The empire's ruling tribe is beginning to discover that
while it's one thing to take the reins of the empire from the people who built
it, it's another thing to run it
successfully:
Goldman is well
positioned to explain what China is about and what the US and even the world
should do. A columnist at the Asia Times and a former senior executive of a
Hong Kong investment bank, he has traveled extensively throughout China for two
decades and negotiated directly with top Chinese industry leaders. He has also
written extensively on Jewish topics for a variety of scholarly and general
Jewish publications. His Jewish background has been central to his approach.
Goldman argues that to understand China, one has both to look at how it
operates today and to examine the long-standing cultural patterns of a proud
and distinct 5,000-year-old civilization.
Goldman explains that most Americans are simply wrong about China. The typical analogies whether on the left or the right are way off base. China does not have the aspirations of the Soviet Union; China does not want to militarily conquer the West, nor does it want to integrate in the existing world order. It could care less how others see the world. Nor is the Chinese economy dangerously over-leveraged. China is more stable than ever. Finally, he argues the Thucydides model — that as an emerging power China seeks to challenge the US — is not even relevant.
Instead, Goldman argues that the Chinese are an ancient imperial civilization who expect to rule under a mandate from heaven and have the confidence to do so. Moreover, as in the past, they prefer soft power that gives them maximum control to a military showdown that might bring chaos. For the Chinese, the ends justify the means.
Currently, China is implementing a concerted plan to control key industries and information to ensure world domination. As Goldman shows, it is working: most of the world has adopted the Huawei technology for 5G and Chinese signal encryption will soon eclipse that of the US. Soon the world will be totally reliant on Chinese technology and will knowingly or unknowingly share its data with the Chinese government. No Chinese Edward Snowden is likely to survive to warn us. With such power, China will dictate the terms of trade and interaction. Already the basic outlines of the existing China-US trade deal signal China’s dominance: the US buys Chinese technology and other manufactured goods and China buys meat and other agricultural goods from the US. These are the terms imperial powers dictate to their colonies.
Goldman outlines a plan for the US to maintain its world position. He insists that the US absolutely cannot leave it to the private sector. It must develop a government policy to massively support R&D at the industry and university levels. Measures will require huge investments and an overhaul of the American education system to drastically improve educational levels, and most of all, to quadruple the number of American graduates in the sciences and technology. Without these two steps, we will be under China’s yoke within the decade.
Goldman explains that most Americans are simply wrong about China. The typical analogies whether on the left or the right are way off base. China does not have the aspirations of the Soviet Union; China does not want to militarily conquer the West, nor does it want to integrate in the existing world order. It could care less how others see the world. Nor is the Chinese economy dangerously over-leveraged. China is more stable than ever. Finally, he argues the Thucydides model — that as an emerging power China seeks to challenge the US — is not even relevant.
Instead, Goldman argues that the Chinese are an ancient imperial civilization who expect to rule under a mandate from heaven and have the confidence to do so. Moreover, as in the past, they prefer soft power that gives them maximum control to a military showdown that might bring chaos. For the Chinese, the ends justify the means.
Currently, China is implementing a concerted plan to control key industries and information to ensure world domination. As Goldman shows, it is working: most of the world has adopted the Huawei technology for 5G and Chinese signal encryption will soon eclipse that of the US. Soon the world will be totally reliant on Chinese technology and will knowingly or unknowingly share its data with the Chinese government. No Chinese Edward Snowden is likely to survive to warn us. With such power, China will dictate the terms of trade and interaction. Already the basic outlines of the existing China-US trade deal signal China’s dominance: the US buys Chinese technology and other manufactured goods and China buys meat and other agricultural goods from the US. These are the terms imperial powers dictate to their colonies.
Goldman outlines a plan for the US to maintain its world position. He insists that the US absolutely cannot leave it to the private sector. It must develop a government policy to massively support R&D at the industry and university levels. Measures will require huge investments and an overhaul of the American education system to drastically improve educational levels, and most of all, to quadruple the number of American graduates in the sciences and technology. Without these two steps, we will be under China’s yoke within the decade.
The amusing thing about this is that Spengler -
as Goldman was known for years before he went public - was completely wrong
about China and its intentions for years. This sudden and very belated concern
for the US maintaining its world position is the result of the failure of the
post-imperial collapse jump-to-China plan.
As I pointed out several years ago, the judeochristians' assumption of their intellectual superiority was fundamentally based on their being a low-trust, high-performance group amidst a high-trust, high-performance population. Now that they are running into conflict with their first conflict with a low-trust, high-performance group since the Maccabean wars, they are discovering that they are at a significant disadvantage.
I expect the Judeo-Sinese conflict to go pretty much the same way the Judeo-Roman wars did. And the article raises the obvious question: to precisely whom does the author mean when he writes "we will be under China's yoke within the decade"?
As I pointed out several years ago, the judeochristians' assumption of their intellectual superiority was fundamentally based on their being a low-trust, high-performance group amidst a high-trust, high-performance population. Now that they are running into conflict with their first conflict with a low-trust, high-performance group since the Maccabean wars, they are discovering that they are at a significant disadvantage.
I expect the Judeo-Sinese conflict to go pretty much the same way the Judeo-Roman wars did. And the article raises the obvious question: to precisely whom does the author mean when he writes "we will be under China's yoke within the decade"?