Trump was niet mals voor China tot nu toe.
Anderzijds kwam Tillerson geheel afgekoeld en positief terug na een gesprek met Xi. Hij sprak over een win-win toekomst.
Op 6 en 7 april , over 10 dagen dus, ontvangt Trump de baas van China in zijn buitenverblijf Mar a Lago.
-------------------------
Even kort de situatie: China heeft nu al een BNP dat 3 trillion$ groter is dan dat van de VS.
Over 13 jaar zal het tweemaal zo groot zijn en over 35 jaar drie keer zo groot.
De Theucides Trap is een 'concept' uit het oude Griekenland: Als een grootmacht ziet dat er een concurrent opkomt, is het wellicht zinvol om die 'in de knop te smoren': dus een oorlog starten nu je die nog kunt winnen. Voorbeeld:
Engdahl: WO1 werd bedacht door Engeland omdat ze wisten dat anders Duitsland de baas zou worden.
Hier dreigt dus oorlog tussen China en Amerika.
Het lijkt er op dat Amerika die oorlog zoekt. De Pivot to the East, van Obama en Hillary.
Maar Amerika wilde tegelijk ook dat het militair sterke Rusland niet meer sterk zou worden, en probeert nu al enkele jaren om Rusland te destabiliseren.
Door zowel Rusland als China tegelijk aan te vallen heeft de VS ze in elkaars armen gedreven.
Dat kan nooit de bedoeling zijn geweest van Washington.
==============================
Hoe denkt China?
Wat zijn hun aspiraties?
Op RT was een kort en informatief interview.
Eerst een samenvatting.
Onder de gele streep de integrale tekst van dat interview. .
------------------------------
Michal Pillsbury. China kenner. Adviseur van Trump, en Pentagon. CFR lid. ( Boek)
Sophie & Co, 24 maart 2017, 30 min.
In 2009 organiseerden de Chinezen een BRICS oppositie tegen het VS klimaatplan. Obama boos.
China heeft nu een plan om oorlog tussen VS en China te voorkomen.
Oplossing: als China meer koopt van de VS. Samenwerking mbt terreur.
De 'Freedom of Navigation' wet speelt een rol. ( Eilanden die China ophoogt.)
China wil de VS niet kwaad maken. Ze willen zeker geen oorlog. Ze willen hun macht verwerven door het te verdienen. China heeft het streven om de grootste te worden.
VS is al de grootste macht sinds 1898. De VS is er van overtuigd dat niemand rol van 'de grootste' kan overnemen.
( 9.30) Pillsbury: er is geen 'Chinees gevaar'. Geen Chinese dreiging. Ik zeg: Wij onderschatten de aspiraties van China om de grootste te worden.
De Chinezen vinden het streven naar Hegemonie middels een militaire overmacht afkeurenswaardig.
Wat de VS en Rusland deden keuren ze af: 'bah' is hun term voor dit soort superman gedrag.
China wil op haar 'natuurlijke deugd' een geliefde supermacht zijn.
Sophie: Is er iets fout aan als China zo de wereld zou leiden?
Pillsbury: Als ze zich beschaafd gaan gedragen is het niet zo slecht. ( Mensenrechten, goed climaat-beleid etc.) Dan is het niet zo erg, hoewel ik en ook Trump het niet leuk vinden.
( 16.30) Sophie: "U beweert dat China stiekem het plan heeft om de wereld over te nemen, maar U werd zelf uitgenodigd in Bejing om hun plannen aan te horen.?'
Pillsbury: "De havikken, de yingpai, willen mij gebruiken om hun positie aan de VS kenbaar te maken. De yingpai zijn bang dat er per ongeluk een oorlog zou kunnen uitbreken.
De Chinezen zeggen : VS is op haar retour, enzou zich dus meer bescheiden moeten opstellen. Ze willen de VS niet vernederen, maar zeggen wel: 'don't mess with China' ( want anders...)
Ze willen dat ik dit overbreng aan de VS.
Sophie: "Maar het optreden van het Amerikaanse leger daar in de Chinesse zee zal de havikken juist machtiger maken ! " Pillsbury: "Ja, dat is het gevaar. "
Pillsbury geeft een voorbeeld uit het verleden, toen de VS ook niet wilde zien wat China zag:
"In 1950 dachten wij dat we een mandaat haden van de UN om Noord en ZuidKorea te verenigen. Ebn we trokken er heen met ons leger. Maar China zag het als een bedreiging voor haar veiligheid en zond 200.000 soldaten naar Noord Korea. We schrokken on s te pletter en verloren heel veel van onze soldaten. "
(19.15) Sophie: "Zijn er Amerikaanse havikken die een oorlog met China wensen? Kunnen die worden gecontroleerd?"
Pillsbury: "Ik denk niet dat ze oorlog willen, maar ze willen de Chinezen wel een lesje leren, op het matje roepen. Ze vinden dat China zich niet aan de regels houd ( spionage , tech diefstal, etc. ) En onze havikken willen niet inzien dat onze macht kleiner wordt. Ze denken nog steeds dat onze beste dagen nog moeten komen.
Velen denken dat China een papieren tijger is, en dat pressie op China haar juist zal doen instorten.
( JV: een tactiek die tav Rusland wel is gelukt)
( 20.30) Pillsbury bepleit dat er meer boeken over Strategie uit het chinees worden vertaald. Wijze lessen over hoe je oorlog voert.
( JV:
Een lang commentaar op Amazon toont aan dat die boeken al lang bekend zijn in de engelse taal. Pillsbury werpt zich op als 'belangrijke bron' terwijl anderen nog onwetend zijn,. Maar dat is onjuist, zegt de commenter. Pillsbury maakt zich groter dan hijis. Dat is verder niet zo belangrijk.)
(21) In Zuyid Korea hebben we afweer raketten staan die tegen Noord Korea gericht zijn. Maar de Chinezen hebben op de website van Raytheon gelezen dat diezelfde afweer-raketten met een sachakelaar om te draaien tot 3000 km kunnen functioneren en dus ook in China hun werk kunnen doen. De Yingpai hebben nu gepleit om veel meer kernwapens in China.
Trump gaat wapens leveren aan Taiwan. Hoe reageert China?
"Ze zijn boos, maar dat is meer voor de buhne. De VS heeft een wet die zegt dat Taiwan er van op aan kan dat ze tegen een aanvan van China verdedigd zal worden. China weet dat."
"Ik vind het veel gevaarlijker dat onze legers nu zo dicht bij elkaar zijn,. Ik ben bang voor een oorlog als gevolg van een misverstand."
De Amerikanen zeggen zelf dat er maar 1 China is en doen verder zaken met beide China's. Ze doen of hun neus bloedt. Dat noemen ze 'OUR 1 Chiuna policy", en daar kan Bejing mee leven.
(25) "Uit de jaren 70, toen de Chinese economie nog maar 10% van de onze was, hebben we allerlei gunstige afspraken met China, zoals het gratis doorgeven van wetenschappelijke informatie. Ik denk dat we daar nu mee moeten stoppen."
"Alle Amerikaanse ministeries hebben wel afspraken met China. Maar nu ze ons een beetje demoniseren, moet n we daar mee stoppen vind ik. "
Trump schreef drie boeken waarin hij zijn bewondering voor de Chinezen als onderhandelaren niet verbergt. Het 5 jarig dochtertje van Ivanka leert al Chinees.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
Extra info:
Het Chinese denken is een mix van Taoisme, Conficianisme en buddhisme.
Ze hebben vele boeken geschreven over de kunst van het oorlogvoeren. ( Die worden nu ook gebruikt in handboeken over: zaken doen, concurreren, omgaan met een vijand etc. )
Wijsheden over oorlog voeren:
======================================
(*)
Hier het volledige interview met Pillsbury uitgeschreven:
American hawks want showdown
with China – Pentagon adviser
Published time: 24
Mar, 2017 08:38Edited time: 24 Mar, 2017 10:20
This century may see the greatest shift in the
balance of power in history. Plagued with economic and infrastructure troubles,
and internal divisions, the US risks losing its role as global leader. China is
preparing to take over the lead role, while not everyone is taking its plans
seriously. With Trump in power – how far will the US-China rivalry go? Will the
new administration play the containment card once again? Or will the two great
powers find a way forward? We ask Pentagon consultant, adviser to the Trump
campaign, and author of The Hundred-Year Marathon – Michael
Pillsbury.
Sophie
Shevardnadze: Pentagon
consultant, member of the Council on Foreign Relations, author of the “Hundred
Year Marathon” - Dr. Michael Pillsbury, welcome to the show, great to have you
with us, sir. On his first visit to China as Secretary of State Rex Tillerson
has said that China and America are at ‘a historic moment in their
relationship’. Could Beijing and Washington be preparing ground for some new
deal, a new phase in the US-China relationship?
Michael Pillsbury: Yes, I think the both sides are preparing for the Mar-a-Lago
summit where there’ll be extensive exchanges, many hours of talks between
President Xi Jinping and Donald Trump. This will be their first meeting, so
it’s quite important. I agree with Secretary of State Tillerson that this is a
kind of historic moment in U.S.-China relations. The Trump campaign had a lot
of very negative rhetoric against China, kind of scared the Chinese government,
so I think there’s a relief in China, which I last visited a month ago, on this
new phase of the Trump administration to seek cooperation and what Secretary
Tillerson called “Win-win” outcome.
SS: So, what’s so historic about this visit? Far from the hostile rhetoric
we’ve heard from both sides in previous months, relations are quite amicable -
what’s the catch here?
MP: The issue is going to be how much President Trump changes President Obama’s
approach to China. President Obama, as you know, got quite offended in 2009, at
the Copenhagen Climate Change summit, when he sort of stumbled into a room with
Hillary Clinton with him and found that Chinese were organising a meeting of
the heads of state, of Russia, India, Brazil, to oppose the American climate
change plan. It was quite a hostile meeting and things never really improved
from 2009. President Obama refused a Chinese request to agree to a new concept
of a World Order that the Chinese call [speaks chinese] It’s translated,
roughly, as “new model” of the Great Power relations. It’s supposed to be to
avoid war between the U.S. and China. So, Obama administration wanted to
explore it, but never quite accepted it. Secretary Tillerson has said some of
the keywords in this new formulation when he was in Beijing - so it’s already a
step towards U.S.-China cooperation, greater than with President Obama. There
are a number of other areas of friction between the two.
SS: Yeah, he’s called for ‘win-win cooperation’ - so where exactly can
China and the US agree to cooperate?
MP: There are quite a few areas, the most important are economics and trade.
There’s a series of things, that I written in an article called “The Road to
Make America Great Again Runs Through Beijing” - it means if that we have good
trade ties with China and China buys a great deal more American products, this
will help the Trump administration to meet its pledge of 4% annual growth.
Terrorism is another… there’s other areas of cooperation. China doesn’t help us
on the ground, militarily, against ISIS, but they have provided cooperation on
terrorism in exchange for us taking into account their own concerns with
Eastern Turkestan independence movement and terrorism inside China. So, this is
another area of cooperation. Sophie, you can imagine the nightmare it would be
if China were a pro-terrorist state, and actively supporting ISIS and Al-Qaeda.
China used to be in favor of armed revolution back in the 1960s - so this is a
great area of cooperation that we need to expand.
SS: Okay, but amicable statements coming from top officials - it’s great,
but they won’t just take the stumbling blocks away in a relationship, right?
What is the Trump administration going to do about the issues standing in the
way - like the South China Sea dispute? For example, will it continue the
freedom of navigation patrols through what China claims as its territorial
waters?
MP: In terms of freedom of navigation operation, that’s a tradition that goes
back more than a 100 years, began with the British, actually. What Obama has
done is not good - he had the American destroyers to go through the
territorial claims of China, turn off their weapons radar, not launch
helicopters, going in the straight line and pretty much let the Chinese know
where they are going. A more aggressive approach has been proposed that the
U.S. and other countries - including France, England, Japan - would not respect
these territorial claims of China, and they would not seek so called “innocent
passage”. I don’t know, if mr. Trump is going to do that or not - it’s one
option that he has, obviously.
SS: Now, in your book ‘the Hundred Year Marathon’ you say the Chinese hawks are
following a multi generation plan to attain global dominance. Why don’t you
think the Chinese leadership will ever agree to the role of one of the world’s
superpowers alongside the United States?
MP: Well, the way the Chinese express it is that they want to avoid
Hitler and Stalin, and Tojo and this kind of model that sought through
aggressive, armed forces to expand territory. Their view is that China’s, I
hate to say “domination”, but China’s role as a #1 power will come by earning
it - they expect to be double of the American economy by 2030 - a couple of
their most famous economists have already written this. They expect to be the
triple of the American GDP by 2049 - that’s what I call “A hundred year
marathon”, from a book by Chinese hawk. So, when they’re triple of our economy,
they have options. They can build up their armed forces, if they wish, to
double or triple our size, but their idea is to get through the next 20 or 30
years peacefully. They’re quite afraid of alerting the American public to their
long-term prospects, of being double or triple us. America, as you know,
Sophie, has been the #1 economy in the world since about 1898. So we’re quite
complacent that God gave us this role and no one can take it away, but already
the IMF and the World Bank have announced that the Chinese economy has
surpassed us. They are two, almost three trillion dollars bigger than us. So,
the size of the entire Russia GDP - that’s how much larger the Chinese GDP is
bigger than America already. This is quite significant.
SS: But, you know, long-term planning is great, but a hundred years? That’s so
far away! You can be as hawkish as you get, but there’s no guarantee your great
grandkids will continue doing what you want them to do, a hundred year plan is
still quite a bit of a stretch, no?
MP: Yes. I don’t think it’s a plan in the sense of details, I think it’s
an aspiration - it would be a better word. They first met in public in 1955
when the Great Chairman Mao himself said that China’s goal is to first surpass
America and then pull way ahead. At that point he estimated it would take 75
years. So, it’s not a plan that worked out. That’s an aspiration, and they’ve
gone quite far in succeeding. They were 10% of our economy back in the 70s.
SS: Tell me something - is the current administration listening to your
arguments about the Chinese threat?
MP: I don’t argue that there’s a Chinese threat. I argue that we’ve
underestimated China’s aspiration and Chinese capability. So part of of the
Administration agrees with me, yes.
SS: Okay, maybe “threat” is a bad word, but are they listening to your advice?
Are they listening to your analysis? Are they also seeing China in 100 years
being the #1 World Power?
MP: I think you saw in three of Mr. Trump’s books. It’s very similar to my
argument. In fact, you could almost say, Trump came before me - I’m not
claiming that I’ve instructed him. It’s in his books going back at least 15-18
years.
SS: But here’s what I’m thinking - China has never in its history been
aiming at global domination, it was always content to stay the dominant power
in its region - why would the traditions break all of a sudden?
MP: Again, this word “world domination” - that’s not the word Chinese use. They
claim that the Soviet Union and the U.S. sought what they call “hegemony” -
they’ve got a wonderful word for it, “Ba”. “Ba” is a ruthless hegemon from the
Warring States period, 25 hundred years ago. He used force and deception to
maintain domination. China’s view is they are going to earn their way with
virtue, economic power. Everyone is eventually going to welcome them to be the
leading economic power. So, “domination” is the wrong word, they would never
use that. They might use a term like “natural virtue” of China, that will cause
a new world order. There’s often speak of a more just world order, that they
are going to to work toward as they become stronger and stronger economically.
The new world order will be more just, they say, because the Southern half of
the Globe will have more power in the UN specialised agencies, in the World
Bank and the IMF, in this global structure created in 1944-1945.
SS: So the key point of China’s version of the global order is removing
American dominance - and I mean, me and you can use this word, “dominance”,
because neither of us are Chinese. So, the way you described it: it’s about
removing pressure groups and basing decisions on consensus.
MP: That’s right.
SS: Here’s what I’m asking, is there anything wrong with the Сhinese world order other than the US is no longer the world’s leader?
MP: Well, it depends on what kind of reforms China puts in place. If the new
China-led world order, let’s call it, has policies on climate change and
reduction of pollution, and the human rights violations, support for
responsibility to protect, of the UN, the whole series of rules based on the
global order approaches that the U.S. has been advocating - then that kind of
China-led world is not so bad. I wouldn’t like it, I mean, I’m an American
patriot who wants America First - I agree with mr. Trump very strongly. But if
it’s an unreformed China, that has got some really, unfortunately, almost
wicked policy features or it gets worse than it is today… Then we will all
regret letting China assume the #1 post in the world.
SS: In the title of your book, you call China’s quest for domination a
‘secret’ strategy - but the way you’ve learned all about it is actually by
being invited to China’s armed forces conference in Beijing. Now why would
Chinese hawks invite an American policy-maker like you to their gathering -
perhaps they want to get their position across to the US leaders?
MP: I think that’s the reason. I think the Chinese hawks who are known as
“eagles” to some degree in Chinese language, “ying pai”, “ying” can be a “hawk”
or an “eagle” - they’ve felt frustrated that the American government has not
understood their views. Their books have not been translated into English, and
so a lot of what I do in the “Hundred Year Marathon” is to give a voice to
China's hawks. They are not all military and they seek to avoid war, but they
are quite a bit more concerned that an accidental war could break out between
U.S. and China due to misperceptions. That’s why they sometimes go into
detail with me with me about military scenarios. China’s view, especially the
hawks, is that America is in decline, actually, in a very sharp decline, and
needs to be more modest in the world and accept its role of what in Chinese
history is very common - an old haegeman, an old emperor in decline, and
replaced by new powers. So that doesn’t mean they want to humiliate America,
but it means they expect more modesty from us and they’re very concerned to use
me as a channel to convey these… sometimes, the warnings of war to the U.S. -
“Don’t mess with China!”.
SS: Don’t you think that surrounding China will only empower the hawks in
Beijing and make it more confrontational?
MP: That’s the most dangerous thing we’re facing now. The U.S. Air Force and
Navy operate closer and closer to Chinese Air Force and Navy units. As happened
in 2001, there could be an encounter, an accident, in which both sides have
their own view on what happened. In some ways, that’s how 1950 and the Korean
War broke out. U.S. thought it had a UN mandate to unify North Korea and South
Korea, but as our forces came closer and closer to the Chinese border, they
interpreted it as potential invasion, secretly sent more than 200,000 troops,
many wore white snow suits, who surprised the heck out of U.S. in North Korea,
and, ultimately, 30,000 American soldiers were killed because of this failure
to analyse on both sides the dangers of our units getting closer and closer
together. I am also afraid of this scenario.
SS: What about American hawks? Are there forces in Washington that desire a
confrontation with China? Can they be tamed?
MP: I wouldn’t say they desire a war, but there are American hawks, they
sometimes want to have a showdown to teach China a lesson, because they feel
China doesn’t respect the American power, or China has broken so many rules:
technology theft, espionage against our companies, there’s quite a long list of
what our hawks see as bad behaviour by China. Our hawks tend to not accept that
we’re a declining power. They think America’s best days are still ahead, as
Ronald Reagan would say, so you have this difference in our balance of power
assessments on the American side. The China, they believe, is quite weak.
There’s a famous book called “The Coming Collapse of China” that came out about
10 years ago. Very widespread view that China is a paper tiger itself and could
easily collapse, and therefore American pressure will cause Chinese
concessions. That’s quite a strong view here in Washington.
SS: In your book, you mention that ‘unfortunately the vast majority of China
experts in the US don’t speak Chinese beyond a few words’ - so how informed is
Washington’s China policy then?
MP: In many ways, it’s very well informed. I have only praise for CIA and DIA.
On the other hand, on the strategic thinking level, I’ve been advocating that
we need to publish in English some of China’s best books on strategy. The hawks
and others have written series of lessons they’ve learned from the Warring
States period that they apply today and to the future. Seems to me, we can’t go
wrong by reading Chinese authors in English, in translation, to get an idea of
how different their thinking is from our own. They do that with us. Almost
every major book by anybody in the U.S. - dr. Kissinger and others - you can
find in Chinese bookstores, fairly quickly after publication, in Chinese.
SS: The US is deploying a missile defence system in South Korea - officially
it’s aimed against the North Korean threat, but China sees it as a threat to
its own security. Do you expect China to retaliate? What can it do?
MP: Yes. They’ve already had some threatening articles. This was the main topic
when I was in Beijing. They have gone to Raytheon company website and learned
that this missile defence system has a kind of switch that can convert it from
a short-range, a 300 mile range, to a long range, as much as between 1500 to
2000 miles, and therefore covering the Chinese ICBM fields, and in some sense,
be able to give an excuse to China’s hawks to greatly increase the number of
nuclear weapons, ICBM force that they have. I don’t want this to happen myself,
but we’ve got to try to persuade them that THAAD as it’s called, isn’t
really designed to do that, it’s a defence against North Korea, and we need to
enlist China’s cooperation in much stronger pressure against North Korea.
Otherwise, they’re putting at risk their own strategic ICBM fields. So, I
think, China is probably going to cooperate more on North Korea, at least in
the area of sanctions and pressure. That could be just my wishful thinking
which I had before.
SS: Washington says the One China policy towards Taiwan isn’t going to be
challenged for now - however, the US is preparing to sell a large arms package
to Taiwan, how’s that going to sit with the Chinese?
MP: They object to even selling one bullet or one spare tire to the Taiwan
military, but a lot of that is just bluff to let us know that they don’t
appreciate it. We have a law that requires the President to provide enough
weapons so that Taiwan can defend itself and to keep our own forces in good
shape in case there’s a crisis in the area. The Chinese know this very well, it
dates back to Jimmy Carter administration. So I don’t expect some huge
out-of-the-proportion reaction by the Chinese. What I’m more worried about is,
I’ve mentioned this to you, the accidental war with patrols so close to each
other, including in the Taiwan Strait. It’s only a 100 miles wide and
often their jet fighters in mainland China and Taiwan’s jet
fighters, in my view, come too close to each other. So, the issue of Taiwan is
not going to go away, but so far, it’s been managed and obviously the Chinese
were very relieved when mr. Trump in his phone call to President Xi said that
he intends to maintain “our China policy” - now, I want to underline the word
“Our” - he didn’t accept the Chinese principle that Taiwan belongs to China, he
agree with what Nixon and Jimmy Carter and other American presidents since 1972
have done - that we just won’t discuss whom Taiwan belongs to. It’s our “one
China” policy, which is what Mr. Trump said according to the press, and I’m
very strongly supporting his approach.
SS:You say the US needs to stop helping China ‘increase its productivity’ -
but is it too late for that now? Not like you can get General Electric,
Microsoft, General Motors to stop investing in China? Where will iPhone's be
put together?
MP: My books talks about U.S. government programs to help China’s
economic growth. They were put in place by Jimmy Carter in 1979 when China was
really only 10% of our economic size, and they’re all still there. We cooperate
far more with China, we help China far more, for example the National Science
Foundation, than we do with Russia. We have almost a hundred agreements, we
have a large National Science Foundation office in Beijing. When we make a
discovery like prairie grass roots that can go deeper, helping Chinese
agricultural productivity, we transfer it immediately to China, for free. All
U.S. government departments have some sort of assistance program with China. It
made a lot of sense in 1979, but it needs to be re-evaluated, it seems to me,
especially, if China’s going to demonize us in their books and articles as a
declining hegemon who’s seeking war. I think China should not say that about
America.
SS: You believe Trump succeeded in staying unpredictable in the eyes of the
Chinese - why do you think that’s an effective strategy?
MP: Mr. Trump thinks it’s an effective strategy, because he has so much praise
for how clever the Chinese are. This is in all three of his books, where he
mentions China. It’s actually a very witty observation that he makes
about how Chinese are the best negotiators he personally has ever encountered
and he explains in his most recent book that that’s why he wants to be
unpredictable to give him a kind of advantage or an edge in negotiating with
the Chinese. It’s really a kind of flattery or admiration for the Chinese. I
think, as you know, Ivanka, Trump’s daughter, only 5 years old, has been
studying Mandarin for more than three years. She goes on Instagram reciting
Tang dynasty poetry - so the Trump family has been involved with China. China -
after the election, actually - has approved that the Trump brand can be
registered in China, the case that has been going on for almost 30 years and it
has not been the one in favor of Mr. Trump. So he seems to have a kind of
admiration for their negotiating skills and the Chinese art of the deal.
SS: Alright. Thank you
so much for this wonderful interview. We were talking to Michael Pillsbury,
author of the “Hundred Year Marathon”. Dr. Pillsbury, can you hold up your book
for us, please, so that the viewers can see what the cover looks like? There
you go, a “Hundred Year Marathon” by Michael Pillsbury. We were discussing the
challenges of the looming global rivalry of the U.S. and China. That’s it for
this edition of SophieCo, I will see you next time.
