Now it seems the doggies, taking a leaf from the USA,
are also lying through their teeth. The EU had, and is now reassessing
their earlier accusation of China of 'economic coercion' against the EU
and wants to move away from being too dependent on China. Just weeks
ago, they were talking about not being able to de-couple from China
economically and now suddenly an about turn in their thinking. They
think China is not aware of them just playing a game and that they are
totally under USA control?
I am really surprise that such an
accusation can come out of the dirty mouths of absolute hypocrites aka
EU leaders, knowing they themselves are the main perpetrators of
'economic coercion' against China and Russia, by ganging up with the
USA.
What are the sanctions that they now imposed on Russia for?
Tens of thousands in fact. Did not Biden gloated about collapsing the
Russian economy and Ruble? Attempting to collapse the Russian economy is
not 'economic coercion'? Call a pile of poo by any other name and it
smells just as bad.
What about the sanctions against Huawei and
other Chinese tech giants for? Those are not 'economic coercion' to
force them out of the USA and Europe as they were cannibalising the
Western mobile phone manufacturer's business? And these same doggies
even followed the USA in sanctioning Huawei, for no other reason than
just dogs obeying their master's command.
What also are the Chip4
Alliance for? Just holding a party of 'Fish and Chips' among those
involved? If that is not also 'economic coercion' to force China from
progressing, what is it for? And what did the EU countries like the
Netherlands do? They cannot and would not sell DUV machines to China,
while other Chip manufacturers are forced to end high end chip sales to
China.
ASML is now trying to fool China by agreeing to sell only
the low end 28nm EUV machines, hoping that China would again fall into
their trap of relying on them for their chip making machines. China has
already developed its own 28nm chip machines and will not be fooled.
And
not to forget Trump's easy to win trade war against China a couple of
years ago. That really made America Great again, I am sure. The only
great was the bigger balance of trade deficit vis a vis China. But isn't
that trade war an 'economic coercion' against China. China did not
start the trade war. USA did.
The EU can think of cutting
dependence on China, but they first have to think of how to deal with
the energy problem. Can they produce things able to compete with China
in price with the kind of price they are paying for energy? They better
think about what they wish for.
Anonymous
The EU is said to be investing in upping their energy production itself, and much has been made of the effort, since the sanctions on Russian energy took effect over the Ukraine War, resulting in huge negative implications for their industries and domestic needs. How much more oil and gas can they produce is the question, and will it be enough for the EU as a whole? And who, out of the 27 EU member countries, takes most of the benefit eventually is another problem to be solved, as they are all energy starved for now. Not all EU countries are equal and treated equally.
ReplyDeleteInvesting resources into oil production is a huge undertaking and even USA oil giants are reluctant and hesitant in taking up the challenge to expand production, despite the US Government's coercion (truth or fallacy), and despite the shortage, as it inevitably means eventually cutting into their own bottomline, if supply overtakes demand, due to over production, with excess extraction. Would they be stupid enough to want to cut their noses to spite their faces? Added to that uncertainty of supply and demand, is the massive investments involved that big oil does not take lightly.
Moreover, with the world moving towards renewables, with countries like China now reported to be phasing out vehicles running on fossil fuel completely, besides extracting more clean energy by building more dams, solar farms, wind energy farms, what does the future hold for fossil fuel? Even Saudi Arabia is moving away from fossil fuel and into renewables, which is something we never would expect for an oil rich kingdom. For a country with so much oil in reserves, why are they doing that? And Saudi Arabia is not the only Middle East oil rich country doing that. Some are already, years ago, investing in infrastructures for tourism as well, though not successfully as it turned out.
Oil and gas reserves for any country can only last longer with less extraction, and is not inexhaustible. Countries wise enough, like China, will now turn to finding alternatives and not just sit idle and wait for this to happen, and are definitely not waiting to be held hostage when the shit hits the fan, like semiconductors. The EU for example, had been able to build up its industrial base by relying on cheap Russian energy and now Russia has found out its 'Achilles Heel'. China is not waiting to be stuck in the same predicament, although Russia is an important reliable partner for now.
The USA had been preserving its massive oil reserves for a strategic purpose, and had been importing a large proportion of its energy needs from other countries instead of upping production itself, thereby inducing other countries to exhaust their reserves first. What is on their agenda, can be said to be nothing good.
China does not want to end up like the EU, and as usual, China plans 20 to 30 years ahead, just like what Yanis Varoufakis said about its investments in Africa. They are long term investors, with a 20 to 30 years timeline. For a civilisation of 5,000 years, what is a couple of decades to them? As in everything they need, they source for it years before building up their facilities to thrive on such procurement. Their needs for rare earth, EV vehicles, batteries to run them, and all basic raw materials for production of steel, solar panels etc were all sourced decades ago, not yesterday. Their only short coming was to rely too much on Chip Manufacturers of the USA, Japan, South Korea and the West. China is making the correction of this strategic mistake a national priority.
Was there ever a time when the USA might be considering weaponising energy to hold the world hostage, just like the US$ hegemony, knowing that at one stage the USA totally controls their Middle East oil allies and were dictating the oil trade? Too bad, the migration towards clean energy is changing the eventual hope to weaponise oil and gas to control the world is being made ineffective. Now they think weaponising semiconductor chips will do China in. Not so fast!