The big hypes about this supposedly great Biden Modi infrastructure plan to counter the BRI have faded the moment the G20 Meeting ended. It was all noise and meaningless chest thumping and all for nothing. When a plan is build with no tangible objectives and clear economic benefits but just to counter another widely received and carefully conceived plan, who is going to buy it?
The plan has totally no benefit to the Americans, and to the Americans it is just like a fiction movie in Hollywood, good to have, good to see, good for propaganda and entertainment but no practical or substantive benefits, at best some political influence and publicity. In the case of BRI, there is a lot of trades going on between China and Europe and the countries in between that made economic sense to all the participants. What would India be selling to Europe and vice versa? As for Saudi Arabia, it would just be a transit role, allowing a railroad through the Arabian desert. The economic purpose to Saudi Arabia is minimum as all its trades could still be served by the existing trade routes with no significant advantages from the IME Corridor.
Given these considerations, the big question is the cost. Who is going to pay for it for minimal or virtual gains? The Americans have no direct benefits and are unlikely to pay anything unless it is treating the IMEC as an extention of war against Russia and China, like Ukraine. Then pouring in their toilet paper money into this project would make the some sense against using their fiat money to help Maui.
The bulk of the money spent would be on the railroad through the Arabian desert. Would the Saudis be willing to pay for it when their only benefit is to collect toll? Or would the Europeans and Indians be willing to pay for a railway track and train system in Saudi Arabia? The cost benefit equation does not make sense to any party in this IMEC, especially nothing much to be gained for the Saudis. The Saudis would not mind if the Americans, Europeans or the Indians food the bill and they offer the desert land to the project.
This frivolous plan is looking more frivolous as day goes by. No one would want to food the bill to build a railroad and train system across the Arabian desert for the Saudis. And the Saudis would not find it economical to build it and pay for it if no one else is willing to be the main paymaster.
There will be more meetings and more meetings on this project for the next few years before it dies a natural death. By the way, who is capable to build this railroad across the Arabian desert? Would they be asking China to build it? Would China want to build it when no one can build it?
The West, Japan, South Korea and India are screwed.
ReplyDeleteAccording to data from the General Administration of Customs (GAC), China exported zero gallium and germanium related items in August.
China exported 7.58 tons of gallium products in July. Exports of germanium products totaled 1,506 tons in July.
China is the largest producer of gallium and germanium. Its gallium output accounts for more than 90 percent of the global total and germanium production accounts for more than 60 percent of the world's total, official data showed.
On July 3, the Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) and the General Administration of Customs (GAC) jointly issued a notice on placing export controls on gallium and germanium related items, which was effective from August 1.
Hi Good morning All
ReplyDeleteTrying to reterieve a Video by One UTuber that all these wasted times meetings of all the GString 7 and what's 20 or 22 are all PIPE Dreams.
UassA cannot even reconstruck their own falling infrastructures and had to seek China's help.
Likewise the Brits and Others.
Pipe dreams to build highways across the Oceans?
Go and build your Lego Blocks for kids first.
Also India build more those outside Funerals and Construction Sites Portable Toilets first.
Hello, tell your Todddy Stone Men to change the Railways Tracks properly ah!
If NOT headon crashes again.
Virgo India not so bad lar. Singapore infrastructure are built by indian workers
DeleteWhy so many DEATHS in the construction sites?
DeleteHDB BTO flats now do many defects?
Nicoll Highway MRT Line whole tunnelling collapse?
They only wanted the Indians for cheap labour's only.
See their own buildings as buit by them collapsing one by one.
Last time the Fibre Networks, that Contractor that engaged the Indian Workers with their World Class Engineers kena fined how millions for overshot their Schedule.
Good?
Buying a car not because you need it but because your neighbour has one. This is the reason for the IMEC.
ReplyDeleteThis kind of thinking can only come from brain dead politicians. China built a BRI that is needed by all the countries in the project. And the BRI covers practically all the essential routes for trade.
IMEC is to slot into some space that is not covered by the BRI, because that slot is not meaningful or needed. It is a silly vanity corridor just to say if China has one, the Americans and Indians must also have one. Never mind if it has little economic values.
Hi Anon 11.49
ReplyDeleteJusy said said only lah!
HOT Airs! What's u expect from all these Clowns?
Cannot even manage their own Shits Crumbling Countries.
Called Africa a Shits Hole?
Anything that the USA proposed with allies is to counter China. Is there anything that you can think of that is not to counter China? The IME corridor will just die of old age, long after Joe Biden is gone. In the context of USA's foreign policy, all hot airs invariably ends with the change of the Presidency. They will either pass new laws, acts or executive orders to null those agreements, or else just walk away, knowing they do not have to face consequences. Therefore, beware of the 'Empire of Lies'.
ReplyDeleteDuring the COVID19 outbreak, even vaccine was used as a weapon to counter China. When Chinese vaccines were sent to help poor countries, vaccine diplomacy as they call it, it was not agreeable to the USA. So the USA coerce India to counter China by using 'Indian Vaccine' diplomacy, which India gleefully carried out. India then was touted as the vaccine hub of the world. The result was that India was producing vaccines not to take care of its domestic market, but exporting them just to counter China.
What happened next was that India was caught with its pants down when a new variant spread so rapidly that it killed many Indians because there was a lack of vaccines. When India pleaded with the USA for help, all kinds of excuses were given. It was not until other countries started to give help to India, that the USA finally saw its position being compromised in the eyes of the world, that it decided to help by allowing the manufacture of its vaccines. By then, hundreds of thousands already lost their lives.
Oops, forgot to mention that this is also in line with Henry Kissinger's quote - To be an enemy of the USA is dangerous, to be its friend is fatal. That I think fits perfectly with what India, a so called friend of the USA went through, after carrying out the USA's vaccine diplomacy to counter China. Have India learnt its lesson. Obviously not!
No, they will not give the IME Corridor project to China. It is too big a project for China's standard to undertake. Remember it is meant to counter the BRI, so it must be so grand in scale that Xi will fall to his knees in admiration. Such a project is only reserved for Allies and obedient followers of the USA. Never for China, Russia, Iran or North Korea to particpate in, just like telling China it cannot even go near the International Space Station etc.
ReplyDeletePerhaps Japan or South Korea might do the construction. But Japan already seems to have lost the 'blue prints' and got stuck in India and Vietnam, asking for help. Lots of blue prints have been reported lost nowadays, the most serious was the first moon landing blue prints. But, please, China did not steal that, having been told to stand far away over the decades in every technological endeavour that the USA and Allies undertake. South Korea can also try for the project, having a 'Blue House' occupant who is so 'gung ho' nowadays. Maybe he has the true 'blue' films oops prints.
If the IME Corridor is meant to be completed within a timeline of say 40 years, maybe India could do it as well. They did high speed rail construction using slow speed construction methods, and they obviously like it that way, still claiming that things are going great guns. Only thing is would Mohammed bin Salman want to wait 40 years for it, by which time Saudi Arabia may aleady be criss-crosed by HSR like China and built by China. So, what is the hurry? Just give it to India.
By the way, have they sat down to study the details yet, or having no details are still just talking and having hallucinations about how grand the project is going to be that China will envy. China's method is working out the details years ahead before announcing it or even having completed projects before announcing it. USA's method is announcing it even before looking at the feasibility and problems to overcome and how to do it. Building across the Arabian Desert is no walk in the park, with sandstorms, unbearable heat and shortage of water. But it must work, even in theory, and even if construction is all carried out up in the air.
Oh, never mind, even if it turns out to be a White elephant. As long as it frightens China, that is all that is to it.
Our daft invited the Indians to help Singapore to become a first world city state. But they forgot that the Indians are from a third world state. Either they are really daft or they are brain dead.
ReplyDelete