The Chinese Century
“Thank you, Hu Jintao, and thank you, China,” said Hugo Chavez, as he announced a $20 billion loan from Beijing, to be repaid in Venezuelan oil.
The Chinese just threw Chavez a life-preserver. For Venezuela is reeling from 25 percent inflation, government-induced blackouts to cope with energy shortages and an economy that shrank by 3.3 percent in 2009.
Where did China get that $20 billion? From us. From consumers at Wal-Mart. That $20 billion is 1 percent of the $2 trillion in trade surpluses Beijing has run up with the United States over two decades.
Beijing is using its trillions of dollars in reserves, piled up from exports to America, to cut deals to lock up strategic resources for the coming struggle with the United States for hegemony in Asia and the world.
She has struck multibillion-dollar deals with Sudan, Brazil, Kazakhstan, Russia, Iran and Australia to secure a steady supply of oil, gas and vital minerals to maintain the 10-12 percent annual growth China has been racking up since Deng Xiaoping dispensed with Maoism and set his nation out on the capitalist road.
China has dozens of nuclear power plants under construction, has completed the Three Gorges Dam — the largest power source on earth — and is tying the nation together with light rail, bullet trains and highways in infrastructure projects unlike any the world has ever seen.
Contrast what China is doing with what we are about. We have declared vast regions of our country, onshore and offshore, off-limits to drilling for oil and gas. We have not built a nuclear power plant in 30 years or a refinery in 25 years. We have declared war on fossil fuels to save the planet from global warming.
Given the power of the environmental lobby to tie up projects in endless litigation, we could never today build our Interstate Highway System, Hoover Dam, the TVA or the Union Pacific Railroad.
Determined to take America’s title as the world’s first manufacturing nation, as she has taken Germany’s title as the world’s leading exporter, China keeps her currency undervalued and demands of those who sell to China that they also produce in China. As America’s share of the world economy steadily falls, China’s share has doubled. This year, China will overtake Japan as the world’s second-largest economy.
Having seen the Soviet Union disintegrate into 15 nations and fearing the ethno-nationalism of Tibetans and Uighurs, Beijing floods her border provinces with Han Chinese. America, declaring racial, ethnic and religious diversity a strength, invites the world to come and swamp its native-born. And mostly poor, unskilled and uneducated, they are coming by the millions.
China puts savings ahead of spending, production ahead of consumption, manufacturing ahead of finance. Embracing free trade, Americans declare that it makes no difference who produces what, where. What’s good for the Global Economy is good for America.
Before the financial collapse, the U.S. savings rate stood at zero percent of family income. In China, it ranged between 35 percent and 50 percent.
Since the Cold War, the United States has been playing empire — intervening to punish evil-doers and advance democracy in Panama, Somalia, Haiti, Bosnia, Kosovo, Kuwait, Iraq and Afghanistan.
We have expanded NATO to include Eastern Europe, the Baltic States and much of the Balkan Peninsula. We have not let a single alliance lapse from the Cold War. And we have fewer friends and more adversaries than at the end of the Cold War. What has all this intervention availed us?
China, having fought no one, has rapidly built up her military power and developed ties to the growing number of nations at odds with America, from Russia to Iran to Sudan to Venezuela.
The Chinese of 2010 call to mind 19th century Americans who shoved aside Mexicans, Indians and Spanish to populate a continent, build a mighty nation, challenge the British Empire — superpower of the day — and swiftly move past her in manufacturing to become first nation on earth. Men were as awed by America then as they are by China today.
America seems a declining superpower. She cannot defend her borders, balance her budgets or win her wars. Her educational system at the primary and secondary level is a shambles. In the first decade of the century, she lost one of every three manufacturing jobs. In this second decade, she is looking at trillion-dollar deficits to 2020. The world is losing confidence in her ability to manage her surging national debt.
While we are finally extricating ourselves after seven years from an unnecessary war in Iraq, we are heading deeper into an Afghan war that has lasted a decade, the end of which it is impossible to see.
During the Cold War, China was in the grip of a millenarian ideology that blinded her to her true interests. Today, it is we who are captive to a utopian ideology that is becoming perilous to the republic.
Patrick J. Buchanan is founding editor of The American Conservative and author, most recently, of Churchill, Hitler, and the “Unnecessary War”.
COPYRIGHT 2010 CREATORS.COM
A great article that shows the stupidity of jacobin nationalism
Mr. Buchanan, what should America do to reverse this?
There is no denying that China’s influence in the world has grown tremendously. However, this recent presentation details the true nature of China’s record economic growth and how it is as unsustainable as our own housing bubble was. That is, it’s the illusionary result of massive government stimulus on a scale even greater than that of the USA:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/30052154/China-The-Mother-of-All-Black-Swans-by-Vitaliy-Katsenelson-April-2010
“China puts savings ahead of spending, production ahead of consumption, manufacturing ahead of finance. Embracing free trade, Americans declare that it makes no difference who produces what, where. What’s good for the Global Economy is good for America.”
Perhaps this gratuitous embrace of WTO-style ‘free trade’ can be undone by getting the paleolibertarians/Paulites on board in promoting protectionism. It’s either that or offshoring ad nauseam.
Pons Seclorum wrote:
“Perhaps this gratuitous embrace of WTO-style ‘free trade’ can be undone by getting the paleolibertarians/Paulites on board in promoting protectionism. It’s either that or offshoring ad nauseam.”
Hear, hear!
America needs to realise that trying to impose its will on other nations is essentially evil in nature and that is the fundamental reason for its decline.
I wonder about our continued attempts to reduce our nuclear arsenal in the face of China’s rise. China appears to me to be taking the wait-and-see approach; if we go under financially, then perhaps we will leave the Middle East and make room for them.
I could care less about their conventional military superiority or even their economic prowess (where would they be without us as a market?), but I do care about the state of their nuclear weapons manufacture. The real danger of nuclear weapons is that a sufficiently populous, wealthy, and militarily supplied nation might feel like it could survive a nuclear holocaust and still project force. China doesn’t fear us, but they do fear a nuclear attack–not just from us, but from the US, Russia, India, and Japan combined.
I’m not sure leaving the Middle East would help this situation. China would almost certainly move in to fill the void, which might provoke Russia but would certainly leave us at their mercy economically. I pray the peak-oil prophets are right, and that we can use up most of the oil before we lose too much strength.
Things haven’t really changed since 1945, have they?
China has built its whole edifice on sand, it makes our housing bubble look like downright goldbuggery, and the disaster that awaits them if they try to flex their military might will make America’s pale by the same order of magnitude.
Been reading up a lot the last few days on the coming war between China and India, who are on the road to Asia’s 1914 while we in America are obsessed with such silliness as the Iranian nuclear program and the neo-Confederate conspiracy.
As Ireland saved civilization after the fall of the Roman Empire, so shall India save civilization after the fall of the American Empire. Jai Hind!!!
Mr. Buchanan -
I agree with your assessment, but chafe against the conclusion. How do we turn this around?
Sincerest Regards,
S. Hoffman
“Today, it is we who are captive to a utopian ideology that is becoming perilous to the republic.”
Would that be neoconservatism or left-liberalism? (Not that there’s much difference between their common radicalism and invade-the-world, invite-the-world ethic).
With that ethic and all the other American travails and failures Buchanan lists (to which I would add the current Wall Street highway robbery), it’s almost as if our own elites have engineered our disgrace, demise and plunder.
Was this motivated by an ideological hatred of Western civilization? Greed? Arrogance? Selfishness? I would say all of those.
I hope your wrong, but fear your right
Jack Ross wrote: Ireland saved civilization after the fall of the Roman Empire, so shall India save civilization.
I admire your enthusiasm Jack, but two points:
The more we learn about the “dark ages”, the sillier the claim that Ireland “saved civilization” becomes.
Also, if India goes to war with China, it would lose, thus ending any hope of saving civilization.
China has never shown itself to be an expansionist military power, so that “possibility” doesn’t worry me. What the Soviets never figured out but the Chinese did was that, ultimately, the road to genuine hegemony runs through economics.
I can’t decide if a Chinese bubble collapse would be good or bad for America. Dumping a bunch of treasury paper for short term liquidity would probably cause a lot of pain for everyone.
The reason is simple. The Chinese are an industrious nation that always builds something.
The Americans are a nation of consumer and government debts.
Today’s Americans do not know how to change a flat tire of their vehicles.
Few years ago, Americans were busy selling each other homes. Today’s Americans are busy giving themselves bonuses for accomplishing nothing but winning bets at the stocks, commodities and derivatives market casino of the world.
When other nations try to build something new to survive competitions, Americans are busy building nations in Afghanistan, Iraq and Israel.
When Chinese workers are busy building something, American workers are too busy watching adult pornographies in their employers’ computers.
Although China is definitely a serious problem and I agree that more should be done to manage them, I have to critique a few of you comparisons and statements.
Firstly, your argument that China’s attempts to improve trade relations with and import huge amounts of resources from various countries around the world will lead to it having a stable supply in the future is flawed: Sudan, Kazakhstan, and Iran are all unstable, and are likely to fall out of Chinese control eventually the same way that Cuba and other Latin American countries went communist because of American economic domination.
Russia is generally xenophobic, and if relations with it and the West improve even a small amount, then Putin’s government will need a new scapegoat to stay in power.
Australia is predominately white, protestant, English speaking, a member of SEATO, and Western to the core. If America and China were to scrap politically, Australia would be in our pocket no matter how much bauxite China buys.
Second, the idea that America is putting itself in the same situation as the Soviet Union by allowing for large numbers of immigrants is half-baked at best. Ukraine wanted independence because it was mostly ethnic Ukrainian, brutally occupied by Russians for centuries, and felt no loyalty to the Union because of it.
Living in a predominately Mexican area in California, I can tell you firsthand that almost all immigrants move to this country because they want to live here and not where they’re from.
Also, unlike in the Soviet Union, Americans move. Sure, the first generation immigrants are afraid to leave the other immigrants from their countries, but the children of immigrants move inland, to new areas, so even in 2200, it’s unlikely that Texas will be 100% Mexican the same way that Massachusetts never became 100% Irish.
You also hint that immigrants are somehow a burden to American society because most are uneducated and unskilled, but the same could be said for the Irish, Italians, and Germans before them, and their descendants are us. Besides, in terms of competing with China, diversity is advantageous politically.
Although China is definitely a serious problem and I agree that more should be done to manage them, I have to critique a few of you comparisons and statements.
Firstly, your argument that China’s attempts to improve trade relations with and import huge amounts of resources from various countries around the world will lead to it having a stable supply in the future is flawed: Sudan, Kazakhstan, and Iran are all unstable, and are likely to fall out of Chinese control eventually the same way that Cuba and other Latin American countries went communist because of American economic domination.
Russia is generally xenophobic, and if relations with it and the West improve even a small amount, then Putin’s government will need a new scapegoat to stay in power.
Australia is predominately white, protestant, English speaking, a member of SEATO, and Western to the core. If America and China were to scrap politically, Australia would be in our pocket no matter how much bauxite China buys.
Second, the idea that America is putting itself in the same situation as the Soviet Union by allowing for large numbers of immigrants is half-baked at best. Ukraine wanted independence because it was mostly ethnic Ukrainian, brutally occupied by Russians for centuries, and felt no loyalty to the Union because of it.
Living in a predominately Mexican area in California, I can tell you firsthand that almost all immigrants move to this country because they want to live here and not where they’re from.
Also, unlike in the Soviet Union, Americans move. Sure, the first generation immigrants are afraid to leave the other immigrants from their countries, but the children of immigrants move inland, to new areas, so even in 2200, it’s unlikely that Texas will be 100% Mexican the same way that Massachusetts never became 100% Irish.
You also hint that immigrants are somehow a burden to American society because most are uneducated and unskilled, but the same could be said for the Irish, Italians, and Germans before them, and their descendants are us.
Besides, in terms of competing with China, diversity is advantageous politically. There are more Vietnamese in America then there are in Vietnam, and, like how having many ethnic Germans helps German-American relations today, having them will help fight the Chinese sphere of influence there. On another note, if war were ever to occur, a poor guy from Honduras is just as good at shooting than the typical new yorker.
Lastly, She does “defend her borders, balance her budgets, or win her wars.”
America defends her borders from invading countries, not desperate families from Mexico, and to say that because we can’t stop every illegal from entering our country we can’t find and destroy a Mexican tank army is kind of funny.
America has fought two wars and is pulling out of a recession, of course the budget is in bad shape! We do need to watch spending more, and we do need to be more careful about getting into foreign entanglements, but when we compare the size of our debt to other developed countries, our debt, in relation to the size of our economy vs theirs, isn’t all that huge, especially given how we’re fighting in the Middle East and they’re not.
America does win her wars. When compared to Vietnam, Korea, or WWII, the occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan can hardly be called wars, more like long-term Marshall Plans, only with the occasional small arms fire. Naturally, building a country from the ground up takes a while. Germany didn’t fully recover from WWII until the early 70s, and Japan took even longer, so it would be really unusual if Afghanistan took anything other than a long time.
In fact, given how we didn’t go in with a real plan and how we shouldn’t have invaded in the first place, Iraq went rather well. As you said, we are leaving Iraq, and it is a democracy; A flawed and ugly democracy, but a democracy nonetheless, which means we won, even though it probably wasn’t worth it. One day, we will leave Afghanistan too.
To Sum up an extremely long post, yes, China is a serious problem, and yes, it is doing things we should probably be doing, but no, America is not doomed to fall behind its shadow and no, America is not doomed to decline. We’ve been in rough spots before, and we got out then; we just have to get out now.
Forgive me for indulging a rhetorical flourish, but don’t be so sure China would win a military conflict. China is repeating history’s worst folly, which is to overlearn the lessons of the last war and refight it. In other words, China has overlearned the lessons of why the Soviet Union collapsed and replicated the American model in a yet many times more unsustainable way.
As to whether a Chinese bubble collapse will be good or bad for America, I would say good insofar as it would accelerate the process of giving up the empire because we can no longer afford it. Perhaps if Japan can capture some of the Chinese reserves along with their own they’ll forgive our debt in exchange for the islands we took from them after the war.
[...] The Chinese Century Can any of you seriously say the Bill of Rights could get through Congress today? It wouldn't even get out of committee. — F. Lee Bailey [...]
America needs to realise that trying to impose its will on other nations is essentially evil in nature and that is the fundamental reason for its decline.
The idea that America is putting itself in the same situation as the Soviet Union by allowing for large numbers of immigrants is half-baked at best, is absolutely correct.
It will be neither an American or Chinese century. It is unrealistic to expect America to have the same kind of power it had in 1945, 1945 were very special circumstances that one cannot expect to happen again. There not be a WW3 in the next 100 years because the Chinese are not stupid, their only goal is to grow their economy and prevent an internal uprising, not play world politics.
Having said that, it is hard to disagree to ideas that the increasing Balkanisation of the USA will lead to real future internal problems, that will not make it possible to play world police whatever the status of the economy.
You can not find a single country that is diverse or one nation. The Soviet Union fell apart, Yugoslavia split apart, even Quebec wants to separate off into it’s own country. Diversity is not an agent of stability, not when the diversity is represented by peoples of other countries that fly their native countries flags, refuse to learn our language – english. These diverse peoples, especially the Chinese have been an endless supply of spies for China to steal any tech they can’t buy, which we seem stupidly to insist won’t hurt our interest. The Global Economy has been mismanaged, we gave our tech lead away, our manufacturing base for tech is in China now, and engineers and R&D follow the manufacturing base not the consumer. If it had been other way around all the third world economies would be leading the world in tech and not the manufacturing countries.
Military power followers the manufacturing industry, just as the technology R&D does. We are fast making ourselves obsolete. This will make the elitist commies happy at first, until they have to take orders from their masters, you’re being to see the first fruits of this with President Hussein’s failure to induce the Chinese to repeg or adjust their money to realistic standards. Free trade doesn’t exist, not for the Chinese. They are nationalistic and can buy from their own manufacturers anything we could make to export. And if they can’t in order to sell there you have to produce there.
Trade with China is a not going to work and ignores histories lessons that the British underwent at the turn of the last century. Google has the right idea they left China, and now we should too. Let Germany, France and any other country that wishes to loose it’s trade secrets or it’s standard of living engage in the one sided trade that is demanded from China in order to have the honor of them stealing your designs and manufacturing techniques.
We should bring back Tariffs. We should concentrate on integrating the millions of illegals, or better kicking out the illegals, draining our economy and driving down our standard of living. This is what a nationalist should want and elitist corporate communist in charge since Nixon want Globalism, but to have it they are willing to sell your freedom and your children’s future. What are we willing to do to keep a future and a nation?
Whatever………………………………………………………
Traaxx
Adam Rurik, on April 24th, 2010 at 10:22 am Said:
China has never shown itself to be an expansionist military power,
Adam, how can you say such a thing. Pat Buchanan wrote in this article “fearing the ethno-nationalism of Tibetans and Uighurs, Beijing floods her border provinces with Han Chinese”. These are two countries invaded by China recently, but before that China had already become an empire by continuously invading her neighbours’ territories. To see the extent of this expansion just look at any map to see where the Great China Wall is, its historical border with Turkic and Mongolian tribes.
When it has opportunity, China will continue its Eastward expansion starting with Afghanistan.
Amercans such as Pat Buchanan have always talked about the missfortunes of other countries such those he recounted here about Venezuela. Unless you live in the Hamptons, Palm Beach, or Martha’s Vinyard and insulate yourself from the rest – the United States still have this huge pocket of the third world within it than is never wanted to reveal.
Along the same line of thoughts, the USA, during its haydays utilized its vantage point to benefit its economy.
So, now, why is China’s supposed to be bad?