Hello China, Meet Our Simpleton In Chief
Like most Americans, I once believed the U.S. was the superpower. We ruled the world with our free-market dollar, Navy fleets and ballistic nuclear missiles. Japan and Korea were child-states needing our protection. Israel, too. When certain of our children misbehaved in the Middle East the U.S. military set them straight.
We have a simpleton President who still believes that.
In the past decade, the U.S. has lost control of the Middle East. It hasn’t registered with anyone I know. The simple fact that Russia now controls more territory (all of Crimea and some of Ukraine) has been yawned over. The fact that most Asian countries now have economies dependent on the health of China (China is Japan’s number one export destination) doesn’t calculate either.
That China once had the largest navy armada in history is never mentioned. That no European country was able to keep its colonies through navel power, which should be obvious to anyone, well that too, is conveniently ignored because the changes rarely happen in one’s lifetime; though they are now.
It is no coincidence that the past two Presidents of the United States (Obama and Trump) have focused inward while Russia and China have grown both economically and militarily. Even Obama, in an uncharacteristically mean-spirited comment said Russia’s economy “doesn’t produce anything that anybody wants to buy,” except oil, gas and arms. The only way Russia can affect the U.S., he said, is “if we lose track of who we are” and “abandon our values.”
That’s false. Russia and China are weakening us because we have ignored the strength of their “values”, Asia-first world power, while the rest of the world hasn’t.
First, like the historical dissipation of Chinese, European or Russian naval power, the U.S. faces the same problems that ultimately destroyed them all — they’re just to dang expensive to operate and don’t make money themselves. Every gallon of oil or seaman’s paycheck the U.S. spends to patrol the South China Seas, China spends on economic growth.
Our Navy is so overstretched that sailors fall asleep and crash into other ships is a truth stranger than fiction.
The “values” Obama talks about, where our military creates free trade which benefits the dollar and U.S. creativity, only works if everyone buys-in. That is, if Japan and the rest of Asia believes our control of the South China Seas allows it to sell cars and cameras to us, then it will support it.
The question most Americans don’t ask themselves is, from a purely selfish economic point of view, do corporations care who keeps trade open, the U.S., Russia or China? Is the U.S. military really necessary for global trade in this day and age?
Historically, China and Japan have been enemies because China believes, and has always believed, all Asian countries should bow before it. Okay, so the U.S. is protecting Japan from China? What does the U.S. get out of it? Simple. After WWII the U.S. wanted to protect itself from future attacks from Asia. It’s a cold-war political sleight of hand that the U.S. is protecting Japan from others in Asia.
The realpolitik has always been that the U.S. can protect itself from Asia, at large, if it keeps Japan and South Korea as friends (and other Asian countries). After WWII the U.S. never expected that China would become the power it has. The rest of Asia had a clue.
What happens now that China’s economic might is eclipsing the U.S. in some key areas? It brings us back to the question what makes any nation strong. History teaches that the economy is the horse; the military is the wagon. China learned centuries ago that letting the wagon pull the horse is bad government. Zheng He’s Navy was just plain unprofitable. Where China erred is believing their society, no matter how superior in thought, can avoid problems when other nations innovate better weapons.
China may have invented gunpowder. But it didn’t invent advanced artillery, radar or super-sonic aircraft technology. In the World Wars, it was caught flat-footed. Anyone who believes China will make this mistake in the next few centuries is, if I may joke, smoking opium.
A simple fact, Russia and China have both increased their territories at the expense of the West.
The U.S. can no longer, on its own, protect Japan, Taiwan or South Korea. One, it simply doesn’t have the economic might to do so. Two, China has built substantial island bases in the South China Seas. Much of Asia may have to kowtow before China in the next twenty years. The Philippines have already fallen in line.
Trump’s tariffs against steel and aluminum, is the move of a President who has probably never read a single book about China, economics or anything else for that matter. Worse, the American steel and aluminum lobby, who is bending the President’s ear, live the same delusion. China could stop selling steel to the U.S. entirely and it wouldn’t affect its economic power one iota.
To the leaders of Asian countries the tariffs are a clear sign that the U.S. is not worried about Asia. If the U.S. was serious about China’s power, it would put the breaks on intellectual property theft. It might stop the Chinese from building military bases in the South China Seas. The way to do that is to put limits on what China can buy in the West.
In the future, if China negotiates an alliance with Vietnam, South Korea, Taiwan and other Asian countries, only Japan would remain. Japan, a country with kids more interested in playing video games, then starting families. And a geriatric population.
China probably means what it says, that is isn’t looking to exercise military might. It’s success and growth is based on business administration. A case can be made that China has been a land of MBAs for millennia. Anyway, low-cost manufacturing and piggy-backing on others R&D has worked just fine, as it did for Europeans and Americans centuries before!
That brings me to Israel. Russia and China are exerting greater control over the Middle East and Africa. Russia has developed defensive missile technology that some believe has surpassed American technology to gain air-superiority. If Russia wants to prevent Israel from creating a buffer zone between it, and the rest of the Middle East, there’s mounting evidence it can do so.
Netanyahu (like Trump to Asia) may be antagonizing the West at the wrong time.
If China or Russia want to help any 3rd world power blow-up an American ship or plane, they have the technology to do so. Obviously, they’re very careful to keep that close to their vest. For anyone who cares to look, there’s evidence from the 1980s-era Falklands War that the age of Navy superpower ended right then. Like the Russians today, the French worked with Argentina close-enough to prove their capabilities of their hardware, but not so much to drag the U.S. into the conflict.
Like China, Russia just wants trade and money. It’s not into the soft-and-fuzzy “values” of the West where the public can freely debate old statues, transgenders and collecting guns. Most people in the world just want more money in their pocket. America, of all places, should appreciate that, since it wrote the book!
If Russia, China and the U.S. get into a proxy war at the end, it may be Israel where the battle will be fought. Or maybe Japan. Israel jets are already being shot down. North Korea fires ballistic missiles over Japan while the Chinese chuckle in private.
Don’t get me wrong. Israel and Japan can defend themselves and more — but the cost to them would be crushing.
