The big strategic game in Asia isn’t military but economic
Australia,
India, Japan, and the United States will be uncomfortable living with a
more powerful China. It’s legitimate for them to hedge by cooperating
in the Quadrilateral Security Dialogue, informally known as the Quad.
Unfortunately, the Quad will not alter the course of Asian history for
two simple reasons: First, the four countries have different
geopolitical interests and vulnerabilities. Second, and more
fundamentally, they are in the wrong game. The big strategic game in
Asia isn’t military but economic.
Australia is the most
vulnerable. Its economy is highly dependent on China. Australians have
been proud of their remarkable three decades of recession-free growth.
That happened only because Australia became, functionally, an economic province of China : In 2018-2019, 33 percent of its exports went to China, whereas only 5 percent went to the United States.
This
is why it was unwise for Australia to slap China in the face publicly
by calling for an international inquiry on China and COVID-19. Now
Australia has dug itself into a hole. All of Asia is watching intently
to see who will blink in the current Australia-China standoff. In many
ways, the outcome is pre-determined. If Beijing blinks, other countries
may follow Australia in humiliating China. Hence, effectively, Australia
has blocked it into a corner.
And China can afford to wait. The
problem for Canberra is that China holds most of the cards. Power in
international relations lies with the country that can impose high costs
on another country at a low cost to itself. This is what China can do
to Australia, but Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison and his
colleagues do not seem to understand that.
No countries can
compare with China and Japan in terms of the length of their historical
contact: 1,500 years.” China and Japan maintained deep cultural ties
throughout much of their past, but China, with its great civilization
and resources, had the upper hand. If, for most of 1,500 years, Japan
could live in peace with China, it can revert to that pattern again for
the next 1,000 years. However, as in the famously slow Kabuki plays in
Japan, the changes in the relationship will be very slight and
incremental, with both sides moving gradually and subtly into a new
modus vivendi. They will not become friends anytime soon, but Japan will
signal subtly that it understands China’s core interests. Yes, there
will be bumps along the way, but China and Japan will adjust slowly and
steadily.
As two old civilizations, India and China have also
lived side by side over millenniums. However, they had few direct
contacts, effectively kept apart by the Himalayas. Unfortunately, modern
technology has no longer made the Himalayas insurmountable. Hence, the
increasing number of face-to-face encounters between Chinese and Indian
soldiers. Such encounters always lead to accidents, one of which
happened in June 2020. Since then, a tsunami of anti-China sentiment has
swept across India. Over the next few years, relations will go
downhill. The avalanche has been triggered.
Yet China will be
patient because time is working in its favor. In 1980, the economies of
China and India were the same size. By 2020, China’s had grown five
times larger. The longer-term relationship between two powers always
depends, in the long run, on the relative size of the two economies. The
Soviet Union lost the Cold War because the U.S. economy could vastly
outspend it. Similarly, just as the United States presented China with a
major geopolitical gift by withdrawing from the Trans-Pacific
Partnership (TPP) trade agreement in 2017, India did China a major
geopolitical favor by not joining the Regional Comprehensive Economic
Partnership (RCEP). Economics is where the big game is playing. With the
United States staying out of TPP and India out of RCEP, a massive
economic ecosystem centered on China is evolving in the region.
[ K M ]
APEC 2024 Peru. Biden shafted to a corner in the back row. Xi in front row next to Peru's President
From January 31, China will no longer recognise the so-called BNO passport as a travel document and ID document, and reserves the right to take further actions,” foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters.
ReplyDeleteAustralia is too self righteous and to think Uncle Sam always have thekr their backs. I like KM's take on the geopolitical take on the issues in the region and understand why he is so sought after for his views intwrnationally. The other Singapore 'expert' has always been negative to neigbouring countries and China in particular and why he often quoted in the Aussie media. Already, he has thrown mud on Xi Jinping for the latter's speech at the recent Davos forum. Go check 'The Australian" who I am talking about.
ReplyDeleteChina is writing off Australia and is calling its 6,300 businesses to pull out of Australia.
ReplyDeleteChina should also ban sanction Trump and his family from entering and doing business in China.
BTW, who is KM? Kishore?
The article was by Kishore on the Foreign Policy website. Bilahari Kausikan is often quoted by the Australian media because of his anti China pro western stance.
DeleteWhoever Controls The Global Economy Controls The World
ReplyDeleteAustralia, UK, USA and Canada are White Supremacists countries, controlled and commanded by the Whites of British Descent. Collectively, they are actually one country with its people spread out in four continents.
China is one country, one people. Chinese people are spread all over the world but do not control or command those countries. Oversees Chinese mostly dominate or control two things in those foreign countries (except Singapore) of their residence. They are the economy and the workforce.
As China's strategy is to dominate and control the world's economy, the Overseas Chinese become a part and parcel of this strategy and therefore contribute directly and indirectly to the success of this global economic strategy.
Once China becomes the World's Number One Economic Power (W1P), much of the world will fall in line to benefit from this global economic framework and a new global economic system will be in place.
By then, the Quad will be out of place. They have to be contended with playing second fiddle. Without economic power, their military power will eventually result in military degradation and deterioration. Before that happens, they will start a world war to disrupt the new global economy under China's control.
India, Japan and Korea will align themselves as the Asian Bloc under the leadership of China. Africa too will align itself with the Asian Powers
Russia, as usual, being from the White Race, will pretend to be in good terms with China and also asserts itself as part of the Asian Powers. But Russia can never be Asian. It has always been and will always be a Caucasian determination.
Ultimately, there will be four groupings - Asian (Yellow Skin), African (Black Skin), European (White Skin) and Others (Brown Skin). Whoever controls the global economy controls these four groupings.
Continues ...
Australia, as one of the five eyes, has to follow the dictates of the USA. It has limited room to manoevour. It has to pay the price of it's affiliation, and paid the ultimate price when it acted like the Asian Sheriff, by trying to add fuel to fire by putting China in a bad light.
ReplyDeleteJapan knows when to shut it's mouth, which is a Japanese trait anyway. But what they plan to do is always sneaky and China must be careful. Japan still insist on having the USA behind it's back, possible for fear of the long standing WW2 baggage of atrocities they are bearing, not just from China, but North Korea and other ASEAN countries as well. South Korea suffered those atrocities too, but they are on the same side of the fence against China.
On a separate note, it looks like the Fukushima issue has not been close to being solved, and is about to explode after discovering what is really happening inside those nuclear reactors. Japan is in deep shit if the Fukushima issue cannot be solved.
It is a blessing in disguise that India is not in the RCEP. It will bleed otherw dry if you let this parasite into the grouping. They expect to take, but not to give, when others expect the grouping to be a give and take arrangement that benefits all. India also made the decision not to join the BRI and that could be another blessing in disguise.
Yes economic, not military is going to move the world into a better place. Those that bet on the right horse will reap the rewards. Those who bet on the wrong horse will fade further into oblivion.
Actually it's not economy but Cause and Effect or Karma.
ReplyDeleteThis planet resources r limited. Whatever thing that people do that violates the universal rule of cause and effect will face its own consequences, it's as simple as that.
US politicians like to use word 'genocide' because they have done it many times
ReplyDeleteOn his last day in office, former US secretary of state Mike Pompeo was still spreading rumors against China by claiming "genocide" in Xinjiang Uygur autonomous region. And his successor Tony Blinken hurried to say similar things upon taking office.
From "forced labor" to "genocide", US politicians have been making increasingly absurd claims about Xinjiang. Their purpose is evident: To "contain" China and curb the nation's prosperous development.
Anybody who travels to Xinjiang can see the truth and know immediately what big lies US politicians such as Pompeo tell.
Ironically, the words of Pompeo and his successor make people wonder why US politicians are so interested in the word "genocide". Maybe the answer lies in their own history — A history in which "genocide" happened more than once.
Whenever the word "genocide" comes up, the first image that flashes in people's minds is of American Indians, or the natives who inhabited the continent there. Some US scholars estimated that before the White immigrants arrived in North America in 1492, there were at least 15 million indigenous people living there; They helped the white immigrants to survive but the latter brought guns, viruses, as well as used cruel measures such as scalping to pay back.
As a result, the number of indigenous people in the US dropped to its lowest point to 237,000 in 1900, as per the US Bureau of Census. It grew in the past 120 years but already lives were lost permanently.
Africans are another race that suffered from "genocide" in the US. A widely quoted BBC report estimated that "more than a million people are thought to have died" during their transport, while some predicted that more died soon after their arrival.
And those who survived had to labor as slaves in the plantations, where mortality rate for their children was twice that of White children.
Their descendants, or whatever survived, had to face sterilization abuse in the 1900s. In North Carolina alone, from 1958 to 1968, over 2,100 sterilizations were done, with rates increasing with the size of the unemployed black population.
There are many more examples that could be called or associated with "genocide". Even today the US military runs more than 200 biological labs all over the world and they are able to commit "genocide" everywhere.
That's why US politicians are so accustomed to fabricating rumors about Xinjiang and China as a whole. Their rumors are based on true stories in their own history.