By Rich Kozlovich Editor's Note: I wrote this piece back in August and it got stuck in my draft file, forgotten, but while I've updated it, the issues and conclusions remain the same. RK
I keep reading how America needs to make some kind of accommodation with China. One that would be to China's benefit. Hogwash! The economic outlook of Asia is at best tenuous and China has brought it on itself. We owe them nothing, they owe us everything. If Richard Nixon hadn't opened China to trade almost 40 years ago, they would have probably gone broke, much to the world's benefit. From that point on, through our trade agreements, we've been funding their efforts - military, social and economic - to destroy America. How smart is that?
We need to learn this once and for all. Corporations are, at the best of times, leaky vessels as allies, and their cat's paws in government are even worse. President Trump's China policies exposed this outrage to the point it was obvious to the most casual observer. So obvious even the media got it. Biden's policies will make it worse.
China has so many economic and social issues that have now caught up to them for their corrupt dealings and actions they cannot afford any kind of economic downturn without serious consequences. Their demographics are out of whack when it comes to gender, meaning because of abortions there are too many men with too few women. The ethnic groups in China hate the ethnic Han who make up most of China and run the Chinese Communist Party.
Instead of allowing Hong Kong to continue being a big economic engine for China, the Chinese Communist Party has pretty much crushed Hong Kong's efforts to maintain their level of autonomy in fear that autonomous mentality will spread to the rest of China.
Chinese politics is all about power and control, not good economics! Hong Kong is an ugly display of that policy. But understand this: That's foundational to socialism. Communism and fascism being forms of socialism; two sides of the same coin; but the end results are always the same. Misery, suffering and unending injustice.
As this piece in Epoch Times point out:
Beijing’s announcement last week that it would pass a national security law for Hong Kong—bypassing the city’s own legislature—has attracted international condemnation and reignited mass protests in the city, with plans for more in the coming weeks.The end result in all of this:
Following Beijing’s move, U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared on May 27 that Hong Kong is no longer autonomous from the mainland, putting Hong Kong’s special trading status with the United States in jeopardy.It appears the business people in Hong Kong seem to believe the CCP intends on destroying Hong Kong as it's currently configures, and growth there has halted. Business people are moving out literally, and figuratively by putting their money elsewhere.
As for Tibet, they've been having small revolts forever, and it's clear if the CCP can't maintain their massive army economically the non-Han ethnic groups will rebel.
The United States overestimated the Soviets for a number of reasons. First, a key principle of war is to never underestimate the enemy. It is a principle that should be used prudently. Second, the Americans underestimated their own capabilities. They saw their weakness without understanding that war is a confrontation less of strength and more of comparative weakness. They were blind to the Soviet weakness and were frightened by their own.
This comports with the Russian operating principle of Maskirovka – the masquerade that makes small men look large and weak countries look strong. It worked so well that the U.S. spent the 1980s creating weapons it could afford and for which it had troops who could operate them. It’s the competition that broke the Russians.
What about the differences between China's military capabilities and America's. China's understanding about war has been all internal, either civil war, and of course the invasion by the Japanese during WWII. But they are incapable of extending their power much beyond their territory, furthermore they have no capability to maintain any force they might send much beyond their immediate supply lines, which are short at best. Furthermore, although they have a huge military, is it equipped with the people necessary to carry out such actions?
We also need to recognize the reality of the Chinese economy versus America's.
They have huge coal deposits but no oil by any meaningful measure, which is the reason they're willing to start small aggressive object lesson actions with Japan over the uninhabited Senkaku Islands. Oil deposits!
China has to import huge volumes of oil from the Middle East, and that oil has to travel through the Straits of Malay, which could easily be stopped by any naval power in the region, no matter how small. India and Japan have substantial forces to bring into play, and Indonesia and even the Philippines with their largely littoral navy could play havoc with any transports. That’s why China has been working the Road and Belt Initiative to bypass all of that. Unfortunately for them they just can’t help themselves. Commies will always be commies. That’s turning sour because basically they're communists, and that makes them bullies, and those who’ve signed on are starting to back off.
China desperately wants to fill any void America abandons regarding geopolitical control. America has been the guarantor for the stability of the current economic and military world order since the end of WWII, but that’s going to change.
This coronavirus scam has done one thing that's proven to be worthwhile. While many of us have recognized who and what China is, that hasn't been true for much of the world due to clabber from writers and politicians. Coronavirus has exposed China for who they are. The economic consequence of all this will force the CCP into untenable situations, and as in the case of all totalitarian regimes, they're resort of aggression. But they will be no war.
In Germany there were still 50,000 American troops stationed there. Why? The Soviet Union no longer exists and Russia, no matter what blather anyone puts out, is not in any position economically, socially or demographically capable of attacking Europe. Oh, it’s true, without American forces to stop them they could easily march across the North European Plain straight over into France without too much trouble, but what happens after they get there? They can’t hold it, they can’t maintain that kind of army presence, and economically and demographically they can’t even defend their homeland. And Putin, in spite of his public posturing, knows it. And even now, all of that is still true, but they're not dealing with a chess master any longer. They're dealing with Biden and Company, and they don't even play checkers, and they will take advantage of that in as many ways as possible.
As for why American troops are still there: They’re still there because every time closing those bases is discussed, the German government screams how devastating that will be to their economy. They take the money they should be spending for their own defense and spend it on social programs that are unsustainable. In short, the American taxpayer is paying for Germany’s social programs. That’s going to change, even with Biden's globalist policies.
The social and economic stability in the rest of the world is going to become difficult. During the Trump administration I expected to see companies moving back to the United States by the end of what would be his second term. That' still my long term expectation, but now it may take a little longer.
Trump wasn't impressed or intimidated by the Chinese, the EU, Russia, N. Korea or Muslim extremists, but unfortunately we now have a President who is both, and that's compounded by serious intellectual and neurological issues. And he's surrounded by radicals as advisers, including his Vice President.
Obama was playing checkers while the EU, China, North Korea and Russia was playing chess. During the Trump years they were dealing with a Grand Master, and didn't like the results, and make no mistake about it, there wasn't going to be a war. But now, we have invertebrates in office, and nothing triggers aggressive action like appeasers and fools, and they're not even playing checkers.
No comments:
Post a Comment