Discussing Biden's Potential China Policy

horse said:

It is rather clear that the Americans do not have a strategy for China.

But, before that, and all the stuff with President Trump, there was Russia.

The Americans did not have an effective policy towards Russia. Under Obama, it was Hilary always talking about a "re-set" in US-Russia relations. They are still talking about a "re-set" to US-Russia relations.

That means the United States does not have a strategy for China, and the United States does not have a strategy for Russia either.

This is not too surprising.

As for China, very few in the west understand it, therefore they miss the mark because everything they think about China is wrong.

As for Russia, the four people negotiating the peace deal to the previous war in the Donbass, there was no United States representative.

For different reasons, we have the same conclusion, no strategy.

No strategy means someone probably will be outmaneuvered.

Click to expand...

I wouldn't argue that Washington does not have a strategy. Still, given the limited resources available to US foreign policy making, Washington has adopted a whole-of-government China-only counter-balancing strategy late 2017. With the rise of China's material power and innovative capabilities, Washington has become sharply focused on China, even if it meant sacrificing other foreign policy goals like denuclearizing NK, finishing up the Afghan War favorably, bolstering NATO, containment of Russia, etc. In fact, policymakers from both parties have previously argued that although Russia poses a military threat, China is a longer term economic, political, and military threat. More importantly, for Washington, China could become the only nation state capable of outcompeting the US in high-tech sectors (economic sectors at the top of industrial supply chain critical to long-term US economic competitiveness and national security) if left unchecked, even if Russia remains a high-tech superpower for now. Thus, for Washington, China techno-nationalist developmental path is deemed more threatening than Russia's massive nuclear arsenal and military aggressions in Ukraine. This is become Russia is deemed a declining power (although I personally disagree with this). It is under such assumption that policymakers in Washington hopes to drive a wedge between Moscow and Beijing (divide and rule, a strategy long mastered by former maritime powers like Britain and Japan). So yes, Washington does have a strategy, and it is an old geopolitical strategy adopted by Britain before the First World War against Germany even at the expense of ignoring the rising US and other imperial goals. The only difference is that the current US strategy is more on steroid since I don't recall London adopting detailed bans on the sales of specific military and dual use technologies against Berlin before the Great War.
We will probably have to wait and see how China rides out Washington's competitive strategy. In the past 200 years and since the Industrial Revolution, no rising powers (Napoleon's France, two Germanies, Imperial Russia, USSR, Japan) have been able to successfully outmaneuver the status-quo Anglos (Britain and then the post-1945 US).

AssassinsMace said:

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Another example of buying Western costs too much so they can't do it.

Click to expand...

I hate that we keep getting in the way of human civilization progressing. I hope someone can do something about this.

Apologized.

SpicySichuan said:

I wouldn't argue that Washington does not have a strategy. Still, given the limited resources available to US foreign policy making, Washington has adopted a whole-of-government China-only counter-balancing strategy late 2017. With the rise of China's material power and innovative capabilities, Washington has become sharply focused on China, even if it meant sacrificing other foreign policy goals like denuclearizing NK, finishing up the Afghan War favorably, bolstering NATO, containment of Russia, etc. In fact, policymakers from both parties have previously argued that although Russia poses a military threat, China is a longer term economic, political, and military threat. More importantly, for Washington, China could become the only nation state capable of outcompeting the US in high-tech sectors (economic sectors at the top of industrial supply chain critical to long-term US economic competitiveness and national security) if left unchecked, even if Russia remains a high-tech superpower for now. Thus, for Washington, China techno-nationalist developmental path is deemed more threatening than Russia's massive nuclear arsenal and military aggressions in Ukraine. This is become Russia is deemed a declining power (although I personally disagree with this). It is under such assumption that policymakers in Washington hopes to drive a wedge between Moscow and Beijing (divide and rule, a strategy long mastered by former maritime powers like Britain and Japan). So yes, Washington does have a strategy, and it is an old geopolitical strategy adopted by Britain before the First World War against Germany even at the expense of ignoring the rising US and other imperial goals. The only difference is that the current US strategy is more on steroid since I don't recall London adopting detailed bans on the sales of specific military and dual use technologies against Berlin before the Great War.
We will probably have to wait and see how China rides out Washington's competitive strategy. In the past 200 years and since the Industrial Revolution, no rising powers (Napoleon's France, two Germanies, Imperial Russia, USSR, Japan) have been able to successfully outmaneuver the status-quo Anglos (Britain and then the post-1945 US).

Click to expand...

This is typical confusion of history with historical propaganda. History is a record of evolutionary processes meaning we know what was happening only after we get the result of evolutionary contest. Historical propaganda on the other hand suffers from survivor's bias and reads history backwards from the result implying that is was somehow inevitable and attributing it to choices made by specific individuals or groups as means of legitimizing the result.

Because our current culture is dominated by the anglosphere we tend to treat American and British historical propaganda as history. It is not history but a lie.

Here's real history.

This is population map of Europe in 1789


Note the four powers - France, Austria, Russia and Turkey. Those four countries are the established powers. Britain and Prussia are the rising powers. France and Russia were rising powers in the period between 1610 and 1740 when Ottomans, Poles and Hapsburgs were the established powers. Specifically the Great Northern War and both wars of Hapsburg succession (Spanish and Austrian) were the conflicts that resulted in the shift of the balance of powers.

This is population map of Europe in 1840


These maps explain the rise of Britain and Germany. Britain is also aided by their relative security and by centralization of political power which occurred even before the French Revolution. This spares Britain the messy and costly period of political centralization and resulting wars allowing them to build up their industrial, economic and military (naval) potential. Britain also benefits from geography in a peculiar way - because the same thing that provides global influence (navy) also provides security they do not have to split investment like other land powers. They double the investment in the navy and that is a positive feedback cycle.

In general the rise of European powers on a global scale can be explained by correlating the rise of European power with the growth of population resulting from industrial revolution.

This is world's population over time.

You can clearly see that the rise of European power corresponds to rise of European power base. That base is rooted in industrial economy and the resulting technology specifically steel and coal power.

The period of unchallenged European (and American) dominance lasts between 1840 and 1940 and can be correctly described as "European moment".

After 1940 the world experience an "American moment".

But before I elaborate on that I have to note that it is a grievous, fundamental error to treat Great Britain and United States as a single entity. They are rivals competing for the same sphere of influence that confuses external observers because of cultural similarities. The relationship between America and Britain is that of Prussia and Austria. If anything you should treat the United States as engaging in a hybrid war with Great Britain over its empire since its inception. The war ended in American victory and the vassalization of the former colonial sovereign which resulted in Brexit. It's an absurd notion that just because a country speaks the same language and shares history it must share the same political interest. The case of Ireland and Iceland (Cod Wars) is a great example of how that illusion - mostly maintained by Britain clinging to delusions of grandeur, but also often brought up by America (when it serves their interest) - is works out in reality.

Returning to "American moment" - what happens following WW2 is a variation of the same process except that the power base shifts to America as power source of the first industrial revolution (coal) is replaced by the power source of second industrial revolution (oil). Europe has plentiful coal, but almost no oil. Oil is in the Soviet Union which allows it to claim superpower status despite suffering devastation in both world wars. Europe has to fight for oil in the Middle East where it is outcompeted by the rising powers (USA and USSR) within a decade. The Suez Crisis is the historical event that is typically given for the sunset of European imperial power. Without oil they simply have no resources to fight for imperial influence worldwide and that leads to "decolonization".

The rise of American power is explained by objective factors. In 1940 the US has 40% of global manufacturing and 60% of global oil production.



This along with geographical separation allows it to outcompete other powers without suffering damage to its power base and establish itself as a global power with the help of the new dollar-based financial system and nuclear weapons - both of which ironically are provided by the British who naively see Americans as a tool to be used as means of retaining their global power. American imperial elites agree because the population is heavily isolationist and it is easier to convince them to accept American empire when it is done by stealth. British imperial elites have no other choice.

Initially the Sterling and the US Dollar share 50% of global reserves but after the collapse of Bretton Woods the share of Sterling reserves drop below 5%. Dollar retains plurality of reserves but the rising currencies of industrial-manufacturing powers of Germany and Japan and the ECU (the internal currency of the EEC) match it in total by 1990. In the meantime the US moves to secure an "oil standard" in place of a gold standard by forcing oil producers in the Middle East to use US dollars exclusively for energy trade. This process lasts from 1973 when the "petrodollar" is established to now and both of the Iraq wars are instrumental in making sure that no Middle Eastern country dares to trade in any other currency. The political isolation of Iran and Venezuela are direct consequence of those countries seeking to establish alternative markets. Because of American military power the only country capable of it is Russia which unfortunately does not have an established market economy.

Currently American global power is dependent on the continuation of dollar hegemony. Without it American empire will collapse in exactly the same fashion as the British empire because it no longer has the advantage it held in 1945. It is no longer the world's sole nuclear power, undamaged major economy, major manufacturer, major oil producer, major food producer, major provider of capital. It is the world's sole bully with a printing press.

Because of currency wars it is difficult to estimate share of production but this is an attempt:



The US will decline for the very same reasons why it ascended - just like it happened to their British predecessors.

Once you ignore American and British propaganda narratives distorting history you realize that China is not rising. China is just returning to its natural place in the world. It were the British and American who rose when the world was otherwise occupied.

A rising power can fall when it grows its sphere of influence beyond its capacity to sustain it. When that happened even the "native" colonies of Australia and Canada slipped away from under Westminster's control. But a power residing in its natural sphere of influence can't be easily subdued - just look to France and Russia who both had their "eras of humiliation".

horse said:

It is rather clear that the Americans do not have a strategy for China.

But, before that, and all the stuff with President Trump, there was Russia.

The Americans did not have an effective policy towards Russia. Under Obama, it was Hilary always talking about a "re-set" in US-Russia relations. They are still talking about a "re-set" to US-Russia relations.

That means the United States does not have a strategy for China, and the United States does not have a strategy for Russia either.

This is not too surprising.

As for China, very few in the west understand it, therefore they miss the mark because everything they think about China is wrong.

As for Russia, the four people negotiating the peace deal to the previous war in the Donbass, there was no United States representative.

For different reasons, we have the same conclusion, no strategy.

No strategy means someone probably will be outmaneuvered.

Click to expand...

The US establishment has a goal, i.e. remain number one, but no proactive strategy on how to achieve/maintain it. Geo-Politics constantly butting heads with Vested Interests. However, over time there is less and less support in the populace of the cost that comes with No 1 in the world and more and more focus on domestic issues (hence the Trump win, on a broadly bring the troops and jobs back platform)

China has a goal too, i.e. to be a moderately prosperous socialist country in the near term and has pretty detailed plans and milestones on how to achieve it. The populace is overwhelmingly behind this vision.

The 2 goals are not really in direct conflict with each other, hence China's constant reference to win win, however, the US establishment doesn't see it that way because they've concluded in the last 5 or so years that in the medium to long term they can't win.

Because achieving China's goal is pretty much internalised within the country and its only the by product (the more prosperous they get the greater their economic clout) that clashes with the US goal, there's very little the US can do to disrupt it, hence the lack of a clear strategy.

Besides as the old Chinese idiom, that roughly translates as 'proclaim yourself No 2 and no one will dare claim to be No 1' I think China is content to claim the No 2 spot!

For the US their usual playbook consists of

'beggar thy neighbour' which is hard to apply against a country that within living memory has known profound hardship and poverty but clawed its way out of it, for now the Chinese people haven't grown fat and lazy yet and still remember what they will need to do if they want that shiny future. Anyway they've had a long time to digest the lessons of Reagan's 'star wars' against the Soviet Union and the Plaza accords against Japan.

'bomb them back to the stone age' which doesn't really fly here either after all China is a Nuclear power.

What's left are smear campaigns and dis-information which have failed to date,

The Europeans are wary of clinging onto the American stone and sinking with them, most of the 'global south', India excepted, enjoys the options presented by a multipolar world, Russia and most of Central Asia are content with what China's offering for now. The outliers Australia and Japan, no longer really matter in the grand scheme of things.

End of the day China wakes up in the morning to go to work to make money, mean while the US sits at home day trading after a while they don't like that China's building a new house extension and buying a nicer car but rather than get a real job the US has decided its easier to try and stop China going to work than do a day's work themselves, that's not a winning strategy!

MarKoz81 said:

Once you ignore American and British propaganda narratives distorting history you realize that China is not rising. China is just returning to its natural place in the world. It were the British and American who rose when the world was otherwise occupied.

Click to expand...

Yes, this is true indeed. China WAS the status quo power in Asia under the Tributary System before the final nail in the coffin in 1895. However, we are now talking about an Anglosphere-centered international system that is fully centered in the United States and backed by US financial and military power. Even China is content with the current international system, except Beijing just wants a bit more say. In other words, the PRC is an intra-system revisionist power, hoping to reform the system in its favor as opposed to completely establishing something new. On the hand, Russia is behaving more like a traditional revisionist power through its actions in Ukraine, the Middle East, and meddling in US and EU elections.
Still, what we have here is that Washington sees China's intra-system revisionism as much a bigger threat than Russia's more traditional revisionism. I think this has to do with China's latent industrial capacities/military power you labeled in the graphs. For example, while we are used to talking about China's small nuclear arsenal, I remember someone mentioned in another thread that China has much bigger enrichment capacity that the US, so it is this kind of latent military power that give US Congressmen cold showers. This is why Washington is in such a rush to limit China's technological capacity before such latent industrial power becomes a real military threat. I need better examples here... The US performance during WWII is a good example how previously latent military power were transformed into real military capabilities.

SpicySichuan said:

I wouldn't argue that Washington does not have a strategy. Still, given the limited resources available to US foreign policy making, Washington has adopted a whole-of-government China-only counter-balancing strategy late 2017. With the rise of China's material power and innovative capabilities, Washington has become sharply focused on China, even if it meant sacrificing other foreign policy goals like denuclearizing NK, finishing up the Afghan War favorably, bolstering NATO, containment of Russia, etc. In fact, policymakers from both parties have previously argued that although Russia poses a military threat, China is a longer term economic, political, and military threat. More importantly, for Washington, China could become the only nation state capable of outcompeting the US in high-tech sectors (economic sectors at the top of industrial supply chain critical to long-term US economic competitiveness and national security) if left unchecked, even if Russia remains a high-tech superpower for now. Thus, for Washington, China techno-nationalist developmental path is deemed more threatening than Russia's massive nuclear arsenal and military aggressions in Ukraine. This is become Russia is deemed a declining power (although I personally disagree with this). It is under such assumption that policymakers in Washington hopes to drive a wedge between Moscow and Beijing (divide and rule, a strategy long mastered by former maritime powers like Britain and Japan). So yes, Washington does have a strategy, and it is an old geopolitical strategy adopted by Britain before the First World War against Germany even at the expense of ignoring the rising US and other imperial goals. The only difference is that the current US strategy is more on steroid since I don't recall London adopting detailed bans on the sales of specific military and dual use technologies against Berlin before the Great War.
We will probably have to wait and see how China rides out Washington's competitive strategy. In the past 200 years and since the Industrial Revolution, no rising powers (Napoleon's France, two Germanies, Imperial Russia, USSR, Japan) have been able to successfully outmaneuver the status-quo Anglos (Britain and then the post-1945 US).

Click to expand...

The key point about the Americans trying to drive a wedge between Russia and China, it does not take into account the current relationship between the three.

If the Americans want to pull Russia away from China, then what incentives can America offer Russia in order to do this?

That question goes straight to one of the immense points of friction between China and America.

Who can offer a better deal? China will play this card over and over again.

I don't know why some even claim this trip was a success. Yeah success in meeting low expectations in the first place. Getting alliance members on board by saying they're together is something new? Is that what an alliance does? Allies still went along with Trump in regards to China. The only conflict was between themselves not with China. What has been exposed in the past fours years under Trump is US allies are weaker than you ever imagined. Don't believe the EU is a power when they hated Trump but all the can do is wait fours years hoping Trump gets voted out of office. They touted how combined they were a larger market than even the US. That's all they have because politically they're still a subordinate. They don't use their market like China and they certainly won't like with the US unlike vice versa.


Yes daring to retaliate is being a wolf. China is suppose to accept punishment because it's not the US and Europe punishing China. It's something higher, something like a god or the environment that no one but the West can interpret. The West can't be punish for something a higher calling wants.

Biden telling the world how just and righteous the U.S. and its lackies are to the world. And my response:

MarKoz81 said:

This is typical confusion of history with historical propaganda. History is a record of evolutionary processes meaning we know what was happening only after we get the result of evolutionary contest. Historical propaganda on the other hand suffers from survivor's bias and reads history backwards from the result implying that is was somehow inevitable and attributing it to choices made by specific individuals or groups as means of legitimizing the result.

Because our current culture is dominated by the anglosphere we tend to treat American and British historical propaganda as history. It is not history but a lie.

Here's real history.

This is population map of Europe in 1789
View attachment 73574

Note the four powers - France, Austria, Russia and Turkey. Those four countries are the established powers. Britain and Prussia are the rising powers. France and Russia were rising powers in the period between 1610 and 1740 when Ottomans, Poles and Hapsburgs were the established powers. Specifically the Great Northern War and both wars of Hapsburg succession (Spanish and Austrian) were the conflicts that resulted in the shift of the balance of powers.

This is population map of Europe in 1840

View attachment 73575
These maps explain the rise of Britain and Germany. Britain is also aided by their relative security and by centralization of political power which occurred even before the French Revolution. This spares Britain the messy and costly period of political centralization and resulting wars allowing them to build up their industrial, economic and military (naval) potential. Britain also benefits from geography in a peculiar way - because the same thing that provides global influence (navy) also provides security they do not have to split investment like other land powers. They double the investment in the navy and that is a positive feedback cycle.

In general the rise of European powers on a global scale can be explained by correlating the rise of European power with the growth of population resulting from industrial revolution.

This is world's population over time.
View attachment 73577
You can clearly see that the rise of European power corresponds to rise of European power base. That base is rooted in industrial economy and the resulting technology specifically steel and coal power.

The period of unchallenged European (and American) dominance lasts between 1840 and 1940 and can be correctly described as "European moment".

After 1940 the world experience an "American moment".

But before I elaborate on that I have to note that it is a grievous, fundamental error to treat Great Britain and United States as a single entity. They are rivals competing for the same sphere of influence that confuses external observers because of cultural similarities. The relationship between America and Britain is that of Prussia and Austria. If anything you should treat the United States as engaging in a hybrid war with Great Britain over its empire since its inception. The war ended in American victory and the vassalization of the former colonial sovereign which resulted in Brexit. It's an absurd notion that just because a country speaks the same language and shares history it must share the same political interest. The case of Ireland and Iceland (Cod Wars) is a great example of how that illusion - mostly maintained by Britain clinging to delusions of grandeur, but also often brought up by America (when it serves their interest) - is works out in reality.

Returning to "American moment" - what happens following WW2 is a variation of the same process except that the power base shifts to America as power source of the first industrial revolution (coal) is replaced by the power source of second industrial revolution (oil). Europe has plentiful coal, but almost no oil. Oil is in the Soviet Union which allows it to claim superpower status despite suffering devastation in both world wars. Europe has to fight for oil in the Middle East where it is outcompeted by the rising powers (USA and USSR) within a decade. The Suez Crisis is the historical event that is typically given for the sunset of European imperial power. Without oil they simply have no resources to fight for imperial influence worldwide and that leads to "decolonization".

The rise of American power is explained by objective factors. In 1940 the US has 40% of global manufacturing and 60% of global oil production.

View attachment 73578

This along with geographical separation allows it to outcompete other powers without suffering damage to its power base and establish itself as a global power with the help of the new dollar-based financial system and nuclear weapons - both of which ironically are provided by the British who naively see Americans as a tool to be used as means of retaining their global power. American imperial elites agree because the population is heavily isolationist and it is easier to convince them to accept American empire when it is done by stealth. British imperial elites have no other choice.

Initially the Sterling and the US Dollar share 50% of global reserves but after the collapse of Bretton Woods the share of Sterling reserves drop below 5%. Dollar retains plurality of reserves but the rising currencies of industrial-manufacturing powers of Germany and Japan and the ECU (the internal currency of the EEC) match it in total by 1990. In the meantime the US moves to secure an "oil standard" in place of a gold standard by forcing oil producers in the Middle East to use US dollars exclusively for energy trade. This process lasts from 1973 when the "petrodollar" is established to now and both of the Iraq wars are instrumental in making sure that no Middle Eastern country dares to trade in any other currency. The political isolation of Iran and Venezuela are direct consequence of those countries seeking to establish alternative markets. Because of American military power the only country capable of it is Russia which unfortunately does not have an established market economy.

Currently American global power is dependent on the continuation of dollar hegemony. Without it American empire will collapse in exactly the same fashion as the British empire because it no longer has the advantage it held in 1945. It is no longer the world's sole nuclear power, undamaged major economy, major manufacturer, major oil producer, major food producer, major provider of capital. It is the world's sole bully with a printing press.

Because of currency wars it is difficult to estimate share of production but this is an attempt:

View attachment 73579

The US will decline for the very same reasons why it ascended - just like it happened to their British predecessors.

Once you ignore American and British propaganda narratives distorting history you realize that China is not rising. China is just returning to its natural place in the world. It were the British and American who rose when the world was otherwise occupied.

A rising power can fall when it grows its sphere of influence beyond its capacity to sustain it. When that happened even the "native" colonies of Australia and Canada slipped away from under Westminster's control. But a power residing in its natural sphere of influence can't be easily subdued - just look to France and Russia who both had their "eras of humiliation".

Click to expand...

I hope the conversation below can supplement above explanation: