A Global Power Shift in the Making

Foreign Affairs ^ | June 24, 2004 | BluegrassScholar

[RightWhale]

This article was posted a couple days ago. Our Smurf-search doesn't always find dups, though.

[CasearianDaoist]

The Bush administration's embrace of engagement with China is an improvement over its initial posture

This says is all another establishment liberal salivating at the prospect of the fall of the West.

[RightWhale]

They are nasty, evil people with malice in their hearts.

[discostu]

What, Asia is gonna take over everything?! Again?!

[GOP_1900AD]

RE: "The West must adapt -- or be left behind." Yes, indeed, we must adapt. We must adapt to the fact that the reality of national interests and power bloc geopolitics will shortly be inarguable. We must adapt to the fact that no amount of chanting the idiocy contained within texts such as "The Lexus and the Olive Tree" and "The End of History" will make the much hoped for utopia of peacably trading merchant states an actual state of being. No, we must adapt to the coming great powers conflicts, identify, proactively, the enemy's centers of gravity, and immediately commence our plans to fight the coming Axis to a conclusive, inarguable Western victory. Western, utopian, liberal intellectuals have spent the past 100 years attempting to discredit Von Clausewitz, based on the "logic" that wars of mass destruction are offensive to the Western liberal psyche and are deemed to be morally difficult. Too bad for the Western liberal psyche that the forces of anti Westernism hold no such self imposed mental strictures to their ultimate strategy. Face the facts, or be conquered, there is no grey area here. OK, to the "diplomatic" anti Clausewitzians, flame away!

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

They are so consistent, whose payroll are they on, anyway.

[E. Pluribus Unum]

Today, China is the most obvious power on the rise.

There is a power shift coming, all right, but it is the Butchers of Beijing who are going to find themselves on the short end of the stick.

The other end of that stick is going to be held by billions of oppressed Chinese civilians.

[CasearianDaoist]

Well from the tone of this article I would say that this is straight out of the CFR maw. I do not even know why I bother to read that rag anymore - it is a pretentious habit I picked up in Grad school. That bunch was so wrong about the cold war. The scary thing is that this could be a self fulfilling prophecy if Kerry gets in. We need a real containment policy for China, now. With sufficient pressure it would crack, the communist would be thrown out and we would see rational economic development. We need another R. Reagan.

[tm22721]

This is the same tripe that Thomas Friedman is spouting so it's probably safe to disregard.

Besides in the end it will only matter who has the best military.

BUMP

[Cronos]

for centuries, China was strong while Japan was impoverished

Actually, for millenia, China was storng while Japan was a backwater near-barbarian state until the Meiji restoration

[Cronos]

What, Asia is gonna take over everything?! Again?!

Yup, after being on top until the 1700s, it would be a major player by the 2050s --350 years out of the top dog position.

[King Prout]

placemark

[discostu]

I was thinking more about the 1970s and 80s when these exact same predictions were being made about the eventuality of Japan taking over the economic world.

[Cold Heat]

Nevertheless, China's own extraordinary economic rise is likely to continue for several decades -- if, that is, it can manage the tremendous disruptions caused by rapid growth, such as internal migration from rural to urban areas, high levels of unemployment, massive bank debt, and pervasive corruption. At the moment, China is facing a crucial test in its transition

Yup!, and like Russia, if the reds stay involved, they will self destruct.

[Cronos]

oh. Japan, in any case was too small. China won't take over the world because it's following a "throw money at it" kind of development with no banking or entrepreneurial infrastructure. Asia as a whole will dominate, but the US will be the dominating nation for a long, loooooong time.

But then Asia is too generic a term, covering extremely diverse regions. I'd like to call it Eurasia to combine that entire land mass.

[The_Media_never_lie]

Thanks for posting this again. I missed it the first time.

[discostu]

Asia as a concept might dominate, but none of the countries in there have the right mix of technical know-how, stable infrastructure, and availalbe stuff to do it on their own. On top of that most of Asia doesn't like most of the rest of Asia so forming any kind of co-operative relationship is pretty much out of the question. If India, China and Japan ever actually start working together we're in trouble, but there's a lot of animosity that needs to get set aside for anything like that to happen.

[Cronos]

On top of that most of Asia doesn't like most of the rest of Asia so forming any kind of co-operative relationship is pretty much out of the question

BEcause most of Eurasia falls into 5 categories --

1. the Confucian states of China, Mongolia, Japan and Kora
2. the Indian/Hindu culture states of India and South East Asia
3. the Islammic world from Pakistan to Saudi A
4. The Russians and eastern Orthodox
5. Europe/Western Christians

[discostu]

But it's even deeper than that since most of the Confucian states hate each other. Xenophobia rules that chunk of the world and hinders not only their co-operation but tends to screw up their business dealings with the rest of the world. That's one of America's biggest strengths in the world of international business, while we often don't take the time to learn foreign culture we generally like people pretty much no matter where they're from or what their skin hue is.