He was killed in his house but Kurds both in southwestern Iraq and in Syria obviously hang in and around US bases or any kind of intelligence or other outpost. Prob staff a lot as well. Its not even an open secret or even unofficial in most cases that they ally and collaborate with US (and even israeli) forces, mercs and intelligence in their ereas
Idk if they have the single missile payload to sink a carrier so that may be only possible if they hit one damaging it enough so it stops moving and then managing a couple more hits on it
Hey that cant be cartoonishly evil. Its on the anarch-kurdist territory there by cooperation with the SDF so its all for the greater good of Actualy Existing Libertarian Confederalism or whatever. Dont expect their presence there being question even by most domestic left “anti-imperialist” voices. USA shouldnt leave and betray them and also the latter dont have any other choice than being comprados and being a side demon to the Great Satan, or so i have been constantly been told
Interesting post but you have made those points again elsewhere in the last couple of weeks ,i know your analysis and i agree in part even if i feel like some assumptions that it takes for granted are less so. But I was not arguing against it or against the point that China should or should not move away from being an exporter country or if thats where the whole play is. My response is questioning the viability and possibility of China NOT being an Exporter country given certain economic sizes and trends and what would such a tranformation entail and its consequences both for the composition of its domestic economy and its worldwide soft power. If the math even works out? I feel like you didnt answer those questions. Maybe the “facts” i laid out are wrong assumptions to begin with so id like to go over my comment and answer me when you have the time ?
China’s share of global manufacturing value added is smth crazy like 35%. It’s industrial might overshadows most of the world combined.
On top of that in context of the deleveraging and derisking of the real estate issue the investing and credit domesticaly has been shifting heavilt away from the real estate sector and towards industry and manufacturing
Yeah Chinese household consumption is low (tho I have seen recalculations that put it at or around Japan and SK levels and not notably lower).
So I’m asking you in light of this. How can China NOT be an exporter country? Even if household consumption along with median income approaches western levels (which is a shift that it’s unreasonable to ask the Chinese state to manufacture in this short timeframe) China’s manufacturing and industrial output is so large that it would still be an exporter country right? Even more so if productivity gains increase in China and the rest of the world doesn’t pick up manufacturing wise.
So what does not being an exporter country entails in light of all these? China becoming more financialized and it’s manufacturing base not expanding or even decreasing?
Because at current scales, and given that real estate related contributions to gdp are to shrink and have already shrinking the growth, it’s industrial and manufacturing sector will only become more dynamic , versatile, efficient and productive while providing jobs to hundred(s) of millions.
It’s domestic consumption can’t and won’t absorb anything close to it’s big majority in the foreseeable future even in good case scenarios. So how can China become significantly less of an exporter country or not at all?
Also what would that mean for its foreign relations and soft power? A China that isn’t the biggest exporter to most nations is a China easier to isolate with countries more likely to fa in line with US coercion, now having less to lose. Unless it becomes a comperably big importer of goods from these countries, especially as they develop too. So now China will have to absorb a much larger part of its own production and also import enough from other countries to counterbalance the loss in soft power from decreased exports of capital and goods?
Also the US “replacing” it’s Chinese imports with other countries (Mexico, Vietnam) is a Potemkin village isn’t it? These countries just import parts from China and assemble them to export to the us. Their imports from China follow the growth of their exports to the US EXACTLY. They become more dependent and inter tangled with China while the US isn’t untagling itself from Chinese supply chains and production or industry. Just adding a middle man. Have you seen any “decoupling” and “manufacturing moving” that hasn’t been that? Why is that such a good deal for the US?
With China reconciling with the US
Name a single relevant and concrete concession, policy change or backstep China has taken in the last couple of months in context of this “reconciling with the US” that noticably diverges from their behavior 6 months or 12 months ago. Xi visiting the US and saying “lets all coexist peacefully mmmkey?” or signing some deal for soybeans or whatever doesnt sell the story to me
what is “the world market” exactly ? China losing most of europe ,Korea, Phillipines and Japan? Like someone else pointed out Chinese mid and high end exports and intergration with most of SEA is going great and China is starting to dominate the market on digital infastructure in a lot of the devloping world elsewhere. USA has been unable to block the penetration and even domination of Chinese world leading mid-high tech exports in some of the worlds most important markets
For example ASEAN leads the world in growth and wants to repeat an “Asian Tigers” like development and China’s leading position in digital and physical infrastructure creates a natural economic partnership with them . Already in 2020, China exported almost twice as much to ASEAN as it did to developed Asia (Japan, Taiwan and South Korea). Chinese exports to the Global South, including ASEAN, Africa, and Latin America, nearly doubled from pre-Covid levels to an annual rate of around $900 billion in 2022 – double China’s exports to either the United States or the European Union.According to the IMF, the region’s per capital GDP in terms of purchasing power parity is $16,163, or nearly three times the USD dollar GDP per capita. The purchasing power of foreign currency in local economies is multiplied by the undervaluation of the region’s currencies. As the US dollar value of GDP converges with purchasing power parity over time and these countries grow, the import capacity of that 700 million people will rise to match western markets even in demand for high tech products . No reason to believe Chinese high tech exports and digital infastructure will not continue to rise even more.
From an ASEAN study published last year:
As ASEAN advances to become the world’s fourth largest economy by 2030, it is undergoing a transition marked by a demographic shift to a younger population, a rising middle class, and rapid adoption of technology. With many mobile-first markets in the region, ASEAN is expected to see rapid increase in the use of technology which would contribute to the growth of its digital economy by 6.4 times, from $31 billion in 2015 to $197 billion by 2025. The digital economy, therefore, is a key factor driving the growth of the region’s economy.
China is already a world leader in practical applications of digital infrastructure (AI/5G) and their strategy centers on creating future markets for its high end products by providing broadband, cloud computing, and training for Southeast Asian nations and in those aspects it already dominates the 700m people market with deals being signed left and right no matter US disagreements. .
According to a July 2022 report by the Carnegie Endowment on Huawei’s success in Indonesia, by far the largest ASEAN nation with a population of 275 million:
Huawei and, to a lesser extent, ZTE have successfully positioned themselves as trusted cybersecurity providers to the Indonesian government and the Indonesian nation. This has been no easy feat given long-held Indonesian animosity toward China. Many Chinese companies have faced protests over concerns they were taking local jobs. Huawei and ZTE have suffered no such fate. Nor has there been a broad coalition of Indonesian voices against using Chinese technology in critical telecommunications infrastructure. In short, Indonesians care a lot more about Chinese cement plants than they do about Huawei involvement in 5G networks.
Huawei teamed up with Thailand’s Ministry of Digital Economy to open a “Thailand 5G Ecosystem Innovation Center” in Bangkok in 2021, the director of Thailand’s digital development office told a Huawei conference in 2021. In October 2022, Huawei released a white paper entitled “Malaysia as the ASEAN Digital Capital.” And all these were for a Huawei in their weakest. They are booming again in 2023 and so are a lot of Chinese tech giants and sectors. Like electric cars. Already bound to dominate in SEA you see them capturing markets just in the US doorstep
Even if you wanna hyper focus on chip exports. China already has a great shot in dominating mid and low end chip production and exports everywhere within the next decade and there is little real ability or plan from the west to counterbalance that legacy chip domination. How will that coexist as a reality with them being completely cut off fin the high end sector when they reach parity. I dont think it can .
Good article on the subject in Chinese https://www.guancha.cn/ChenFeng3/2023_02_14_679722_s.shtml
everyone does not know why .A lot arent that online to have seen the discourse come up before or that informed about some specific period in modern chinese history. Its worth pointing it out since its a pretty weird relation even if its stating the obvious for most. And did say it sucks so idk why you think i disagree with people finding it lame
Idk what people expected, Kissinger is legit seen as a figure that positively impacted the trajectory of modern China by being important in the restoring of diplomatic relations with the US and the West and the opening up of China to the global economy and acceptance to global institutions. If they uphold the policy decisions they made domesticaly and abroad in the late mao and Deng era ,and they do, then they will still be formal and cordial to a figurehead like Kissinger that was central to a lot of these shifts and developments. Mao or no Mao, Revisionism or no Revisionism china would have made such a statement for Kissinger either way. Sucks but thats how china is where it is now and thats part of its history. Mao himself was cracking jokes and hanging out with Kissinger while the latter already had the blood of millions on his hands. This position (at least in their mind) has little to do with how commited in socialism or communist anyone in the prc is
Some funny and probably positive news from Greece with the political landscape there being both the same and the opposite from other countries in Europe rn.
Its same in the sense that New Democracy (not Maoist but like 80% Macron - 20% Le Pen) governs after getting ~40% in the elections this year all while the socdem to center-left has either been eating shit and imploding (SYRIZA), being PASOK doing nothing after being Pasokified and or being Varoufakis enjoying his internationalist larp party at ~2% outside of parliament. With Syriza’s implosion being the funny one since they ate shit in the elections, Tsipras resigned and then they literaly imported some better looking Pete Buttigieg - Beto O’Rourke dude from the US but with worse politics (reaganite, campaigned for Biden in 2008) and made him the leader so now they are about to be polling at signle digits. Like look at this
But there are also opposing trends compared to other countries.
The Greek Communist Party (Hardline MLs who also dont suck too much on LGBT issues anymore despite what the convo was some years ago) has more than doubled their support, consistently hitting 10%+ in recent polls and now has a real chance of actually reaching 2nd place. Looking at the state of communist parties and movements in most of the west , at eurocommunism and in general the post war trajectory of most , you dont have that kind of party that doesnt suck in 90% of issues with that kind of parliamentary numbers + organizational strength at a youth or union level almost anywhere else.
Also contrary to other countries the far right is very split and incoherent . After the collapse of Golden Dawn the overtly anti-migrant fascists, neonazis , ethnonationalists, alt-right nutjobs, religious nutjobs etc are split over 4-6 parties with basicaly no organizational strength or organic reach. They wont and cant reach any really threatening unified movement as of now and they mostly overtly clownish and lame
Isnt the majority of Chinese loans to low and middle income countries already mostly in Yuan and not Dollars ?. Arent these to be paid back in Yuan/local currencies as well?
Unless the trend has been totally reversed in the last year dont these already dawrf whatever the BRICS bank can dish out in volume ?
If people were asking as a consequence of the meeting what was China’s concession this time? Well its right here. China continues their commitment to non-interventionism, they continue to claim they wont fight the US. In doing so this is the result
Wtf do you want China to do for the Argentinian elections? Rig them or assasinate the ancap nutjob ? It wasnt close enough to be flipped by an agressive China intervention in the first place and its not like its losing some strategic ally. Argentina is gonna get worse with the clown and in 4 years time some socdem peronist will win and things will be more of the same. What is this “Well its right here?” that you so clearly see in this case?
Also where are you seeing this normalization and concession stuff ? The Americans were begging for a meeting for years and Xi went there in a position of strength and repeated every buzzword and positions China has stated in the last 10 years. There was no rhetoric shift. China is as non-interventionist today as it was 2 or 3 years ago. That may already be in issue yeah but that doesnt mean that somehow believe that they will have good peaceful relations with the US or that they conceeded their position in any international matter
Millenium Actress is moderately known just by beinga Kon joint. Tho unfortunately is maybe the lesser known of the 4 (and the best).
Liz and the blue bird has a bunch of following just through Kyoani having a bunch of following tho its not the most active online.
Votoms is weird. Like its super important and pretty amazing but the people who have heard it and talk about it are just people that like old Mechas cause its like 3rd/4th in line for most people when they started getting into that rabbithole. I have seen a bunch of people starting it on twitter but maybe pushing it as a MGS core influence would get more people to give it a try. people SHOULD watch it
Vampire Hunter D bloodlust is probably the better known of the bunch but mostly by US millenial audience. The physical releases sold very well and it was one of the best known “anime movies” of the 00s . But that crowd prob is just normal people that dont partake into online an ime discussions now
Beautiful Dreamer its probably the lesser known in the west. Despite it being Oshii and UY being such an important franchise. Its a hard sell when its attached to a 100+ ep 80s romcom no matter how good the latter is and even if you try to convince people to watch it standalone. Also thats not really true cause there is a ton of enjoyment and depth to be found when you are at least familiar with the characters and format of the show and how the movie handles them andbrings them upside down
People who were not Chinese got the same progress like the Chinese did at different speeds (earlier or later).
Those who did either did it on the back of the rest of the world and by plundering and colonizing billions (west and western protectorates) with China still managed to catch up with that in half a century or they just havent yet and wont in the forseeable future (most of the third world) and their progress marely amounts to the most generalized side effects of world wide medical and tech progress. China is bringing to 1.5 billion people the progress, QoL and modernity the former group achieved (and then some) without colonizing, imperializing or impovershing any other nation or people and in 1/5th of the time.No one else did that, no one else is doing that. Other than you know, the USSR (relative to era)
idk if i would read into a couple of purges and changes of personel with such negative and “china observer” like analysis.
We know the long standing issues of the PLA and how it improved and modernized a lot under Xi’s tenure (often with purges like this) and we know there are different wings and interests inside the CPC. Whose to say that this isnt a case of Xi consolidating a more loyal and competent comand. Or that its indeed a corruption case which extremely realistic given PLA in the last 20 years and so despite a very widespread and successfull anti corruption campaign you can still find big names lacking. Or that they were found out to have a mistress like a couple of big officials in the last few months.
“Political shake up that has not occured since the cultural revolution” seems like a quite overblown take at the very least given the things you listed. China had self contained political crises in the 80s ,90s ,00s and 10s that saw “shake ups” much more dramatic and in scale. Hell the anti-corruption campaign that i mentioned saw like 500k mid, low and high level party officials and army officers purged. The “shake up” during zero covid and before the party’s congress also seemed much more important than whatever this is.
In the end of the day under Xi the biggest shake up has occured. That in a way “Politics are in command” in much more real sense than they have been in 40+ years. That new reality foundementaly makes staff changes, purges and shake ups in positions much more common than they were in lets say 90s-early 10s .And that shouldnt immediately be thought of as a negative or as a measure of instability, or that Xi positions is more precarious than ever. I simply dont see it.
Also repeating the completely and utterly unsubstantiated submarine incident rumor as something that even remotely can lend more merit to your analysis makes it more flimsy.
The source (Lude media) has no credibility and then the guy who originaly (and only) put the story out in western twitter claiming he also veryfied it ,H I Sutton, isnt a particularly trustworthy figure in the PLA watching sphere. He run with the “there is a coup against Xi” and “China is hiding 20 million covid deaths” stories last year and the manner in which the story broke was at best shaky. For example Lude media has written a rather defensive follow up tweet stating that the supposed incident occurred in the Yellow Sea and nothing occurred in the Taiwan strait, and that people saying it happened in the Taiwan strait are 50 cent shills, essentially claiming it is disinformation. Of course, it is rather confusing, as it was Lude media himself who first stated so confidently that he had top secret information, and that among other details he had access to, that this happened in the Taiwan strait (“在执行台海任务时出事”). And both had follow up tweets walking back on the claims saying that it is unconfirmed and to treat with great caution (and if im not mistaken they later delete dtheir original posts). And then nothing . There here’s been no other news sites reporting this, even anti-china ones , and had the Chinese somehow lost a sub in the Taiwan Strait or SCS, the ereaand the skies above it would be full of Chinese ships and aircraft on search and rescue missions, and all of the traffic and survailance on the erea would see it and report it. There’s no way such an effort could go unnoticed in such a busy water ways. Nothing came out of it an dnothing was reported.
But lets ignore that the submarine thing as a misstep. I see little reason to think Xi is going to meet biden from a position of weakness even if there is relative weakness in some apsects of the economic sphere as you claim.
The collapse of Ukraine’s offensive against Russian forces , its commander’s admission that the war is a “stalemate” and the slow but certain shift in narrative is a setback for America’s strategic geopolitical position and a gain for China and the end of the war seems to be shifting towards a net loss for the US and a net gain for China. And Russia itself isnt a market or economic hub that can be handwaived as easily as you think. China has doubled its exports to Russia since the February 2022 invasion of Ukraine, has increased their coordination with Moscow in almost all foreign actions and have secured or are in the process of securing energy and food security configurations they could not expect some years prior
The US tech war on China has mostly flopped, with even western think tanks and pushers of the sanctions admitting deffeat or panicking to double down. America’s restrictions on high-end chip exports to China failed to prevent Huawei Technologies from offering a new smartphone as well as Artificial Intelligence processors with performance comparable to or close to what’s achieved by the products of Nvidia and other US designers. Huawai is expanding both domesticaly and worldwide and so do other chip and tech companies America tried to strangle. Chinese and SEA market is increasingly being caprtured by China and so is the developing world and the lead in 5g tech and applications only grows larger . The mate60 came out of no where and Chinese AI firms buy fast Huawei processers in place of chips from Nvidia and other US producers. US,japanese and Korean tech firms lost and are losing markets of ~2 billion peope and they are in a positionf of weakness right now, many begging the US regime to change approach and course
The Isreili war on Gaza and the US response gives China a free option to act as the de facto leader of the Global South in opposition to Israel, an American ally even by simply not doing much and simply watch the US losing their hold in PR and public opinion in lot of the developing world. US prob spend tens of billions in worldwide media and NGO campaigns to undermine China’s image and postive attitudes towards it but all that effort has been at the very least counteracted it by the last month;s impact on West’s and US’s image for billions. Also China now exports more to the Muslim world than it does to the United States and more to the developing world than they do to US+EU+Japan+Korea+Canada
Also the US military ,despite what the political hawks are pushing for, really wants to avoid confrontation with China in the Northwest Pacific region as well as its home waters in the South China Sea, where the PLA’s thousands of surface-to-ship missiles and nearly 1,000 fourth- and fifth-generation warplanes give China an overwhelming home-theater advantage in firepower. By most credible voices ,both official and unoffical, China holds a distinct advantage in the erea and can achieve right now a ,costly for itself but even more costly for the US in more way than material, win in a military campaign against Taiwan.ANd that will become increasingly more true over the next decade
LA Rocket Force “is the largest ground-based missile force in the world, with over 2,200 conventionally armed ballistic and cruise missiles and with enough anti-ship missiles to attack every US surface combatant vessel in the South China Sea with enough firepower to overcome each ship’s missile defense,” Major Christopher J. Mihal wrote in 2021 in a US Army journal.
If you think this is just a “please give us money” and not the realistic analysis a lot in the US military are having you are mistaken.
We got a taste of the Biden-Xi discussions from Newsom’s visit (who is also the likeliest 2024 Democratic presidential candidate should Biden withdraw for health reasons) . Newsom has been quoted as saying that he had “expressed my support for the One-China policy … as well as our desire not to see independence” of Taiwan. Clear rejection of Taiwanese independence contrasts with the approach and statements of the last few years of almost all US officials including Biden who will likely echo such retorical pull back in the next few months. It doesnt mean too much materialy but its an important point of where the wind is shifting and with teh upcoming Taiwanese elections in mind and the weakening of the DPP positions.
Thats all to say that yeah (de)dolarization matters, yeah US financial capital hegemony and capabilities matter but they dont come or exist from without. Their strength and usability is at some point a function of the material,political and social base and on the ground contradictions both domesticaly and abroad matter more long term. Each global or geopolitical crisis or event of the last few years has “trickled down” much more instability and rot in the US political and social fabric than it did for China and provided much more fertile ground for counterhegemonic developments in the developing world , even if one can say that China and Russia didnt take advantage of them as much as they could. US financial hegemony doesnt exist outside of politics or (geo)politics in “people” centered sense even if we might still be far from the US domestic contradictions and global crises having significant impact on the ability and effectiveness of it to act and react in the way it needs to to “win” (but we also might be closer than we think). US might have gotten a lot of economy related “wins” already in Ukraine for example but in a long term PoV im not sure “putting EU back in its place” and having them on a geopolitical and economic leash is enough considering the changes it kickstarted and accelerated domsetcialy and abroad and especially their consolidation given the likely outcome
deleted by creator
You can “nuance” the matter all you want but at the end of the day i cant shed many tears for those acting like comprador dogs in the face of genocide, fighting with the ones facilitating it no less. When you not only make a deal with the devil but actively help him and fight for him in such situations, you are one of his demons. No matter the “libertarian socialist” or whatever coating (that so many people still buy into)
I have only seen polls where Vietnamese opinion on the US is comfortably positive ,annoyingly so, while opinions towards China are at the absolute best close to 50-50