By Godfree Roberts – selected from his extensive weekly newsletter : Here Comes China
Ten Predictions for 2021
- GDP expands 10%. Western experts predict GDP will expand by 8% and, since they are always 25% low, expect 10%–a $2.4 trillion addition to the economy and the fastest growth ever. Bonus Predictions: Wages rise 12%, the EU signs the Investment Agreement, the EEU merges with the RCEP.
- Most Fortune 500 companies are Chinese. More than 140 Chinese companies and fewer than 120 US companies will make the Fortune list. 80% of the Chinese companies will be State Owned Enterprises.
- Five new billionaires created weekly, following four a week in 2020. .
- Extreme poverty, homelessness vanish. There will be more drug addicts, suicides and executions, more homeless, poor, hungry and imprisoned people in America than in China by this time next year. 99% of the bottom half of Chinese society will own a home and have an income, plenty of food and clothes, safe streets, health insurance, a pension, and old age care.
- Gini gap narrows. Inequality has been Xi’s pet project since 2012 and will become a priority through 2035. The gap is already narrower than Europe’s: Luxembourgeois are 50 times richer than Moldavans, while Beijingers are 5-6 times richer than folks in Gansu, and Gansu is richer than Armenia, Ukraine and Moldova.
- Urban life revolutionized. China has constructed the equivalent of San Francisco’s entire housing stock every month since 1950 and Xiong’An New Area, south of Beijing, embodies everything they have learned. Most of it will be woods and wetlands, the loudest sound will birds twittering, and it will be fully automated, with infrastructure underground. Increased productivity will repay its capital cost in 30 years.
- The first exascale computer. Top supercomputers nowsolve problems at the petascale—a quadrillion calculations/second. Exascale computers, at a quintillion calculations/second, will more realistically simulate the processes involved in precision medicine, regional climate, additive manufacturing, the physics in materials discovery and design, the fundamental forces of the universe, and more.
- Another quantum surprise to match its recent boson sampling achievement. China outspends the US 4:1 in R&D and its Taoist worldview accommodates quantum physics’ ‘both-and’ paradigm better than the Western ‘either-or’ tradition.
- Chinese outlive Americans. US deaths will rise 15% 3.2 million and life expectancy will fall by three years. China’s life expectancy was on track to match America’s by 2028, but thanks to Healthy China 2030, it may maintain its 2021 lead permanently.
- Chinese vaccines protect the world. Sixty percent of the world’s people will be protected by Chinese vaccines (and The WHO will reveal India as the source of the Covid-19 virus.
This represents but a fraction of what is included in the Here Comes China newsletter. If you want to learn about the Chinese world, get Godfree’s newsletter here
Cover Photograph : Zhou Chengyu, a 24-year-old from Guizhou province (above) is China’s youngest ever space commander. She’s in charge of the rocket connector system, a “pivotal role.” The Chang’e 5 mission marked China’s third successful Moon-landing in seven years. Read full article →
I still don’t understand the true nature of the relationship between Russia and China. I want them to be real allies but the more I look into it, it seems that if anything it is just a “marriage of convenience”. If so, I would put the blame on Russia rather than China because it appears that Russia cannot shake off its complex about being European and part of the Western club. Russia needs to breakaway from this attitude and start regarding itself as Eurasian rather than soley European.
I hope the Saker can perhaps write an article if time and effort permits and explain what is the real relationship between these two powers. I would love to know the following:
1. Would Russia come to China’s aid in the
event of war and vice versa?
2. Will there ever be a true formal alliance
between the two? It seems the US has many
alliances where countries like Japan , South
Korea, Italy, Australia etc would without
hesitation help the US in any major conflict.
3. What is the real reason China hasn’t sent
troops to Syria to help their “friends”?
4. Why don’t Russia and China combine their
resources in manpower and expertise to
create high quality news networks and social
media platforms as alternatives to Facebook,
Twitter and YouTube to win the soft power
battle.
5. Are they in the process of breaking away
from the Western financial system?
6. Why don’t they combine resources to win
the new space race or will we see the
American flag planted on Mars first.
7. How can the two convince other countries to
join them?
8. Can’t two such superpowers join hands and
cure cancer, heart disease and other ailments
with the speed and determination they found
to create vaccines for Covid? I can think of no
greater way to win the hearts of the people of
the world then to do this. We have enough
hypersonic missiles to kill people. We need
hypersonic missiles to kill cancer.
Many hear talk of this bond between Russia and China to stop the madness of the other side but I’m slowly losing faith and thinking it’s not really what it seems to be. I hope it isn’t so because bar divine intervention I don’t see any hope.
Interesting you should say that. In a wide-ranging interview, an ex-foreign intelligence chief of the USSR blames the USSR for the deterioration of ties with China which allowed Kissinger to prize China out of the Soviet sphere.
“- The alliance of the USA and China against the USSR was largely the result of the bungling of the Soviet leadership. With our own hands we have created the ground on which Kissinger has cleverly built an anti-Soviet alliance. We were dogging because of the islands on the Amur River. For some reason, our elite decided that China is enemy number 1.”
https://rusvesna.su/news/1609854978
Personally, I don’t think President Putin will repeat that mistake – and that is what the West is afraid of. Russia will not do a Mao and side with the West. On the other hand, China is exploding into a mega power and it will not be easy to keep pace with it. Good luck to Russia and China!
Both are not as keen on a formal alliance as on a strategic partnership based on economic and military cooperation.
I think this is a sensible approach since both have diverse and sometimes divergent interests.
No messing about. They appeared sluggish and timid while they were collecting data and preparing a mega case against the CIA Kraken.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jan/06/american-lawyer-arrested-by-hong-kong-police-in-national-security-crackdown
Here the China / Russia relationship is explained.
/russia-china-sitrep-double-helix-strategic-coordinationrussia/
It is called a China-Russia comprehensive strategic partnership of coordination and enhanced cooperation in global affairs.
https://news.cgtn.com/news/2020-12-31/Chinese-Russian-leaders-exchange-New-Year-s-greetings-WFFYRs9RJK/index.html
China / Russia just completed on Dec 23, 2020 a joint aerial strategic patrol over the Sea of Japan and East China Sea.
In terms of trade, they are on 25% settlement in national currencies, and this is steadily moving up.
https://www.rt.com/business/510994-russia-china-settlements-national-currencies/
Here is an article that explains the origins of Washington’s anti-China stance:
https://viableopposition.blogspot.com/2020/10/the-origins-of-washingtons-anti-china.html
Washington has long had a fixation on the dangers that China poses to its position as the world’s sole military and economic superpower.
If China develops a fusion-powered nuclear power plant, US hegemony is “over” the next day (unless the US nukes it, in which case humanity itself would soon after be “over’).
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/science/article/3112684/china-turns-its-artificial-sun-quest-nuclear-fusion-energy
What I found interesting about this article – which reeks of the same triumphalism that is found in Western media about the “exceptionalism” of the West – was the last point about India being found to be the source of the COVID infection.
This allegation was brought up with little evidence by Chinese officialdom amidst deteriorating ties with India. Note that India itself has not accused China having been responsible for the virus (either via a lab or due to unhygienic conditions) despite its far greater impact on India.
And this brings us to the Chinese-US propaganda wars going on in which the Saker’s otherwise excellent website has been taken over.
The Saker, and I assume most of his audience, is fed up with the corruption, decay and wanton imperialism of the US Empire and its EU and assorted vassal’s, ruthless war – financial, economic, legal, cyber, informational – against those who remain independent of it. This includes Russia, China, Iran.
This has morphed to then assuming that anyone opposed to specific policies of Russia, China, Iran are therefore members of the US Empire and in turn be demonized as such.
Specifically, since the core interest of the Saker is Russia and its survival as an independent civilization, and since China is crucial for assuring that against a concerted attack from the US Empire, the Saker has become partial to articles that are pro-China. And pro-China articles invariably tend to be anti-India because of the border dispute between them and China’s encroachment into what India sees as its regional space.
The irony is that India is one of the few countries that has effectively developed a truly independent, multi-vector foreign policy. India has deep ties with Russia, and though it has increased ties with the US, it has not done it at Russia’s expense. Similarly India has deep ties with Iran and though US imperial sanctions vs Iran have forced India to curtail much trade/cooperation with Iran – like indeed Russia has been forced to do – it has continued to politically support Iran the best it can (while balancing its own self-preservation and being pragmatic).
In particular, India has refused to join in the US imperial demonizing of Russia or Iran and continues to maintain good ties with leaders of these countries (as well as the Arabs and Israel, countries in Africa, South America and even the DPRK). The only major country that India has a dispute with is China and this is driven not by US imperialism but its own outstanding issues. Even so, India has insisted that the US stay out of their border dispute (even as India tries to procure US, Russian, Israeli technology to protect its borders against a superior force).
However, increasingly the tone in the Saker is to hew to the Chinese propaganda line that protesting against China means that you’re a US imperial stooge and in turn eligible for counter-propaganda. Ergo, India – who the Saker should otherwise count as an ally of Russia – is thrown under the bus.
This brings up a larger point about the Russia-China defacto alliance and whether China – who has no issues strengthening ties with Ukraine for example – will force Russia and pro-Russian media to align their policies to suit their own needs rather than letting Russia remain independent.
I’m going to call this an attempt to apply an ideological standard to this blog which is nonsense. Your assessment of ‘tone’ is questionable.
The fact that we regularly post a short Sit Rep on China, is simply that. The actuality of business, economy and geopolitical affairs and the other fact is that they are roaring ahead on many fronts.
Please go over to the right, to the search bar, and search on India. You will find fascinating and in-depth articles by a correspondent by the name of Straight-Bat. You will find Noel Monteiro, Pepe Escobar, Zamir Awan, Allen Yu and more, each writing from his or her own perspective.
What you are reading here is Godfree’s ten predictions, with no ideological slant. Only the predictions of someone who knows China. WHO knows WHO the WHO will finger. It is a prediction and is not fact.
We are always looking for new writers and if you have a special talent on India, you may always present your writing to The Saker for publication. We try and stay a little away from hard ideology here. But fact is, China is developing incredibly fast and huge and their relationship with Russia is modern, forward-looking, and very active. In addition, they are both countries known to be anti-western hegemony. India is certainly and demonstrably not that.
If we have ideological bias here, it would be anti-western hegemony.
Spot on amarynth. Russia and China are neighbours. They are destined to live next door to each other. It is better for them to cooperate and live in peace. But this is seen as a threat by the hegemon. This made it even more necessary for Russia and China to band together to secure their collective peace and the peace of the continent of Eurasia and beyond, even to Africa and Sout America.
Russia ad China need each other for all time since they could never stop being geographical neighbours.
India made a statement indeed when she stayed out of the RCEP agreement and lined up with US imperialism as a member of the QUAD. Today’s India stands out as the exact opposite of China. The two countries emerged as newly-liberated parts of the world in the late 1940s after a hellish experience under the jackboot of Western imperialism and — in China’s case — Japanese genocidal barbarism (Winston Churchill could be said to have played that role in India at the very same time).
Today’s China has vanquished the West, whose pathetic colour revolution stunts have all failed. Today’s India, by contrast, is an utter third world hellhole ruled by rabid Hindunazis who are happily trashing their own country: enormous corruption, fanaticism, violence, poverty, and alarming rates of air pollution in the cities. Whoever is trying to justify India against the backdrop of China’s achievements has got quite a lot to answer for.
The list is indeed long and is getting longer every year, and I would add:
11. China space craft soft landing and rover on Mars (scheduled sometime in Feb, I believe).
12. Launching the first module of China’s long term space station.
13. 28nm semiconductor manufacturing equipment that is free of foreign tech.
14. More recorded dives of deep sea exploration.
15. Launching the first electromagnetic aircraft launch (EAL) system on a non-ski-slope carrier.
16. Start of experimental 6G network.
17. World fastest wind tunnel.
18. 2022’s list by Godfree will be longer.
Not to forget:
19. Another piece of Pindo awe-inspiring legislation passed unanimously. Yellow Asian Dictatorship Damnation Act.
I moved to mainland China in 2012, and stayed until the evacuation of foreigners from Wuhan April 2020. Wuhan is considered a 3rd ranked city by the Chinese, yet there are move building construction cranes in the city of Wuhan alone, than the entire USA. The infrastructure in China is 100 years ahead of the US. The article is already 10 years out of date. Americans seem to have no idea…
Changing the subject to something even bigger (if you can stand the shock?) Please watch “Jab” to the end. Don’t worry it’s short. Cheers https://youtu.be/87SbKOYoQLo