU), or for that matter China has a cost. What the American working and the middle classes
will see (sooner than anyone imagines) is that actions of his sort have unexpected global consequences. They could cost the United
States and the rest of the world big-time. If he were indeed emperor and his subjects (that would be us) grasped where his policies
might be leading, they would be preparing a revolt. In the end, they -- again, that's us -- will be the ones paying the price in
this global chess match.
The Art of Trump's Deals
So far, President Trump has only taken America out of trade deals or threatened to do so if other countries don't behave
in a way that satisfies him. On his
third day in the White House, he honored his campaign promise to remove the United States from the Trans-Pacific Partnership,
a decision that opened space for our allies and competitors, China in particular, to negotiate deals without us. Since that grand
exit, there has, in fact, been a boom in side deals involving China and other Pacific Rim countries that has weakened, not strengthened,
Washington's global bargaining position. Meanwhile, closer to home, the Trump administration has engaged in a barrage of NAFTA-baiting
that is isolating us from our regional partners, Canada and Mexico.
Conversely, the art-of-the-deal aficionado has yet to sign a single new bilateral trade deal. Despite steadfast claims that he
would serve up the best deals ever, we have been left with little so far but various tariffs and an onslaught against American trading
partners. His one claim to bilateral-trade-deal fame was the
renegotiation of a six-year-old
deal with South Korea in March that doubled the number of cars each US manufacturer could export to South Korea (without having to
pass as many safety standards).
As White House Press Secretary Sarah Sanders
put
it , when speaking of Kim Jong-un's North Korea, "The President is, I think, the ultimate negotiator and dealmaker when it comes
to any type of conversation." She left out the obvious footnote, however: any type that doesn't involve international trade.
In the past four months, Trump has imposed tariffs, exempting certain countries, only to reimpose them at his whim. If trust were
a coveted commodity, when it came to the present White House, it would now be trading at zero. His supporters undoubtedly see this
approach as the fulfillment of his many campaign promises and part of his
classic method of keeping both friends and enemies guessing until he's ready to go in for the kill. At the heart of this approach,
however, lies a certain global madness, for he now is sparking a set of trade wars that could, in the end,
cost millions of American jobs.
The Allies
On May 31st, Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross
confirmed that Canada, Mexico, and the EU would all be hit with 10 percent aluminum and 25 percent steel tariffs that had first
made headlines in March. When it came to those two products, at least, the new tariffs bore no relation to the previous average 3
percent tariff on US-EU traded goods.
In that way, Trump's tariffs, initially supposed to be
aimed at
China (a country whose president he's praised to the skies and whose trade policies he's lashed out at endlessly), went global.
And not surprisingly, America's closest allies weren't taking his maneuver lightly. As the verbal-abuse level rose and what looked
like a possible race to the bottom of international etiquette intensified, they threatened to strike back.
In June, President Trump ordered
that a promised 25 percent tariff on
$50 billion worth of imported
goods from China also be imposed. In response, the Chinese, like the Europeans, the Canadians, and the Mexicans, immediately
promised a massive response in kind. Trump countered by threatening another
$200 billion in tariffs against China. In the meantime, the White House is targeting its initial moves largely against products
related to that country's "
Made in China 2025 " initiative, the Chinese government's strategic plan aimed at making the country a major competitor in advanced
industries and manufacturing.
Meanwhile, Mexico began adopting retaliatory tariffs on American imports. Although it has a far smaller economy than the United
States, it's still the second-largest importer of US products, buying a whopping
$277 billion of them last year. Only Canada buys
more. In a mood of defiance stoked by the president's
hostility to its people, Mexico
executed its own trade gambit, imposing
$3 billion in 15
percent–25 percent tariffs against US exports, including pork, apples, potatoes, bourbon, and cheese.
While those Mexican revenge tariffs still remain limited, covering
just 1 percent
of all exports from north of the border, they do target particular industries hard, especially ones that seem connected to President
Trump's voting "base." Mexico, for instance, is by far the largest buyer of US pork exports, 25 percent of which were sold there
last year. What its 20 percent tariff on pork means, then, is that many US producers will now find themselves unable to compete in
the Mexican market. Other countries may follow suit. The result: a possible loss of up to 110,000 jobs in the pork industry.
Our second North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) partner (for whose prime minister, Justin Trudeau, there is "
a special place in hell ," according to a key Trumpian trade negotiator) plans to invoke tariffs of up to 25 percent on about
$13 billion in US products beginning on July 1st. Items impacted
range "from ballpoint
pens and dishwasher detergent to toilet paper and playing cards sailboats, washing machines, dish washers, and lawn mowers." Across
the Atlantic, the EU has similarly announced retaliatory tariffs of 25 percent on 200 US products, including such American-made classics
as Harley-Davidson motorcycles, blue jeans, and bourbon.
Trump Disses the Former G7
As the explosive Group of Seven, or G7, summit in Quebec showed, the Trump administration is increasingly isolating itself from
its allies in palpable ways and, in the process, significantly impairing the country's negotiating power. If you combine the economies
of what might now be thought of as the G6 and add in the rest of the EU, its economic power is collectively larger than that of the
United States. Under the circumstances, even a small diversion of trade thanks to Trump-induced tariff wars could have costly consequences.
President Trump did try one "all-in" poker move at that summit. With his game face on, he first suggested the possibility of wiping
out all tariffs and trade restrictions between the United States and the rest of the G7, a bluff met with a healthy dose of skepticism.
Before he left for his meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un in Singapore, he even suggested that the G7 leaders "consider
removing every single tariff or trade barrier on American goods." In return, he claimed he would do the same "for products from their
countries." As it turned out, however, that wasn't actually a venture into economic diplomacy, just the carrot before the stick,
and even it was tied to lingering
threats of severe penalties.
The current incipient trade war was actually launched by the Trump administration in March in the name of American "
national security
." What should have been highlighted, however, was the possible "national insecurity" in which it placed the country's (and the
world's) future. After all, a similar isolationist stance in the 1920s and the subsequent market crash of 1929 sparked the global
Great Depression,
opening the way for the utter devastation of World War II.
European Union countries were
incredulous when Trump insisted, as he had many times before, that the "U.S. is a victim of unfair trade practices," citing the
country's trade deficits, especially with
Germany and China. At the G7 summit, European leaders did their best to explain to him that his country isn't actually being
treated unfairly. As French President Emmanuel Macron
explained , "France runs trade
deficits with Germany and the United Kingdom on manufactured goods, even though all three countries are part of the EU single market
and have zero tariffs between them."
"... The official who described this to me said Trump believes that keeping allies and adversaries alike perpetually off-balance necessarily benefits the United States, which is still the most powerful country on Earth. ..."
"... "No," the official said. "There's definitely a Trump Doctrine." "What is it?" I asked. Here is the answer I received: "The Trump Doctrine is 'We're America, Bitch.' That's the Trump Doctrine." ..."
In an interview with "CBS Evening News" anchor Jeff Glor in Scotland on Saturday, President
Trump named the European Union -- comprising some of America's oldest allies -- when asked to
identify his "biggest foe globally right now."
"Well, I think we have a lot of foes. I think the European Union is a foe, what they do to us
in trade. Now, you wouldn't think of the European Union, but they're a foe. ..."
Bashing allies is an essential component of the
Trump doctrine :
The second-best self-description of the Trump Doctrine I heard was this, from a senior
national-security official: "Permanent destabilization creates American advantage." The
official who described this to me said Trump believes that keeping allies and adversaries
alike perpetually off-balance necessarily benefits the United States, which is still the most
powerful country on Earth.
...
The best distillation of the Trump Doctrine I heard, though, came from a senior White
House official with direct access to the president and his thinking. I was talking to this
person several weeks ago, and I said, by way of introduction, that I thought it might perhaps
be too early to discern a definitive Trump Doctrine. "No," the official said. "There's
definitely a Trump Doctrine." "What is it?" I asked. Here is the answer I received: "The
Trump Doctrine is 'We're America, Bitch.' That's the Trump Doctrine."
I think Trump simply has a very prosaic, very sincere even, view about the world: he treats
his equals equally (e.g. Putin, Xi, Kim) and his unequals unequally (NATO countries'
leaders, Abe etc.).
That is, he simply views his allies for what they really are: clients. And when you go
visit clients, you expect them to stop, lower their heads, listen and obey you: that's why
he probably found strange the fact that the Europeans were insulted by his behavior during
the NATO summit and the individual countries official visits. He must have been
particularly thunderstruck over the popular protests in Scotland: from his point of view,
Scotland owes everything they have now to the USA (NATO), so he, as chief of State of the
USA, has every right to go there and play golf whenever he pleases to do so. And the fact
is he's right to think so: the European peninsula is an American protectorate, a
"subState", inhabited by second-class citizens (like the peoples of Latin status of the
Roman Republic).
As for the destabilization doctrine (Trump Doctrine), it's absolutely correct: peace,
right now, is nocive to the USA. That's why Russia and China are trying to descalate: peace
(and time) is on their side. If the USA doesn't manage to trigger WWIII soon, it will start
to eat itself up, because the world didn't recover from the 2008 meltdown. The clock is
ticking for the Americans (and, by extension, for the Europeans and the Japanese).
Last, I agree completely with the theory that May is a remainer who's trying to implode
brexit without appearing to do so. She was a remainer during the camapaign, that's the
reason she was elected as Cameron's successor (it was she or Leadsom or Johnson, both
hardcore brexiters). The British elite is holding her while it can, and she is only in
office right now because she has the elite's full weight behind her: if it was a Labour MP,
he/she would've already fallen.
There is one significant weakness to Putin's patient, restrained and reasonable response
to US/NATO aggression and intimidation...
...
Posted by: les7 | Jul 15, 2018 12:17:17 PM | 2
Huh?!
If you watch the last 8 minutes of Episode 3 of Oliver Stone's Putin Interviews it'll cure
you of the habit of confusing Putin's "Our Partners" diplo-speak with the hair-raising
reality experienced by the crew of the Donald Cook in the Black Sea a couple of years ago.
It'll also dissuade you from imagining that Putin/Russia has a 'weak' or 'reasonable'
attitude toward NATO military provocations.
Imo Trump would have either watched them himself or been briefed on their contents by
someone who has.
Trump is acting out the good cop bad cop role all in one. He comes in with slashing attacks
and praise. The media only prints the slashing attacks. By placing his adversaries off
balance he seeks to gain something. I would say that he is operating like a corporate
raider. The weak kneed euro leaders just do not know how to handle this stuff.
He will not try that with Putin because he respects him. Putin is operating with a weak
hand and he cannot and will not take on the Europe on his borders conventionally when he
can possibly get what he wants in time with no bloodshed. Libya is his next target.
Putin and his family are from Stalingrad and Putin will cut off the head of the Snake
(US) before he lets that happen again. How? Think bright glowing mushroom clouds. It is
that serious.
Trump wants to bring Russia back into Europe. The Anglo Europeans want more control over
Russia's vast resources and companies that control them. Offering then a role in NATO would
be genius.
Putin is being conflated into an enemy of the world by a mass propaganda campaign.
Crimea and Ukraine was NATO pushing to hard to make Putin act with aggression. Crimea fell
without a shot being fired. As an independent republic full of Russians it can choose who
it wants to affiliate with.
All in all this can be solved diplomatically but not by the current crop of deep state
diplomats.
THERESA May's new soft Brexit blueprint would "kill" any future trade deal with the United
States, Donald Trump warns today.
Mounting an extraordinary attack on the PM's exit negotiation, the President also reveals
she has ignored his advice on how to toughen up the troubled talks.
Instead he believes Mrs May has gone "the opposite way", and he thinks the results have been
"very unfortunate".
His fiercest criticism came over the centrepiece of the PM's new Brexit plan -- which was
unveiled in full yesterday.
It would stick to a common rulebook with Brussels on goods and agricultural produce in
a bid to keep customs borders open with the EU.
But Mr Trump told The Sun: "If they do a deal like that, we would be dealing with the
European Union instead of dealing with the UK, so it will probably kill the deal.
Trump's declaration that "trade wars are good, and easy to win" is an instant classic, right up there with Herbert Hoover's "prosperity
is just around the corner."
Trump obviously believes that trade is a game in which he who runs the biggest surplus wins, and that America, which imports more
than it exports, therefore has the upper hand in any conflict. That's also why Peter Navarro predicted that
nobody would retaliate against Trump's
tariffs. Since that's actually not how trade works, we're already facing plenty of retaliation and the strong prospect of escalation.
But here's the thing: Trump's tariffs are badly designed even from the point of view of someone who shares his crude mercantilist
view of trade. In fact, the structure of his tariffs so far is designed to inflict maximum damage on the U.S. economy, for minimal
gain. Foreign retaliation, by contrast, is far more sophisticated: unlike Trump, the Chinese and other targets of his trade wrath
seem to have a clear idea of what they're trying to accomplish.
The key point is that the Navarro/Trump view, aside from its fixation on trade balances, also seems to imagine that the world
still looks the way it did in the 1960s, when trade was overwhelmingly in final goods like wheat and cars. In that world, putting
a tariff on imported cars would cause consumers to switch to domestic cars, adding auto industry jobs, end of story (except for the
foreign retaliation.)
In the modern world economy, however, a large part of trade is in intermediate goods – not cars but car parts. Put a tariff on
car parts, and even the first-round effect on jobs is uncertain: maybe domestic parts producers will add workers, but you've raised
costs and reduced competitiveness for downstream producers, who will shrink their operations.
So in today's world, smart trade warriors – if such people exist – would focus their tariffs on final goods, so as to avoid raising
costs for downstream producers of domestic goods. True, this would amount to a more or less direct tax on consumers; but if you're
afraid to impose any burden on consumers, you really shouldn't be getting into a trade war in the first place.
But almost none of the Trump tariffs are on consumer goods.
Chad Bown and colleagues
have a remarkable chart showing the distribution of the Trump China tariffs: an amazing 95 percent are either on intermediate goods
or on capital goods like machinery that are also used in domestic production: KS
Is there a strategy here? It's hard to see one. There's certainly no hint that the tariffs were designed to pressure China into
accepting U.S. demands, since nobody can even figure out what, exactly, Trump wants from China in the first place.
China's retaliation
looks very different. It doesn't completely eschew tariffs on intermediate goods, but it's mostly on final goods. And it's also
driven by a clear political strategy of hurting Trump voters; the Chinese, unlike the Trumpies, know what they're trying to accomplish:
Image
What about others?
Canada's picture
is complicated by its direct response to aluminum and steel tariffs, but those industries aside it, too, is following a far more
sophisticated strategy than the U.S.:
Except for steel and aluminum, Canada's retaliation seemingly attempts to avoid messing up its engagement in North American
supply chains. In broad terms, Canada is not targeting imports of American capital equipment or intermediate inputs, focusing
instead on final goods.
And like China, Canada is clearly trying to inflict maximum political damage.
Trade wars aren't good or easy to win even if you know what you're trying to accomplish and have a clear strategy for getting
there. What's notable about the Trump tariffs, however, is that they're so self-destructive.
And we can already see hints of the economic fallout. From the Fed's
most recent minutes :
[M]any District contacts expressed concern about the possible adverse effects of tariffs and other proposed trade restrictions,
both domestically and abroad, on future investment activity; contacts in some Districts indicated that plans for capital spending
had been scaled back or postponed as a result of uncertainty over trade policy. Contacts in the steel and aluminum industries
expected higher prices as a result of the tariffs on these products but had not planned any new investments to increase capacity.
So Trump and company don't actually have a plan to win this trade war. They may, however, have stumbled onto a strategy that will
lose it even more decisively than one might have expected.
Note to readers: please click the share buttons above
On Tuesday, his trade representative Robert Lighthizer released a list of $10% tariffs
to be imposed on $200 billion worth of Chinese goods.
A senior Trump regime official falsely said it's "roughly equal to their exports to" the
US. It's around 40% of the 2017 total.
Newly announced tariffs won't take effect before completion of a two-month review process,
concluding at end of August. Trump warned he may order tariffs on $500 billion worth of Chinese
goods.
In 2017, imports from China were $506 billion, US exports to the country $130 billion. The
trade deficit was $375 billion last year.
It's because so much of industrial America was offshored to China and other low-wage
countries, millions of US jobs lost, Washington under Republicans and undemocratic Dems
permitting what demands opposition.
The Investment-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) system incorporated into US trade deals like
NAFTA and others, letting a corporate controlled extrajudicial tribunal resolve disputes,
promotes offshoring of US jobs.
China called the latest announced tariffs "totally unacceptable" bullying, urging other
countries to unite against Trump's trade policy, promising to retaliate in kind.
Along with earlier duties on $50 billion worth of Chinese goods, newly announced ones raise
the total to half of Chinese imports – maybe all of them to be targeted ahead if China
retaliates in kind as expected.
China Association of International Trade senior fellow Li Yong believes one Beijing
retaliatory measure may be a greater push to attract foreign investment other than from the US,
adding:
Trump "closed the door for negotiations. It's up to (him) to open the door again."
Trade policy expert Eswar Prasad believes
"(t)he internal political dynamics in both countries make it unlikely that either side
will stand down and offer conciliatory measures that could deescalate tensions and lead to a
resumption of negotiations."
Economist Stephen Roach called trade wars "not easy to win easy to lose, and the US is on
track to lose (its) trade war" with China, adding:
"This is live ammunition. This is not just rhetorical discussion anymore. We're in the
early stages of fighting skirmishes in a real, live trade war."
"The question is, how far does it go? And how significant will the ammunition be in the
future?"
Roach believe China has lots of ammunition to hold firm and fight back with.
"The US is hugely dependent on China as a source for low-cost goods to make ends meet for
American consumers. We're hugely dependent on China to buy our Treasuries to fund our budget
deficits," he explained.
Beijing has lots of ways to retaliate against Washington besides imposing duties on US
goods.
On Thursday, China's People's Daily slammed the Trump
regime, saying
Beijing "will never back down when faced with threats and blackmail, neither will it waver
its resolution in safeguarding the global free trade and multilateral trade system,"
adding:
"The US is undermining global trade rules and causing problems for the global economy.
(Its) mentality not only brings negative impacts to both parties directly involved, but also
to every country on the global industrial chain."
China's Global Times called Trump's trade policy "extortion," stressing "countermeasures"
will be taken.
Markets believe both sides eventually will show restraint. There's no sign of it so far
– just the opposite.
*
Stephen Lendman is a Research Associate of the CRG, Correspondent of Global Research
based in Chicago.
Trump's declaration that "trade wars are good, and easy to win" is an instant classic, right up there with Herbert Hoover's "prosperity
is just around the corner."
Trump obviously believes that trade is a game in which he who runs the biggest surplus wins, and that America, which imports more
than it exports, therefore has the upper hand in any conflict. That's also why Peter Navarro predicted that
nobody would retaliate against Trump's
tariffs. Since that's actually not how trade works, we're already facing plenty of retaliation and the strong prospect of escalation.
But here's the thing: Trump's tariffs are badly designed even from the point of view of someone who shares his crude mercantilist
view of trade. In fact, the structure of his tariffs so far is designed to inflict maximum damage on the U.S. economy, for minimal
gain. Foreign retaliation, by contrast, is far more sophisticated: unlike Trump, the Chinese and other targets of his trade wrath
seem to have a clear idea of what they're trying to accomplish.
The key point is that the Navarro/Trump view, aside from its fixation on trade balances, also seems to imagine that the world
still looks the way it did in the 1960s, when trade was overwhelmingly in final goods like wheat and cars. In that world, putting
a tariff on imported cars would cause consumers to switch to domestic cars, adding auto industry jobs, end of story (except for the
foreign retaliation.)
In the modern world economy, however, a large part of trade is in intermediate goods – not cars but car parts. Put a tariff on
car parts, and even the first-round effect on jobs is uncertain: maybe domestic parts producers will add workers, but you've raised
costs and reduced competitiveness for downstream producers, who will shrink their operations.
So in today's world, smart trade warriors – if such people exist – would focus their tariffs on final goods, so as to avoid raising
costs for downstream producers of domestic goods. True, this would amount to a more or less direct tax on consumers; but if you're
afraid to impose any burden on consumers, you really shouldn't be getting into a trade war in the first place.
But almost none of the Trump tariffs are on consumer goods.
Chad Bown and colleagues
have a remarkable chart showing the distribution of the Trump China tariffs: an amazing 95 percent are either on intermediate goods
or on capital goods like machinery that are also used in domestic production:
Image
Is there a strategy here? It's hard to see one. There's certainly no hint that the tariffs were designed to pressure China into
accepting U.S. demands, since nobody can even figure out what, exactly, Trump wants from China in the first place.
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China's retaliation
looks very different. It doesn't completely eschew tariffs on intermediate goods, but it's mostly on final goods. And it's also
driven by a clear political strategy of hurting Trump voters; the Chinese, unlike the Trumpies, know what they're trying to accomplish:
Image
What about others?
Canada's picture
is complicated by its direct response to aluminum and steel tariffs, but those industries aside it, too, is following a far more
sophisticated strategy than the U.S.:
Except for steel and aluminum, Canada's retaliation seemingly attempts to avoid messing up its engagement in North American
supply chains. In broad terms, Canada is not targeting imports of American capital equipment or intermediate inputs, focusing
instead on final goods.
And like China, Canada is clearly trying to inflict maximum political damage.
Trade wars aren't good or easy to win even if you know what you're trying to accomplish and have a clear strategy for getting
there. What's notable about the Trump tariffs, however, is that they're so self-destructive.
And we can already see hints of the economic fallout. From the Fed's
most recent minutes :
[M]any District contacts expressed concern about the possible adverse effects of tariffs and other proposed trade restrictions,
both domestically and abroad, on future investment activity; contacts in some Districts indicated that plans for capital spending
had been scaled back or postponed as a result of uncertainty over trade policy. Contacts in the steel and aluminum industries
expected higher prices as a result of the tariffs on these products but had not planned any new investments to increase capacity.
So Trump and company don't actually have a plan to win this trade war. They may, however, have stumbled onto a strategy that will
lose it even more decisively than one might have expected.
"... By David Llewellyn-Smith, founding publisher and former editor-in-chief of The Diplomat magazine, now the Asia Pacific's leading geo-politics website. Cross posted from MacroBusiness ..."
"... Captains of the German auto industry kowtowing to US ambassador Grenell make a remarkable scene, not unlike the Chinese capitulating to the British and handing over Hong Kong in the opium wars. ..."
Europe
Isolates China Trade Cheat Posted on July 7,
2018 by Yves
Smith Yves here. I'm faithfully replicating the MacroBusiness headline as an indicator of
unhappiness in some circles in Australia about the degree to which the government has opened
the floodgates since I was there to investment from China, particularly in real estate. When I
lived in Sydney in 2002 to 2004, property struck me as awfully fully priced by global
standards, and it's been on a moon shot trajectory since then, in part due to Australia also
liberalizing immigration. When I was there, the intent of policy was to have immigration in
certain skilled categories, and then with an eye to maintaining population levels, not goosing
them. Since then, the population in Australia has grown from 20 million to over 24 million.
But in addition, even though imposing tariffs on cars and car parts would hurt quite a few
US employers, it would also hurt European multinationals (many of whom happen to be US
employers), to the degree that they've pushed the European officialdom to see if they can cut a
deal with Trump. If that happens, Trump gets a win he can brandish for the midterms and the
tariff brinksmanship presumably eases off a bit, potentially a lot.
By David Llewellyn-Smith, founding publisher and former editor-in-chief of The Diplomat
magazine, now the Asia Pacific's leading geo-politics website. Cross posted from MacroBusiness
Recall that China has tried to play Europe for the chump, via
Reuters :
China is putting pressure on the European Union to issue a strong joint statement against
President Donald Trump's trade policies at a summit later this month but is facing
resistance, European officials said.
In meetings in Brussels, Berlin and Beijing, senior Chinese officials, including Vice
Premier Liu He and the Chinese government's top diplomat, State Councillor Wang Yi, have
proposed an alliance between the two economic powers and offered to open more of the Chinese
market in a gesture of goodwill.
One proposal has been for China and the European Union to launch joint action against the
United States at the World Trade Organization.
But the European Union, the world's largest trading bloc, has rejected the idea of allying
with Beijing against Washington, five EU officials and diplomats told Reuters, ahead of a
Sino-European summit in Beijing on July 16-17.
Instead, the summit is expected to produce a modest communique, which affirms the
commitment of both sides to the multilateral trading system and promises to set up a working
group on modernizing the WTO, EU officials said.
"China wants the European Union to stand with Beijing against Washington, to take sides,"
said one European diplomat. "We won't do it and we have told them that."
Despite Trump's tariffs on European metals exports and threats to hit the EU's automobile
industry, Brussels shares Washington's concern about China's closed markets and what Western
governments say is Beijing's manipulation of trade to dominate global markets.
"We agree with almost all the complaints the U.S. has against China, it's just we don't
agree with how the United States is handling it," another diplomat said.
But it's China that looking more isolated today, via
Quartz :
The US may have been accused by China of "opening fire on the world" with its punitive
trade tariffs, but it looks like officials may be making more progress in Europe's largest
economy Germany.
Richard Grenell, the US ambassador to Germany, has caused quite a stir since he arrived in
Berlin in May, lecturing German companies to stop trading with Iran, and saying he planned to
"empower" anti-establishment conservatives in Europe. However, with the threat of punitive US
tariffs on its cars looming, Grenell certainly has the attention of Germany's powerful car
bosses.
German business daily Handelsblatt reports (link in German) that Grenell met Daimler CEO
Dieter Zetsche, BMW CEO Harald Krüger, and VW CEO Herbert Diess on Wednesday evening to
discuss both sides abolishing all tariffs on each others car imports. Right now, the European
Union adds a 10% tax on imported US cars, and the US puts 2.5% on EU car imports, and is
threatening to ramp that up to 25%. As part of the deal, president Donald Trump would
reportedly want German carmakers to invest more in the US.
Last night's meeting was not the first time the carmakers and Grenell have talked about
abolishing two-way tariffs. The Wall Street Journal (paywall) reported on June 20 that the
ambassador had been meeting with all Germany's most important car companies, and that they
were already behind the idea.
Chancellor Angela Merkel is worried about the damage a car trade war could do to one of
Germany's core industries. "We now have tariffs on aluminum and steel and we have a
discussion that is far more serious," she told parliament, referring to auto tariffs. "It's
worth every effort to try to defuse this conflict so it doesn't turn into a war."
German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Thursday she would back opening talks with trading
partners on lowering automobile tariffs, in what appeared to be an olive branch to US
President Donald Trump as the EU battles to dissuade him from imposing hefty levies on
European cars.
But Merkel said that any negotiations on lowering tariffs in one area could only be
conducted with "all the countries with which we have trade in cars," rather than just with
the United States.
A deal with the US alone "would not conform with WTO" rules, she said.
"We can either have negotiations about a wide range of tariffs, for 90 percent of goods,"
Merkel said in a reference to the stalled talks for a transatlantic free-trade deal known as
TTIP.
"Or we can talk about one type of goods, but then we must accord the same treatment to all
trading partners of the world. That's an option I could imagine," she added.
Interestingly, Nomura sees it all as deflationary:
US pursuit of beggar thy neighbor policies: is it leading to a whole new world for global
automakers?
Automakers have set up an intricate web of suppliers and assembly plants globally to
leverage the benefits of trade agreements, while keeping FX risks at acceptable levels. The
pursuit of beggar thy neighbour policies by a large, connected, and heretofore open Now 3
mths 12 mths US Europe Japan Korea Brazil Russia India China Thailand Indonesia Nomura |
Global Autos Outlook 4 June 2018 4 economy such as the US threatens to upend this
structure.
In this edition of the Global Autos Outlook, we therefore look at trade-related challenges
(and opportunities) facing global automakers, possible strategies they could adopt to cope,
and potential winners and losers over the near-to-medium term. Risk of "No NAFTA" has risen,
although our base case remains NAFTA 2.0 Trump's openly protectionist policies have increased
the risk of a "No NAFTA" outcome, although our base case still remains that NAFTA will be
renegotiated.
Nearly 25 years of NAFTA have integrated the North American auto industry very tightly. If
NAFTA is dissolved, it will impact all automakers operating in North America. In particular,
we think GM and FCA could be hit the hardest (higher import tariffs cut 40% of GM's FY2018E
EBIT, 23% of that for FCA). In our opinion, it increasingly appears that the US President's
decision-making is centered on autoworkers, even if that is to the detriment of the
automakers. Thus, US automakers getting hurt might not hold back Trump from making such a
move.
Auto industry staring at global excess capacity, no matter what the outcome of the Section
232 drama
The US Department of Commerce has started a Section 232 investigation into US imports of
autos and auto parts. Under the worst case scenario, this may result in broadbased import
tariffs slapped on US automotive imports after the investigation concludes and reports back
to the President in several months. US imports of new passenger vehicles and auto parts
totaled $333bn in 2017. Import duties on such a large volume of goods would be highly
disruptive and impact all the major car exporting countries/regions such as Mexico, Canada,
Japan, the EU, and South Korea.
While we think that the threat of tariffs is largely Trump's negotiation tactic to get a
better NAFTA deal, we caution investors to pay attention, as the tail risk (of import tariffs
materializing) is not negligible. Furthermore, no matter whether new auto tariffs are imposed
or not, global carmakers, irrespective of nationality, are feeling pressured to build plants
and increase employment in the US. This is likely to lead to increased capacity in the US,
where car demand is no longer growing.
On the other hand, non-US carmakers are unlikely to cut capacity at home or elsewhere,
leading to excess capacity globally. This will impact most markets except for relatively
closed ones such as China, India, and Southeast Asia, due to their existing high import
tariffs. For global automakers, we therefore see a binary outcome from a growing list of
protectionist measures being deployed by the US. Neither outcome is good news, with
automakers staring at excess global capacity in either case:
If Section 232 tariffs are imposed, it (largely) cuts off imports into the
domestic US market. However, that would mean that there is excess capacity outside the US, as
existing foreign plants supplying to the US (7.88mn/$192bn new PVs, 8.2% of global volume,
and $141bn auto parts in 2017) have to find markets elsewhere.
If new tariffs are not imposed, we still have additional capacity coming up in
the US as automakers are goaded into doing so to avoid political pressure. This also leads to
a global supply-demand imbalance in the auto industry.
Although US protectionism is a real threat, we see a couple of silver linings. China
announced an import tariff cut for autos, from 25% currently to 15% beginning 1st July 2018.
The Japan-EU Economic Partnership Agreement (JEEPA) was agreed upon last December and is
likely to become effective in spring 2019, benefiting Japanese car exporters. One of the
biggest beneficiaries from both China and the EU's tariff cuts would be Toyota Motor.
"US lure carmakers with tariff offer – but the proposal is illegal"
That's the title in WirtschaftsWoche. A premier german language trade and economics
magazine. It had an interview(in German) with Ewald Pum attorney at internal law firm
Wirtschaftskanzlei Rödl & Partner.
He states that what Ambassador Grenell proposed is illegal under international WTO law,
and the EU could therefore not support it. Also, the EU had historically supported rules
based free trade, and this could only be accomplished via an bilateral trade deal in goods,
what he called TTIP on a diet.
' Nomura sees it all as deflationary: the pursuit of beggar thy neighbour policies by a
large, connected, and heretofore open economy such as the US threatens to upend this
structure. '
So does UK-based Russell Napier, who sees the US obsession with shrinking its trade
deficit provoking a seismic shift in China:
Investors need to prepare for a formal widening of the trading bands for the RMB
relative to its basket and the problems such a move will create for all emerging markets.
That first move in the RMB is inherently deflationary. This is no counter-punch in a trade
war; it is the beginning of the creation of a new global monetary system.
The ability of China to extend the cycle has come to an end as its current account
surplus has all but evaporated. It has also come to an end because Jay Powell has warned
China, and other emerging markets, that he will not alter the course of US monetary policy
to assist with any credit disturbances outside his own jurisdiction.
Who can run the current account deficits necessary to make their currency an attractive
anchor for smaller countries seeking to run current account surpluses?
It seems well nigh impossible to believe, following almost 40 years of mercantilism,
that China would opt to become a country running large current account deficits. Such a
change in mindset may seem revolutionary, but it is just another necessary shift in the
long game in the attempt to make China the pre-eminent global economy.
The initial shift to a more flexible Chinese exchange rate is deflationary and
dangerous. The USD selling price of Chinese exports will likely fall, putting pressure on
all those who compete with China – EMs [Emerging Markets] but also Japan. The USD
will rise, putting pressure on all those, particularly EMs, who have borrowed USD without
having USD cash flows to service those debts. With world debt-to-GDP at a record high, such
a major deflationary dislocation can easily trigger another credit crisis.
Following the great dislocation, China will be free to reflate the world.
' Free to reflate the world ' much as the US did post-WW II with its Great
Inflation that flooded the world with dollars.
But getting from here to there is the tricky bit. As Napier insists, a deflationary ditch
lies between. Combine Llewellyn-Smith's comments on the auto industry's overcapacity and
supply-chain disruption with a deflationary break in the global economy, and you've got the
recipe for a nasty little crisis and perhaps a second bankruptcy in GM, whose long-term debt
is rising rapidly.
Flake-o-nomics may be creative destruction, but folks are not going to like the interim
results. The purblind Hoover-Trump will be blamed, rightly.
This whole tariff fight really seems to be about derailing China's plans to be a world
leader with its 'Made in China 2025' plan. Maybe Trump and his advisers reckon that if this
fight is not carried to the Chinese soon, then it will be too late. Europe, though under
attack by Trump, is also seeing the dangers where the EU will be eclipsed by a single
country.
It may be that Europe is giving Trump a message that if he plays nice with Europe's
tariffs, then the EU will cooperate with the US against China. I hope that the calculation is
not to push China into financial chaos as serving Europe's and Trump's interests. Supply
chains are far too meshed to make that a good option and I can easily see a recession in the
making which will hit the world hard.
China may have a long term advantage in that it has invested in infrastructure, transport,
education and training whereas the west has been devaluing these things due to neoliberal
policies for decades now. They may start pulling their money back which will hit places like
Australia, Canada and the US hard as to my eye Chinese money keeps things like property
values high in those places. We'll find out soon enough.
I've been following CGTN on the tariff war, and it looks like China is going to go the
'proportional reciprocity' route, just as Russia has with sanctions.
The latter has benefited from sanctions, while Europe has lost billions in trade.
As for the 'five EU officials' – all anonymous – cited in Reuters' report, I
would take their statements with a large dose of salt.
EU is in ferment, and Merkel is not doing well in the polls.
There is strong anti-US sentiment in Germany, albeit not reported in the media. A
combination of Trump's policies and the perpetual wars – now implicated in the greatest
mass migrantion crisis since WWII – has led to a disenchantment with US.
Then there is OBOR, with various interest groups – particularly in European industry
– beginning to look East rather than West.
Thus there is no real unified resolve at EU level to warrant such claims.
Dedollarization is continuing apace too, and new alliances are emerging like the SCO and
the reported deals between the major oil producing countries like Russia and Saudi.
China plays a much longer game than the US, so it is hard to estimate what the consequence
will be within the short – tern assessment models used by the Western powers.
I've gotten into the habit of rolling my eyes whenever an establishment media outlet
quotes "anonymous sources". Looking at the prospects in the global automotive sector, surely
the smart money is on the east (and other emerging markets) being where the long term growth
is going to emerge, so why the EU would bet on a jockey riding a horse that's falling behind
the pace would be rather difficult to fathom. One assumes that CEOs of the big three German
automakers play as long a game as anyone, so being brow beaten into an anti-china stance by a
US ambassador would be incredibly shortsighted, to say nothing of raising investor ire
Captains of the German auto industry kowtowing to US ambassador Grenell make a
remarkable scene, not unlike the Chinese capitulating to the British and handing over Hong
Kong in the opium wars.
But Germany is an occupied and humbled nation, with tens of thousands of US troops
garrisoned on its soil for three generations now. And Grenell, a product of the John F
Kennedy School of Gubmint at Hahhhhhvid, was born to rule.
It's good to be king ambassador.
*summons his liveried steward to fetch oysters and mimosas for brunch*
I agree that this is looking like creative destruction -- but more like intentional
creative destruction. Bringing down the dinosaur auto industry – now that's definitely
a step in the right direction, imo. So it's curious that Trump has such a strategic focus,
no? And he just started Space Force.
So clearly that is where the technology is. I do not agree that this is hyper-nationalism
(that's just the cover) and it seems absurd for anyone to suggest that Trump is actually
doing anything to benefit domestic auto workers he's just not that dumb. And of course Merkel
is in a tizzy. She's going to do everything she can to soften the impact of the
inevitable.
Ha! As discussed and promised 'round the table at D4 last night ;-) #ChicagoNCMeetup
Thanks again Yves!
Part of me wants to believe that the capitalist nations were always destined to circle
the wagons against communist China, despite all the hand wringing about Trump. The
political aspect of this is more interesting to me at the moment. Given all we know about the
loyalty Trump still enjoys from those who put him in office, a yuge trade "win" this
year will play to the theme of tempered expectations of a "Blue Wave".
"... Back to Turkey. The largest net backstabbing of Turkish economy could be the slowdown of investments from the Gulf, where Erdogan bravely sided with Qatar. Erdogan engineered de facto confiscation of media assets owned by tycoons sympathetic to the opposition, to be purchased by Qataris, now Qatar is to Turkey what Adelson is to Israel. ..."
"... Add the effect of Iran sanctions -- it increased prices of oil and gas, but no associated increase the demand from the Gulf, on the northern shore there is a prospect of tightened belts, on the southern shore anti-Turkish policies, and Qatar alone is too small ..."
...Rusal,
the dominant aluminum maker in Russia recently was sanctioned by USA, while a while ago it
gained control of a large portion of alumina production -- aluminum ore, bauxite, has to be
processed into more pure feedstock for smelting factories, called alumina. Now aluminum
producers in many areas, notably, Europe, have a shortage of alumina that may lead to
mothballing of some smelters; the largest alumina facility in Europe is in Ireland and it is
owned by Rusal. Perhaps great for American smelter owners, but there has to be some teeth
gnashing in Europe.
Back to Turkey. The largest net backstabbing of Turkish economy could be the slowdown of
investments from the Gulf, where Erdogan bravely sided with Qatar. Erdogan engineered de facto
confiscation of media assets owned by tycoons sympathetic to the opposition, to be purchased by
Qataris, now Qatar is to Turkey what Adelson is to Israel.
Siding with Qatar would eliminate
investments from KSA and UAE, and draconian treatment of Saudi princes and other tycoons
probably led to their assets being under the control of the Crown Prince.
This is not
particularly recent, but financial markets tend to have delayed fuse. Add the effect of Iran
sanctions -- it increased prices of oil and gas, but no associated increase the demand from the
Gulf, on the northern shore there is a prospect of tightened belts, on the southern shore
anti-Turkish policies, and Qatar alone is too small.
Plus Erdogan himself promised to "pay more
attention to Turkish central bank", and justifiably or not, that is a very strong sell signal
for the currency.
"... The ultimate goal of the new world order as an ideology is total centralization of economic and governmental power into the hands of a select and unaccountable bureaucracy made up of international financiers. This is governance according the the dictates of Plato's Republic; a delusional fantasy world in which benevolent philosopher kings, supposedly smarter and more objective than the rest of us, rule from on high with scientific precision and wisdom. It is a world where administrators become gods. ..."
"... Large corporations receive unfair legal protection under limited liability as well as outright legislative protection from civil consequences (Monsanto is a perfect example of this). They also receive immense taxpayer funded welfare through bailouts and other sources when they fail to manage their business responsibly. All this while small businesses and entrepreneurs are impeded at every turn by taxation and legal obstacles. ..."
"... Only massive corporations supported by governments are able to exploit the advantages of international manufacturing and labor sources in a way that ensures long term success. Meanwhile economic models that promote true decentralization and localism become impractical because real competition is never allowed. The world has not enjoyed free markets in at least a century. What we have today is something entirely different. ..."
"... The fact is, globalist institutions and central banks permeate almost every corner of the world. Nations like Russia and China are just as heavily tied to the IMF and the Bank for International Settlements and international financial centers like Goldman Sachs as any western government. ..."
"... The first inclination of human beings is to discriminate against ideas and people they see as destructive and counter to their prosperity. Globalists therefore have to convince a majority of people that the very tribalism that has fueled our social evolution and some of the greatest ideas in history is actually the source of our eventual doom. ..."
"... As mentioned earlier, globalists cannot have their "new world order" unless they can convince the masses to ask for it. Trying to implement such a system by force alone would end in failure, because revolution is the natural end result of tyranny. Therefore, the new world order has to be introduced as if it had been formed by coincidence or by providence. Any hint that the public is being conned into accepting global centralization would trigger widespread resistance. ..."
"... This is why globalism is always presented in the mainstream media as a natural extension of civilization's higher achievement. Even though it was the dangerous interdependency of globalism that helped fuel the economic crisis of 2008 and continues to escalate that crisis to this day, more globalism is continually promoted as the solution to the problem. It is spoken of with reverence in mainstream economic publications and political discussions. It receives almost religious praise in the halls of academia. Globalism is socioeconomic ambrosia -- the food of deities. It is the fountain of youth. It is a new Eden. ..."
"... Obviously, this adoration for globalism is nonsense. There is no evidence whatsoever that globalism is a positive force for humanity, let alone a natural one. There is far more evidence that globalism is a poisonous ideology that can only ever gain a foothold through trickery and through false flags. ..."
When globalists speak publicly about a "new world order" they are speaking about something
very specific and rather sacred in their little cult of elitism. It is not simply the notion
that civilization shifts or changes abruptly on its own; rather, it is their name for a
directed and engineered vision - a world built according to their rules, not a world that
evolved naturally according to necessity.
There are other names for this engineered vision, including the "global economic reset," or
the more general and innocuous term "globalism," but the intention is the same.
The ultimate goal of the new world order as an ideology is total centralization of economic
and governmental power into the hands of a select and unaccountable bureaucracy made up of
international financiers. This is governance according the the dictates of Plato's Republic; a
delusional fantasy world in which benevolent philosopher kings, supposedly smarter and more
objective than the rest of us, rule from on high with scientific precision and wisdom. It is a
world where administrators become gods.
Such precision and objectivity within human systems is not possible, of course . Human
beings are far too susceptible to their own biases and personal desires to be given
totalitarian power over others. The results will always be destruction and disaster. Then, add
to this the fact that the kinds of people who often pursue such power are predominantly
narcissistic sociopaths and psychopaths. If a governmental structure of high level
centralization is allowed to form, it opens a door for these mentally and spiritually broken
people to play out their twisted motives on a global stage.
It is important to remember that sociopaths are prone to fabricating all kinds of high
minded ideals to provide cover for their actions. That is to say, they will adopt a host of
seemingly noble causes to rationalize their scramble for power, but in the end these
"humanitarians" only care about imposing their will on as many people as possible while feeding
off them for as long as time allows.
There are many false promises, misrepresentations and fraudulent conceptions surrounding the
narrative of globalism. Some of them are rather clever and subversive and are difficult to pick
out in the deliberately created fog. The schemes involved in implementing globalism are
designed to confuse the masses with crisis until they end up ASKING for more centralization and
less freedom.
Let's examine some of the most common propaganda methods and arguments behind the push for
globalization and a "new world order"
Con #1: Globalism Is About "Free Markets"
A common pro-globalism meme is the idea that globalization is not really centralization, but
decentralization. This plays primarily to the economic side of global governance, which in my
view is the most important because without economic centralization political centralization is
not possible.
Free markets according to Adam Smith, a pioneer of the philosophy, are supposed to provide
open paths for anyone with superior ideas and ingenuity to pursue those ideas without
interference from government or government aided institutions. What we have today under
globalism are NOT free markets. Instead, globalism has supplied unfettered power to
international corporations which cannot exist without government charter and government
financial aid.
The corporate model is completely counter to Adam Smith's original premise of free market
trade. Large corporations receive unfair legal protection under limited liability as well as
outright legislative protection from civil consequences (Monsanto is a perfect example of
this). They also receive immense taxpayer funded welfare through bailouts and other sources
when they fail to manage their business responsibly. All this while small businesses and
entrepreneurs are impeded at every turn by taxation and legal obstacles.
In terms of international trade being "free trade," this is not really the case either. Only
massive corporations supported by governments are able to exploit the advantages of
international manufacturing and labor sources in a way that ensures long term success.
Meanwhile economic models that promote true decentralization and localism become impractical
because real competition is never allowed. The world has not enjoyed free markets in at least a
century. What we have today is something entirely different.
Con #2: Globalism Is About A "Multipolar World"
This is a relatively new disinformation tactic that I attribute directly to the success of
the liberty movement and alternative economists. As the public becomes more educated on the
dangers of economic centralization and more specifically the dangers of central banks, the
globalists are attempting to shift the narrative to muddy the waters.
For example, the liberty movement has railed against the existence of the Federal Reserve
and fiat dollar hegemony to the point that our information campaign has been breaking into
mainstream thought. The problem is that globalism is not about the dollar, U.S. hegemony or the
so-called "deep state," which in my view is a distraction from the bigger issue at hand.
The fact is, globalist institutions and central banks permeate almost every corner of the
world. Nations like Russia and China are just as heavily tied to the IMF and the Bank for
International Settlements and international financial centers like Goldman Sachs as any western
government.
Part of the plan for the new world order, as has been openly admitted by globalists and
globalist publications, is the decline of the U.S. and the dollar system to make way for one
world financial governance through the IMF as well as the Special Drawing Rights basket as a
mechanism for the world reserve currency. The globalists WANT a less dominant U.S. and a more
involved East, while the East continues to call for more control of the global economy by the
IMF. This concept unfortunately flies over the heads of most economists, even in the liberty
movement.
So, the great lie being promoted now is that the fall of the U.S. and the dollar is a "good
thing" because it will result in "decentralization," a "multi-polar" world order and the
"death" of globalism. However, what is really happening is that as the U.S. falls globalist
edifices like the IMF and the BIS rise. We are moving from centralization to
super-centralization. Globalists have pulled a bait and switch in order to trick the liberty
movement into supporting the success of the East (which is actually also globalist controlled)
and a philosophy which basically amounts to a re-branding of the new world order as some kind
of decentralized paradise.
Con #3: Nationalism Is The Source Of War, And Globalism Will End It
If there's one thing globalists have a love/hate relationship with, it's humanity's natural
tribal instincts. On the one hand, they like tribalism because in some cases tribalism can be
turned into zealotry, and zealots are easy to exploit and manipulate. Wars between nations
(tribes) can be instigated if the tribal instinct is weighted with artificial fears and
threats.
On the other hand, tribalism lends itself to natural decentralization of societies because
tribalism in its best form is the development of many groups organized around a variety of
ideas and principles and projects. This makes the establishment of a "one world ideology" very
difficult, if not impossible. The first inclination of human beings is to discriminate against
ideas and people they see as destructive and counter to their prosperity. Globalists therefore
have to convince a majority of people that the very tribalism that has fueled our social
evolution and some of the greatest ideas in history is actually the source of our eventual
doom.
Nationalism served the globalists to a point, but now they need to get rid of it entirely.
This requires considerable crisis blamed on nationalism and "populist" ideals. Engineered war,
whether kinetic or economic, is the best method to scapegoat tribalism. Every tragedy from now
on must eventually be attributed to ideas of separation and logical discrimination against
negative ideologies. The solution of globalism will then be offered; a one world system in
which all separation is deemed "evil."
Con #4: Globalism Is Natural And Inevitable
As mentioned earlier, globalists cannot have their "new world order" unless they can
convince the masses to ask for it. Trying to implement such a system by force alone would end
in failure, because revolution is the natural end result of tyranny. Therefore, the new world
order has to be introduced as if it had been formed by coincidence or by providence. Any hint
that the public is being conned into accepting global centralization would trigger widespread
resistance.
This is why globalism is always presented in the mainstream media as a natural extension of
civilization's higher achievement. Even though it was the dangerous interdependency of
globalism that helped fuel the economic crisis of 2008 and continues to escalate that crisis to
this day, more globalism is continually promoted as the solution to the problem. It is spoken
of with reverence in mainstream economic publications and political discussions. It receives
almost religious praise in the halls of academia. Globalism is socioeconomic ambrosia -- the
food of deities. It is the fountain of youth. It is a new Eden.
Obviously, this adoration for globalism is nonsense. There is no evidence whatsoever that
globalism is a positive force for humanity, let alone a natural one. There is far more evidence
that globalism is a poisonous ideology that can only ever gain a foothold through trickery and
through false flags.
We live in an era that represents an ultimate crossroads for civilization; a time of great
uncertainty. Will we seek truth in the trials we face, and thus the ability to create our own
solutions? Or, will we take a seemingly easier road by embracing whatever solutions are handed
to us by the establishment? Make no mistake -- the globalists already have a solution
prepackaged for us. They have been acclimating and conditioning the public to accept it for
decades now. That solution will not bring what it promises. It will not bring peace, but
eternal war. It will not bring togetherness, but isolation. It will not bring understanding,
but ignorance.
When globalists eventually try to sell us on a full-blown new world order, they will pull
out every conceivable image of heaven on Earth, but they will do this only after creating a
tangible and ever present hell.
* * *
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While the U.S. has intentionally kept it trade wide open with China, China has stolen trillions over the last 20 years in intellectual
property, including military technology. It has kept its markets tightly controlled and/or closed while the U.S. has made China
rich. Today China has a 1/2 Trillion trade surplus, is still stealing our intellectual property, and still keeps its markets tightly
controlled and mostly closed and under Chinese control. That might be ok if the goal of making China richer, a member of the world
community, and peaceful had worked, but it has not.
China is a hegemon using its wealth to grow its military, build up military forces in international sea lanes like the South China
sea, and bullying its neighbors like India, Vietnam, Taiwan, Japan, and others while also supporting the Ballistic Nuclear missile
program of NK. Its time for the USA to realize that China is an adversary, not because we want it that way, but because China
sees itself that way. And its time to stop letting an adversary use us, and steal from us, to further its imperial/hegemonic aggressive
ambitions. Apple can make iPhones in Vietnam, the Philippines, and India as cheaply as in China. Let's stop the theft, and shift
the flow of our money to the countries China is bullying like the Philippines, India, Vietnam, as well as more modern allies like
Taiwan and Japan. Let's make India rich, rather than let China continue to steal from us. Let China figure out how to keep hundreds
of millions of Chinese employed from that 1/2 Trillion surplus employed. Keep in mind a richer Vietnam and India with improved
ties with the USA and increasing wealth helped by the USA both border China. China still has time to play fair and leave the path
of hegemony and aggression, but everything point to the fact that they would rather be our adversary than our friend. So we have
to wake up and smell the coffee of that reality and move forward with our eyes open. Thank God Trump isn't sticking his head in
the sand like Bush, and especially weak, worthless, appeasing Obama.
typical trump supporter, can't even do simple arithmetic. on paper the US calculates the trade deficit to be $347 billion not
the half a trillion figure your lying president so often vomits out.
btw if moving production line to another country is so easy you people would've done it ages ago. but they're still in China,
why is that I wonder, since south east asia and india has much much lower wage than China, why dont the brilliant accountants
at Apple tell their CEO to move their production lines? =)
US Trade Deficit with China (2017) is $375.2B/year.
https://www.census.gov/fore... Moving a Production is easy. Moving a production line while improving productivity is very
hard. The US elites found it easier to move production lines overseas to take advantage of low-cost labor. In the alternative
they could have improve productivity so the US could produce the goods in question at competitive prices. That was the US history
from 1935 to 1985. Changing production processes entails risks, you could create competitors who might displace you. Moving a
standard process overseas gave you a cost advantage and increased the US elite 1% share of income from 10% GDP to 22% of GDP.
The benefits of competive destruction now flow to the Chinese. They Globalized Labor to reduce the power of the US working and
middle classes. See Blyth:
https://www.youtube.com/wat... (around 3:00 Min).
What stops China from IP rights violation now? In fact, this is an incentive to go to town with it. China has excess capacity
there is no way to halt production. China's challenge is to find markets. For instance, if they sell a product to a US owner at
$40 a piece where the US owner sells it to consumers at $900, China can sell it direct to consumers at $500 (or even $50) and
be better off. This is what will happen. Consumers outside USA will be able to buy US goods at a fraction of the price and with
time there will be importers in USA who will use third parties to import these to USA clandestinely. Why should US consumers pay
more anyway!
Talking about stealing who can compete with the whites in this game.
Pls go visit museums and galleries in London, Paris and other European capitals to see how much had been looted and stolen from
China, Asia, Arab world and Africa in the last 500.
The essentials of what Mr Brown wrote are that China got rich trading, got richer stealing IP, and spends riches on militarily
expanding with the stated goal of excluding the U.S. Navy west or south of Guam. From the perspective of an American of any political
variety, would you rather the U.S. observe this trend continuing or act to stop the IP theft and military challenge?
The best approach is go with fully reciprocal tariffs and restructure international trade around Warren Buffet's idea of a
market for Import Certificates based on US exports. This would automatically balance trade (an Import Certificate based on exports
is needed for any Import), provide a rules-based approach (vs. bureaucratic), and thus block massive rent-seeking around Trade
Policy. It would dampen potential trade wars because the focus is on reciprocity, balancing trade and not on tariffs to constantly
reduce imports. See:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wi... and
http://thehill.com/blogs/co... We can (perhaps) back off reciprocal trade when we better understand free-markets and can identify
nations who practice this freedom.
There is a reason why China carries a huge trade surplus against USA - Americans have benefitted Chinese cheaper goods and
services (than trying to procure them from other sources). They will pay more for the same service. This will reduce their savings
and increase borrowings. China progressively dumps the US dollar in petroleum purchases which will devalue the USD. This will
make imports even more expensive for Americans. China will devalue its currency again to overcome the tarrif impact.
The worlds largest market for commercial aircraft and Trump just put Boeing out of contention. Betcha Trump gets a yuuuugh
campaign contribution from Airbus on the condition he starts a trade war with the second biggest market of airliners, India, as
well.
China has been preparing for a trade war with the USA for some time. The belt/road project and petroyuan are 2 such projects
looking to build trade relations that bypass the USA altogether. It won't be that difficult for China to find markets for TV's,
dollar store plastic and consumer appliances. I'm sure it will hurt but there are other markets for their products.
Try finding another market for Boeing Dreamliners .... all those high paying specialized jobs. The good news is that with this
trade war markets open up for consumer appliances which Boeing can fill ..... the bad news is the stealth toasters they make will
cost $250,000, will only be operational one day a week as long as it isn't raining and you won't be able to find it on that day
because it's a stealth toaster.
Doesn't matter about finding another market for Dreamliners .. So your implying its ok for China to rip us off and we just
take it. Boeing has done well these last few years.. Boeing plans to increase 737 production to 57 aircraft a month not counting
the 767, 777 and 787. China drops their orders there are customers right behind them to take their slot on the line.
The worse part is the requirement to turn over your intellectual property to the state. Why should they spend the billions
in R&D when they can just wait it out, crack their market open a small bit, then take or steal the property with no recourse from
the owner. Once they have that IP they set up another business putting the original business into bankruptcy.
China is playing an economic war to win. Trump plans to win...
"The worse part is the requirement to turn over your intellectual property to the state."
If that's a condition of the contract why do US companies agree to the contract?
I have a lot of experience negotiating contracts with US firms. The US businesses I've dealt with have always sought favourable
terms to the extent that I really don't like doing business with them.
When I see terms in a contract I can't live with I walk away ..... and I've done it a lot. Now you're trying to tell me US
businesses were coerced into signing contracts that forced them to give away intellectual property?
I don't believe that for a moment.
I have a dozen stories of guys getting screwed over because they didn't bother with the details of a contract. If you are that
naive you take your lumps and if you're smart you learn from it.
What you don't do is keep signing the same agreements that has technology transfers in the terms then cry foul after doing
it for thirty or forty years.
The way I see it technology transfer was likely seen by the Chinese as part of the overall compensation. You got the product
made for a killer price on the condition you tell them how to make it themselves.
You should know that no one works for nothing. If you're getting an unbelievably good price look at the fine print.
Given who your president is, the business he's in and his reputation as a business man I have a pretty good idea what he's
really up to with this tactic and it might play well to the peanut gallery but the Chinese are not going to be played so easily
Most developing countries require some level of technology transfer before they permit foreign firms to operate inside their
borders. It's their only way of avoiding becoming commercial colonies of countries like the US. If firms don't like it, the solution
is as you suggest: they can decline to set up in foreign countries and simply export finished products made in their home country.
Lots of multinational firms have legitimate grievances against the Chinese government for being lax in policing and prosecuting
copyright laws. Fake prestige brand fashion, handbags, cell phones and the like, made in China, are openly sold throughout Asia.
But the crap about 'intellectual property theft' is nonsense.
There is no such thing as FAIR trade among vastly unequal economies. China has a billion citizens (an endless supply of cheap
labor). China is a major polluter (not limited like the US is with it's EPA). The laws concerning wages, working-hours, over-time,
workman's compensation, safety, pensions don't compare between economies. Thus, the US is at a severe competitive disadvantage.
China plays dirty on top of their already significant economic advantages. FAIR trade between China and the US is a fairy-tale.
I support Trump. China is not our friend.
Industrial revolution and consequently polution lasted for decades in west before China jumped into the game. So your "carbon
footprint" is much higher cumulatevely than China's. Also you don't complain about countries like Bangladesh where USA companies
exploit people like modern day slaves. Drop that moralising please! Globalisation is 2 way street, in begining when you "oppened"
3. World markets and flooded them with your superior technologies and products and practically plundered them, it wasn't a problem.
Now when things changed you whine like babies.
Even if U.S. exports to China went to zero, that'd be way less than 1% of our GDP. If China's exports to the U.S. went to zero,
that be about 5% of its GDP.
When one reads Chinese propaganda, Xi is banking heavily on U.S. politics to stop the U.S. from getting tough on China's trade
cheating. He thinks that farmers and other business people will stop the Trump admin from enacting tariffs and other measures
because of fear of Chinese retaliation. Xi faces no similar domestic political pressure because China is an authoritarian state.
The only thing that can mess-up gaining a U.S. trade victory is self-defeat. People here in the U.S. should stop overreacting
and playing into the hands of Xi. Let's get some backbone people!
Given that the U.S. has severely reduced our industrial metal production and manufacturing by failing to modernize years ago,
we do need China. The same goes for several other industrial and manufacturing products. China's pork production is currently
battling a corona virus from bats that is killing off their young swine. Our food products are important to the Chinese given
the high levels of pollution in their country. The U.S. is most vulnerable because China provides nearly all of the Rare Earth
Elements (REEs) that are essential for our high tech industries and defense equipment.
The U.S. would face a real problem anyway if the shipping lanes were closed down because of conflicts or natural catastrophes...better
to prepare for the worst now and get China to open up trade barriers or follow fairer trade policy.
The worst Chinese import is the Marxist-Leninist ideology that slaughtered over 100 million Chinese...blame the Russians!
U.S. free market ideological imports lifted a billion plus Chinese out of poverty.
For anyone travelling in China, being labelled a Laowei or foreignor is commonplace. The current government is pushing a defensive,
Han Chinese based, zenophobic system that seeks to monopolize ideas and keep the imported Marxist-Leninist ideology in total control
of the thoughts and minds of the average Chinese citizen.
The U.S. can't change that, but we can look out for our own sovereign interests in better trade deals, re-establishing vital mining,
industrial and/or manufacturing capabilities, and maintaining strategic reserves of essential elements.
This Guardian pressitute can't even mentions the term neoliberalism, to day noting to accept that neoliberalism now experience a
crisis (which actually started in 2008)
Globalization blowback will not totally bury neoliberal globalization, but it puts some limits on transnational corporations racket...
hat is happening to national politics? Every day in the US, events further exceed the imaginations of absurdist novelists and comedians;
politics in the UK still shows few signs of recovery after the "
national nervous breakdown " of Brexit.
France "
narrowly
escaped a heart attack " in last year's elections, but the country's leading daily feels this has done little to alter the "
accelerated decomposition " of the political system. In neighbouring Spain, El País goes so far as to say that "the rule of law,
the democratic system and even the market economy are in doubt"; in Italy, "the collapse of the establishment" in the March elections
has even brought talk of a "barbarian arrival", as if Rome were falling once again. In Germany, meanwhile, neo-fascists are preparing
to take up their role as
official opposition , introducing anxious volatility into the bastion of European stability.
But the convulsions in national politics are not confined to the west. Exhaustion, hopelessness, the dwindling effectiveness of
old ways: these are the themes of politics all across the world. This is why energetic authoritarian "solutions" are currently so
popular: distraction by war (Russia, Turkey); ethno-religious "purification" (India, Hungary, Myanmar); the magnification of presidential
powers and the corresponding abandonment of civil rights and the rule of law (China, Rwanda, Venezuela, Thailand, the Philippines
and many more).
What is the relationship between these various upheavals? We tend to regard them as entirely separate – for, in political life,
national solipsism is the rule. In each country, the tendency is to blame "our" history, "our" populists, "our" media, "our" institutions,
"our" lousy politicians. And this is understandable, since the organs of modern political consciousness – public education and mass
media – emerged in the 19th century from a globe-conquering ideology of unique national destinies. When we discuss "politics", we
refer to what goes on inside sovereign states; everything else is "foreign affairs" or "international relations" – even in this era
of global financial and technological integration. We may buy the same products in every country of the world, we may all use Google
and Facebook, but political life, curiously, is made of separate stuff and keeps the antique faith of borders.
Yes, there is awareness that similar varieties of populism are erupting in many countries. Several have noted the parallels in
style and substance between leaders such as Donald Trump, Vladimir Putin, Narendra Modi, Viktor Orbán and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. There
is a sense that something is in the air – some coincidence of feeling between places. But this does not get close enough. For there
is no coincidence. All countries are today embedded in the same system, which subjects them all to the same pressures: and it is
these that are squeezing and warping national political life everywhere. And their effect is quite the opposite – despite the desperate
flag-waving – of the oft-remarked "
resurgence of the nation state ".
The future of economic globalisation, for which the Davos men and women see themselves as
caretakers, had been shaken by a series of political earthquakes. "Globalisation" can mean many
things, but what lay in particular doubt was the long-advanced project of increasing free trade
in goods across borders. The previous summer, Britain had voted to leave the largest trading
bloc in the world. In November, the unexpected victory of Donald Trump , who vowed to withdraw from
major trade deals, appeared to jeopardise the trading relationships of the world's richest
country. Forthcoming elections in France and Germany suddenly seemed to bear the possibility of
anti-globalisation parties garnering better results than ever before. The barbarians weren't at
the gates to the ski-lifts yet – but they weren't very far.
In a panel titled Governing Globalisation , the economist
Dambisa Moyo , otherwise a well-known supporter of free trade, forthrightly asked the
audience to accept that "there have been significant losses" from globalisation. "It is not
clear to me that we are going to be able to remedy them under the current infrastructure," she
added. Christine Lagarde, the head of the International Monetary Fund,
called for a policy hitherto foreign to the World Economic Forum : "more redistribution".
After years of hedging or discounting the malign effects of free trade, it was time to face
facts: globalisation caused job losses and depressed wages, and the usual Davos proposals
– such as instructing affected populations to accept the new reality – weren't
going to work. Unless something changed, the political consequences were likely to get
worse.
The backlash to globalisation has helped fuel the extraordinary political shifts of the past
18 months. During the close race to become the Democratic party candidate, senator Bernie
Sanders relentlessly attacked Hillary Clinton on her
support for free trade . On the campaign trail, Donald Trump openly proposed tilting the
terms of trade in favour of American industry. "Americanism, not globalism, shall be our
creed," he bellowed at the Republican national convention last July.
The vote for Brexit was strongest in the regions of the UK devastated by the flight of
manufacturing. At Davos in January, British prime minister Theresa May, the leader of the party
of capital and inherited wealth, improbably picked up the theme, warning that, for many, "talk
of greater globalisation means their jobs being outsourced and wages undercut." Meanwhile,
the European far right has been warning against free movement of people as well as goods.
Following her qualifying victory in the first round of France's presidential election,
Marine Le Pen warned darkly that "the main thing at stake in this election is the rampant
globalisation that is endangering our civilisation."
It was only a few decades ago that globalisation was held by many, even by some critics, to
be an inevitable, unstoppable force. "Rejecting globalisation," the American journalist George
Packer has written, "was like rejecting the sunrise." Globalisation could take place in
services, capital and ideas, making it a notoriously imprecise term; but what it meant most
often was making it cheaper to trade across borders – something that seemed to many at
the time to be an unquestionable good. In practice, this often meant that industry would move
from rich countries, where labour was expensive, to poor countries, where labour was cheaper.
People in the rich countries would either have to accept lower wages to compete, or lose their
jobs. But no matter what, the goods they formerly produced would now be imported, and be even
cheaper. And the unemployed could get new, higher-skilled jobs (if they got the requisite
training). Mainstream economists and politicians upheld the consensus about the merits of
globalisation, with little concern that there might be political consequences.
Back then, economists could calmly chalk up anti-globalisation sentiment to a marginal group
of delusional protesters, or disgruntled stragglers still toiling uselessly in "sunset
industries". These days, as sizable constituencies have voted in country after country for
anti-free-trade policies, or candidates that promise to limit them, the old self-assurance is
gone. Millions have rejected, with uncertain results, the punishing logic that globalisation
could not be stopped. The backlash has swelled a wave of soul-searching among economists, one
that had already begun to roll ashore with the financial crisis. How did they fail to foresee
the repercussions?
Comment of the Day : Dennis Drew :
GLOBALIZATION: WHAT DID PAUL KRUGMAN MISS? : "I'm always the first to say that if today's
10 dollars an hour jobs paid 20 dollars an hour
(Walgreen's, Target, fast food less w/much high labor costs) that would solve most social
problems caused by loss of manufacturing (to out sourcing or automation). The money's there.
Bottom 40% income take about 10% of overall income. "Mid" take about 67.5%. Top 1%, 22.5%.
The instrument of moving 10% more from "mid" to the bottom is higher consumer prices arriving
with the sudden reappearance of nationwide, high union density (see below for the easy
application). The instrument of retrieving the "mid's" lost 10% is Eisenhower level
confiscatory taxes for the top 1%.
Jack Kennedy lowered max income tax rate from 92% to 70% to improve incentives (other cuts
followed). But with the top 1% wages now 20X (!) what they were in the 60s while per capita
only doubled since, there will be all the incentive in the world left over while we relieve
them of the burden of stultifying wealth. ;-)
Brad argues that globalization is as good for the USA as Krugman thought in the 1990s. He has three key arguments. One is that
the manufacturing employment which has been off shored is unskilled assembly and such boring jobs are not good jobs. The second is
that the problems faced by US manufacturing workers are mostly due to electing Reagan and W Bush and not trade. Finally he notes
that local economic decline is not new at all and that trade with South Carolina did it to Massachusetts long before China entered
the picture. The third point works against his general argument and is partly personal. I won't discuss it except to note that Brad
is right.
I have criticisms of Brad's first two arguments. The first is that the boring easy manufacturing jobs were well paid. They are
bad jobs in that thinking of doing them terrifies me even more than work in general terrifies me, but they are (or mostly were) well
paid jobs. There are still strong forces that make wages paid to people who work near each other at the same firm similar. As very
much noted by Dennis Drew, unions used to be very strong and used that strenth to help all employees of unionized firms (and employess
of non-union firms whose managers were afraid of unions). I think that, like Krugman, Brad assumes that wages are based on skills
importantly including ones acquired on the job. I think this leaves a lot out.
... ... ...
Kaleberg , April 1, 2018 4:03 pm
An argument no one mentions is about comparative advantage. The US had a comparative advantage in manufacturing. It had the
engineers, the technicians, the labor, the venture capital and so on. When transportation costs are low and barriers minimal,
comparative advantage is something a nation creates, not some natural attribute. The US sacrificed that comparative advantage
on the altar of ideological purity. Manufacturing advantage is an especially useful type of advantage since it can permeate the
remaining economy. We sacrificed it, and we have been paying for it. Odds are, we will continue to pay.
likbez , April 1, 2018 6:38 pm
The problem here is that neoliberalism and globalization are two sides of the same coin.
If you reject globalization, you need to reject neoliberalism as a social system. You just can't sit between two chairs (as
Trump attempts to do propagating "bastard neoliberalism" -- neoliberal doctrine is still fully applicable within the country,
but neoliberal globalization is rejected)
Rejection of neoliberal globalization also implicitly suggests that Reagan "quiet coup" that restored the power of financial
oligarchy and subsequent dismantling of the New Deal Capitalism was a disaster for common people in the USA.
While this is true, that's a very tough call. That explains DeLong behavior.
"... And, quoting his colleague Archon Fung from the Harvard Kennedy School, " American politics is no longer characterized by the rule of the median voter, if it ever was. Instead, in contemporary America the median capitalist rules as both the Democratic and Republican parties adjust their policies to attract monied interests." And finally Mr. Ringen adds, "American politicians are aware of having sunk into a murky bog of moral corruption but are trapped." ..."
"... Trump merely reflects the dysfunctionality and internal contradictions of American politics. He is the American Gorbachev, who kicked off perestroika at the wrong time. ..."
"... Global financial services exercise monopolistic power over national policies, unchecked by any semblance of global political power. Trust is haemorrhaging. The European Union, the greatest ever experiment in super-national democracy, is imploding ..."
"... Probably this is because the Western model of neoliberalism does not provide any real freedom of commerce, speech, or political activity, but rather imposes a regime of submission within a clearly defined framework. ..."
"... america is going through withdraw from 30 years of trickledown crap. the young are realizing that the shithole they inherit does not have to be a shithole, and the old pathetic white old men who run the show will be dead soon. ..."
"... The liberal order is dying because it is led by criminally depraved Predators who have pauperized the labor force and created political strife, though the populists don't pose much threat to the liberal-order Predators. ..."
"... However by shipping the productive Western economies overseas to Asia, the US in particular cannot finance and physically support a military empire or the required R&D to stay competitive on the commercial and military front. ..."
"... So the US Imperialists are being eclipsed by the Sino-Russo Alliance and wants us to believe this is a great tragedy. Meanwhile the same crew of Liberal -neoCon Deep Staters presses on with wars and tensions that are slipping out of control. ..."
Haass writes: " Liberalism is in retreat. Democracies are feeling the effects of growing populism. Parties of the political extremes
have gained ground in Europe. The vote in the United Kingdom in favor of leaving the EU attested to the loss of elite influence.
Even the US is experiencing unprecedented attacks from its own president on the country's media, courts, and law-enforcement institutions.
Authoritarian systems, including China, Russia, and Turkey, have become even more top-heavy. Countries such as Hungary and Poland
seem uninterested in the fate of their young democracies
"We are seeing the emergence of regional orders. Attempts to build global frameworks are failing."
Haass has previously made alarmist statements , but this
time he is employing his rhetoric to point to the global nature of this phenomenon. Although between the lines one can easily read,
first of all, a certain degree of arrogance -- the idea that only we liberals and globalists really know how to administer foreign
policy -- and second, the motifs of conspiracy.
"Today's other major powers, including the EU, Russia, China, India, and Japan, could be criticized for what they are doing,
not doing, or both."
Probably this list could be expanded by adding a number of Latin American countries, plus Egypt, which signs arms deals with North
Korea while denying any violation of UN sanctions, and the burgeoning Shiite axis of Iran-Iraq-Syria-Lebanon.
But Haass is crestfallen over the fact that it is Washington itself that is changing the rules of the game and seems completely
uninterested in what its allies, partners, and clients in various corners of the world will do.
" America's decision to abandon the role it has played for more than seven decades thus marks a turning point. The liberal
world order cannot survive on its own, because others lack either the interest or the means to sustain it. The result will be
a world that is less free, less prosperous, and less peaceful, for Americans and others alike."
Richard Haass's colleague at the CFR, Stewart Patrick, quite agrees with the claim that it is
the US itself that is burying the liberal world order . However, it's not doing it on its own, but alongside China. If the US
had previously been hoping that the process of globalization would gradually transform China (and possibly destroy it, as happened
to the Soviet Union earlier), then the Americans must have been quite surprised by how it has actually played out. That country modernized
without being Westernized, an idea that had once been endorsed by the leader of the Islamic revolution in Iran, Ayatollah Khomeini.
Now China is expanding its influence in Eurasia in its own way, and this is for the most part welcomed by its partner countries.
But this has been a painful process for the US, as it is steadily and irrevocably undermining its hegemony.
"Its long-term ambition is to dismantle the U.S. alliance system in Asia, replacing it with a more benign (from Beijing's perspective)
regional security order in which it enjoys pride of place, and ideally a sphere of influence commensurate with its power.
China's Belt and Road initiative is part and parcel of this effort, offering not only (much-needed) infrastructure investments
in neighboring countries but also the promise of greater political influence in Southeast, South, and Central Asia. More aggressively,
China continues to advance outrageous jurisdictional claims over almost the entirety of the South China Sea , where it continues
its island-building activities, as well as engaging in provocative actions against Japan in the East China Sea," writes Patrick.
And as for the US:
"The United States, for its part, is a weary titan, no longer willing to bear the burdens of global leadership, either economically
or geopolitically.
Trump treats alliances as a protection racket, and the world economy as an arena of zero-sum competition. The result is a fraying
liberal international order without a champion willing to invest in the system itself. "
One can agree with both authors' assessments of the changed behavior of one sector of the US establishment, but this is about
more than just Donald Trump (who is so unpredictable that he has
staffed his own team with a member of the very swamp he was preparing to drain) and North American populism. One needs to look
much deeper.
"Today, American democratic exceptionalism is defined by a system that is dysfunctional in all the conditions that are needed
for settlement and loyalty...
Capitalism has collapsed into crisis in an orgy of deregulation. Money is transgressing into politics and undermining democracy
itself ."
And, quoting his colleague Archon Fung from the Harvard Kennedy School, " American politics is no longer characterized by
the rule of the median voter, if it ever was. Instead, in contemporary America the median capitalist rules as both the Democratic
and Republican parties adjust their policies to attract monied interests." And finally Mr. Ringen adds, "American politicians are
aware of having sunk into a murky bog of moral corruption but are trapped."
Trump merely reflects the dysfunctionality and internal contradictions of American politics. He is the American Gorbachev,
who kicked off perestroika at the wrong time. Although it must be conceded that if Hillary Clinton had become president, the
US collapse would have been far more painful, particularly for the citizens of that country. We would have seen yet more calamitous
reforms, a swelling influx of migrants, a further decline in the nation's manufacturing base, and the incitement of new conflicts.
Trump is trying to keep the body of US national policy somewhat alive through hospice care, but what's really needed is a major restructuring,
including far-reaching political reforms that would allow the country's citizens to feel that they can actually play a role in its
destiny.
These developments have spread to many countries in Europe, a continent that, due to its transatlantic involvement, was already
vulnerable and susceptible to the current geopolitical turbulence. The emergence of which, by the way, was largely a consequence
of that very policy of neoliberalism.
Stein Ringen continues on that score:
"Global financial services exercise monopolistic power over national policies, unchecked by any semblance of global political
power. Trust is haemorrhaging. The European Union, the greatest ever experiment in super-national democracy, is imploding
"
It is interesting that panic has seized Western Europe and the US -- the home of transatlanticism, although different versions
of this recipe for liberalism have been employed in other regions -- suffice it to recall the experience of Singapore or Brazil.
But they don't seem as panicked there as in the West.
Probably this is because the Western model of neoliberalism does not provide any real freedom of commerce, speech, or political
activity, but rather imposes a regime of submission within a clearly defined framework. Therefore, the destruction of the current
system entails the loss of all those dividends previously enjoyed by the liberal political elites of the West that were obtained
by speculating in the stock market, from the mechanisms of international foreign-exchange payments (the dollar system), and through
the instruments of supranational organizations (the UN, WTO, and World Bank). And, of course, there are the fundamental differences
in the cultural varieties of societies.
In his book The Hidden God, Lucien Goldmann draws some interesting conclusions, suggesting that the foundations of Western culture
have rationalistic and tragic origins, and that a society immersed in these concepts that have "abolish[ed] both God and the community
[soon sees] the disappearance of any external norm which might guide the individual in his life and actions." And because by its
very nature liberalism must carry on, in its mechanical fashion, "liberating" the individual from any form of structure (social classes,
the Church, family, society, and gender, ultimately liberating man from his very self), in the absence of any standards of deterrence,
it is quite logical that the Western world was destined to eventually find itself in crisis. And the surge of populist movements,
protectionist measures, and conservative policies of which Haass and other liberal globalists speak are nothing more than examples
of those nations' instinct for self-preservation. One need not concoct conspiracy theories about Russia or Putin interfering in the
US election (which Donald Trump has also denied, noting only that support was seen for Hillary Clinton, and it is entirely true that
a portion of her financial backing did come from Russia). The baseline political decisions being made in the West are in step with
the current crisis that is evident on so many levels. It's just that, like always, the Western elites need their ritual whipping
boy(although it would be more accurate to call it a human sacrifice). This geopolitical shake-up began in the West as a result of
the implicit nature of the very project of the West itself.
But since alternative development scenarios exist, the current system is eroding away. And other political projects are starting
to fill the resultant ideological void -- in both form as well as content.
Thus it's fairly likely that the current crisis of liberalism will definitively bury the unipolar Western system of hegemony.
And the budding movements of populism and regional protectionism can serve as the basis for a new, multipolar world order.
Oh, Wicked Witch of the West Wing, the cleansing fire awaits thy demise! Those meds can only keep you standing for so long.
Keep tripping. Keep stumbling. Satan calls you to him. The day approacheth. Tick tock tick tock. 👹😂
Democracy ultimately melts down into chaos. We have a perfectly good US Constitution, why don't we go back to using it as written?
That said, I am for anything that makes the elites become common.
Democracy is a form of government. Populism is a movement. Populist movements come about when the current form of government
is failing ... historically it seems they seldom choose wisely.
Ridiculous cunt Hillary thinks after getting REJECTED by the voters in the USA that somehow being asked to "go the fuck away
and shut the fuck up" makes her a women's leader. The cocksucker Soros and some of these other non-elected globalist should keep
in mind that while everybody has a right to an opinion: it took the Clinton Crime Family and lots of corruption to create the
scandals that sets a Clinton Crime Family member aside, and why Soros was given a free pass on election meddling and not others
requires congressional investigation and a special prosecutor. And then there is that special kind of legal and ignorant opinion
like David Hogg who I just disagree with, making him in my opinion and many fellow NRA members a cocksucker and a cunt. I'd wish
shingles on David Hogg, Hillary Clinton, and Soros.
america is going through withdraw from 30 years of trickledown crap. the young are realizing that the shithole they inherit
does not have to be a shithole, and the old pathetic white old men who run the show will be dead soon.
all i see is a bunch of fleeting old people who found facebook 10 years late are temporarily empowered since they can now connect
with other equally impotent old people.
The usual self-serving swill from the Best and the Brightest of the Predator Class out of the CFR via Haas.
The liberal order aka the New British Empire, was born 70 years ago by firebombing and nuking undefended civilian targets.
It proceeded to launch serial genocidal rampages in the Koreas, SE Asia, Latin America until finally burning down a large portion
of the Middle East.
The fact that there has not been a catastrophic nuclear war is pure dumb luck. The Deep State came within seconds of engineering
a nuclear cataclysm off the waters of Cuba in 1962. When JFK started dismantling the CIA Deep State and ending the Cold War with
the USSR, Dulles dispatched a CIA hit-squad to gun down the President. (RFK and Nixon immediately understood the assassination
was a CIA-led wet-works operation since they chaired the assassination committees themselves in the past).
The liberal order is dying because it is led by criminally depraved Predators who have pauperized the labor force and created
political strife, though the populists don't pose much threat to the liberal-order Predators.
However by shipping the productive Western economies overseas to Asia, the US in particular cannot finance and physically
support a military empire or the required R&D to stay competitive on the commercial and military front.
So the US Imperialists are being eclipsed by the Sino-Russo Alliance and wants us to believe this is a great tragedy. Meanwhile
the same crew of Liberal -neoCon Deep Staters presses on with wars and tensions that are slipping out of control.
Liberalism is anything but liberal... and I suppose that is the problem with it. It aims to do to the western world what Mao
did to China and Stalin did to Russia. Many people were murdered or imprisoned and people had no rights, just obligations to dictators
and their cronies.
I think this world is past the point where any benefit is gained from having "owners of the people", benevolent or otherwise.
And we certainly do not benefit from perverted demonic entities even if they come bearing technology. The price is too high.
Populism goes along with essential freedoms for the human race.-
As I told the idiotic retards who argued with me on Prodigy fucking 27 years ago, China will not change because of increased
trading and the West making them wealthier. In fact, just the opposite. I wonder if they have caught on yet?
The recent German Marshall Fund's Brussels Forum, which brought together influential
American neocons and trans-Atlantic leaders from Europe, marked the failure of the
Western-centered globalist idea, Sputnik political observer Dmitry Kosyrev notes, adding that
meanwhile, Russia and China continue to facilitate the emergence of a multi-polar world.
Globalists have admitted their defeat by recognizing that neither Russia nor China will dance
to their tune, Sputnik political observer Dmitry Kosyrev writes
.
"It seems that work has begun to revive the half-dead 'liberal world order'," the observer
noted. "It will take quite some time, and it is not necessary that the United States will be
its epicenter. However, this 'order' will not be global -- goodbye, illusions. It will involve
only part of the countries while China, Russia and some other states won't be affected [by the
project]."
The observer referred to the 2018 German Marshall Fund's (GMF) Brussels Forum ,
citing Josh Rogin of The Washington Post. The Brussels Forum is an annual high-level
meeting of influential politicians, corporate leaders and scholars from North America and
Europe. The event had the eloquent title "Revise, Rebuild, Reboot: Strategies for a Time of
Distrust." The organizers of the forum raised the alarm over "a decline in trust, both in
domestic and international spheres."
"We lost sight of what it took to create this international order and what an act of
defiance of history and even defiance of human nature this order has been. We have the capacity
to push back -- we just need to understand the pushback needs to start occurring," Robert
Kagan, neoconservative American historian and husband of former US Assistant Secretary of State
for European and Eurasian Affairs Victoria Nuland told the forum, as quoted by Rogin.
For
his part, Senator Chris Murphy bemoaned the fact that US President Donald Trump is not
interested in "projecting liberal values" into other countries, let alone trade liberalization.
The White House's recent
initiative to introduce additional tariffs on aluminum and steel imports has prompted a
wave of criticism from the US' global partners and allies.
Furthermore, the US president made it clear that the US will not support numerous
international institutions and withdrew from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and
Cultural Organization (UNESCO).
Murphy called upon the defenders of the liberal world order to team up and "build new
alliances within their societies."
On the other hand, the transatlantic bloc has seemingly recognized its failure to impose a
Western-style political order on Russia and China.
"We can no longer expect that the principles of liberal democracy will expand across the
globe," Rogin wrote. "We can no longer assume the United States will carry the bulk of the
burden."
Following Trump's win in 2016, The New York Times
called Germany's Angela Merkel the last defender of the trans-Atlantic alliance and liberal
values.
However, not everything is rosy in the European garden, Kosyrev noted referring to
the
rise of right-wing forces in Austria, Italy, Hungary, Poland and other EU member states.
Although Merkel still remains at the helm of German politics, the right-wing Alternative for
Germany (AfD) entered the Bundestag in September 2017 as the third-largest party.
Given all of the above, the rebuilding of the liberal international order will take years,
Kosyrev presumed.
According to the political observer, Russia and China could benefit from the inner struggle
in the trans-Atlantic camp. On the other hand, he does not exclude that the West will continue
its overseas operations to maintain the status quo. To illustrate his point, Kosyrev referred
to Syria: While Washington has virtually no leverage to oust Syrian President Bashar al-Assad,
it
continues its saber-rattling, threatening Damascus with a massive strike.
The failure of globalism means the further rise of a multi-polar order based on the
principles of equality and sovereignty with its own norms and regulations, the political
observer concluded.
The views and opinions expressed by Dmitry Kosyrev are those of the contributor and do
not necessarily reflect those of Sputnik.
The Trump administration's proposed tariffs on steel and aluminum imports will target China, but not the way most
observers believe. For the US, the most important bilateral trade issue has nothing to do with the Chinese authorities'
failure to reduce excess steel capacity, as promised, and stop subsidizing exports.
CAMBRIDGE – Like almost all economists and most policy analysts, I
prefer low trade tariffs or no tariffs at all. How, then, can US President Donald Trump's decision to impose substantial
tariffs on imports of steel and aluminum be justified?
3
Trump no doubt sees potential political gains in steel- and
aluminum-producing districts and in increasing the pressure on Canada and Mexico as his administration renegotiates the
North American Free Trade Agreement. The European Union has announced plans to retaliate against US exports, but in the
end the EU may negotiate – and agree to reduce current tariffs on US products that exceed US tariffs on European
products.
But the real target of the steel and aluminum tariffs is China. The
Chinese government has promised for years to reduce excess steel capacity, thereby cutting the surplus output that is
sold to the United States at subsidized prices. Chinese policymakers have postponed doing so as a result of domestic
pressure to protect China's own steel and aluminum jobs. The US tariffs will balance those domestic pressures and
increase the likelihood that China will accelerate the reduction in subsidized excess capacity.
Because the tariffs are being levied under a provision of US trade
law that applies to national security, rather than dumping or import surges, it will be possible to exempt imports from
military allies in NATO, as well as Japan and South Korea, focusing the tariffs on China and avoiding the risk of a
broader trade war. The administration has not yet said that it will focus the tariffs in this way; but, given that they
are being introduced with a phase-in period, during which trade partners may seek exemptions, such targeting seems to be
the likeliest scenario.
For the US, the most important trade issue with China concerns
technology transfers, not Chinese exports of subsidized steel and aluminum. Although such subsidies hurt US producers of
steel and aluminum, the resulting low prices also help US firms that use steel and aluminum, as well as US consumers
that buy those products. But China unambiguously hurts US interests when it steals technology developed by US firms.
Until a few years ago, the Chinese government was using the Peoples
Liberation Army's (PLA) sophisticated cyber skills to infiltrate American companies and steal technology. Chinese
officials denied all wrongdoing until President Barack Obama and President Xi Jinping met in California in June 2013.
Obama showed Xi detailed proof that the US had obtained through its own cyber espionage. Xi then agreed that the Chinese
government would no longer use the PLA or other government agencies to steal US technology. Although it is difficult to
know with certainty, it appears that such cyber theft has been reduced dramatically.
The current technology theft takes a different form. American firms
that want to do business in China are often required to transfer their technology to Chinese firms as a condition of
market entry. These firms "voluntarily" transfer production knowhow because they want access to a market of 1.3 billion
people and an economy as large as that of the US.
These firms complain that the requirement of technology transfer is a
form of extortion. Moreover, they worry that the Chinese government often delays their market access long enough for
domestic firms to use their newly acquired technology to gain market share.
1
The US cannot use traditional remedies for trade disputes or World
Trade Organization procedures to stop China's behavior. Nor can the US threaten to take Chinese technology or require
Chinese firms to transfer it to American firms, because the Chinese do not have the kind of leading-edge technology that
US firms have.
So, what can US policymakers do to help level the playing field?
This brings us back to the proposed tariffs on steel and aluminum. In
my view, US negotiators will use the threat of imposing the tariffs on Chinese producers as a way to persuade China's
government to abandon the policy of "voluntary" technology transfers. If that happens, and US firms can do business in
China without being compelled to pay such a steep competitive price, the threat of tariffs will have been a very
successful tool of trade policy.
people.umass.edu/dmkotz/Glob_and_NL_02.pdf · PDF file
Globalization and Neoliberalism 3 The Problematic
Character of Neoliberalism Neoliberalism appears to be problematic
as a dominant theory for contemporary …
Until the onslaught of the global economic crisis, the ...
What Is "Neoliberal Globalization"? ... In its neoliberal
stage it is not enough for capitalism to ...
From the Battle of Seattle to the Financial Crisis. The
decisive role of collective action in undermining neoliberal
ideology and the continuing structural …
Video embedded · What is neoliberalism ... Economic issues
such as globalization, ... Added some more about how the global
financial crisis has shown more flaws in the neoliberal
...
papers.ssrn.com/sol3/Delivery.cfm/SSRN_ID1676730_code290244.pdf?...
· PDF file
The crises of neoliberal globalization in the
semiperiphery started with the Turkish and - Mexican financial shocks in 1994,
continued with the devastating Asian ...
home.ku.edu.tr/~zonis/pdf/ONIS_GUVEN_Global Crisis-National...
· PDF file
The Global Economic Crisis and the Future
of Neoliberal Globalization: Rupture versus Continuity ZİYA
ÖNİŞ and ALİ BURAK GÜVEN GLODEM Working Paper Series
Neoliberal Globalization. ... neoliberal ideology
also embraces the privatization of resources using the rhetoric of efficiency
and individual responsibility.
The Last but not LeastTechnology is dominated by
two types of people: those who understand what they do not manage and those who manage what they do not understand ~Archibald Putt.
Ph.D
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