04-01 The Issues

If we accept the premise that the goal of China, or what they like to call the People’s Republic of China, is to become the most dominant society in the world, we would have to assume that their growth in military spending has an offensive capability. Well I just can’t see that anywhere.
The only problem serving as an amateur visionary on things like the threat posed to the US by Russia, China, North Korea or Iran, is that you never know the whole story.
The US spends something like $619 billion per year on defense, whereas China spends something like $171 billion. And the US has something like ten nuclear powered aircraft carriers to the one owned by China.
And then the US has all those nuclear-powered submarines. And what is obvious about nuclear powered subs is that they can stay underwater for long periods of time and are difficult to detect.
It is all the areas close to China, what they call the South China Sea and the East China Sea where China is trying to dominate and push out the US. China’s growing naval power is intended to strengthen and protect China’s growing power and influence in Asia.
I have been to Taiwan twice, and believe if there is ever going to be confrontation between China and the US it will be over Taiwan. I have met the President to Taiwan twice and have been interested to learn the number of Chinese Christians on Taiwan. And how closely the Taiwan ruling class identify with the west rather than Asia. I never met so many US educated PhDs anywhere compared to Taiwan.
And it was not lost on me how much the government of China must hate knowing so many historic Chinese treasures were taken from China by Chiang Kai-shek when they were driven out of China by Mao in 1949.
The other big issue is the extent to which China and Russia partner in areas linked to the economy, military spending, technology and diplomacy. Together these two nations would pose a military threat to the US.
And I am sure that the Pentagon is studying how they would conduct a war against two adversaries at the same time.
The issue of a cold war developing between the US and China is everyone’s business. The high standard of living for people living in Canada and the US is very dependant on all the cheap goods made available through trade.
But the monstrous trade surpluses generated by China has enabled it to become the banker to the world.
Even the US with its massive defense expenditures must borrow from China to pay its bills. Sound crazy? It is.