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Politics

الصين ومناورة المثلث

Feb 10, 2022 Stephen S. Roach

نيوهافين ــ نادرا ما تكون نقاط التحول ظاهرة بقدر كبير من الوضوح. لكن البيان المشترك الصادر في الرابع من فبراير/شباط عن الرئيس الروسي فلاديمير بوتن والرئيس الصيني شي جين بينج مع افتتاح دورة الألعاب الأوليمبية الشتوية في بكين ربما يكون استثناء ــ مما يشير إلى نقطة تحول جديدة في حرب باردة جديدة.

كانت لعبة المثلث مناورة أميركا الاستراتيجية الحاسمة في الحرب الباردة الأولى. أفضى تقارب ريتشارد نيكسون مع الصين قبل خمسين عاما إلى عزل الاتحاد السوفييتي السابق في وقت حيث بدأت أساساته الاقتصادية تتداعى. على حد تعبير هنري كيسنجر في كتابه "عن الصين"، "بدأ التقارب الصيني الأميركي كجانب تكتيكي في الحرب الباردة؛ ثم تطور إلى أن أصبح على قدر كبير من الأهمية في تعزيز تطور النظام العالمي الجديد". استغرق الأمر بعض الوقت قبل أن تنجح الاستراتيجية. ولكن بعد سبعة عشر عاما، سقط سور برلين وانهار الاتحاد السوفييتي.

لم تكن الصين قَـط ممن يتجاهلون دروس التاريخ، وهي الآن تختار ممارسة مناورة المثلث في حرب باردة ثانية وليدة. قد تتسبب الشراكة الترادفية بين الصين وروسيا في تحويل توازن القوى العالمي في وقت حيث تعاني أميركا من الضعف بشكل خاص. وهذا يشير إلى نهاية مثيرة للقلق.

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0 Comments on this paragraph, 8 Comments on this article

Henry Rech Feb 17, 2022

What is the source of China's strategic power? Its economic power.

What is the source of its economic power? The fact that it turned to capitalism 40 years ago and has been able to exploit western capital, western technology, western education and western markets.

Given that the US and to some extent the West generally is now denying, to a degree, China's access to these four factors so China's economic and strategic power will wane.

As China internalizes its economy, its internal cost structure will rise and make it less competitive in world markets, contributing to weakening its external economic power.

Its burgeoning internal economic power will however allow it to continue to build its military power.

So China's strategic power will be constrained by its waning external economic power and enhanced by its developing military power.

The source of Russia's strategic power is its military power. Its economic power is of little consequence. (Although its control of gas supplies to Europe is of consequence.)

The power of the Chinese Russian alliance is only of consequence if Russia is willing to exercise its military power.

The question is, is Russia actually willing to exercise its military power? For instance, is Russia actually willing to invade the Ukraine? It would not be too difficult to believe that Russia is not actually willing to invade but is only intent on playing a strong game of strategic poker.

The Russian deployment of substantial forces on the Ukrainian border has to some degree catalyzed a largely unified response in Europe but has also exposed fracture lines. Germany relies on Russian gas and is the strategic weak link.

The military and economic power of the US is without question (despite Roach's allusions to problems).

The central concern is the US's political stability. Its polity is highly polarized and troubled with the political class focused on the upcoming congressional elections.

If the triangulation of the US succeeds it will not be because of the Russian-Chinese alliance or US economic weakness but because the US is riven by an internal political maelstrom.
- Henry Rech Feb 19, 2022
  
  Kaysoon Lim
  
  Much of what you say is correct, but so what?
  
  Chinese hubris will lead it into strategic blunders and threaten world peace.
  
  Your intimations that the US economy is troubled are exaggerated. The US is the world's most powerful economy. That doesn't mean it is the largest or that it has to be the largest.
  
  The only thing holding the US back is internal political turmoil.
  
  But that might just be stilled in the face of an existential external strategic threat.
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- KaySoon Lim Feb 19, 2022
  
  Western Capital is a mirage of printed USD, which the printed machine is already over-heating, triggering inflation. Western technology is struggling even with 5G, glided hypersonic...etc. Western education is no longer the only premier education. As for Western market, despite tariffs, sanctions and bans on China, US continue to grow her trade deficits with China. US Treasury Secretary warns that any increase of tariffs on China will only exacerbates US inflation only. Economic power is the tip of the ice-berg, the mass is in China's mass education, hunger for knowledge, and the determination to climb to the top of development in important fields, resulting in China as the world factory. China BRI is to expand economic growth in all directions instead of counting on the West alone, while internal consumption growth is to strengthen her economic base. As for Russia-China economic cooperation, they have very good synergy as pointed out by Stephen Roach.
  
  As for military, even Biden himself admitted, US has to avoid a face-to-face military confrontation with Russia (over Ukraine) when nuclear holocaust can be a likely outcome between the two nuclear power nations. Trump's administration of planning a tactical nuclear war with China has woken her up to the need of increasing her nuclear arsenal to match US, to ensure M.A.D. With China's production costs, production of her conventional weaponry (sea, land, air and space) can catch up with the US in the near future.
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George Stockus Feb 17, 2022

Corporate America's titans are living off China. From Apple to Starbucks to JPM and Blackrock. Call it commercial kompromat. Either via cost arbitrage of supply chain or in chasing end market growth, how much of the S&P500 is vested in China's form of communism, human rights commitments and territorial ambitions - a concept unthinkable decades ago. How is it America can exercise any wits on the geopolitical chessboard with such a compromised economic reality?
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Chris Cullen Feb 14, 2022

It’s worrisome to see the article painting such a dismal picture of the future. It seemed from the article, if the two countries decide to cooperate, it could only be a bad thing for the world. This narrow-minded zero sum mentality is poisonous to what the world really needs, cooperation, and obstructs people from thinking beyond one’s own lifespan. Putting interest higher than one’s responsibility to the society and the world may only contribute to the dismantlement of world peace. Living in a world with so many countries, sometimes, taking a step back and let others’ breathe for a while could be an advance for the human race and lead to a more harmonious future.
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KaySoon Lim Feb 13, 2022

US tends to look at the world with her own prism, diffused with colours, instead at what it is. To make matters worse, she thinks the world also see it with the same prism of Machiavellism, with zero-sum game of international relations. China has gone through her era two thousands years ago of triangulation in the classic 'Romance of the Three Kingdoms'. I can assure you, China has learned that if it is anything, it is definitely not romantic, as over the two hundred years, endless confrontations and degradations on all sides. At the end, none of the Kingdom emerge as the top "dog", instead someone other power took over. Mutual respects and mutual benefits with win-win mentality will give mankind a better chance and better lives.
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الصين ومناورة المثلث

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