Thursday, November 18, 2010

America is betting on the wrong horse

Upright Opinion

November 12, 2010
America is betting on the wrong horse
By Saeed Qureshi
On the face of it, the visit of American president Barrack Obama to India appears a rarity. But intrinsically it is going to be counterproductive in the longer run. In the aftermath of the era of the so-called cold war between former Soviet Union and the United State, America has virtually snatched India from the Soviet orbit. The American overweening bid to forge an alliance with India cannot be dismissed as wooing. It is a monumental strategy that primarily aims at the containment of People’s Republic China and to hinder her spreading influence around the world.
America wants to re-play on China, the same containment strategy that it applied to the Soviet Union during the cold war era with epoch-making success. Despite the fact that China is a powerful economic partner of the United State, this anti- China containment policy’s fundamental thrust is to debilitate China as a well-entrenched communist state. As such, the ideological war is still being carried on by the United States as the leader of the free world.
But as the episode of the Soviet Communist Empire’s disintegration bears out, the successor Russian Federation, emerged economically more powerful than before. It is, more geographically and nationally cohesive with less backlog of communism, although it is still embracing a diluted version of socialism. Russian politico-economic system is in a melting pot and would crystallize in several decades to come. This at best can be characterized as a mix of the features of both the free world and of socialism.
The story of China is different. Way back between 1978 and 1992, the wise, and wizard Deng Xiaoping, known as paramount leader, fundamentally transformed the essence and character of the Chinese economic system. It was a metamotphosis of the stagnant and closed Chinese socialism based economic paradigm. As a result, China leapt into an aura of economic miracle that converted its economy into a dynamic, vibrant, and progressive form.
China’ economy and industrial sectors have been moving ahead with terrific speed with no let up during the last three decades. Under Deng Xiaoping, China opened its doors to the foreign investors in earmarked regions with unprecedented safeguards, facilities, and tax exemption that brought interminable heavy rainfall of foreign investments into China. Chinese’s labor is one of the cheapest in the world.
The heaviest investment came from the arch capitalist America’s entrepreneurs and investors who produced goods in China in pennies and sold in America in dollars. The socialist market economy that ingenious Deng propelled in China has no cotemporary parallel and is a novel economic theme that integrates the best hallmarks of both the capitalism and socialism.
Chinese has currently, $2.5 trillion in her foreign exchange reserves making this figure as the highest in the world. It lends money to the Unites States. Chinese poltical system leaves no room for dissent and as such, the decisions taken are not stalled or consigned to red tape. Its accountability system has no mercy or tolerance for defaulters, felons, crooks, adulterators, and sideline manipulators. Chinese government does not compromise on quality. The latest instance is the prompt sentence to the people trading in tainted milk. There are no marked interest groups like feudalism and economic robber barons in China thriving on loot and kickbacks. There are billionaires in China but their wealth is all accounted for and the sources of earnings are transparent.
Chinese army is one of the strongest and numerically largest in the world. The Peoples’ Liberation Army ( PLA) is the world's largest military force, with approximately 3 million members. China also has the world's largest standing army, with approximately 2.25 million members. China does not import the military hardware. On the contrary, she manufactures all the military equipment from a rifle to submarines to aircraft carrier ships. It is self sufficient in the military assortment of weaponry, including missiles, nuclear weapons, destroyers, warships, and combat vessels.
To expect that India can prove to be an effective bulwark against the Chinese prodigious military capability and can shape up as a befitting counterpoise nuclear power is simply fanciful and unequivocally far removed from reality. If history is any guide then let us see in the hindsight the 1962 war fought between China and India. The then prime minister of India Pundit jawahar Lal Nehru ordered the India army to throw Chinese out of the Indian soil. What happened in that brief skirmish? Instead, that Indian army could accomplish that mission impossible; it fell like leaves from a tree in a strong wind. It fled from the battlefield and mercifully, the Chinese retreated from the Indian territory voluntary. So much for the prowess and valor of Indian army to fight!
As far equipping India with nuclear arsenal, it is drastically doubtful that a nuclear war can ever take place on earth because such a war can never remain confined to the two belligerents. If India and China start trading nuclear warheads then neither China nor India would survive extinction of both biology and human race for centuries together. The Indian and Chinese leadership is aware of the horrendous outcome of nuclear clash and would never take that ruinous course because the loss would be colossally collateral.
Indian leadership might get all the perks and privileges from the mighty United States but would never act as a proxy or mercenary of the United State, a role that Pakistan has been willfully playing for several decades now. If India wants to destroy mother India it would resort to that irreparable blunder that would neutralize whatever India has gained so far.
It would, therefore, be in the best interests of United States to come out of the mindset of cold war and discard the erroneous fantasies that by creating protégés and proxies it can annihilate the global rivals. It should also be borne in mind that China is not the Soviet Union and the 21st century is not the 20th century. The attrition and guerrilla war can be an effective strategy to wear down the enemy. But such a war of attrition can be successful only is fought on foreign lands between the adversaries as was done in Afghanistan.
If India or United States intend to start an insurgency against China a la Afghanistan, then it would be not only unattainable but would be a sheer mad man’s dream. China has rather an effective and foolproof domestic mechanism to curb or to foil any attempt for internal disintegration either by the domestic elements or by the foreign agents.
The containment of China and raising a matching Sphinx in the form of India is an extremely flawed proposition and would not be beneficial for either the United States or India. A policy of appeasement between China, Pakistan, and India should constitute the best option that the United States can sponsor and promote in the Far East and South Asian regions. But for goodness sake why at all does United States want China to go the way the former Soviet Union went? Cannot these two power work in tandem for the global peace and jointly undertake and advance such projects as space research, eradication of poverty, hunger, diseases epidemics from the planet earth?
The baits of providing civilian nuclear technology and paving way for India to become the permanent member of the United Nations Security Council are not going to work if these are meant to burden India for posing as anti-China contender in the region at the behest of the United States. If the goal is to make India as an economic partner, spur the bilateral trade, and promote world peace, then those are laudable motives and should be pursued with all the vigor and speed.
(The writer is a Dallas-based freelance journalist and a former diplomat writing mostly on International Affairs with specific focus on Pakistan and the United States)

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5 comments:

  1. Is this even a serious article? The verbal gymnastics done in this article to defend China is incredible, but typical of much of the Pakistani press. I have yet to read a critical article or opinion about China yet.

    China is an authoritarian government run by an oligarchy of CPC and business. It has no ideology other than to make China powerful. This capitalism/socialism you have mentioned is utter nonsense. What to do you think Deng Xiopeng meant when he said: "To be rich is glorious".

    As for fighting corruption, I would like to utter another Deng quote: "It doesn't if the the cat is black or white, as long as it catches mice." What to do you think Deng meant by that. Corruption is woven into the fabric of China's economy, more so since power is concentrated to the CPC.

    And this sole control of power gives China the ability to do anything it want without debate, discussion, or even a vote. I'm sure you realize that China is no democracy, but your verbal gymnastics justified that.

    As for having the world's biggest military? So what? The size of the military is a meaningless metric. And more so in China's case since a bulk of the military is there not to keep invaders out, but to keep the peace in China. I'm sure Tianammen Square rings a bell.

    And how do you contain a country where both India and the US has billions of dollars of trade? Debilatating China is a fool's strategy. China, unlike the Soviet Union, is a rival, not an enemy. So your idea of containing China (for what purpose?) seems, well, just plain wrong.

    I'm surprised you would write such drivel being a Dallas-based journalist, I would've thought you have a better perspective. Instead you sound like you are paid hack of China's Foreign Ministry.

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  2. I think the author is influenced more by his dislike for India than anything else.
    United States being a global economic power has global interests. If it sees her economic interest in India, and would like India to rise as a economic contender in the region, then what is wrong with that. India can provide cheap labor like China. Let market forces determine who the big winner will be.

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  3. The Cold War was a political battle to determine whether Democracy or Communism would serve as the stronger government. China and India are not democratic. There model is class struggle and discrimination. Nixon opens the door with China now they finance us. This is more of an economic battle than political. The political system in USA is run, governed and owned by the corporate that are international. This economic battle started by Bankers, corporate and business of the West and they are internationalist or you can call them Globalist. Globalization is all about consolidation. The world economy has become so centralized thought the Globalists operations, they are going to continue to consolidate until chaos will take place or N.W.O. pushed by greed and power. For this reason N.W.O may no work.

    The international bankers control the money supply world wide - Corporate acting as puppets. These Globalists control them by shares. These Globalists are dreaming this from their childhood. Cecil Rhoades at Oxford University started this dream with Rothschild connections.

    Indirectly, Mr. Saeed is implying that U.S. is about to lose its status as the dominant global superpower if she continues on this path. Is it true Mr. Saeed?

    Today, we all are witnessing how global geopolitical climate is changing rapidly. This has become more apparent since the start of the world financial crisis, which finds its roots in the U.S. economic downturn.

    U.S. is the heart of the global economy because the U.S. dollar is currently the reserve currency of the world. Oil, gold and all major commodities are measured in U.S. dollars.

    As Mr. Saeed is implying that if United States continues on the current path U.S. were to collapse in the same way that Iceland and Latvia already have, the whole world would be affected. A new world order would need to be formed that no longer relied on U.S. global hegemony. Today many experts believe that this is not only possible, but likely. According to Professor Willem Buiter, a former member of the Monetary Policy Committee who is now at the London School of Economics, "There will, before long... be a global dumping of U.S. dollar, assets, including U.S. government assets... Could this "truly global society" be the same society that Bush Senior spoke of, with the UN fulfilling "the historic vision of its founders? Or perhaps this is the scenario that Buiter envisions when he describes a "global dumping of U.S. dollar assets." If the Chinese government were to abandon the U.S. dollar it would certainly trigger such a "dumping" of U.S. assets..

    China is the largest creditor to the U.S. if the Chinese government decided to dump all of its U.S. dollars, the entire U.S. economy would collapse. But would china do that? The motivation would be two-fold; firstly, the U.S. Federal Reserve's "inflationary policies" devalue the U.S. currency to the point that china no longer has an incentive to hold U.S. dollars, and secondly, China sees an opportunity to become the dominant player in the new world order.

    The Kremlin recently called for the creation of a "supranational reserve currency" in G20 meeting in London. Zhou Xiao chuan, the governor of china's central bank, has expressed a similar desire for a new global reserve currency "that is disconnected from individual nations and is able to remain stable in the long run, thus moving the inherent deficiencies caused by using credit-based national currencies." Mean some form of global bank would be creditor IMF? All these scenario are linked to Mr. Saeed's Article "America is betting on the wrong horse" or "America has started a wrong race" on which no one can bet? Only American public might be able to bet.

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  4. Let me add little more to this article. Rothschild stated who control the money of nation controls the nation now the world. Donald Trump wanted to know why 7 billion dollars U.S. tax payer money had been used by U.S. bankers to buy banks in China. Holland and France voted no to the European Union - Lisbon Treaty tactics played way around to bring Holland and France in the game.

    Why is the world in condition it is in? Power and greed is the answer. There have always been factions. This is human nature. These factions sometimes result in revolution. Look at the world leaders, all in collusion. Free trade, outsourcing, destruction of unions, and destruction of the people’s rights, outsource to Asia, Western nations no control on immigration. No efforts to preserve the independence of nations and self deficiency. Who are creating this need for globalization? Who pushes it? Does America really betting on the wrong horse as Mr. Saeed is referring in his article or just because Asia is more profitable for them?

    Per Corbett Report of G20 nations especially China and Russia pushing to monitor Federal Reserve Bank activities? Why is our nation in depression? Why is there continuous wars and outsourcing, triggering unemployment? Who cause this crisis? The International bankers, corporate and business sectors? Or United States Politicians? The evidence is conclusive. The world has expanded to its limit and will constrict at a much faster rate. The nature of man has the power but not the intellect or will to control it. It is getting clearer by the day where we are heading. He now has the power to destroy the world, if not we all are about to enter a new period of history evidencing a dramatic change in world political thought and the balance of power and the advent of a cryptoclastic or totalitarian world government.

    Until recently, the advent of a global government seemed unrealistic, and reserved for conspiracy theorists. But since the acknowledgement by then President George W. Bush in September 2008 that the United States is indeed "in the midst of a serious financial crisis", there have been numerous calls for a "new world order" by global leaders and prominent intellectuals.

    Conclusion: This is a very critical time for all Americans to bet on the correct horse. We have involved in this wrong race by our own puppet politicians.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Let me add little more to this article. Rothschild stated who control the money of nation controls the nation now the world. Donald Trump wanted to know why 7 billion dollars U.S. tax payer money had been used by U.S. bankers to buy banks in China. Holland and France voted no to the European Union - Lisbon Treaty tactics played way around to bring Holland and France in the game.

    Why is the world in condition it is in? Power and greed is the answer. There have always been factions. This is human nature. These factions sometimes result in revolution. Look at the world leaders, all in collusion. Free trade, outsourcing, destruction of unions, and destruction of the people’s rights, outsource to Asia, Western nations no control on immigration. No efforts to preserve the independence of nations and self deficiency. Who are creating this need for globalization? Who pushes it? Does America really betting on the wrong horse as Mr. Saeed is referring in his article or just because Asia is more profitable for them?

    Per Corbett Report of G20 nations especially China and Russia pushing to monitor Federal Reserve Bank activities? Why is our nation in depression? Why is there continuous wars and outsourcing, triggering unemployment? Who cause this crisis? The International bankers, corporate and business sectors? Or United States Politicians? The evidence is conclusive. The world has expanded to its limit and will constrict at a much faster rate. The nature of man has the power but not the intellect or will to control it. It is getting clearer by the day where we are heading. He now has the power to destroy the world, if not we all are about to enter a new period of history evidencing a dramatic change in world political thought and the balance of power and the advent of a cryptoclastic or totalitarian world government.

    Until recently, the advent of a global government seemed unrealistic, and reserved for conspiracy theorists. But since the acknowledgement by then President George W. Bush in September 2008 that the United States is indeed "in the midst of a serious financial crisis", there have been numerous calls for a "new world order" by global leaders and prominent intellectuals.

    Conclusion: This is a very critical time for all Americans to bet on the correct horse. We have involved in this wrong race by our own puppet politicians.

    ReplyDelete