Silk Roads, Night Trains and the Third Industrial Revolution in China
by Pepe Escobar
The US is transfixed by its multibillion-dollar electoral circus. The European Union is paralyzed by austerity, fear of refugees, and now all-out jihad in the streets of Paris. So the West might be excused if it’s barely caught the echoes of a Chinese version of Roy Orbison’s “All I Have to Do Is Dream.” And that new Chinese dream even comes with a road map.
The crooner is President Xi Jinping and that road map is the ambitious, recently unveiled 13th Five-Year-Plan, or in the pop-video version, the Shisanwu. After years of explosive economic expansion, it sanctifies the country’s lower “new normal” gross domestic product growth rate of 6.5% a year through at least 2020.
It also sanctifies an updated economic formula for the country: out with a model based on low-wage manufacturing of export goods and in with the shock of the new, namely, a Chinese version of the third industrial revolution. And while China’s leadership is focused on creating a middle-class future powered by a consumer economy, its president is telling whoever is willing to listen that, despite the fears of the Obama administration and of some of the country’s neighbors, there’s no reason for war ever to be on the agenda for the US and China.
Given the alarm in Washington about what is touted as a Beijing quietly pursuing expansionism in the South China Sea, Xi has been remarkably blunt on the subject of late. Neither Beijing nor Washington, he insists, should be caught in the Thucydides trap, the belief that a rising power and the ruling imperial power of the planet are condemned to go to war with each other sooner or later.
It was only two months ago in Seattle that Xi told a group of digital economy heavyweights, “There is no such thing as the so-called Thucydides trap in the world. But should major countries time and again make the mistakes of strategic miscalculation, they might create such traps for themselves.”
A case can be made – and Xi’s ready to make it – that Washington, which, from Afghanistan to Iraq, Libya to Syria, has gained something of a reputation for “strategic miscalculation” in the twenty-first century, might be doing it again. After all, US military strategy documents and top Pentagon figures have quite publicly started to label China (like Russia) as an official “threat.”
To grasp why Washington is starting to think of China that way, however, you need to take your eyes off the South China Sea for a moment, turn off Donald Trump, Ben Carson, and the rest of the posse, and consider the real game-changer – or “threat” – that’s rattling Beltway nerves in Washington when it comes to the new Great Game in Eurasia.
Xi’s Bedside Reading
Swarms of Chinese tourists iPhoning away and buying everything in sight in major Western capitals already prefigure a Eurasian future closely tied to and anchored by a Chinese economy turbo-charging toward that third industrial revolution. If all goes according to plan, it will harness everything from total connectivity and efficient high-tech infrastructure to the expansion of green, clean energy hubs. Solar plants in the Gobi desert, anyone?
Yes, Xi is a reader of economic and social theorist Jeremy Rifkin, who first conceived of a possible third industrial revolution powered by both the Internet and renewable energy sources.
It turns out that the Chinese leadership has no problem with the idea of harnessing cutting-edge Western soft power for its own purposes. In fact, they seem convinced that no possible tool should be overlooked when it comes to moving the country on to the next stage in the process that China’s Little Helmsman, former leader Deng Xiaoping, decades ago designated as the era in which “to get rich is glorious.”
It helps when you have $4 trillion in foreign currency reserves and massive surpluses of steel and cement. That’s the sort of thing that allows you to go “nation-building” on a pan-Eurasian scale. Hence, Xi’s idea of creating the kind of infrastructure that could, in the end, connect China to Central Asia, the Middle East, and Western Europe. It’s what the Chinese call “One Belt, One Road”; that is, the junction of the Silk Road Economic Belt and the Twenty-First Century Maritime Silk Road.
Since Xi announced his One Belt, One Road policy in Kazakhstan in 2013, Pricewaterhouse Coopers in Hong Kong estimates that the state has ploughed more than $250 billion into Silk Road-oriented projects ranging from railways to power plants. Meanwhile, every significant Chinese business player is on board, from telecom equipment giant Huawei to e-commerce monster Alibaba (fresh from itsSingles Day online blockbuster). The Bank of China has already provided a $50 billion credit line for myriad Silk Road-related projects. China’s top cement-maker Anhui Conch is building at least six monster cement plants in Indonesia, Vietnam, and Laos. Work aimed at tying the Asian part of Eurasia together is proceeding at a striking pace. For instance, the China-Laos, China-Thailand, and Jakarta-Bandung railways – contracts worth over $20 billion – are to be completed by Chinese companies before 2020.
With business booming, right now the third industrial revolution in China looks ever more like a mad scramble toward a new form of modernity.
A Eurasian “War on Terror”
The One Belt, One Road plan for Eurasia reaches far beyond the Rudyard Kipling-coined nineteenth century phrase “the Great Game,” which in its day was meant to describe the British-Russian tournament of shadows for the control of Central Asia. At the heart of the twenty-first century’s Great Game lies China’s currency, the yuan, which may, by November 30th, join the International Monetary Fund’s Special Drawing Rights reserve-currency basket. If so, this will in practice mean the total integration of the yuan, and so of Beijing, into global financial markets, as an extra basket of countries will add it to their foreign exchange holdings and subsequent currency shifts may amount to the equivalent of trillions of US dollars.
Couple the One Belt, One Road project with the recently founded, China-led Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and Beijing’s Silk Road Infrastructure Fund ($40 billion committed to it so far). Mix in an internationalized yuan and you have the groundwork for Chinese companies to turbo-charge their way into a pan-Eurasian (and even African) building spree of roads, high-speed rail lines, fiber-optic networks, ports, pipelines, and power grids.
According to the Washington-dominated Asian Development Bank (ADB), there is, at present, a monstrous gap of $800 billion in the funding of Asian infrastructure development to 2020 and it’s yearning to be filled. Beijing is now stepping right into what promises to be a paradigm-breaking binge of economic development.
And don’t forget about the bonuses that could conceivably follow such developments. After all, in China’s stunningly ambitious plans at least, its Eurasian project will end up covering no less than 65 countries on three continents, potentially affecting 4.4 billion people. If it succeeds even in part, it could take the gloss off al-Qaeda- and ISIS-style Wahhabi-influenced jihadism not only in China’s Xinjiang Province, but also in Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Central Asia. Imagine it as a new kind of Eurasian war on terror whose “weapons” would be trade and development. After all, Beijing’s planners expect the country’s annual trade volume with belt-and-road partners to surpass $2.5 trillion by 2025.
At the same time, another kind of binding geography – what I’ve long called Pipelineistan, the vast network of energy pipelines crisscrossing the region, bringing its oil and natural gas supplies to China – is coming into being. It’s already spreading across Pakistan and Myanmar, and China is planning to double down on this attempt to reinforce its escape-from-the-Straits-of-Malacca strategy. (That bottleneck is still a transit point for 75% of Chinese oil imports.) Beijing prefers a world in which most of those energy imports are not water-borne and so at the mercy of the US Navy. More than 50% of China’s natural gas already comes overland from two Central Asian “stans” (Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan) and that percentage will only increase once pipelines to bring Siberian natural gas to China come online before the end of the decade.
Of course, the concept behind all this, which might be sloganized as “to go west (and south) is glorious” could induce a tectonic shift in Eurasian relations at every level, but that depends on how it comes to be viewed by the nations involved and by Washington.
Leaving economics aside for a moment, the success of the whole enterprise will require superhuman PR skills from Beijing, something not always in evidence. And there are many other problems to face (or duck): these include Beijing’s Han superiority complex, not always exactly a hit among either minority ethnic groups or neighboring states, as well as an economic push that is often seen by China’s ethnic minorities as benefiting only the Han Chinese. Mix in a rising tide of nationalist feeling, the expansion of the Chinese military (including its navy), conflict in its southern seas, and a growing security obsession in Beijing. Add to that a foreign policy minefield, which will work against maintaining a carefully calibrated respect for the sovereignty of neighbors. Throw in the Obama administration’s “pivot” to Asia and its urge both to form anti-Chinese alliances of “containment” and to beef up its own naval and air power in waters close to China. And finally don’t forget red tapeand bureaucracy, a Central Asian staple. All of this adds up to a formidable package of obstacles to Xi’s Chinese dream and a new Eurasia.
All Aboard the Night Train
The Silk Road revival started out as a modest idea floated in China’s Ministry of Commerce. The initial goal was nothing more than getting extra “contracts for Chinese construction companies overseas.” How far the country has traveled since then. Starting from zero in 2003, China has ended up building no less than 16,000 kilometers of high-speed rail tracks in these years – more than the rest of the planet combined.
And that’s just the beginning. Beijing is now negotiating with 30 countries to build another 5,000 kilometers of high-speed rail at a total investment of $157 billion. Cost is, of course, king; a made-in-China high-speed network (top speed: 350 kilometers an hour) costs around $17 million to $21 million per kilometer. Comparable European costs: $25 million to $39 million per kilometer. So no wonder the Chinese are bidding for an $18 billion project linking London with northern England, and another linking Los Angeles to Las Vegas, while outbidding German companies to lay tracks in Russia.
On another front, even though it’s not directly part of China’s new Silk Road planning, don’t forget about the Iran-India-Afghanistan Agreement on Transit and International Transportation Cooperation. This India-Iran project to develop roads, railways, and ports is particularly focused on the Iranian port of Chabahar, which is to be linked by new roads and railways to the Afghan capital Kabul and then to parts of Central Asia.
Why Chabahar? Because this is India’s preferred transit corridor to Central Asia and Russia, as the Khyber Pass in the Afghan-Pakistani borderlands, the country’s traditional linking point for this, remains too volatile. Built by Iran, the transit corridor from Chabahar to Milak on the Iran-Afghanistan border is now ready. By rail, Chabahar will then be connected to the Uzbek border at Termez, which translates into Indian products reaching Central Asia and Russia.
Think of this as the Southern Silk Road, linking South Asia with Central Asia, and in the end, if all goes according to plan, West Asia with China. It is part of a wildly ambitious plan for a North-South Transport Corridor, an India-Iran-Russia joint project launched in 2002 and focused on the development of inter-Asian trade.
Of course, you won’t be surprised to know that, even here, China is deeply involved. Chinese companies have already built a high-speed rail line from the Iranian capital Tehran to Mashhad, near the Afghan border. China also financed a metro rail line from Imam Khomeini Airport to downtown Tehran. And it wants to use Chabahar as part of the so-called Iron Silk Road that is someday slated to cross Iran and extend all the way to Turkey. To top it off, China is already investing in the upgrading of Turkish ports.
Who Lost Eurasia?
For Chinese leaders, the One Belt, One Road plan – an “economic partnership map with multiple rings interconnected with one another” – is seen as an escape route from the Washington Consensus and the dollar-centered global financial system that goes with it. And while “guns” are being drawn, the “battlefield” of the future, as the Chinese see it, is essentially a global economic one.
On one side are the mega-economic pacts being touted by Washington – the Trans-Pacific Partnership and the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership – that would split Eurasia in two. On the other, there is the urge for a new pan-Eurasian integration program that would be focused on China, and feature Russia, Kazakhstan, Iran, and India as major players. Last May, Russia and China closed a deal to coordinate the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) with new Silk Road projects. As part of their developing strategic partnership, Russia is already China’s number one oil supplier.
With Ukraine’s fate still in the balance, there is, at present, little room for the sort of serious business dialogue between the European Union (EU) and the EEU that might someday fuse Europe and Russia into the Chinese vision of full-scale, continent-wide Eurasian integration. And yet German business types, in particular, remain focused on and fascinated by the limitless possibilities of the New Silk Road concept and the way it might profitably link the continent.
If you’re looking for a future first sign of détente on this score, keep an eye on any EU moves to engage economically with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. Its membership at present: China, Russia, and four “stans” (Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan). India and Pakistan are to become members in 2016, and Iran once U.N. sanctions are completely lifted. A monster second step (no time soon) would be for this dialogue to become the springboard for the building of a trans-European “one-belt” zone. That could only happen after there was a genuine settlement in Ukraine and EU sanctions on Russia had been lifted. Think of it as the long and winding road towards what Russian President Vladimir Putin tried to sellthe Germans in 2010: a Eurasian free-trade zone extending from Vladivostok to Lisbon.
Any such moves will, of course, only happen over Washington’s dead body. At the moment, inside the Beltway, sentiment ranges from gloating over the economic “death” of the BRICS nations (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa), most of which are facing daunting economic dislocations even as their political, diplomatic, and strategic integration proceeds apace, to fear or even downright anticipation of World War III and the Russian “threat.”
No one in Washington wants to “lose” Eurasia to China and its new Silk Roads. On what former National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski calls “the grand chessboard,” Beltway elites and the punditocracy that follows them will never resign themselves to seeing the US relegated to the role of “offshore balancer,” while China dominates an integrating Eurasia. Hence, those two trade pacts and that “pivot,” the heightened US naval presence in Asian waters, the new urge to “contain” China, and the demonization of both Putin’s Russia and the Chinese military threat.
Thucydides, Eat Your Heart Out
Which brings us full circle to Xi’s crush on Jeremy Rifkin. Make no mistake about it: whatever Washington may want, China is indeed the rising power in Eurasia and a larger-than-life economic magnet. From London to Berlin, there are signs in the EU that, despite so many decades of trans-Atlantic allegiance, there is also something too attractive to ignore about what China has to offer. There is already a push towards the configuration of a European-wide digital economy closely linked with China. The aim would be a Rifkin-esque digitally integrated economic space spanning Eurasia, which in turn would be an essential building block for that post-carbon third industrial revolution.
The G-20 this year was in Antalya, Turkey, and it was a fractious affair dominated by Islamic State jihadism in the streets of Paris. The G-20 in 2016 will be in Hangzhou, China, which also happens to be the hometown of Jack Ma and the headquarters for Alibaba. You can’t get more third industrial revolution than that.
One year is an eternity in geopolitics. But what if, in 2016, Hangzhou did indeed offer a vision of the future, of silk roads galore and night trains from Central Asia to Duisburg, Germany, a future arguably dominated by Xi’s vision. He is, at least, keen on enshrining the G-20 as a multipolar global mechanism for coordinating a common development framework. Within it, Washington and Beijing might sometimes actually work together in a world in which chess, not Battleship, would be the game of the century.
Thucydides, eat your heart out.
Pepe is always a pleasure to read anything you write. I have not seen you writing lately for atimes. com. What is going on with this journal I wonder?
@Oscar
He had some sort of fall-out with Atimes. Here’s how he announced it on his facebook page (November 21). The piece referred to is: Paris Terror Attscks – How ISIS Profits
VERY IMPORTANT MESSAGE TO ALL MY READERS
This is my last piece for Asia Times. It was published on Monday. Keep it as a souvenir. The original has “vanished” from the Asia Times website, as many readers alerted me.
This is the end of a long, convoluted and ultimately very sad story that has been dragging on since December 2014. And it’s all about the information war. You will all hear the true, in-depth story at an appropriate time.
Heartfelt thanks to all of you, readers from all over the world who have been following me for years. And as many of you know, I’m still open for business at RT, Sputnik, TomDispatch, Counterpunch, Information Clearing House, etc..
No Pasarán.
Steve. Thank you for this info! I was unaware of that.
I stopped reading the ATimes about seven months ago, after noticing an editorial outlook for the preceding year that could only be described as politically schizophrenic.
I got the impression of some kind of power struggle with a HuffPo/NYT worldview clearly in the ascendant.
I pick Pepe up at the many other outlets that carry his articles, mainly for his verbal panache: I prefer information from original sources and from as wide a range as possible.
They replaced him with someone more PC and more western.. A good parakeet is one that sings the exceptional song. If you read the replacement article you will understand. Not as bad as what’s printed in the west but you do notice it. I have not read them for many months and even removed the link to them now.
Unfortunately Pepe’s articles have lately been filled with magical thinking, technopianism, and ignorance about infinite growth on a finite planet.
If one quarter of what he outlines in this piece happens the planet is toast.
Also all his predictions require solid, robust, and growing REAL economies in all these locations generating skyrocketing consumption in consumer goods. I mean … come on… what planet does he live on.
That’s NOT it, he is reporting on the vision that was given by the Chinese on what should be. He takes all the visions given in speeches by different world leaders to come to a conclusion on what it will end up looking as. That would only happen if there are no external resistance to it. If you just want to read the multitudes of reports on the speeches then go do that and you can come to your own conclusions. But since I don’t have time to read Chinese, Russian and other Asian and European economic resources I have to depend on people like Pepe who keep up with such things. He has a far better idea of where things are coming from and where it is going. Which is not really “news” but analysis.. Since there is not much on the ground yet, there is nothing concrete about it, but if you have been following someone for a decade you would find he was saying what was happening and where it was going, some of which has happened.. Like the high speed rail between China and Russia which was a pipe dream 10 years ago but they are building it now. China has built 16,000 km of rail lines.. Moe than the entire world combined.. Why is the US not doing it? They are using Trucks which are highly inefficient to move so much traffic.. US don’t care about costs.. They just pass on the costs to the consumers.. China does not have people who can pay the high costs.. On a global scale things move slowly.. Unless you have unlimited resources and a whole bunch of chums who buy worthless bonds to build your infrastructure.. Like how wall street used the US public to fund the internet revolution and then ended up owning most of it. Which is not possible in most of the world. China itself is funding all the growth in many countries.. A single country helping a few dozen.. Its not such an easy task..
China suffer its own people and throw money around world. China is not what many people here think . If you can read Chinese you would know what really is go on inside china.
This kind of thinking is a huge mistake.
What’s destroying the planet is a money system based on debt. This manufactures artificial scarcity by demanding interest and debt service on virtually everything.
This is what demands continuous exponential growth, ignoring that the Earth is a living system.
It’s perfectly possible to take care of humans and the planet.
WASP Exceptionalists have a distinct problem with anyone challenging what they believe to be their rightful spot atop the economic pyramid, which is why they have a policy formulation called Vision 2020 aiming at Full Spectrum Domination of the planet and its peoples and are willing to destroy things to keep their perceived position intact. China on the other hand, doesn’t need such validation or seek dominance as they understand that peace requires sharing, as do the Russians. And on a planet with finite resources facing a climate catastrophe, sharing is the only viable path forward. In other words, China and Russia offer life and dignity while the Outlaw US Empire demands fealty and disruption for those unwilling to bow to it.
Anglo Saxon Protestants are underrepresented at the top of the banking and finance pyramid.
It’s also my dream to be able to cover vast distances by HS rail… rather than flying. I remember reading about Pepe’s article in brief about the Silk Route HS rail some time ago from an Oliver Stone’s post but this is in greater detail … if only they could just end all futile wars of killing and destruction. There’s still much grounds for humans to cover – apart from this, they can explore habitation on the moon and other planets. In the light of constructing a globally empowering infrastructure like developing the wild parts of Eurasia with cutting edge technology, the war of words on capitalism, democracy , communism , pivots and such scheming plots sound superfluous. If politics and ideology are so divisive, let’s turn to economics science and development.
To get a bit grounded read the following article:
http://asia.nikkei.com/magazine/20151119-SOMETHING-TO-PROVE/Politics-Economy/Isolated-Beijing-changes-tune-after-failed-US-visit
Some quotes: In a highly surprising article posted on the website of China’s Ministry of National Defense, Liu Yazhou, political commissar of the People’s Liberation Army National Defense University, argued that China must do its utmost to avoid conflict with Japan and warned that making the wrong move could destabilize the regime.
“The Japanese navy claims that once the war breaks out, it can ‘clear’ the East Sea Fleet of the navy of the PLA within four hours. It is not a joke,” wrote Liu, a general in the PLA Air Force. Liu has a reputation for holding hawkish, anti-Japanese views, but antagonism toward Tokyo is distinctly absent from this article. For instance, he asserts that the ongoing territorial dispute over the Senkaku Islands, known as the Diaoyu in China, is not a major issue in bilateral relations. He also categorized ties with Japan as nearly as important as those with the U.S.
Many of the more bellicose elements within the PLA, inlcuding Liu, were highly critical of a 2008 agreement between Tokyo and Beijing to jointly develop natural gas fields in the East China Sea. Due to former President Hu Jintao’s weak grip on the military, he caved in to their opposition and did not fulfill the agreement. Not being able to deliver on the pact after spending so much political capital to realize it was seen as a major defeat for his administration.
Is it wishful thinking on Japanese side? They also boasted of conquering China in three months in the Second Sino Japanese War, but were dragged into a quagmire for eight years. Four hours is the length of a tea ceremony or so. To clear PLAN from East Sea will take thousands of tea ceremonies, when China is now immeasurably stronger.Nikkei has bought FT, an Anglo Zionist media resource. Imo, Liu Yazhou is hyping Chinese naval weakness since the Navy is largely unaffected by President Xi military cuts which cause stomach burn in land forces.
If you can read Chinese you would know what is really going on inside china. China is not what many people here think it is. Don’t count on China in alliance with Russia . China just takes advantage of Russia difficult time and acquires resource and technologies as businesses.
Wondrous!
How can one remove the article in order to send it on from here?
Choose from the menu on your browser…….Edit >..Select all >..Copy >…
then Edit > ..paste to a new file,like a Wordpad RTF,remove any unwanted comments,then……
Save as, what name ?? ….attache to emails or other links
cheers.
You could cut and paste the url link.. easier than cutting and pasting the entire article
/silk-roads-night-trains-and-the-third-industrial-revolution-in-china-by-pepe-escobar/#comments
URL links disappear!
save it or lose it!
So’can Turkey be relied on at all to link to the new silk road, just as it shot down rus plane probably at behest of usa masters trying to get TTIP in place, or will usa do more to block it so as not to lose european trading……will Turkey be sufficiently tempted to join in or try to play off nato/eu membership in a very tricky game, will it be sufficiently impoverished after Rus economic sanctions to go begging to China, or will China have the patience to see it through to southern europe via Turkey?Or be tempted just to at first connect via Rus routes to europe as a priority for trading but liit itself short of Turkey’s borders so gas,oil can go eastwards……one wonders.
Silk Roads, Third Industrial Revolution, Designed by who – God? Oligarchs? Our Bettors?
Pepe Escobar and the missing link!
Who makes these governments? Who decides? Do the People have a say in these economic plans? Do the People matter? Does matter matter?
Is this mysterious Totalitarian Eurasian world to advance without Locke, without Jefferson, without Montesquieu? Without Democratic Republics? Minus a VISION?
Can economy be discussed without including a human political dimension?
Does Mr. Escobar believe the active political decision making of a free people is an irrelevancy?
Can you design or discuss a ‘Liberation’ without including the great unwashed masses? Where do the people come into this equation? Economic transformation without the People actively designing and defending their wishes – by way of Revolution – is going to separate the masses, into the wealthy, – – – and the poor, and the rulers, and the ruled, as is the political reality in China, and the United States, much of Europe, including the Zionist entity.
in the USA, Wall Street’s Zionist Oligarchs rule. America’s Republic was destroyed half-a-century ago.
On the other side of the Global Human divide, Russia has grown, gradually and imperfectly into a
rough, and unpolished, and still weak, Democratic Republic. Its greatest accomplishments have been forged by the Moral impulse of its Lockean commitment to its own people, and that, despite its unbalanced and damaged economy, has enabled it to forge – above average leadership, and with them, to hold their ground, and even to forge the early victories in Georgia, Novorossiya, and Syria.
It was Russia’s new Moral strength that enabled its President, Vladimir Putin, to stand with a representative of France (the nation which carries the Heritage, if not the present reality of the Europe shaping French Revolution of 1793, and the barricades in Paris, from 1830, to 1848, to 1870).
Vladimir Putin (did you notice the almost identical flags of both nations), and Msieur. Hollande, (who is as much an imposter as America’s Hollywood Obomber), stood together and declared a war against terrorism. That visual and emotional Press Conference may open the doors to the renewed freedom of the European Nations, from the prison chains of the Zionist American-terrorist financial Oligarchs.
The visual (Delacroix fashioned) setting of the press conference, promised that these two Nation’s leaders would fashion a Better World (what else were they promising?). France, from the political center of the Universe, and Russia, France’s (and Europe’s), savior, together with the free Republics, in the trenches, in the sky, and on the barricades, joining together to fight against Terrorism (and who are these terrorists?). Yes, Hollande and his ministers are not capable of honoring this promise. They made it, nevertheless. And they made in the presence of the Russian leaders.
The Silk road to a happy, modernized, and prosperous Eurasia cannot succeed without the political transformation of ‘People’s China’ into, just that, its own Democratic Republic. The Chinese people must enjoy a human and political liberation, where they regularly voice and vote their choices (that means more than one candidate and more than one idea choices).
China, with its present government, cannot achieve its proper economic and human potential. It remains, weak, subject to unstable, and often corrupt, and always morally corrupt, Oligarchic political factions. China hosts a medieval style government, in an age when it needs to involve its people in the vast charge forward they wish to make.
China is not imperialist, and the Zionist Americans are. The Chinese must defend themselves. They will do it best by transformation into a Democratic Republic. Under any government, we must solidarize with the Chinese. As feudal Ethiopia deserved support against the imperialist Italy in the 1930s.
This we understand:
All freedom and justice is enshrined within the establishment of Democratic Republics, best with well armed and contentious citizens, advancing unevenly, but advancing as free humans, off their knees.
Escobar portrays a world devoid of humans: And (correctly so) a Chinese government, almost without leaders. He calls it “China.” Where are its people? Where are its political Parties? Where are its students and working class and farmers? Does it have writers, intellectuals, comedians? Yes! I know! The CIA has some of them. Does China have any?
“China is indeed the rising power in Eurasia and a larger-than-life economic magnet. From London to Berlin, there are signs in the EU that, despite so many decades of trans-Atlantic allegiance, there is also something too attractive to ignore about what China has to offer. There is already a push towards the configuration of a European-wide digital economy closely linked with China. The aim would be a Rifkin-esque digitally integrated economic space spanning Eurasia, which in turn would be an essential building block for that post-carbon third industrial revolution.”
There is no, even brief, mention of the role of the human race in deciding upon matters such as their economic future. That is because their political future is not discussed here. Perhaps I should not pick on Mr. Escobar, few other political/economic analysts are willing to broach the matter of human political participation; but, Escobar is available.
For the Democratic Republics!
IMAGINE
Anonymous
Imagine if you at least had enough guts to use your own name when attacking other posters here…
Just sayin’
KM the post has been removed.
Thanks for that TR…..
Darn it…
That was me who posted above.
Sorry….KM
Alas, friend, there is no freedom, no free people, This, today, is now. Law has become ukase, and the flag always follows the money. The war between Empire and Russ may waste us all, but if that doesn’t happen the good fellas in Wall Street and their slaves in DC will all do business with the Celestial Empire of Wu, and we can like it or lump it, as they say. Meantime life in a delusion, the dream that there is freedom, may be fun, but acting based on delusions of freedom…like sleepwalking on the railroad tracks, brother. Just accept that “they” tell us what to do, when to work, when to die – and then just be nice, kind, and tend what gardens they permit us. Long ago, when the US tax rate was 90% (yes, 90%) and there was, by the way, prosperity in those days, long ago I saw somebody’s tax form and was shocked! I said so! And the adult filling out the forms simply sighed, and said: just be glad they don’t take it all.”. So I say to you, brother, be thankful for what they permit, they can take it all.
Red, I totally agree with your comments. The real power in the world rests with the plutocrats (not the oligarchs), and the people, the masses, had best get used to it, no matter what pretense of liberal democracy is draped over it.
Freedom or fighting for it. Not necessary with violence, that’s their tool. Exposing their deeds should make them self destruct. We, the people, haven’t been in such an opportune environment for millennia. Billions can read and write, and communicate instantly world wide. This is the time, it’s now or….maybe an other opportunity will present itself when they have droid/drone armies. Hack in to them and use against them. If we’re still around by then. Zbigniew Brzeziński wrote in one of his books about the post-human period. Starting around 2035. Transhumanism, beings not held back by emotions and opinions, or whatever he wrote exactly.
But always remeber Rx3
Resist
Rebel
Revolt
Sounds like dogma – bring democracy to the world. What the west calls democracy is actually representative government, which most countries have – it’s just the method of choosing representatives that’s debated. Here in NZ we have proportional representation (mmp) and it works rather well in giving a voice in government to minorities. It usually results in coalition governments which are unable to push through extreme policies and have to incorporate minority policies which would otherwise be rejected regardless of merit.
Any system that retains ‘first past the post’ elections is just reinforcing the fake two party paradigm which has developed in the west. In the upcoming US elections, it doesn’t matter who stands, what is promised, or how well they ‘perform’ in their campaigns. It will be business as usual once the new seating arrangements are in place.
I would normally stay on topic and comment on the article but I can’t let the ‘democracy’ mantra pass by. Pepe gives a refreshing and well balanced view which I find very informative. Thank you Saker for bringing this to us.
Democracy and Freedom are a secular religion or better yet a secular fundamentalism, which America and the West aggressively prostelytize around the world.
What they won’t tell you, however, is that their secular religion is a false idol that promises something akin to political heaven only to create a hell on earth in reality for those who are not the Chosen People (aka the “democratic” West).
Democracy and freedom are the propaganda masks of the universal American Empire.
But like all false gods, this dogma will also fall.
Dear Anonymouses…please use names
Or you could use numbers after your chosen identity…ie anonymous.#1 anonymous#2
Or even anon1 anon2 etc…
this above thread is very hard to follow for all the anons’ and then mods deleting anons’ comments with comment
and hen
People identifying themselves with anons’…which anon ?
The problem isn’t with democracy or freedom, the problem is that they’re Orwellian bastards who are lying when they promise it, both at home and abroad. It’s just like the way the US can talk like they’re trying to safeguard peace–the problem isn’t with peace, the problem is that they’re actually making war.
Representative democracy isn’t real democracy, and “democracy” ruled by money and the plutocrat-owned press still more of a delusion. What freedom can come out of that?
I omitted to enter my name in reply to Peter J Antonsen
Hi Peter, yeah, I heard recently about an experiment of Chinese teachers coming to American schools…and they were invited to ‘impose’ their way of teaching on American students for about 3 months…12 hour days. uniforms. no iphones or food eating in class.
Anyway, the American kids hated it, but did better on the tests at the end of the 3 months, than American kids, learning the same material ‘American style’…
Anyway, I love … actually adore the Chinese President…so IMNSH (in my not so humble opinion)
China is going the right way, her own way…not your American way…dear Peter.
Dear Ann,
And thanks to all – for the input to the discussion (or lack of it), about Political Culture.
Ann, “China is going the right way, her own way…not your American way…dear Peter.”
America is not a Democracy, or any version thereof. America is a proto-fascist Totalitarian puppet of – Jewish Financial Oligarchs. Their MOSSAD (based, but not exclusively, in the Occupied Territory of Palestine), with cooperation from local traitors, assassinated our last Constitutional President, John F. Kennedy, and overthrew our Republic on November 22, 1963.
Even former President Jimmy Carter has said that America is no longer a democracy. https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0ahUKEwjY1NPcwLjJAhXBqh4KHUv0BaoQFggdMAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fmic.com%2Farticles%2F125813%2Fjimmy-carter-tells-oprah-america-is-no-longer-a-democracy-now-an-oligarchy&usg=AFQjCNEU7D6h6odWCCUjLZiZJnQhFmE1Jg&sig2=WOXuInndoykUs4VKmBDCyQ
Yes, the non-musical Lenin used the phrase “bourgeois democracy” when referring to Democracy. He used that phrase to indicate his disrespect for the ideal of Democracy; he insisted that all Democracy was to be measured by its opposite, – false, or non-democracy. I might as well analyse chocolate, by referring to vanilla.
The so-called ‘West’ has no monopoly on democratic ideals, which its leaders have dragged into the mud. But this Anarchist will not award the accolade of “freedom” to a society ruled by a small group of infallible leaders, who rule over people, rather than as their representatives. History has shown that Nations such as Cuba, China, those in Africa, or Latin America, or those in Asia, who are victims of imperialist Oligarch controlled nations, have great difficulty in liberating their peoples, if they cannot advance a World Vision of free peoples choosing their destiny, rather than having their destinies chosen for them.
People, defending free libertarian political entities, such as Democratic Republics, and who are not faceless automotons are able to defend their freedoms and build a prosperous – human futures. If you deny the liberating history of Novorossiya and Crimea, and Vladimir Putin’s legitimate elections in Russia, and the very reality of the Revival of the Russian People and their nation, then you join the cynics from the imperialist Zio/American controlled propaganda media who heap such hatred and lies upon these free peoples.
It is the Zionist Huffington Post rag that regularly labels the democratically elected Vladimir Putin, a “Thug,” and a “Dictator.” The Russians deny those labels. So did I at the time of the Huffington Post attack, and right here, in The Saker. Either the Russian state sports a Democratic Republic, or it doesn’t. Let me know! I’ll wait for your answer………..
Or maybe, Joseph (Djugashvili) Stalin and his brand of political organization was correct. Ask Solzhenitsyn. He is also waiting (in Heaven) for your answer…… You recall that the Marxist Lemonists, and their Communist Party’s infallible non elected leader, Gorbachev, gave up the ghost and the entire store in 1990, without asking the Russian people their opinion. And look where the Marxist Lemonist Stalinist government led Russia. Their phony Vision so greatly weakened the Russian people and their nation, that the government of Vladimir Putin is still picking up the pieces (and gluing them back together as best he can, while he and his nation are under daily and multi-sided attack of the Zionist imperialists).
There are no short cuts. You get what you wish for. Wish well. Wish with confidence. Leave fear at the door.
It was an earlier Spanish Republic that resisted the advance of Fascism, supported by Germany, Italy, England, and America, for 3 years. Only a Democratic Republic (and in this case not the non existing one from America), can send an Air Corps of Heroic Motivated Warriors to rescue the oldest nation and their inhabitants on earth – from the very fires of Hell.
America and Europe have no special claim on democracy. To accuse me of supporting my – “your American way” is somewhat insulting, when I have written many missives, and extensively leafletted, advocating a revolutionary restoration of the (not now existing) American Republic. I understand (hope) that you did not intend a personal insult. Just call me stupid, I can handle that. Political Freedom and Democratic forms of government are no more specifically, or attributable to being ‘American,’ than fascist dictatorship is German. The Zionist oligarchs are clearly proving that point.
Without supporting political freedom, involving the full range of human Liberties, it is pointless to discuss the global conflicts that wrack the world, because you will not understand just what motivates humans to resist, and more to the point, just what enables humans to resist.
For the Democratic Republics!
IMAGINE
Ok, I see your point. I wonder what a great government would look like in your eyes ?
Could you describe it ? Is there a president still ? Is there a congress still ?
Have you ever heard about Rudolf Steiner’s ‘Three fold Social Order’ ?
Where culture and finance and government are completely separate with equal power….
Ann,
A Democratic Republic, never perfect, but in many hues of the rainbow.
Separation of powers,
No $ money to be spent on electioneering, equal media access to all candidates.
Multi Party, multi idea political contention.
Full (bill of rights) style rights for all to speak, advocate, etc.,
People better armed & organized than any standing-government military establishment – no standing armed forces needed, or secret agencies.
Free love – lots of sex (a little humor)
Lightly controlled banking & financial market sector (Glass Steagal, Nationalized Banks -possible)
Gov’t controls credit.
Only People (through government) control National resources. In other words, No private control of national Resources.
Rights to employment, a home,
FD Roosevelt’s “4 Freedoms.” to worship in ones own way, speech & expression, freedom from fear (no more war), & efforts to promote Prosperity for all.
Something like that.
Orwell’s “Homage to Catalonia” might give some hints.
CLR James “The Black Jacobins” more hints of economic and political approaches.
The efforts of the Republics in Novorossiya.
IMAGINE
Dear Pepe,
Thak you so much for something positive to remember whilst all the wars continue.
What is your view of how Turkey will now be treated by China and other SCO/EEU members?
Rgds,
Veritas
@ Steve – Thanks for the update about the AsiaTimes – I hope a Chinese broadcaster/paper picks up Pepe to write articles too in addition to his other contributions.
Dang did not say “to get rich is glorious.”
The quote was made up by Orville Schell.
Here’s looking forward to the day that China dumps U.S. debt. ALL of it.
Pepe long time follower and admirer of your writing. One issue but concerning american geopolitical aspirations and Xi’s nievate with regards to us -European.(colony) Aspirations. They only have hammers because they see all there obstacles as nails. Negotiated diplomacy died in western politics in the 1960’s. China’s hand of friendship will be treated no differently than Russia’s
Perfectly summarized Pepe. You have been a guiding force journalist for quite a while now. This vision of the future is THE hopeful one, but as you have pointed out forever, my estranged home country wants to be the spoiler.
“Some day this war’s gonna end”
Pepe is too well meaning, the great satan intends to ransack the new library of Alexandria that has arisen in the East. We are in no doubt about that and Xi is on a one man mission to put out all the fires the US Ambassadors are lighting in the region.
The trick for China will be to ignore the US and all its military containment moves, which in the end are deceptions. China has handled the sail by at Fiery Cross Reef well. The US dared not challenge the sovereignty of China. It merely sailed as tourist through the 12 mile region. Could have been a barque, sloop or cabin cruiser. Happened to be a warship. China ignored it basically.
Same with all the island and reef challenges. The US would have a lot of explaining if the Teddy Roosevelt aircraft carrier suddenly caught a Chinese missile by doing a war dance in Chinese waters. 8000 men and lots of airplanes daring the Chinese is massively stupid. It won’t happen. They too will sail by, wave to the new lighthouse and gardeners prettying up the reefs.
Meanwhile, China will work out bilateral deals with ASEAN nations. Japan wants to flex its muscles. But up north in the East China Sea, Yellow Sea and Sea of Japan there’s a another neighbor that takes no sh*t from ex-Imperialists. Russia is the policeman of the NorthEast Asian region, though the US thinks it is. Follow the relationships of Russia with China, So. Korea, No. Korean and Japan and you see the headstart and economic opportunity Russia affords to all who behave. The US instigates Japan, but Japanese money is flowing into Russia for investment. Japan needs trade. It extracts little out of its ground and it needs to import most commodities. After Abe is gone (he’s wrecking the economy badly) Japan should get back on track with trading and developing.
The US has no easy wars to start in the Asia-Pacific region. So that part of Eurasia should be secure from the Hegemon’s containment. The US may dare to try to push Taiwan over the edge, but that seems remote. Hong Kong is a joke as a color revolution. The people of Kowloon threw feces on the students during the sit-ins. There is no support for US manipulation.
Philippines has its Abe, Aquino, who fell back in love with the US military, but there is a 20 year hiatus from US domination that has been broken, but it will fester again after Aquino.
Okinawa hates the US military. That leaves Guam to be the US outpost 2000 miles away from China’s coast. It’s a stretch to think the US can contain anyone from 2000 miles. All the TPPs and mutual defense pacts are meaningless in a few more years. The US is a visitor in Asia, and will have no say in Asian matters if it comes with guns. China will be the power because of wealth not weapons.
Really, the US has to directly start a war with China and Russia in Asia to “contain them”. I don’t see how that happens. There can be no small war with either. Any “war” will be nuclear. The US has no sufficient shield to think it can avert total annihilation if it started a war.
South Asia and SE Asia have many places that can get hot, and be turbulent and disruptive. Myanmar, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia are favorite places for stirring up Islamic trouble. Bangladesh has its violent Islamic problems. And Pakistan and India are always problems to solve. But China has projects and corridors and investments and loans for all these places and the scent of money and a fresh start in the 21st Century should overwhelm US chaos projects.
Mongolia and Central Asia are well within both China’s and Russia’s orbs of development and security arrangements. They will team with the two giants to crush US destabilization through Islamic terror.
So, that leaves the Middle East, on our front page in Syria and Iraq, Egypt and Libya. Yemen is separate, though a problem to solve, minor in the scheme of things.
And then Ukraine, the canker sore of Europe, oozing pus from a fountain of fascism and nazi religion. Like gangrene or bone cancer or in more accurate diagnosis, bowel cancer, Ukraine will die as we knew it. It is on a death march, creating a perverse ghost dance of hopelessness for itself and its incredibly stupefied citizens. It has whored out its women and girls and from some reports its children. It uses its young men as cannon fodder and sources of human organs. It is a State Department Horror Show, a Dance Macabre on the Dniester.
It will be broken, patched back as a confederation and UN protectorate or some such neutral entity, wrapped up so its infectious matter doesn’t spread beyond its new borders.
LIke everything so deeply touched by US ideologues and geogyrators, Ukraine is ruined, left for dead, and a pathetic heap. China knows how to revive such garbage dumps. Eurasia will find uses for parts of it. After US flees the morgue of Kiev, the de-zombiefication can begin.
Eurasia will come to the doorstep of all these problem spots and by then Russia will have destroyed ISIS, the US presidency will be in new hands, and NATO will have discovered that it is no longer king of the hill. Every six months the US gets weaker and Russia and China grow more important to everyone except the vassal states. Iran and India will join the Eurasian parade and the monster the US has to derail will be too big, too fast, too strong and too smart.
Tectonic change is happening. It is evolutionary. China is an engine of innovation. It is a hybrid of social development and wealth building. Never has one nation chosen to use its own wealth accumulation built from trade to invest in vast numbers of emerging and developing nations, some not even trade partners of any sort. China is sharing.
The US can try to contain China, but it cannot contain the flow of Chinese investment, infrastructure expertise, connectivity projects and all the other elements of the Eurasia Silk Belt and Road concept.
Chess the game of the century?
It is beyond me why we constantly see Western writers invariably refer to chess in this Chinese context.
Why not look into traditional, strategic Chinese GO, for once? There is much, very much to learn in that more appropriate direction, I believe…
I have spoken of GO as the game of the multi-polarity leaders. It truly is the game of Strategy and best represents what we see not only the Chinese doing, but precisely what Putin does. The notion of Chess as the game of geopolitics is very Western, very limited and clearly fails the test of what goals are, what the means are and what a role timing and patience plays.
Of course, Chess appears to many as a game of Hegemony because there is a King. However, GO is all about developing regions on the game board, influencing, controlling, blocking, surrounding, positioning, and playing multiple regions simultaneously. GO resembles what we see unfolding across continents if we scour the globe and don’t just stare at one spot. It is 1000 times more complex a strategic game than Chess.
I believe you sent contact information for auslander … can you please resend to saker-webmaster@yandex.com Thanks mod-hs
I was reading something earlier about a soviet strategist in the 70’s who recognized a condition where you get the other person to do what you expect modeling behavior.. Which is basically game theory.. He designed the soviet strategy to get nato to do what the soviets wanted hence all of what nato did was because to gain an advantage in the long run. Guess that broke down in the 90’s and they are back to doing it again. It might also be why we see Russia is being prepared for most actions by nato. Although in many cases the timings too soon.. And you can only prepare so much with limited resources and time. Maybe why Putin delays things to the last possible moment.. IF Putin had given more support to Syria last year, things would not have gotten this dire.. New tanks and weapons for the SAA could have stopped the terrorists taking over so many areas in just the last year after the US started supplying advanced weapons and Turkey getting directly involved by providing military assistance to terrorists. Remember 2 years ago, Russia only SOLD weapons to Syria.. mostly paid for by Iran.. That also no advanced weapons.. Syria still waiting for the 8 Mig31’s ordered in 2007..
“After years of explosive economic expansion, it sanctifies the country’s lower “new normal” gross domestic product growth rate of 6.5% a year through at least 2020. ”
When I look at the US economic growth, as measured by true GDP, which seems to be a decline rate of 1%, that 6.5% growth rate in China does not look so bad.
http://www.shadowstats.com/alternate_data/gross-domestic-product-charts
Can I found any information regarding to this subject in different languages?
http://www.klimaya.com
Pls see my article on China’s silk road initiative published the Millennium Post when President Xi was visiting New Delhi:
http://www.millenniumpost.in/NewsContent.aspx?NID=69406
Excerpt:
Strategic Implications
As a Chinese saying goes, ‘To succeed one has to take advantage of the opportunity, geographic proximity and good-neighbourly relations’. Xi was fully aware of this. His idea is based on solid domestic and international calibrations. Late Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping put forward the opening-up and reform policy in late 1978. Deng’s initiative has become a driving force for China to become the 2nd largest economy from a backward and poor country in a time span of three decades. It has helped lifting tens of millions of people out of poverty. But it is the eastern and southern coastal regions that have benefited the most.
The gap between eastern China and western China has increased. To narrow the gap, former President Jiang Zemin put forward the ‘Develop the West’ policy a decade ago. Since then, China’s inner, poor western part has experienced marked progress in terms of per capita GDP, reduction of poverty, development of infrastructure, health and education. The 2nd largest economy came with a price. China is now increasingly encountering energy and environmental constraints and bottlenecks. In a sense, China is now on a cross road. The responsibility for fulfilling the Chinese dream falls on the shoulders of Xi. But there are not many policy alternatives left. Xi has to move his head westward and is now presiding over the opening-up of version 2.0. The twin silk roads initiative will make the western and southwestern China, engines for the new phase of development. These regions have great potential for development.
This interior part will transform from a backyard to the face of opportunities. But it did not start from scratch. Western China has world class infrastructure, abundant in natural resources. It is high time to connect it to Central Asia, South Asia and other Euro-Asian countries. Obviously, Xi plans to use the silk roads as means to rejuvenate the nation. Silk roads are like a spread folding fan with China as the pivot. China has the need, the will and the ability to implement the grand blueprint.
In contrast, although Japan and the United States came up with the idea of silk road strategies in late 1990s and in 2012, when former US secretary of State Hillary Clinton emphasised its importance but they have fatal defections and China was intentionally avoided. Majority of the US troops are set to pull out of Afghanistan by yearend and the American idea seems dull and pale. It is not difficult to understand how far their strategies can be carried forward.
The twin silk roads have several mechanisms and platforms in place. First and foremost, it is the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO). It is an effective tool for enhancing regional cooperation and tackling terrorism, separatism and religious extremism. Other such initiatives are the Euro-Asia Expo held annually in Urumuqi, Xinjiang Autonomous Region, the South Asia Expo held in Kunming, Yunnan Province and the China-ASEAN Expo held in Nanjing in Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region.
Second, comes the Bangladesh-China-India-Myanmar (BCIM ) Corridor, the China-Pakistan Corridor, the Five Principles of Peaceful Co-existence (Panchsheel). The international railways
In Brasil the cost of just one km of subway is around 100 millions USD.
See link http://www.cimentoitambe.com.br/custo-torna-quase-inviavel-a-construcao-de-metros/
Pepe Escobar is first of all a US expert, as all Latin Americans are, next he is a Russia expert, as Fidel Castro is, and lately – the past 5 years or so – he has evolved into a China expert. A free soul indeed
3rd Industrial revolution will also have to involve monetary reform, away from debt money monopoly; and 3D printing.