Decouple and Control: US Must Secure Supply Chains and Production as China breaks its treaty guaranteeing Hong Kong political autonomy

Epoch Times ^ | 07/03/2020 | Austin Bay

[SeekAndFind]

Beijing’s June 30 decision to impose its national security law on Hong Kong renders the Sino-British Joint Declaration of 1984 null and void. Promising one China, two systems, that treaty guaranteed Hong Kong’s political autonomy through 2047.

So another Chinese Communist Party guarantee has entered the dustbin of history. Now tyrannical whim backed by military threat will rule the city. After a decent interval of propaganda glorifying “one China, one system,” the Pearl of the Orient’s free media and honest courts will die along with its democracy.

CCP guarantees go poof when its senior leaders decide breaking a treaty, ignoring a contract or hedging a deal serves them. In short form, that’s unfortunate Hong Kong’s strategic lesson.

To protect their own political, economic and military security, the United States and other democracies must treat Beijing’s CCP regime as the aggressive adversary it is.

Unfortunately, the economic globalization process that accelerated in the 1990s entwined the U.S. and Chinese economies. A large slice of U.S. manufacturing moved offshore. China began producing computers, communications gear and pharmaceuticals. Why? As China’s economy modernized, the United States bet political liberalization would follow. International integration would moderate China’s communists, and a democracy focused on internal development and peaceful economic competition would emerge.

Information globalization, however, didn’t follow economic embrace. The Great Firewall of China (attempting to isolate Chinese digital connectivity) exemplifies CCP hedging.

Evidence of CCP dirty dealing emerged in the 1990s, even as the United States lost critical production capacity and ceded control of vital mineral resources to unreliable foreign states. Evidence that America was vulnerable to a rare-earths embargo emerged in 2010. The COVID-19/Wuhan virus pandemic has exposed the fragility and flaws of globalized supply chains and extensive offshore production, especially drugs and medical gear.

[immadashell]

I’M SHOCKED!

[imardmd1]

Yeah! Just keep on shifting more abd more of the burden of drug supply to India! < /sarc >