by Pepe Escobar for Sputnik News
The G20 meets in tech hub Hangzhou, China, at an extremely tense geopolitical juncture.
China has invested immense political/economic capital to prepare this summit. The debates will revolve around the main theme of seeking solutions “towards an innovative, invigorated, interconnected and inclusive world economy.”
G20 Trade Ministers have already agreed to lay down nine core principles for global investment. At the summit, China will keep pressing for emerging markets to have a bigger say in the Bretton Woods system.
But most of all China will seek greater G20 backing for the New Silk Roads – or One Belt, One Road (OBOR), as they are officially known – as well as the new Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB).
So at the heart of the G20 we will have the two projects which are competing head on to geopolitically shape the young 21st century.
China has proposed OBOR; a pan-Eurasian connectivity spectacular designed to configure a hypermarket at least 10 times the size of the US market within the next two decades.
The US hyperpower – not the Atlanticist West, because Europe is mired in fear and stagnation – “proposes” the current neocon/neoliberalcon status quo; the usual Divide and Rule tactics; and the primacy of fear, enshrined in the Pentagon array of “threats” that must be fought, from Russia and China to Iran. The geopolitical rumble in the background high-tech jungle is all about the
http://sputniknews.com/columnists/20160829/1044733257/russia-china-game-brics.html “containment” of top G20 members Russia and China.
It doesn’t take an oracle to divine which project is intriguing – and in many ways seducing – the Global South, as well as an array of G20 member-nations.
That connectivity frenzy
Shuttling between the West and Asia, one can glimpse, in myriad forms, the graphic contrast between paralysis and paranoia and an immensely ambitious $1.4 trillion project potentially touching 64 nations, no less than 4.4 billion people and around 40 per cent of the global economy which will, among other features, create new “innovative, invigorated, interconnected and inclusive” trade horizons and arguably install a post-geopolitics win-win era.
An array of financial mechanisms is already in place. The AIIB (which will fund way beyond the initial commitment of $100 billion); the Silk Road Fund ($40 billion already committed); the BRICS’s New Development Bank (NDB), initially committing $100 billion; plus assorted players such as the China Development Bank and the Hong Kong-based China Merchants Holdings International.
Chinese state companies and funds are relentlessly buying up ports and tech companies in Western Europe – from Greece to the UK.
Cargo trains are now plying the route from Zhejiang to Tehran in 14 days, through Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan; soon this will be all part of a trans-Eurasia high-speed rail network, including a high-speed Transiberian.
The $46 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) has the potential to unblock vast swathes of South Asia, with Gwadar, operated by China Overseas Port Holdings, slated to become a key naval hub of the New Silk Roads.
Deep-sea ports will be built in Kyaukphyu in Myanmar, Sonadia island in Bangladesh, Hambantota in Sri Lanka. Add to them the China-Belarus Industrial Park and 33 deals in Kazakhstan covering everything from mining and engineering to oil and gas.
Back in February, PwC was already detailing $250 billion in OBOR projects that had been built, recently started or agreed on and signed.
An array of Silk Road projects now crisscross Eurasia, progressively networking east-west and north-south corridors through many an economic zone; an expanding connectivity and infrastructure development frenzy involving Russia, China, India, Pakistan, Iran, Southeast and Central Asia. Connectivity, now more than geography, is destiny.
It’s not by accident that a lot of the action happens in member-states or observers of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO). The New Silk Roads are about to be totally intertwined with the reprogramming of the SCO as a security-economic cooperation umbrella.
In parallel Russia, with the progressive coordination of the Eurasia Economic Union (EEU) with the New Silk Roads, projects the Russia-China strategic partnership much further than just New Silk Road connectivity to Europe.
Follow those CUES
Southeast Asia – via the Maritime Silk Road – is a key hub in the New Connectivity Game in Eurasia. Which brings us to the alleged illegality of the “nine-dash line” Chinese claim of indisputable sovereignty as recently ruled in The Hague.
The US and the Philippines have a mutual defense treaty since 1951, according to which “island territories under [Manila’s] jurisdiction” must also be defended. Washington under a potential neoliberalcon Hillary Clinton presidency – and Kurt Campbell, who conceptualized the “pivot to Asia” as possible Secretary of State – might be tempted to declare the treaty applies to offshore islands, atolls, “rocks” and even underwater features such as Scarborough Shoal.
Beijing won’t wait to fall into this possible trap. Following a recent meeting in Inner Mongolia, China and ASEAN are set to launch an emergency diplomatic hotline and eventually adopt a Code for Unplanned Encounters at Sea (CUES).
ASEAN and East Asian powers, meanwhile, keep weighing the merits of the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) – 16 nations, 29% of global trade – as an alternative to the US corporate-pushed TPP, a sort of NATO-on-trade that excludes China.
China is hyperactive on all fronts. It will boost the use of Singapore know how to advance New Silk Road projects. Singapore, with a population nearly 75% ethnic Chinese, is China’s largest foreign investor and a major overseas hub for yuan trade. More than 20% of Singapore’s GDP is linked to China.
At the same time, planning for a post-war Syria, Beijing is committed to boost trade and economic cooperation with Damascus, another future OBOR hub. It does not hurt this is also asymmetrical payback for Pentagon interference in the South China Sea and the deployment of THAAD in South Korea.
Beijing has made it clear that the South China Sea won’t be discussed at the G20. Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte for his part has insisted, “We’re not in a hurry to wage war, we’re in a hurry to talk.”
The heart of the matter in the OBOR-linked South China Sea is not sovereignty over “rocks” or even unexploited reserves of oil and gas; it hinges on the capacity of the Chinese Navy to regulate and eventually deny “access” to the Pentagon and the US Navy. What’s certain is that the US Navy will take no prisoners to prevent China from strategically dominating the Western Pacific, as much as Washington will go no holds barred to ram TPP to prevent China from economically reign over the Asia-Pacific.
Deng Xiaoping’s maxim – “never take the lead, never reveal your true potential, never overstretch your abilities” – now belongs to the past. At the G20 China once again is announcing it is taking the lead. And not only taking the lead – but also planning to overstretch its abilities to make the hyper-ambitious OBOR Eurasia integration masterplan work. Call it a monster PR exercise or a soft power win-win; the fact that humanitarian imperialism as embodied by the Pentagon considers China a major “threat” is all the Global South – and the G20 for that matter – needs to know.
What choice ?
Isn’t that “OBOR” a form of war ?
@septiksceptik
No OBOR is not a war ,it is just a simple respond to the greedy parasites who were parassiting for centuries on the innocent nations around the world and don’t let them live peacefully or just enjoying their lives as supposed to be.
How you call to the mountains, mountains will respond soon or later.
We need our own version of Youtube – they may not shut down the internet, but they will narrow the debate on it:
“A new “advertiser friendly” policy introduced by YouTube will punish those who express politically incorrect opinions or dare to offend viewers by de-monetizing their content.
The new rules have sparked an outcry from the YouTube community because they are so incredibly restrictive.
YouTube will now retain the right to demonetize any videos that contain, “Controversial or sensitive subjects and events, including subjects related to war, political conflicts, natural disasters and tragedies, even if graphic imagery is not shown.”
@anonymous
It looks like these are the last desperate restrictions before gangsters are all of them going to be exposed, why they want us to put into their oppressive laws.
Humanity is much more intelligent then to accept these last kicking psychotic manipulations.
Everything is going to be fine we just need to be more patient
One of my favorite YT channel victim of that ‘advertiser friendly’ policy.
StormCloudsGathering
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OqkIr-rUNpg
Excellent analysis. Looking at a map, the myanmar port would be awesome. Linking china to Iran would be great. Sure, in times of war, you would still have to go through siberia. The rest of the time, send the goods through the port in Myanmar. Constantinople would benefit tremendously.
I was wondering why they dont link Beijing, Ulanbataar and Novosibirsk. From Novosibirsk, you can go to Moscow easily. From what I see on the map, the siberian road goes around mongolia. I dont like that. I would prefer something that goes straight through. Beijing, Ulanbataar and Novosibirsk.
On the other side, Yun Nan to Myanmar. Short ride on a ship and then you are in Iran and you can go toward Syria and Turkey. More growth for Europe presumably, once they have an easy way to get to china.
It is increasingly clear that what everybody was afraid of when BJP was projected in power, namely India’s dream of joining the Big Boys Club of cricketers, against China and Russia, becomes a reality nightmare. Dizzy with delusions of grandeur, India openly chose to walk the road of war rather than OBOR and it lost no time in stepping up provocations against China, Iran and Russia, by fanning the winds of revolt in Balochistan with the further results of sabotaging the North-South Corridor, by posturing as a naval power in the South China Sea, a.o.
The naive belief that “India and Russia share a relationship of strategic depth that will survive the pivot to Asia, Silk Roads, and the BRICS nonsense” proves to be misplaced. People knowledgeable of Indian politics and ‘Himalayan ego’ like Bhadrakumar underscored it immediately: “Despite the backdrop of New Cold War, India is shifting away from Russia, its Cold War ally, toward the new alliance with the US.”
The danger is that when a country is capable of acting against her own better interests, is capable of further irresponsible acts, the more when she is intoxicated with delusions of grandeur.
Here we go….you quoted from my response to the other article without attributing the reference. Your ad hominems will not detract from the fact that you are a Chinese shill, trolling ahead of the G20 meet. No, the choices are not OBOR or war, or OBOR or bust. If this is truly a push for a multipolar world, then India has the right to choose for itself what works for them. India not joining OBOR, does not mean war for India.That is China’s lookout with the Americans for having a greedy, parasitic mercantilist relationship that has gone sour. India does not need plastic crap or sub par steel from China.
“sub par steel from China”
I buy steel tooling from China. I quality test it against name brand European/US tooling.
You show your ignorance and bias.
Mara says: -“India does not need plastic crap or sub par steel from China.”
She must mean steel from India is superior to Chinese steel.
Ever quality tested Indian steel?
Steel depends on alloying elements and heat treatment, depending on grade. Some alloys and heat treatments are more expensive than others. You get what you pay for.
A number of different standards for steel such a ISO ect. All can be cross referenced. Most steel is made to one of the standards so the correct grade can be picked for the application.
Long before any of this, before chemical analysis, Damascus steel – knives and swords – had a reputation as extremely good quality. They were made from steel imported from India. Balls of steel that had been smelted from the local ore. The iron ore used contained molybdenum in the correct amount to give an extremely tough alloy. India had the quality ore. Damascus had the skills to turn this into exceptionally high quality knives and swords for the time.
Well nobody obliged India to share the advantages of OBOR. She can continue to wallow in her own ‘made in India’. What is irking is her obvious intentions to throw spokes in the wheels of OBOR. What is really India’s business to support the Uyghurs? Or patrolling the South China Sea? (“U.S., India, Japan Begin to Shape New Order on Asia’s High Seas. The three democracies are pursuing closer ties and military cooperation to counter an assertive China”).
WizOz, your analysis is not correct.
I heard the same talk–that India was going to join the U.S. alliance–after the 2008 nuclear deal. That didn’t happen. Since that time, India has opposed the West’s murderous plans both in Syria and Ukraine. (With regards to Ukraine and Crimea, India has been more supportive of Russia than China has been.) It also should be noted that in 2008, India was led by the Congress Party; since 2014, India has been led by the BJP. India’s national-security policies run deeper than party politics.
Regarding Pakistan, there are many similarities to it and Ukraine. Both are artificial states propped up by the West to threaten the civilizational spheres they were once part of (India/Russia). India has lost patience with Pakistan’s jihadist antics. For its part, Balochistan is tired of Pakistani exploitation. (It never wanted to be part of Pakistan to begin with, and has been fighting Pakistan on-and-off since 1947.)
Regarding China, all this talk of opposition to the U.S. is puzzling to me. Post Deng, the Chinese economy has been designed to be structurally complementary to the U.S. economy. (Western corporations keep the intellectual property, and Chinese oligarchs occupy Chinese workers with low and mid-tech assembly of Western designs. China’s trying to change, but I don’t think it’ll succeed.)
This is why Henry Kissinger and Hillary Clinton had a sound basis for proposing the G-2 (the U.S. and China managing the world).
Do you know why the U.S. is trying to embrace India? The U.S. knows that it is dying, and fears that India, within a generation, could replace it as the world’s leading power. India knows that, too. That’s why India–all appearances aside–is extremely careful to keep its distance and maintain its strategic autonomy.
Do you know that word: “If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck”?
‘The U.S. knows that it is dying, and fears that India, within a generation, could replace it as the world’s leading power. India knows that, too.’ Do you seriously believe that? Well, it could if it really integrates with SCO. Alone, no.
@WizOZ at 2.00 P.M.
Well I’m not an Indian descendant / I’m European /, but I definitely can see how this new generation of young people are so bright,they want to see the change, they don’t want to live in poverty how they parents use to live for sue.
I have a feeling India is going to be another star in five – ten years regarding to their economy and development. Look at the Uzbekistan, Kazachstan, Chechnya,China, these countries were low down just recently and look at them today, it is amazing how fast they have changed their economy and life for their people.Just Google in to get the picture.
I would never underestimate any country around this beautiful earth, every single country can bring riches for everyone and plenty of it, just let them do it and do not parasite on them and create artificial wars on them.
1) I don’t think you understand how disinformation campaigns work. Sometimes, a tiger quacks like a duck because it has an interest in being perceived as a duck for the time being. The West thought the Russian military was a joke until the operations in Crimea and Syria.
2) You must not be aware that in 2004, India made the world’s most advanced variant of a Sukhoi fighter jet.
http://www.bharat-rakshak.com/IAF/aircraft/current/603-vetrivale.html
The Su-30 MKI’s mission computer and other avionics were invented and built in India.
3) India is concentrating more on the Indian Ocean Region (IOR) rather than Eurasia. There are good reasons for this. Who do you think knows more about India’s future development? Indian leaders, or you?
Western NGO’s did their best to stop Narendra Modi. I followed the 2014 campaign closely. Why do you think this is? Why do think that Western leaders were so angry when Narendra Modi decided to replace Raghuram Rajan as India’s central banker?
You have a lot to learn regarding India.
I believe that India “does” have a bright future. If it joins with Russia and China firmly (or at the very least remains totally neutral).But it will neuter that future.And waste the progress it is making, if it joins the dying West. And tries to sabotage the progress towards Eurasian economic integration.India has way too many internal issues they need to solve.To waste their future siding with the US. I’ve always considered Indians as an intelligent people. But if they can’t see that the US only uses countries. And then throws them under the bus when they aren’t needed. I’ll have to rethink about their intelligence.Its not “needed” that India accept military and political alliance with Russia or China. But it would be a good thing for Indians if they joined with those two economically to build a Eurasian strong regional economy.And certainly at the very least not try to stand against that.India needs no more problems joined with those they already have.
India was a jewel in the empires crown. India seems to be a sucker for divide and conquer. Again its Gurkha’s will fight for empire.
India is a very complex country because of the legacy of colonialism and the fact that many Indian elites would like nothing better than to live in the west. The Indian business elite are the descendents of collaborators and traitors. Yet, for the life of me, I cannot see why the BJP and Modi get such a hard time from the posters here. Modi is not perfect and the BJP certainly is not. But they are concerned primarily with internal structural issues and trade issues, not war.
Several points on India:
India will never go to war with China. China is a friendlier competitor and Asian brother nation. India wants a separate but complimentary path to development, alongside China and Russia. Judge India’s relations with the US according to what is actually happening. I see Foxconn building factories in India. I see South Korean and Japanese firms building infrastructure. I see Russia making agreements. I see the Indian rail network being linked to the north-south corridor through Iran to Russia. I see these real, concrete things happening.
Judge the Indians by what they are doing, not the diplomacy they are talking with the US. India’s official policy is ‘look East’.
@India will never go to war with China
That’s we all hope for. But many people would feel uneasy, to say the least, when they read things like that (said by an Indian who generally knows what he’s talking about):
“Indeed, it is also useful to gain clarity on the overall trajectory of the Sino-Indian relations, especially since tensions are steadily building up. Simply put, Modi should ignore the pervasive ‘anti-China’ mood among the present ruling elites in Delhi and look ahead at the future, being the visionary he claims to be.
However, the signs are pointing in a different direction. Never in recent decades has India approached a high-level exchange with China with such methodical mobilization of a litany of discords at the negotiating table. India has tried to ruffle Chinese feathers in any whichever way possible in the run-up to the meeting in Hangzhou.
With just about 10 days for the meeting in Hangzhou, the government “leaked” the sensitive top secret information that Modi chaired a meeting of the Cabinet Committee on Security to clear the fourth BrahMos missile regiment – constituting a mobile command post, 12×12 heavy-duty trucks mounted with five mobile autonomous launchers and around 100 missiles – to be deployed in the disputed Arunachal Pradesh to “deter” China.
With only 5 days to go for Hangzhou, India signed the logistics agreement with the US, where the sub-text is a budding India-US alliance to contain China. Why August 29? Why not sometime October? (Unless, of course, Washington insisted on it from the slippery Indians as quid pro quo for accommodating Modi for a few precious minutes in President Barack Obama’s crowded schedule in Hangzhou.)
With 24 hours to go for the meeting in Hangzhou, Modi landed in Hanoi to announce a $500 million line of credit to boost Vietnam’s military capabilities. Although, fortunately, it is only half the $1 billion line of credit Modi had pledged to Mongolia in May last year when he traveled to Ulaanbaatar from Beijing, the symbolism is self-evident.
In sum, Modi government hopes to rub it into the Chinese psyche that:
India is preparing for the worst — war with China;
India will link up with the US to contain China;
India cannot tolerate China-Pakistan Economic Corridor; and,
India cannot accept China’s activities in its sphere of influence in South Asia.”
So, ‘Judge the Indians by what they are doing’? You can (perfectly) see why the BJP and Modi get such a hard time from the posters here. It’s on you to stop deluding yourself.
@WizOz
You said:
“So, ‘Judge the Indians by what they are doing’? You can (perfectly) see why the BJP and Modi get such a hard time from the posters here. It’s on you to stop deluding yourself.”
I am sorry but you are the one who is deluding yourself. I have given several cases of actual economic developments. You are quoting propaganda. India vs China, etc. I see that having a discussion based on facts is not an option so I will not continue to respond regarding this matter.
However, I will provide some free information. If you really do want to understand India, then Bhadrakumar is not your guru. You are better off searching YouTube for lectures from Arvind Subramanian – special economic adviser to the Modi government – to understand what is actually happening in India and what are the goals and objectives.
In India, M.K. Bhadrakumar is considered to be on the fringe.
It would be like reading a jihadist-friendly analyst on political developments in Europe. The analysis might be interesting, but it would be distorted in some key ways.
Shri Bhadrakumar comes from a Communist background, and Communists are not politically or socially significant in India.
The fact that Bhadrakumar is marginal (Communist or else) has no relevance whatsoever on the fact that he noticed what many of us did not fail to notice either: India’s sabre – rattling at China at the behest of the Americans and the offer to bring American troops to the Chinese border (what the Logistical Support Agreement is). The potential threat to Russia, SCO, has been perceived for long. Now it came out of the closet. We may expect now the torpedoing of BRICS and in the future a fabricated ‘betrayal by Moscow’.
The reason Bhadrakumar is not taken seriously in India is because he consistently gets things wrong. I still remember him saying, before the 2014 elections, that the widespread support for Narendra Modi was an illusion. What actually happened? Narendra Modi was elected with the first non-Congress majority in the history of the Indian Republic. The fact that you agree with Shri Bhadrakumar says something about the quality of your insight into India.
Honestly, the people saying that Modi is a Western stooge remind me of the people who said that Putin was a Western stooge for not invading Kiev. Leaders have to balance many different things. “Hurray patriots” don’t understand that, which is why they’re not taken seriously.
This is my last comment regarding this. By the way, I’ve noticed that you didn’t respond to the facts posted above regarding Indo-Russian cooperation, etc. Facts are inconvenient things.
I did not respond to the ‘facts posted above regarding Indo-Russian cooperation, etc’, not because ‘facts are inconvenient things’, but because what you called ‘facts’ have no relation to the subject in discussion: the anti-China stand of the Hindutva crazies and the delusions that India has become an ‘indispensable nation’ for sabotaging the CPEC economic corridor and not so farfetched alarm that India could exploit its status as “indispensable” US ally to blow up the whole region.
Obviously, you abandon commenting because YOU cannot answer.
OT:
Facebook Confirms $200Mln Internet Satellite Destroyed in SpaceX Explosion
http://sputniknews.com/science/20160901/1044863780/spacex-explosion-facebook-satellite.html
“Facebook’s $200 million Amos-6 satellite was destroyed when a SpaceX rocket exploded ahead of a planned launch from the US state of Florida, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg said in a statement on Thursday.”
Divine intervention? Karma? Or perhaps even better: cosmic justice?
It was Iran.
For the scientists.
@anonymous
Ha,ha, very good sense of humor
no, no….it’s Putin’s fault.
I read the Xspace explosion story on German news.
But they didn’t mention the value of the satellite.
Wow!
Serves Zuckerberg right for wanting to control communications on earth and call it humanitarianism.
So, this one is kind of a Bwa ha ha.
Katherine
Someone will still insure Elon Musk’s space project?
Good that Pepe now sees the importance of the SCS for China’s defence rather than the natural resources there. Perhaps China may back off to avoid war if it was just resources, but it will not back off if it requires a presence in the SCS for strategic defence.
Judging by what has happened in Syria recently – US threatening to shoot down Syrian or Russian aircraft to protect its special forces in Syria, the US is at a point of desperation where it is ready to start or risk a major war. Apparently the US now has Special forces on the Kurd frontline with NATO Turkey to prevent Turkey pushing the Kurds back.
In Syria the US is now starting to take serious risks.
The US Hague tribunal scam was a miserable flop, ASEAN not buying it. US allies against China now are Japan, Australia, India, none of which have a stake in the SCS. Somehow the US has to start a war in this area and it’s getting desperate.
Unless the US can bring the Chinese economy down, the Chinese economy will cause the fall of the US dollar and the US economy. Without that the US military machine will collapse.
Dangerous times as most of the US gambits so far have failed, so they will have to start taking more risks.
Not long ago Rand I think did a paper on how the US could fight a limited war on China, keeping it conventional, and that China would capitulate after having its sea access cut off.
Rand also projected the costs for a war now, in five years, in ten years (I think that was the time scale). In ten years it would come at a very high cost to the US. After ten years, possibly no longer possible. A war now and Rand believed the US could cause China to capitulate at relatively low cost.
I don’t think Rand factored in Russia into a US/China war.
The delusion in the US seems to be from the think-tanks at the top of the chain right down through politics.
@Peter AU
Let’s hope that this creature named Clinton is NOT going to win the ellection
http://theduran.com/watch-cnn-marine-le-penn-interview-hillary-clinton-is-war-devastation-instability-world-conflict/
The *’Deepstate’ will have no problem coronating it’s candidate in it’s homeland. Never doubt their control of their own shop. You have to be kidding about Trump
However, it really seems that the Emperor’s clothes are missing. It seems that the world’s generally aware of the U.S. Gov’s MO. Other country’s can’t claim plausible deniability anymore.
*We have to think of a better name for the coalitions of oligarchs in control. I have a few suggestions…..
The prospect of an American initiated world war is not a US policy option. In my view it is – at this time – a must-have. The geo-political equation is this: if the US allows the rise of competing economic structures that reduce the $ in global trade from its current 63% it looses the capacity to skim global dollar transactions, looses the ability to issue unlimited debt to the planet for ever, looses the ability to subvert and plunder the planet by closing off nations access to international banks, looses the ability to force the world to fund its military, looses its ability to pay its creditors: on the right of the equation, if Russia and China allow the US to enjoy this ‘exorbitant privilege’ they must also accept that at some point they will be over-run and must surrender their territory and sovereignty. For both parties therefore this is a fight to the death. Both are set to loose everything.
The profound respect I have for Putin is his refusal to respond to real provocations by the US to get this war off the ground, and for the Chinese who continue to press a global peaceful alternative.
If a nation prepares for and invests in war, war is what it will have. The plunder this has facilitated has been at the core of the post 16th century reformation/redistribution model of English speaking Empire, and flows directly out of the principals of Roman Imperialism. Go read your Tacitus ‘Agricola and Germania’ again.
All parties are aware that the only thing that will stop the US is time. If the planet can refuse to pick up the US gauntlet for 10 years, American has lost.
Those are the options: war or multipolar Utopia.
Very sharp evaluation. The Americans know this, i.e. delay war for 10 years and they would lose. Therefore, they will push for war in the SCS against the weaker enemy as perceived by them. Will the US neocons/liberalcons prevail? Brutus tried the same strategy in Philippi against the rising Augustus i.e. strike a strengthening enemy before it becomes too strong. History, or what will be left of it, awaits the verdict.
@ Anonymous on September 02, 2016 · at 7:01 am UTC
“All parties are aware that the only thing that will stop the US is time. If the planet can refuse to pick up the US gauntlet for 10 years, American has lost.”
———————-
Interesting perspective. For the planet to “refuse to pick up the US gauntlet” means letting the US get his way time and again, allow it to keep tightening its control over the rest of the world. If not, what does it mean?
So then, why limit the wait to only 10 years? Wouldn’t it be safer for the planet to refuse to pick up the gauntlet for 20 years? Or better yet, 50? Come to think of it, the planet might as well leave the picking of the gauntlet to the people of the 23nd century. That way victory for the planet will be a certainty.
@anonymous
It is very unfortunate, but Mr.Trump is right when he said “ALL world hate us because everywhere we go we just create a disaster”
Definitely it is so true including Europeans now they can see how big fraud was to bring democracy under the direction of Mr.Havel and gang.
These days everybody knows it was nothing just a big theater and huge fraud to lead towards absolute looting of the former East European countries.
Well more and more evidence is coming out from the South America how it was destroyed by the pretension to bring democracy to them not to mentioned Africa. It is very clear who was behind the curtain. It is going to be very hard to convince the NATO alliance countries to go to war for the benefit of US even the absolutely corrupted politician are going to try to deliver the promise to their masters.
It looks like that the game is over and US will be in a very big trouble if they are not going to change the course of their war mongering tactics.
Respectfully, you perhaps misunderstand the reference to ‘picking up a gauntlet’. Assuming you don’t, but forgive me if you do, the gauntlet of a gentleman was thrown on the floor in front of a rival as a challenge to a duel. If it is picked up, the challenge is accepted and a duel to potential death followed or was timetabled.
The US has been throwing several down – Syria and Ukraine being just two – in which the objective is twofold – to isolate Russia in the hope of breaking it and, better still, to provoke a reaction that justifies a hot war. The gaining of territory is secondary to isolating and provoking Russia. They are trying this now while they have a slim advantage. In 10 years their military advantage will be over. They can grab as much territory as they wish until then and from then on – it will make them poorer and weaker – but the indisputable fact remains that beyond that point the US will have ever declining revenues as the world can fearlessly leave the dollar based financial system for Russia-China backed alternatives without fear of reprisals. They know this is happening. TTIP, TSA and TPP trade agreements are a direct response: these attempt to lock into treaty form the rape and subversion of vassal states that was formerly exercised at the point of a gun. If you can’t feel the urgency with which the US is pushing these treaties, then you are also not seeing the crisis the US is running towards. Debt, and the looming prospect that the US (and the EU, Aus, UK can not pay their creditors.
Zbigniew Brezinsky: part of the mastermind of US hegemony, wrote this in ’98 http://www.wanttoknow.info/brzezinskigrandchessboard.shtml
A couple of weeks ago he admitted the following: http://www.the-american-interest.com/2016/04/17/toward-a-global-realignment/
“The fact is that there has never been a truly “dominant” global power until the emergence of America on the world scene. Imperial Great Britain came close to becoming one, but World War I and later World War II not only bankrupted it but also prompted the emergence of rival regional powers. The decisive new global reality was the appearance on the world scene of America as simultaneously the richest and militarily the most powerful player. During the latter part of the 20th century no other power even came close.
That era is now ending. While no state is likely in the near future to match America’s economic-financial superiority, new weapons systems could suddenly endow some countries with the means to commit suicide in a joint tit-for-tat embrace with the United States, or even to prevail. Without going into speculative detail, the sudden acquisition by some state of the capacity to render America militarily inferior would spell the end of America’s global role. The result would most probably be global chaos. And that is why it behooves the United States to fashion a policy in which at least one of the two potentially threatening states becomes a partner in the quest for regional and then wider global stability, and thus in containing the least predictable but potentially the most likely rival to overreach. Currently, the more likely to overreach is Russia, but in the longer run it could be China.”
For a US neocon, that is certainly a sales pitch for ‘make and drop more bombs’. But proposing to make partners out of current enemies is also called a major reality check.
@proper gander
Very good analysis just a small point is that US is already gone with this enormous debt and loss of probably two generations to produce intellectual properties / for example science, math, biology and more/.
These “Hollywood News” what they are producing every single day and half naked singers on the screen,killing,cheating,political briberies we can go on and on, it doesn’t going to help US to go ahead.
To destroy the US next genertions and most of the West generations was preprogramed by the Tavistok Institute in London -goole in “Educate yourself” and start to read how this disaster was carefully prepared.
US Army Official: Australia Must Choose Between US, China
Says Govt Must Decide Which Country Is More of a Vital Interest
by Jason Ditz, September 01, 2016
In comments on Australian radio, US Army Assistant Chief of Staff Col. Tom Hanson warned that the Australia needs to make a decision between its alliance with the United States or its efforts to improve economic ties with China, saying the time was fast approach that they would need to decide which was more vital to their national interest.
But the SCS’s resources – fish (huge potential in fish farming and export) and O&G will help pay for defence of the SCS.
All that noise about growth and expansion on a finite Earth.
What we need is localism, not an other form of globalism.
Just ‘cos someone else is doing it, it prolly has the same consequences in the long run.
Politically, economically, financially and genetically highly autonomous local regions(we used to call them Nations, countries)
That is the answer, not destroying them.
I feared the same: Chinese capitalism would be no better than Western capitalism. Then I remembered the old saying, ‘Better a century [of growth] in the West than a thousand years [of growth] in China.’ Thousands of years living within her own borders might have taught China how to tame even the rampant dragon of unrestrained capitalism.
@ Dr. N.G. Maroudas on September 02, 2016 · at 10:01 am UTC
Mr.Mao was financed by the Rothschild and Rockefeller foundations for many,many years because they were interested what kind of population product they will get as a result by the I would say animal style of repression.
Try to search more materials on Mao and you will get the picture. Same was happening in the former communist countries and what they have experienced as the result for example torturing people by the secret police now they practicing this with the US residents.
Airport security checks, put your car apart at the border even you are going to visit your relatives, sudden night invasions by the squad just to scare a hell from your family, this was the regular practice during the communist regime and now they are putting these horrendous actions against the US and Western people. It is very simple.It was just a rehearsal during the communist regime.
Would you care to post links to Mao being supported by those elements. I would strongly disagree,but I’d like to see what you base that thinking on first.
No, he would not care because those links does not exist.
Instead, there are a lot of documentaton on Mao Tse-tung life and work: ( These documents are in Spanish. Comrades, try to translate with a translator, I have not the time to translate right now )
“The true history of Mao Tsetung and the Chinese Communist Revolution”
https://culturaproletaria.wordpress.com/2014/06/23/la-verdadera-historia-de-mao-tse-tung-y-la-revolucion-comunista-de-china/
“On the struggle of the revolutionary proletarians to take power (Documents on the GPCR)”
https://culturaproletaria.wordpress.com/2016/08/23/sobre-la-lucha-de-los-proletarios-revolucionarios-para-tomar-el-poder-documentos-sobre-la-grcp/
Haha, might it be too much to ask of you to please explain why Pindos approve so wholeheartedly of their obnoxious superiors? Indeed, repression, violence, and chauvinism have always been hard-core Pindo attitudes, especially towards the world’s non-Exceptionals.
Judging by your noises, at long last it’s time for you to fight a huge communist onslaught right where you are for a change. Show what your exceptionalism is worth, especially your infatuation with guns for everybody.
@anonymous at 08.04 A.M
Thank you so much for your very sober proposal for the world. We don’t need to hate each other, we need to support each other and flourish, but in this case parasites would get empty basket and it is not good for them, they always want everything for free.
Good for you Anonymous. We want actual, real democracies– not the EU writ large.
US has purposely painted itself as overt evil– in favor of torture & an insider reveals that it intended to take down 7 countries in 5 years. Why so broadly reveal its evil? So that we will embrace a different “multipolar” path to the same global oligarchy.
Latest report in the Singapore’s Straits Times state that Prez Duterte of the Philippines has received ‘intelligence’ report that the Chinese has began building in Scarborough Shoal. The US had drawn a red line there that if the Chinese builds there they would consider it as crossing their red line. So it looks likely the Chinese has crossed that red line of the US! If so, the Chinese has just picked up the gauntlet thrown down by the US and is giving the US the war that it seeks!
China I believe considers “building” on what to them is “Chinese territory” is their right.And any attempt to stop them as aggression against China’s sovereign land. So yes,they will defend their territory,even if it means war. The memories of a “weak China” of the 19th and first half of the 20th Century,standing by while foreign powers despoiled their country,burn deep.They vowed after the revolution to “never” let that happen again. I don’t see them changing from that today.What may be for an imperial power ,thousands of miles away,the US,a red line. Interference in China’s internal affairs is beyond question a red line for China.When the US invaded North Korea and marched ever closer to the Chinese border. China warned the US not to move their armies to near the border.The US,with its normal arrogance,didn’t believe China was serious.Until massive Chinese armies moved into the war and pushed the US troops back.China always tries to solve troubles without war. But once the other side ignores those attempts,they are willing to fight if need be.
US like all the West has a tendency to interpret all situations by referring to a past when they were all powerful. Russia is a backward country, China is a backward country, China and Russia always have problems between themselves, they are no match for the ‘sole superpower’, etc.
Dear Saker,
Why no more ‘edit’ function? I sometimes made embarrassing grammar mistakes and would like to correct.
Two paths– leading to the same end.
Vladimir Putin 11/25/10 http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/from-lisbon-to-vladivostok-putin-envisions-a-russia-eu-free-trade-zone-a-731109.html
No more tariffs. No more visas. Vastly more economic cooperation between Russia and the European Union. That’s the vision presented by Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin in an editorial contribution to the German daily Süddeutsche Zeitung on Thursday.
“We propose the creation of a harmonious economic community stretching from Lisbon to Vladivostok,” Putin writes. “In the future, we could even consider a free trade zone or even more advanced forms of economic integration. The result would be a unified continental market with a capacity worth trillions of euros.”
Does this sound to you like sovereign countries over which citizens might once again gain control? What will they be voting on if monetary policy and trade policy are decided somewhere else? No visas? So it’s just one big country? Is that different than the New World Order?
—
Putin at Valdai:
“I am certain that if there is a will, we can restore the effectiveness of the international and regional institutions system. We do not even need to build anything anew, from the scratch; this is not a “greenfield,” especially since the institutions created after World War II are quite universal and can be given modern substance, adequate to manage the current situation.
“We need a new global consensus of responsible forces. It’s not about some local deals or a division of spheres of influence in the spirit of classic diplomacy, or somebody’s complete global domination. I think that we need a new version of interdependence. We should not be afraid of it. On the contrary, this is a good instrument for harmonising positions”
He supports the Rule of Law, but this seems to mean supporting the UN, which is greatly controlled by the US and by the Rockefeller family. Nothing in Putin’s vision suggests redressing power towards democracy or self-government. Says he’s for national sovereignty but never speaks of the desirability for nations to regain trade sovereignty, let alone economic or currency sovereignty. He LIKES the Bretton Woods institutions which hold much of the world in debt slavery. He’s reversed his earlier criticism of AGW as a “hoax”, and now champions it although it’s plainly another way to centralize power in the hands of the oligarchs, masked by the UN. The financial hand that pays those nice environmental organizations to consistently distort and exaggerate the scientific reports are subsidized directly by the US foundations whose owner-directors control the major US corporations and banks. https://www.epw.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/6ce8dd13-e4ab-4b31-9485-6d2b8a6f6b00/chainofenvironmentalcommand.pdf They also control most govt grants that enable academic scientists to do their research, so there is a great incentive to avoid contradicting the AGW hoax.
I’d like to believe that Putin is for freedom, democracy, Grexit & Brexit, but I don’t even see WORDS to support these.
A long before there was anything about global warming, it was known that the earths atmosphere controls the earths climate, prevents the massive temperature swings between night and day.
You seem to believe that changes to the gas mix that make up our atmosphere will have no affect on the climate?
There are very measurable changes to the gas mix, mainly CO2 from the burning of coal and oil.
I tend to think the climate will revert to whatever it was when all that CO2 was previously in the gas mix.
In a large open cut coal mine, seeing the trees still in the upper levels, the massive amount of coal that had been taken out, the very small ash dump from the coal that had gone into the power station burners, in comparison to the hole that stretched for kilometers by kilometers, the difference all having been converted to gas, made me realise how much we are changing the gas mix that makes up the atmosphere.
There is still the oceans as massive carbon sinks. In the old days of the Biblical Noah, when those massive coal deposits were even more massive forests, the oceans were much smaller. The landmasses were much bigger. After Noah’s flood and the breakup of the supercontinent, the oceans were much bigger to contain the waters of Noah’s flood and to enable the dry land to reappear. So now if the carbon in the coal is re-released into the atmosphere, the oceans will just absorb them – no problem. There is no conclusive proof that the present ‘climate change’ is due to the burning of fossil fuels. The Earth had gone through cycles of cooling and warming before. It is not clear what factors drive the cycle.
“After Noah’s flood and the breakup of the supercontinent, the oceans were much bigger to contain the waters of Noah’s flood and to enable the dry land to reappear.”
Perhaps because I am not religious, this part of your theory I cannot agree with Simon. This would mean that at this point in time (Noah), God put more water on the earth? It rained for forty days and forty nights. This rain rather than being natural precipitation, was conceived from nowhere?
Come to think of it, according to the specs, God made the earth in seven days and seven nights and after that production ceased? If the earth is warming there will be more evaporation and more precipitation, but I don’t think extra rain or water will be created.
Peter, I have already replied last night, but somehow it did not appear. I wonder why.
Simon, your comment is in Moveable Feast Cafe, probably because Saker or webmaster (the only two that can move comments) thought that it had very little to do with the subject in Pepe Escobar’s article. I can see that the somewhat derailing conversation had already started, and your comment happened to be the first one to be moved. We try to keep the discussion as much as possible about the topic of the article, and ask all readers to try to follow that principle. Even if some short comments have already been approved although they can be considered a little Off Topic, please don’t add more and more replies to it. You can discuss further in MFC. Mod.
OK. Noted. Thanks.
The SUN is the earth’s heater. CO2 is a tiny part of the atmosphere. In geologic history there is no correlation between CO2 levels and temperature. Trillions have been spent to make you believe otherwise. Positions which are scientifically verifiable don’t require Trillions to sustain them.
Take any ONE aspect of the GW argument and follow it all the way back to the data, looking for the strongest arguments on both sides. If you do this, you will discover as I have that nothing sustains the gw argument except money. Climate determinants are much more complicated than the assumption that CO2 alone, with its effect upon water vapor, determines global temperature.
I recommend that you look at the studies of Sea Level Rise. I think you will be astounded to see how slight they are. Here’s a few to start you off:
The PSMSL data base include the time series of the monthly average mean sea levels recorded by every tide gauge… · Go to http://www.psmsl.org/products/trends
· Use as start year 1900 and end year 1975 and then zoom and window over one selected area, for example Europe (but the United States and Canada or Australia and New Zealand work fine as well …)
—
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/03/19/worldwide-tide-gauge-comparisons-show-no-acceleration-in-sea-level-rise/
Penelope is correct. ‘Anthropogenic global warming’ claims are a scam. The global climate certainly changes, but not because of human activity. See the five articles at Climate Change for a refutation of the Global Warming Scare based on a consideration of the actual data.
I suppose China is looking for new export markets. Not surprising with the US market stagnant to declining. Still, I don’t see why this is anything the average person should celebrate. Trade frameworks are just more neoliberalism. They result in a net wealth transfer from resource rich low value-added economies to economies based on high-value added manufactures. Certainly worked well for the British for quite a while.
One problem for China is enforcement. The real reason for the engagement of the US military in the global space is to protect foreign investment, enforce contracts, promote investor confidence and generally make the world safe for global Capitalism. The Chinese military have no ability to project global power. How is this to be enforced?
Masterful, as is usual! The entrance into the G20 summit by Obama and how Susan Rice following him was met is the priceless affirmation of Pepe’s analysis here.
Obama could not wait to declare the USA ownership of the South China Sea meant China must stop
saying the SCS is it’s lake. The effort to remove Susa Rice explained clearly, this was China’s summit, not hers…nor Obama’s.
Thanks for this posting, it has become hard to find Escobar.
Suzanne
Forget YouTube. How about posting and linking everything to Yandex.com. Yandex is a Russian search engine comparable to YouTube.
Saker: Russia saved Chechnya from becoming an Atlanticist sponsored Wahabbi state, and for that, Ramzan Kadyrov is a grateful and loyal ally. Russia recently prevented the coup in Turkey from succeeding. Is Russia’s strategy to get Turkey to become a friendly nation similar to Chechnya?
All Putin has to do is wait patiently for the dollar to implode. The US will soon no longer be able to afford to meddle in Eurasia. If the Anglo-American elites soon lose the dollar as the world currency, how will they be able to continue to wage war and terrorize nations?
What will the Chinese do to ensure they can cash in the US treasury bills? Do the Anglo-American elites really think they can use war to get out of repaying China with real assets.
What will the Chinese do to ensure they can cash in the US treasury bills? Do the Anglo-American elites really think they can use war to get out of repaying China with real assets.?
I don’t know who has the final say of these meetings, like which weekend & which country, but this meeting’s location was more than symbolic for at least 2 big reasons, neither even mentioned by pepe.
Also answers your query, somewhat.
The date held is nearest 2 very important & embarrassing historical landmark anniversaries in the west’s pillaging of China, intent on forcing their terms of what constitutes ‘fair trade’:
AUG 29/1842 1st Opium War Treaty of Nanking;
SEP7/1901 Boxer Protocol;
1st one was 174 yeas ago, which makes it a 29 times 6, both really big numbers in numerology;
2nd one, 115 years ago tomorrow, dunno what that is;
Based on present behavior & their psychopathy, I don’t see them changing their (past) ways.
The US administrations have strongly disappointed the whole world since the end of the
20th century on all levels, morally, spiritually, economically etc.. with its fixed idea of supremacy. It hits hard all the time and leaves behind death, destruction and chaos. Its own citizen are in a terrible reversal of precedent wellbeing to impoverished people. Their representatives are blind and crazy with few exceptions. There is no more democracy, its plutocracy and it starts to fall deep. Unfortunately it takes their allies with its travel to hell. Those of them, responsible for this mayor destruction on earth have their flying saucer ready to take off to Mars. I would not like to be with those criminals on Mars.