Adam Tooze on the temptations facing a declining power
In the most recent ChinaTalk episode, Jordan Schneider asks Adam Tooze about the cold war between the US and China:
Jordan: It’s interesting thinking about the extreme Republican take on U.S.- China relations, how it almost echoes the clock running out on the U.S. We have to shut down Huawei, we have to take down SMIC, because time is absolutely not on our side.
Adam: The answer to this apocalyptic thinking, which in the case of folks like Pompeo who belong to the evangelical faction around the Trump administration, they really do have a kind of end times possibility in their kind of cosmology. That’s a dangerous thought pattern. Apparently, Peter Navarro sincerely believes that there is the possibility of a shooting war with China as a realistic prospect over the next couple of decades. That’s dangerous stuff, because the job is not to refuse a relative decline, because that’s necessary and legitimate and inevitable. The question is to code it as something other than end times. . . .This sort of apocalyptic thinking of a history that’s going to end with some sort of big bang, or some terrible ghastly discreditable whimper, rather than just facing up to reality in which the world is different and America’s position is not what it was in 1945. Which is not after all the end of the world.
The worry for me is more about the American side than it is about China. This is in no way to diminish the aggression that Beijing is clearly displaying, it’s determination to resolve the “Hong Kong problem,” and its very earnest commitment to finding a new solution for Taiwan in the foreseeable future. This isn’t to underestimate the seriousness of that intent on their part. But I don’t think it’s driven by the insistent ticking clock kind of logic.
As you’d expect, the entire interview of Adam Tooze is interesting.
Update: Gordon directed me to the latest issue of Politico:
WITH 40 DAYS LEFT until Election Day, it seems as though the United States is well on its way to becoming a banana republic.
I must be highly contagious. It seems like whenever I develop some sort of “hysterical” reaction to current events, the mainstream media follows along a few years later.
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24. September 2020 at 11:11
Some may recall that I was being called shrill 4 years ago for referring to Trump as fascist and senile. I don’t get the same reaction today. Some of us knew who Trump was all along.
24. September 2020 at 11:58
Yes, you and I were ahead of the curve.
24. September 2020 at 13:23
It’s pretty impressive the M.I.C. has managed to successfully propagandize both sides of the political isle with two different enemies (Russia and China). They really learned their lesson in from the Bush era.
24. September 2020 at 14:39
“Relative decline” strikes me as a prejudicial framing. I prefer to call it “catch-up growth.”
In any plausible future, for at least the next century if not permanently, your average American is going to have far more opportunities and a far better life than your average Chinese person. Calling Chinese development “relative decline” is like calling the improvement in the lot of African-Americans over the last 100 years a “relative decline” for white Americans.
24. September 2020 at 14:44
“William Evanina, director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center, informs us that “Russia is backing Donald Trump, China is supporting Joe Biden and Iran is seeking to sow chaos in the U.S. presidential election…”. I guess that means that Russia and China will cancel each other out and that he’s telling us that Iran will choose the next POTUS. Who would have thought that the fate of the “greatest nation in earth” (as Presidents Trump, Obama, Bush Jr, Clinton, Bush Sr and Reagan like to call it) would be hidden under a turban somewhere in Iran?
So, American, know this: your “trusted sources” are telling you not to bother to vote in November – it’s not your decision. “
https://raymcgovern.com/2020/08/20/the-abyss-of-disinformation-gazes-into-its-creators/
24. September 2020 at 15:35
Mark, I actually agree that total GDP is not that all important in today’s world. But the perception of relative decline could nonetheless drive an overreaction by the US government.
24. September 2020 at 15:57
Krugman was saying that the U.S. had become a banana republic during George W.’s first term.
24. September 2020 at 16:09
Everyone on the left was calling Trump fascist and senile and narcissistic and a moron since he started leading in the polls in 2016. Mainstream (i.e. left wing) media we’re writing glowing stories about “the resistance” to his presidency since before his inauguration.
24. September 2020 at 17:16
How trump transfers power this election cycle is a likely non-issue as old man biden is going to lose
24. September 2020 at 23:20
“It’s pretty impressive the M.I.C. has managed to successfully propagandize both sides of the political isle with two different enemies (Russia and China).”
Quite right.
Look, look, over there, it’s ‘the Russian/Chinese squirrels’.
Don’t look here at the US ‘plutocrats’ and the M.I.C.. There is nothing to see!
24. September 2020 at 23:33
“This is in no way to diminish the aggression that Beijing is clearly displaying”
Why is this statement almost always spoken by someone that is diminishing the aggression? The Italians tried to warn us about Covid-19 given their experience, but some wouldn’t listen. The Israelis and Saudis tried to warn us about the Iranian threat, but some decided to listen instead to far away Europeans. I guess because the Europeans have such a strong history in addressing threats to Jews? Fortunately, pulling out of the Iran deal and more generally supporting Israel again has given Arab nations enough confidence to make peace with Israel so that they can confront the Iranian threat together. Now, just about every Asian is warning us about the Communist Chinese threat: Hong Kongers, Uyghurs, Tibetans, Taiwanese, Japanese, Indians, South China Sea inhabitants, Singaporeans, even Chinese dissidents themselves. But, what do Asians know? They just live there. Sure, the problem is the American side, something about “cosmology”.
25. September 2020 at 03:46
” . . . the Iranian threat . . . “?
So nothing re the US invasion of Iraq, the destruction of Libya and the illegal occupation of parts of Syria.
25. September 2020 at 10:47
I think basically everyone paying attention knew everything about Trump the whole time. There have been no surprises re: Trump himself over the past 4 years at all. There have been some surprises at the inability/unwillingness of institutions and the Republican rank-and-file to stand up to Trump. The incompetence of Democrats is not super-surprising, but the sheer idiocy of the left/social justice wing is. I voted against Trump in 2016 for the same reasons I am voting against him now, but pretty much all of the risks I feared in 2016 have now been confirmed.
25. September 2020 at 12:41
Todd, We’d moved slightly in that direction–so you could argue that Krugman was right. But Krugman was also hurt by his wolf crying. When a real wolf came along, he’d lost some credibility with his over the top criticism of people like Mitt Romney.
Kevin, I agree, old man Trump will likely win.
BC, LOL, how’s Trump’s new Iran policy working out?
No mention of the Saudi atrocities in Yemen?
No mention of Russia invading Ukraine?
No mention of India’s actions in Kashmir?
You said:
“South China Sea inhabitants”
LOL sea birds?
And no mention of the fact that Taiwan controls the largest island in the South China Sea? (An island claimed by nearby countries.)
Let me guess, you have an “agenda”.
25. September 2020 at 14:23
“It was widely reported in the West that Russia then invaded Crimea. This is not so. Under an existing agreement with the Yanukovych Government, the Russian navy was already stationed at the port, with the right to have 25,000 troops there. At the time of the coup, they had 16,000.
What then happened was, given the Government in Kiev had been toppled, and given that the new Government was unconstitutional (the vote to impeach Yanukovych after he fled did not reach the sufficient numbers according to the then constitution), the Parliament in Crimea, exercised their right to hold a referendum. Interestingly enough, they had several times requested this right during the 1990s and had been told where to go in no uncertain terms by Kiev. But with a viscerally hostile anti-Russian Government, with no legal authority, now installed in Kiev, the Parliament and the people held a vote, firstly on independence, and then on whether to rejoin Russia. This was not, therefore, an annexation. It was a decision by the Crimean people, who are overwhelmingly culturally and linguistically Russian (more than 90% of the population), to secede. . . .
The Western portrayal of this was one long train of lies. To this day, they also still say that Russia invaded the Donbass. This is actually a rather amusing claim if you stop to think about it. On the one hand, we’re all supposed to be afraid at the grave threat they pose to us because “they invaded Ukraine”. But on the other hand they are apparently still, after 6 years, unable to make any further progress than a tiny chunk of land on Ukraine’s Eastern side. It’s all nonsense. If Russia had wanted to invade Ukraine, they’d have reached Kiev within 48 hours of the start of the war. And yet the West still sells this myth to a gullible public.”
http://www.theblogmire.com/the-salisbury-poisonings-two-years-on-a-riddle-wrapped-in-a-cover-up-inside-a-hoax/
25. September 2020 at 14:27
“You cannot equate Kosovo with the Crimea.
Kosovo was part of Serbia for centuries – part of their most historic legacy.
It was illegally wrenched from them by an illegal war.
The UN has never recognised this Yugoslav dismemberment of a sovereign state which is against the UN Charter and international law.
Serbia has never recognised the action.”
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2018/04/the-british-governments-legal-justification-for-bombing-is-entirely-false-and-without-merit/comment-page-1/#comments
25. September 2020 at 18:14
Scott,
Thanks buddy, imitation is the sincerest form.of flattery.
Trump fo life
26. September 2020 at 08:27
Kevin, Sad to see a Trump supporter who doesn’t understand the meaning of a pretty simply word like “imitation”.
26. September 2020 at 10:02
Thanks for the response.
Who’s the trump supporter who doesn’t understand the word imitation
26. September 2020 at 10:20
Scott,
A strange talk, there might be some interesting ideas and they talk a lot about Carl Schmitt, but it’s mostly strange, not to say dead wrong.
1) The moderator does not ask a single critical question.
2) Bringing Pompeo’s religion compulsively into play is silly, and only falls back on the person making the statement. Why would you even quote this part.
3) Tooze talks about how grandiose and grotesque the one-child policy was, but he doesn’t even address the essential point. Just below his sentences is a graph showing that this policy does not seem to have had much influence. The birth rate in the graph falls massively long before the one-child policy.
4) The cynical conclusion of Tooze seems to be that China is a fascist regime that will soon conquer Taiwan and then large parts of the world. But America should just accept that, because, hey, Carl Schmitt.
26. September 2020 at 20:49
“BC, LOL, how’s Trump’s new Iran policy working out?” You mean other than two landmark Israeli-Arab peace agreements within a few weeks when the two previous ones took decades? To be fair, the Iran policy was only one factor. The others were moving the US embassy to Jerusalem and, more generally, reverting back to pre-Obama historical support of Israel. Also, I would not credit Trump so much as Trump going along with neoconservative orthodoxy. I am no neocon myself, but I must concede that they got Iran right. I admit when other people get something right.
“No mention of Russia invading Ukraine?” Trump is wrong to downplay the significance of that. We should indeed help arm the Ukrainians. Again, I believe that is pre-Trump Republican orthodoxy. I concede that they got that one right over the Russia doves (of which Trump is one).
“South China Sea inhabitants” I was referring to countries neighboring the South China Sea, of course.
“And no mention of the fact that Taiwan controls the largest island in the South China Sea? (An island claimed by nearby countries.)” I don’t know about that island, but I believe the entire South China Sea should be treated as international waters through which Freedom of Navigation is protected.
“Let me guess, you have an ‘agenda’.” Yes, my agenda is the securing of Liberty throughout the world. China is the largest threat to Liberty in Asia, and Russia is the largest threat in Europe.
27. September 2020 at 08:40
Kevin, You.
Christian, You said:
“The cynical conclusion of Tooze seems to be that China is a fascist regime that will soon conquer Taiwan and then large parts of the world.”
Yeah, China’s always been the sort of great power than likes to conquer other countries, just like Japan, Germany, Russia, America, the UK and France and the rest.
Meanwhile, Russia actually does invade Ukraine and Trump makes one apology after another. Russia is the real threat.
BC, You said:
“To be fair, the Iran policy was only one factor. The others were moving the US embassy to Jerusalem”
LOL. The UAE thought to themselves “The US is moving its embassy to Jerusalem, time for a peace deal!”
But yes, at least the world no longer has to live in fear of Israel being invaded by Bahrain.
And Trump is not a “dove”, he’s a Putin bootlicker.
27. September 2020 at 14:21
Scott,
well, so sorry, you did link to the talk. Not my problem if you don’t grasp what Tooze is actually saying.
And China’s history has always been that China is the center of the universe, all other countries were obliged to pay tributes, and the edges of the world, seen from the center, are unworthy barbarians at best, whose existence and interests are as important as that of a cockroach.
As I have often said before, it is absurd that you recognize the danger of Russia so precisely, but not that of China. Both act in almost the same way.