Capt. James Fanell warns about the rise of China

[Anomalocaris]

This is the first time since the cold war that the west has to play with another dominant power.

What I will say about the Chinese however is that their economy is heavily reliant on exports. If the rest of the world suffers, they do too (as evidenced by the past 5 or so years following the credit crunch in the West). But their colonisation of East Africa has been rapid and almost undocumented. Quite scary really!

Also worth nothing that China is a de facto totalitarian dictatorship, so you can't expect it to play by anyone's rules except it's own when it comes to economics. It's a free market up till a point where the Communist party doesn't want it to be, meaning operating there can be difficult (impossible if you're facebook and google!). History tells us that economies that operate under a system that consistently fluctuates doesn't tend to have much longevity, meaning either a rejection of free market economics (no chance of that happening considering the dramatic rise in wealth and borrowing there) or a gradual, slow decline of authoritarianism. Or a big party, I dunno.

China is remarkably uncontrolled for a totalitarian regime. Highly authoritarian, yes, totalitarian, not in any sense as the word is normally understood, as applied to Nazi German or Soviet Russia, when the word had a descriptive meaning, before the word became a convenient tool for the vilification of those perceived to not eagerly serve the best interests of the unipolar world political and economic system that happen to places United States and its English speaking minions at the center upon a self made pedastal.

One could always forecast the imminent end of Chinese economic growth because of it is so authoritarian. Authoritarianism may yet prove to be China's achille's heel. But it is indisputable that China would still be as poor as, say, philippines, or India, had it not been so authoritarian in the last 35 years or so. The fact remains Chinese authoritarianism mixed with a freewheeling capitalism that oddly pay homage to communism and socialism is what had in the course of 35 years lifted more people out of abject subsistence poverty into something like an existence with disposible income and leisure than all other political economic systems in the world combined during the last 100.


In the chinese view, human rights are very good. But not nearly as good as the ability to live better than in abject poverty, have leisure time and disposible income. They think implimentation of westen concept of human rights is not all together compatible with granting a billion people the right to have disposible income and leisure time sometime within this life time. Being closer to abject poverty, their estimate of which is more valuable - the right vote or the ability to have leisure and disposible income, freedom of speech or freedom from starvation, carries more weight than opinionating gadflies of the west several generations removed from knowing what it exact is like to live a hand to mouth existence always tetering on the edge of starvation.

[The_greatest_river]

Thank you, thank each and every one of you individuals who have posted in this thread. You are all so intelligent that it makes me tear up a little. No sarcasm. Coming from Facebook as my only means of social networking to this is such a transition. Most of the people I know and have "befriended" are absolutely blind and know less of a fraction of what has been posted on this thread. China is with out a doubt preparing to attack Japan, tension between not only the states but as well within the people have increased dramatically since Japan's pm visited the graves of Japanese WW2 war criminals. Japan has a very visible lack of confidence within the United States protection, displaying that we may not actually interfere with this war if it were to occur. China as of recent has become the worlds largest importer and exporter, topping the United States. It's only a matter of time before China strikes, and I do not believe the United States will react efficiently. It's a little scary to be honest.

[Thumpalumpacus]

We're bound by treaty to respond, and I believe we will.

I also wouldn't be surprised to learn that Japan is running design studies on deployable nuclear weapons.

[The_greatest_river]

Yes but as displayed in Ukraine, how dependable are we with signed treaties? Plus China is a huge market that if it were to crash, the United States would be negatively affected and possibly crippled due to China being the only country to buy our bounds for the prices we ask for and they buy a lot of our products as we do with theirs. We are almost co-dependent on them, it's hard to say we would choose Japan over China.

[Anomalocaris]

Yes but as displayed in Ukraine, how dependable are we with signed treaties? Plus China is a huge market that if it were to crash, the United States would be negatively affected and possibly crippled due to China being the only country to buy our bounds for the prices we ask for and they buy a lot of our products as we do with theirs. We are almost co-dependent on them, it's hard to say we would choose Japan over China.

Ukraine is nothing, a negligible quantity in the scheme of world economy and world politics. We would look to all the world like raving lunatics which must be locked away if we chose to go to war for nothing. It would be even worse than the raving lunatic we were seen as when we invaded Iraq over nothing. At least Iraq held the mirage of oil and was not backed by Russia's transcontinental reach and nuclear arsenal.

Japan is not nothing. It is the largest economy amongst our minions and the only one in the pacific that might be an aid rather than an burden to us as we try to figure out how the world would be reconfigured as the western alliance gradually lose economic preeminance, the ultimate basis of political and military preeminance, in the world. So we would chose Japan over China, at least while it was clear we would win a war against China. If we don't, we would be totally discredited everywhere in the world as a ally worth having, and we would become just another second tier power with pretentions without China ever having to do the heavy liftng needed to match us in resource and influence. The damage from that would outweigh even the damages from rupturing of economic relationship with China.

If it eventually transpired that China becomes powerful enough such that an outcome of a war between China and US is 50/50, then everyone would understand if we silently ditch Japan to avoid the possibility of losing a war to China. At that time Japan had better figure out how Japan can best be to China what Japan has been to the US since WWII.

[Minimalist]

Yes but as displayed in Ukraine, how dependable are we with signed treaties?

Refresh my memory. What treaty was that?

[Thumpalumpacus]

Yes but as displayed in Ukraine, how dependable are we with signed treaties?

We didn't have a treaty signed with Ukraine, unless you're counting the 1994 treaty that got them to surrender their nukes.
That treaty did not obligate us to go to their defense. That is not the case with Japan; we have a positive guarantee that we will fight alongside them if they are attacked.

Plus China is a huge market that if it were to crash, the United States would be negatively affected and possibly crippled due to China being the only country to buy our bounds for the prices we ask for and they buy a lot of our products as we do with theirs. We are almost co-dependent on them, it's hard to say we would choose Japan over China.

Of course; that's almost exactly the point that Fidel was making upthread.

However, the same line of reasoning, essentially was made by the writer Norman Angell back in 1910 ... about four years before WWI. The reason is that not all statecraft is a rational process. I don't think the Chinese are looking for a fight; I think they're what every other country has done when it sees its power waxing -- they're taking what they want and challenging another power to do something.

The big difference with China is that they seem to practice diplomacy on a timescale the we here don't. They think more about long-term plans in order to achieve long-term goals, I think, and they're wedded to the idea of doing a cost-benefits analysis regarding each possible line of action they are considering.

[The_greatest_river]

Yes I was speaking of the 1994 agreement. The US & russia made an agreement to protwct Ukraine inorder to relieve them of their nuclear weapons. The chinese government may not "look" for a fight but they are intagonizing their neighboors with agressive behavior. We will inevitably have to choose to either react or not soon. I don't see how we would gain from fighting China for the sake of Japanese protection since they've recently begun to act against the treaty by increasing their military spending. Japan sees China as a real threat, and if they preemptively strike China then what will happen? The Japanese will eventually feel pushed into a corner due to Chinese advancements. It's a matter of time before one of the two crosses the line, forcing the other to attack. The Chinese sphere of influence is growing at a very rapid rate, and their growth is dependant on our growth. It's a hard decision, money may speak louder than previous treaties and I think that may become the main issue. Public opinion on this issue can swing either way to be honest. We should take out China for personal interests in fear of them becoming too powerful to mantain, for that reason I think we will fight with Japan.

[Anomalocaris]

It's not a matter of practicing diplomacy on a time scale. It's a matter of not having to win over a dumb, rash, impressionable and opinionated electorate every 4 years, and having a professional rather than appointed foreign policy establishement.