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OK, now I understand what you mean. You seems to miss the gist of my scheme. How can China complain when America sells them much cheaper and better agro products? This is a good news to Chinese consumers by getting more value for their money. Can America complain and threaten Japan when Sony and Toyota flooded the US’s electronic and automotive market? Why does China spend 17 years of hard negotiation to enter the WTO? WTO is about free competition.

Look, Russia and North Korea can get food aid because they are really poor and food production is insufficient to feed their people. China is relatively rich (by developing country standard). Food supply is abundant. My game plan is to change the supplier (from local to imports). Its effect is not to reduce their food supply but to replace it with US imports. It benefits their consumer but damage their long-term economy. They lose the market because their own agribusiness is way too inefficient. We are not talking about starvation here. Can France obtain food aid/grant when their own farmers are driven out of business by cheaper Spanish products?

How can China obtain any international food aid/grant just because their local food market is flooded with everything (from rice to wheat, from meat to chicken) from America? Can China ask the UN for aid just because they don’t like the “Made in USA” label on their food? This is a joke.... Can they ask the UN: “We are going to start a war with our biggest food supplier, America, so, can you grant me some aid?” Or ask the US: “We are going to attack your country very soon. But, ...er... since you are our biggest food supplier and we cannot fight a war with empty stomach, can you support our cause and grant us some food aid?”

Trade war or hi-jacking their rice bowl or not, if America sits there and do nothing, Australia is going to grab a major share of the food market in China. Do you want to see that? Trade war or not, food exports to China is still a good business. Why give that to somebody?

China’s military and nuclear is still insufficient to attack America but enough to keep America from intervening in her aggression in Asia. If China ever attacks America, the reason is not for food (if they cannot produce, they can buy), oil (they have a vast reserve of natural gas in the west) or water (China floods every other year, only that the rain is not falling in the right place). Why do you think China wants to attack America? They want to occupy California? Texas? Or New York? Does Jiang or his successor want to sit in the White House managing 300 million foreign white devils? Do they want to turn America into a communist country? No, your assumptions are totally wrong. China will only attack America under one of the three scenarios.

1) America’s economic and military force is so depleted that she is totally defenseless. Under this scenario, Iraq, Iran and even Cuba can make a move on America, not only China. So, this is the least likely.

2) If China wants to expand and make a military move against Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam or India, America is their single biggest obstacle. If America responds with blockade, economic sanction, or direct military intervention, China will threaten nuclear strike on US territory. Under this scenario, would America back off and watch China expands and becomes a superpower? Or, would America call their bluff and risk an attack on US soil? What would you do if you were the US president? One way or the other, you are doomed either way. What choice do you have?

Can America stay safe by turning her head the other way in Asia politics? When a fierce gang of robbers want to rob a bank, they have to shoot down the police patrolling that street first. Otherwise, they will risk a gunfight with the police during the robbery. The question is: Would China attack America first, BEFORE they make a move on Asia’s countries? Or would they just fight with America during their act of aggression?

3) China’s basic survival is being threatened to a stage that an immediate expansion is imminent and becomes the only option. This may be driven by internal need and/or political pressure from her military. China’s ruling party, the CCP, sees their stepping down from power as a death sentence. They fear that they would be shredded to molecules by the long oppressed mass public in a bloody uprising or revolution. So, they would and prepare to do anything just to stay in power. If the CCP’s existence is being threatened in any way, they will wage a war with America to divert public attention and rally them in support of the government.

--thanks! Your scenario #3 seems the most likely to me at this point.

China’s basic survival is being threatened to a stage that an immediate expansion is imminent and becomes the only option. This may be driven by internal need and/or political pressure from her military. China’s ruling party, the CCP, sees their stepping down from power as a death sentence. They fear that they would be shredded to molecules by the long oppressed mass public in a bloody uprising or revolution. So, they would and prepare to do anything just to stay in power. If the CCP’s existence is being threatened in any way, they will wage a war with America to divert public attention and rally them in support of the government.

Hello FreepForever. What an outstanding discussion this has been so far. I've particularly enjoyed the information and perspective you've brought to bear on this topic. Some of us here have suspected PRC as the "silent partner" behind the current world war, whose opening shot was the attack on the WTC -- if not directly, then indirectly, through giving aid and comfort and technology to terrorist groups, and then just "stirring the pot" til the inevitable outbreak of hostilities would occur.

And I agree with you and zog, that PRC must "expand" (i.e., via "theft" -- i.e., conquest) in order to stay in power. What is news to me is that there are pockets of resistence within Chinese society that make the CCP uncomfortable -- and thus dangerous. I knew about the Falun Gong, anti-Christian, and other persecutions of course. But I didn't realize the extent to which CCP has gone to propagandize its own people against the United States over the past several years. I do see the dangerous necessity from CCP's point of view of identifying "external threats" in order to distract attention from critical domestic problems inside China.

As you say, no way is PRC a "strategic partner" of the United States -- or of anybody else, for that matter. The regime survives by craftiness and expediency, not by what we in the West might call civilized principles. To me, the biggest mystery of all is that there are American multinational corporations who are so deluded as to think it is possible to do business with PRC.

First of all, this potentially "vast consumer market" seems to be a total mirage. It may be vast, but there's little money there for Western goods (with the exception, as you note, of agricultural products -- the necessities of life). What good is it if there are lots of people with no money to spend? And if you're going there for "cheap labor" -- to pay cheap wages -- they still don't have much money to spend.

A second point is, if any of these multinationals had any sense of history, they should know that confiscations and nationalizations of Western investments have occurred in the past, and could occur again.

There is a third point: if these multinationals continue to work against the national interests of the countries in which they are domiciled, then it seems to me that they ought to be regarded as plainly treasonous -- and prosecutable at law. (Bernie Schwartz from Loral Corp. comes to mind as a recent example; Henry Kissinger possibly might fit the bill also.)

These multinationals have the protection of U.S. law -- contractual, copyright, patent and other (none of which means a thing inside China today) -- which makes it possible for them to do business in the first place. And then they seek to undermine the nation that upholds and defends the very law that protects their interests -- for some perceived benefit that is more illusion than real? This is the part I don't "get."

If U.S.-based multinationals do not feel they have a duty of loyalty to their own country, then maybe they should consider doing business elsewhere. If they think PRC is such a good place, well -- may they relocate there and good luck to them. All their "stuff" would likely end up in the hands of PLA and other elites inside Chinese society in due course, and they'd be given the boot -- or worse.

In the final analysis, there is nothing in Communism that respects the necessary conditions of real economic development: free markets, individual initiative and creativity, the right of private property, the right of contract, etc. Which is why China remains a third-world, economic basket case to this day; and why the Soviet Union finally simply gave up the ghost. And the system cannot be "fixed" as long as the CCP continues to deny the sanctity of the individual. (I'd argue the latter is fundamentally what has made America great.)

Thank you for your excellent contributions, FreepForever. I hope you'll write again, whenever the spirit moves you. Best wishes -- bb.

China has enough food to feed not only itself but the entire world. Just check out any American, Japanese, European, or Korean grocery store these days to see how many products are coming out of China. The Japanese and Koreans complain that Chinese rice is flooding their markets. This rice costs 5-6 times lower than their local rice. 800-900 mil. Chinese farmers today can still produce a lot of food, and they still mostly do it the old fashioned way -- using ox and cart and hands. Just imagine when more Chinese farming is done with massive machinese like in America. The productivity will be even higher, the water wastage smaller, and the manpower needed lower. 100 years ago, America's population was about 70% still living on farms, like China is today. Today, 75% of Americans live in urban areas. China will experience a similar "urbanization" migration from farms to cities. As the urban population grows, China's GDP will rise, while food output also increases due to the industrialization of agriculture.

Bump.