The massive expansion of NATO, not only in Eastern and Central Europe but the Middle East, Latin America, Africa and Asia, presages endless war and a potential nuclear holocaust.
NATO and its parent, the United States government, has no purpose other than to attack and destroy anything that is perceived as threatening to the U.S. government, and nearly everything is perceived as a threat by the paranoid rulers in Washington and Langley. Billions of dollars into the pockets of weapons manufacturers. Billions of dollars sent to Ukraine into the hands of Nazis. All this while the people of the United States are suffering from lack of jobs, lack of health care, privitization of education, lack of a living wage, abysmal and deadly working conditions, homelessness, deaths of despair and no support or protection from the ravages of SARS-CoV-2. The filth and corruption of the government and its revolving door to and from think tanks of the ruling class are devouring the planet for profit and an almost sexual satisfaction of wielding power for the sake of it.
But this is the last gasp of a doomed society. Unfortunately, before the capitalist hegemons are brought down, many milions of people will die, whether from war, starvation, or environmental destruction.
Facts on the ground and the academic work of Mearsheimer, Stephen Cohen, and Sachs (as well as many other Russian scholars and military and geo-political experts) can't penetrate the incredible propaganda machine that's been ginned up and sent into overdrive.
Pro-War Liberals and progressives are flying the Ukrainian flag.
Even Chomsky is baffled by all this - only a Freudian analysis seems capable of explaining the collective suicide.
After years of Russiagate lies & propaganda, it's clear that Americans can no longer think straight regarding Russia (if they ever could). I don't know what western Europe's problem is, maybe they were brainwashed by Russiagate too.
Sadly, your analysis is correct. Following this current war and the forces at work can be self mortifying and definitely the results are unknown, but perhaps very predictable given the history of the 20th century. The war is looking grim and the Ukraine is being destroyed day by day and so many people already killed. I can only conclude that we are in need of mature leaders who understand the consequences and they are not there. Thank you for your clear voice Chris. I do pray for true leadership in yet another dark time.
The leaders in the U.S. have maintaining and expanding U.S. empire as their top priority. They're such psychopaths that they apparently now think that nuclear war is an acceptable option. Considering this, we'll be very lucky to avoid nuclear war, and by "we" I mean the Earth and all the life here, not just humans.
It's no fun reading Hedges' assessment that we're closer to all-out nuclear war than the Cuban Missile Crisis. There's nothing of comparable gravity in the media, just political sniping-as-usual. I suppose informing people that the world could end so capitalism can make a those last few bucks would dampen profits.
That the greatest minds in charge of our nuclear arsenal can only think to replay the plot of 1984's "Threads", a cinema-verite British movie that gave me years of middle- and high-school nightmares of what nuclear war really meant, is beyond absurd. There is no off-world sanctuary, no bunkers that will protect the Croesuses of today from nuclear war. They will die out here with us and the rest of the biosphere.
It's absolutely insane (Dr. Strangelove-level insane) that profiteering bureaucratic goons think they can predict the course and extent of a nuclear conflict. After the first nuclear volley, all bets are off. Their only concern is how such destruction will affect the bottom lines of the arms culture they serve. Those industries can probably absorb the 90,000,000 deaths predicted in one of their scenarios. Those killed will be rank and file human beings, hardly worth the effort needed to avoid such a nightmare in the first place. After the nuclear dust settles, they'll simply move on and create a new war zone, no muss, no fuss.
A nuclear war, assuming that it's not limited, would kill a lot more than 90 million people; it would kill a lot more than that in the U.S. alone, and likely make the Earth unlivable for the foreseeable future.
Yes China has been working ruthlessly to grow economically. But the same Blob/MIC voices now desperate to stir up hysterical fears were the exact same people who surrendered the West's industrial advantage to China (and enormous middle class wealth) so that banks could earn outsized fees from globalization deals and so that the stock prices (and executive compensation) of the companies moving production to China could be hugely inflated and so the direct competition from Chinese (and similar places) would massively surpress the wages of domestic workers (further inflating stock prices and executive compensation).
Anyone in Washington and Brussels who thinks that China's Belt and Road initiative presents a major economic threat is braindead or cynically dishonest. Upgrading a few China-Europe rail links is useful for everyone but not a big deal. These links have existed for decades and remain totally uncompetitive with ocean shipping. Most BRI projects are make work projects for Chinese companies; few of the ports and freight terminals make any sense, and the process of client governments who cannot possibly pay for projects that don't produce any revenue turning against Beijing angrily has already begun.
Everyone has understood for decades that the autonomy of Taiwan was never going to be sustainable forever. No one has done more to to hasten the inevitable end of Taiwanese independence that NATO, who have shown Chinese military hawks that the people running the Western military are paper tigers incapable of doing anything more than pounding tables in order to maintain taxpayer funding that can't accomplish anything in Afghanistan, much less Ukraine or the South China Sea.
A quibble or two, Chris. The US government debt and the debt service are not actually a problem for reasons that would take too long to explain and belong in a different forum. It's also possible that the loss of reserve currency status may not be a bad thing.
Actually, the level of private debt, including mortgages, student debt, car loans, credit card debt, etc., is the real problem. People are spending so much of their income on debt service, their discretionary income for consumption is dropping and wages aren't rising enough to make a difference. As we move into a recession, private spending will fall causing more problems for the economy.
That being said, the rest of your analysis is spot on. The sanctions we have imposed on Russia have backfired tremendously and that, plus any specific retaliation by Russia and/or China (if we start sanctioning them) is what will sink the American economy. There is no substantial amount of manufacturing in the US anymore, we exported it all to China and other Asian countries, except for armaments. You can't eat armaments.
Otherwise, all that is left in the US is the predatory elite of multi-national corporations and Wall Street who control our economy and politics and the financialization that has been part and parcel of the neoliberal project for the past 50 years.
I'm in my 70's, so I don't expect to live to see the Jackpot (if readers aren't familiar, Google it), but I grieve for my children and grandchildren. We are well and truly fucked.
Support and stand with Russia which fights for all of us against corrupt and criminal US “elite” and its bipartisan War party (Biden, Pompeo, Obama, Pelosi, Cotton, Blinken, Nuland, McConnell, Schumer, etc…).
We live in choreographed and constructed endless lies starting with Russia-gate immense hoax. We are totally controlled by a criminal and immensely corrupt “elite”. Ukraine was their bottomless goldmine since even before 2014. They provoked Russia’s special military operation to protect its goldmine -- hence immense hatred of CAPITALIST Russia which has infinitely higher moral values than US ruling “elite” gangsters.
There's no doubt that the good old US of A can stand a major change in its foreign policy by brutality.
There is no doubt that the US of A and the Military Industrial Complex control much of our so called "Democracy" (where people who do not get the majority of votes can win elections).
Citizens of the US of A are given choices from which to vote depending upon what the establishment of both parties decide we can vote on.
Media and conspiracy theories drive many to vote against their own best interest.
Yes, there is a lot that needs to be improved in our government, but Russia is not an example as it is governed by a dictator and billionaires who have stolen the soul of true Russia as Alexei Navalny and many more bear witness to Putin's control. https://www.imrussia.org/en/political-prisoners
OUTSTANDING int’w – including that commission’s chairman, Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs, concluded that Covid virus was made --- in a US LAB !!
The Lancet COVID-19 Commission, an interdisciplinary initiative set up by the prestigious medical journal to improve the world’s response to the pandemic, last month quietly and abruptly dissolved its origin task force after 10 months of work. That news was preceded by a dispute over academic freedom, and also reflects the deep and bitter divisions that have been steadily escalating over whether a natural spillover of a virus was the trigger or whether laboratory studies might have played some role.
Jimmy Dore is another conspiracy theorist whose diatribes inflame more than inform. So easy to find fault and ridicule. Tucker and Sean do it daily for a fabulous reward of riches.
Boris, my apologies. I much more get where you were/are coming from now.
Recent readings and interviews with Sachs, Hedges, Kuchenich, McGovern and more have opened my eyes to the big picture that goes back to perestroika, the expansion of NATO, etc. I can see how we have provoked, through our quest for global hegemony, the disaster of today's Ukraine.
OUTSTANDING int’w – including that commission’s chairman, Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs, concluded that Covid virus was made --- in a US LAB !!
The Lancet COVID-19 Commission, an interdisciplinary initiative set up by the prestigious medical journal to improve the world’s response to the pandemic, last month quietly and abruptly dissolved its origin task force after 10 months of work. That news was preceded by a dispute over academic freedom, and also reflects the deep and bitter divisions that have been steadily escalating over whether a natural spillover of a virus was the trigger or whether laboratory studies might have played some role.
Thank you for this, Chris. It's not going to make you any more popular with TPTB and their gullible mass-media adherents, but it is a truth that must be told. With the end of the Cold War, NATO's purpose was clearly over, but the militaristic hegemons who run the USA and her allies decided to pump the organization up into a global bully serving a new goal: beating down any nation that dares to stand between U.S. allies and full global hegemony. NATO has become an ugly and monstrous presence on this planet, an excuse for avoiding diplomacy, cooperation, and mutual respect among nations. NATO does not by any means represent the interests of the citizens of the nations who comprise it; it is utterly non-democratic and dishonorable in methods and objectives.
I dearly hope the American people will wake up to the fact that NATO does not represent who we are as a people and what we want for our future.
I agree except for your last sentence (not the hope aspect of it). NATO and other war machines are EXACTLY what Americans are: violent thugs and bullies. The latest poll on the subject showed that the U.S. military is the most trusted federal government institution in the U.S., and has a 64% approval of the public. That's what Americans are, not some fantasy version of freedom or some such nonsense.
The points made about China's economy are well-taken, but I'd argue that there' s persuasive evidence (from the IMF, and probably other sources) that it has already surpassed the USA's. It of course depends on how you measure, but in the article by Dean Baker that I've linked here, he argues that China passed us in 2017. This is what really has American elites desperate to hose things up for them. https://cepr.net/china-has-the-worlds-largest-economy-get-over-it/
I have seen the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative spanning the Mekong in Laos and their initiatives in Vietnam. They will, if not already, control the electrical power supply to that part of the world. They have already won there.
Are all our light bulbs made in China? Then what happens when they go out?
Wall Street demands for more profit has driven our sources to the cheapest labor markets, China the greatest of them.
Our national greed and unchecked capitalism has provoked our own weakening.
Very good, Chris but I have a few issues. One, NATO is not an entity unto itself like, say, France or Germany. It is, in reality, the US foreign legion. Officially speaking it is made up of forces belonging a variety of NATO member states but as Libya, Afghanistan, and Syria have demonstrated, it has much less of a bite unless the US is leading the charge (i.e. by providing weapons and manpower). NATO today is really just a collection of US vassal states; kill the master and the vassals will start wandering around aimlessly. By attacking Russia the US has made a strategic mistake. Your description of the plan is spot on. Destroy Russia financially with sanctions and isolate it diplomatically which should all lead to the ousting of Vladimir Putin so another drunken incompetent like Boris Yeltsin can be put in office and we can go back to plundering the country. Funny thing happened on the way to the forum. The US and our vassals have been unable to destroy Russia financially (the latest effort to impose a price cap on Russian oil is a hilarious response to the failure of that destruction attempt) and Vladimir Putin has an approval rating over 80%. This is not going well and it will destroy our vassals in Europe if Russia decides to play hard ball. At the same time, we've piss everybody else on the planet off and the only countries trying to isolate Russia are the US and our vassal states. As a side note, Crimea in the hundreds of years that it was in the Russian empire was never a part of the Ukraine. Khrushchev no more made Crimea a part of Ukraine than East St. Louis was made a part of Missouri when it was put in the St. Louis Statistical Metropolitan Area.
You are correct that China is the main course and this is yet another strategic mistake. The chances of our success in the Asia Pacific region is smaller than in the Ukraine. We can pump weapons into the Ukraine for Russia to destroy through useful idiots like Poland, Germany, and France but no such arrangement is possible in the vicinity of Taiwan (or, if you prefer, Formosa). The US has no place to mount an attack from.
I see this playing out as either the financial collapse of "The West" or nuclear holocaust.
All one needs to do is read the speeches and interviews of Lavrov, Putin and Xi to understand what is taking place now. They are very clear in stating that the U.S./NATO are doing everything in their power to prevent the emergence of a multipolar world, which seeks balanced economic prosperity while respecting the rights of individual countries to practice their own forms of government free of outside interference. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union the U.S. has been systematically engaged in establishing full spectrum, unipolar domination under the guise of promoting “Western values”. Ukraine and Taiwan have become staging points for the U.S. to try and obtain this dominance. Putin and Xi are well aware of this and have decided that the time is now for them to form a new Eurasian Empire outside the control of the U.S. and NATO. The outcome of this struggle will probably determine humanities future on earth.
Not that simple, but close. If you live in the American death cult (we're #1!), you have a unique responsibility to hold it accountable for its many crimes... otherwise you are either complicit in them, or a completely ignorant and well propagandized sheep. We are the number one purveyor of war crimes on the planet... by far. Pointing fingers at other countries... especially those you are directed to by the death cult's court jesters and presstitutes, is lazy and dangerous. Clean your own filthy house before bleating about the the state of other's.
That's the one thing you've written in this thread that's correct. But overpopulation is an ecological and environmental problem more than it's a political one, though it causes problems in every aspect of life. Way too many people of every kind everywhere! Since you recognize this problem, you should support China, which is the only country to actually do something about it with its one-child-family program.
This OP is Bullshit… I am sickened by this ideology that Russia is a Nobel protector. You people are crazy! You fret about NATO as American fascism explodes. Get a life take off your John Lennon glasses. Signed, Red Neck Liberal
Naw. Your a prick. It’s ok. I watch my fellow over educated liberals hunting for any grammatical or spelling errors to beat up on those you assume are unintelligent because of a misspelling or grammar error or damn even a typo. Makes your prickle parts quiver does it not!? Bully. We have bigger fish to fry no?
Chris, I usually enjoy your reporting because I get what seems like an objective perspective. As a previous commenter pointed out, and I agree, Wray’s warning about China isn’t hyperbole or inflammatory- it’s overdue. And to say -
“ NATO expansion and the 2014 US-backed coup in Kyiv led Russia to first occupy Crimea, in eastern Ukraine, with its large ethnic Russian population, and then to invade all of Ukraine to thwart the country’s efforts to join NATO.”
- is to really let Putin off the hook for his aggression. I don’t think there’s any doubt the military/industrial complex is out of control- but I see their response as exploitive more than manufactured. W think George Carlin said? “Just because your paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you!”
Just because Russia was wrong to invade Ukraine doesn't meant that the U.S. & NATO didn't provoke it and aren't the root causes of the invasion, because they did and they are.
And for an American to obsess on China gaining economic power is the height of hypocrisy. Good for China, it's about time someone else got a chance. That said, it would be much better for the entire planet, including the vast majority of life here which isn't human, if ALL humans stopped being materialistic and worshiping money. Humans need to consume a lot less, and to live a lot more simply and naturally, or we will continue Destroying the Earth and all the life here.
"Wray warned the business leaders they addressed that the Chinese government was “set on stealing your technology, whatever it is that makes your industry tick, and using it to undercut your business and dominate your market.”
"This inflammatory rhetoric presages an ominous future."
Inflammatory rhetoric? This is absolutely true and has been going on for several decades and has already presaged an ominous future for the western middle class... but not the elites expecting to profit from the Chinese connection.
From my perspective, anyone that criticizes these criticisms of China are on the take, or love communism... or both.
Your perspective seems to be capitalist and anticommunist in the extreme. As a Marxist, I can only deplore your defense of American imperialism. It is sickening.
Carolyn, As you know from our last Trump administration, a great percentage of the American people are very ignorant. Our education programs are controlled by right wing fanatics at the grade school by school boards. They are driven by Fundamentalist ideology, outright lies and distortions. There is a complete social media system that feeds them lies, FOX being the most prominent. That is truly sickening.
American imperialism is not a real thing. Other than what is the 50 US states, name a territory taken over by the US my military force or even by diplomatic means. You cannot.
Yes, communism sucks. Marxism sucks too. Neither are sustainable ideologies. But Democratic capitalism has lifted the world to the point that we have a lot of malcontent people with spare time on their hands to try and destroy all that goodness.
Iran. In 1953 the CIA and British Intelligence over threw their Democratically elected elected president Dr.Mohammad Mossadegh. All for their oil, oil, oil.
Likewise. Who owns all that oil, oil, oil? Not the US.
That is the problem with that weak "American imperialism" canard that claims America stole the oil. Pursuing global economic opportunities is not imperialism. Interfering in the elections of enemy regimes to replace leaders with those friendly to the US is not imperialism.
How do you Marxists that make up this American Imperialism claim square it with you corresponding love of the liberal global new world order? It sure seems that you are criticizing the country for not being more nationalist and isolationist.
You're either a lying propagandist or you have no idea what you're talking about. Read Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, for just one example of American Imperialism, which started with the invasion of what is now the U.S. by Europeans, continued to places like the Philippines and Cuba, and has continued to this day.
The fact that you love crapitalism means that you worship money, greed, and material things, making you about as unevolved as it gets. Really nothing else to say here.
LOL. Sure, the “invasion of the US by Europeans”. You write your own stuff? Hilarious.
Philippines… your mean that independent country? Cuba… hahaha… you mean that old puppet of Putin and his ghosts of communist power?
Again, global economic expansion is not imperialism.
So maybe you can list some countries that are NOT guilty of imperialism based on this really sketchy definition.
I support capitalism - democratic capitalist systems to be exact - because it actually works as a sustainable system and your worshiped collectivist dream is a nightmare that has never worked and is not sustainable. Maybe you can tell me of any existing example historically or present that you think is da bomb we should all follow?
Capitalism works? Try asking one of the hundreds of thousands of homeless people in the U.S., the wealthiest country in the history of humanity. Try asking any of the majority of people who live paycheck-to-paycheck, with the extreme stress that entails. Try asking one of the U.S. children who are suffering hunger and make up the majority of children here. And most important, try asking the Earth and all the nonhuman life here, which the cancer of capitalism is destroying and killing at an even faster pace than humans had been doing before capitalism.
You're either rich or want to be rich, so you benefit from this evil system. But the large majority of the planet, including everything not human, is being harmed, killed, and/or destroyed by it.
And BTW, saying that economic expansion outside one's own country is not imperialism shows total ignorance on your part. I suggest a book, try reading it instead of posting your evil ignorant comments.
What a fatalistic, negative, America-hating person you appear to be. Either that, or you get your social status virtue signaling "care" that is a false front.
I work in liberal land territory in an industry that seeks to develop more affordable housing and also bring in more small business to create more jobs. The liberal progressives that have adopted the global warming religion and other environmental extremist positions are the NIMBYs that block any and all significant development. Capitalists like me want to build it. People in your political tribe prevent it. People like me want to stop the flow of drugs over the southern border that is contributing to homelessness. People like me support building more asylums and committing the insane to treatment. People like me want to restrict homelessness and consider it a crime in certain areas and circumstances. People like you want to keep the border open. People like you oppose more asylums and external commitment of the insane to treatment. People like you implement ordinances and laws that prevent law enforcement from criminalizing homeless behavior. Look in the mirror for the fault of increasing homelessness.
The people that live paycheck-to-paycheck... something my single-wide trailer family did, and I did when younger with my young family and almost everyone else besides the average elite social justice virtue signaling liberal raised with a silver spoon and an over-paid government position... has done. But yes, the path to a better financial position has been depleted, but by corporatism... the same that Biden Democrats are transparently engaged in with their billionaire boys club, Wall Street and the globalist cabal,... and not capitalism.
But there is a need for workers and the jobs are going unfilled... because the snowflakes got a meaningless degree in gender studies and don't want to do any physical labor. Meanwhile someone with a high school education makes $125 per hour as a C-4 certified welder.
No, American corporations doing business in foreign countries and the US government supporting policies that protect those businesses is not imperialism. Japan has many Toyota and Nissan manufacturing facilities in the US and Japanese officials work with American politicians to encourage policies to protect those economic interests. If that is an example of Japanese imperialism then WTF are you supporting globalism? How can there be a liberal global new world order if nations expand their economic footprint to other counties and implement policies to help protect those interests? Please, don't be a fool. You were told by your political tribe that the US is imperialist and so you believed it... without doing the actual work to understand that the term means and research the real facts that back the claim.
The US, after it formed its states, has been involved in stopping the imperialist expansion of other countries.
Your first problem is that you seem to be only able to focus on negative and completely ignore everything else that capitalism has provided. Like inexpensive energy and food. Air conditioning. Modern medicine. I could make a list a mile long on this marvelous device that capitalism built. But it would not help you because you are like other people I know that are steeped in your own victim mentality because you have failed to achieve the level of social and economic status you think you deserve, and so you are just a negative malcontent committed to nihilism of everyone else that shows you up.
This written by someone who has benefited by western colonialism and imperialism. If you're American, you're living on stolen land. Who cares if China takes some of your ill-gotten wealth, you shouldn't have it in the first place.
Respond to my last sentence. The point is that if you're OK stealing other people's land, you have nothing to complain about when someone steals yours.
How can people be so gullible as to believe they are fighting a noble war. At its very core you have one person consciously deciding to end the life of a person they have never met. The profiteers are well known and no where to be found.
Thank you for this article. It speaks to me of truth and sadness
NATO and its parent, the United States government, has no purpose other than to attack and destroy anything that is perceived as threatening to the U.S. government, and nearly everything is perceived as a threat by the paranoid rulers in Washington and Langley. Billions of dollars into the pockets of weapons manufacturers. Billions of dollars sent to Ukraine into the hands of Nazis. All this while the people of the United States are suffering from lack of jobs, lack of health care, privitization of education, lack of a living wage, abysmal and deadly working conditions, homelessness, deaths of despair and no support or protection from the ravages of SARS-CoV-2. The filth and corruption of the government and its revolving door to and from think tanks of the ruling class are devouring the planet for profit and an almost sexual satisfaction of wielding power for the sake of it.
But this is the last gasp of a doomed society. Unfortunately, before the capitalist hegemons are brought down, many milions of people will die, whether from war, starvation, or environmental destruction.
So sadly accurate. Thanks for the hard truth. It takes guts to face the facts and not be a rosy optimist.
Facts on the ground and the academic work of Mearsheimer, Stephen Cohen, and Sachs (as well as many other Russian scholars and military and geo-political experts) can't penetrate the incredible propaganda machine that's been ginned up and sent into overdrive.
Pro-War Liberals and progressives are flying the Ukrainian flag.
Even Chomsky is baffled by all this - only a Freudian analysis seems capable of explaining the collective suicide.
After years of Russiagate lies & propaganda, it's clear that Americans can no longer think straight regarding Russia (if they ever could). I don't know what western Europe's problem is, maybe they were brainwashed by Russiagate too.
Sadly, your analysis is correct. Following this current war and the forces at work can be self mortifying and definitely the results are unknown, but perhaps very predictable given the history of the 20th century. The war is looking grim and the Ukraine is being destroyed day by day and so many people already killed. I can only conclude that we are in need of mature leaders who understand the consequences and they are not there. Thank you for your clear voice Chris. I do pray for true leadership in yet another dark time.
The United States has made it clear that Ukraine is not to negotiate but to fight to the last Ukrainian.
The leaders in the U.S. have maintaining and expanding U.S. empire as their top priority. They're such psychopaths that they apparently now think that nuclear war is an acceptable option. Considering this, we'll be very lucky to avoid nuclear war, and by "we" I mean the Earth and all the life here, not just humans.
It's no fun reading Hedges' assessment that we're closer to all-out nuclear war than the Cuban Missile Crisis. There's nothing of comparable gravity in the media, just political sniping-as-usual. I suppose informing people that the world could end so capitalism can make a those last few bucks would dampen profits.
That the greatest minds in charge of our nuclear arsenal can only think to replay the plot of 1984's "Threads", a cinema-verite British movie that gave me years of middle- and high-school nightmares of what nuclear war really meant, is beyond absurd. There is no off-world sanctuary, no bunkers that will protect the Croesuses of today from nuclear war. They will die out here with us and the rest of the biosphere.
It's absolutely insane (Dr. Strangelove-level insane) that profiteering bureaucratic goons think they can predict the course and extent of a nuclear conflict. After the first nuclear volley, all bets are off. Their only concern is how such destruction will affect the bottom lines of the arms culture they serve. Those industries can probably absorb the 90,000,000 deaths predicted in one of their scenarios. Those killed will be rank and file human beings, hardly worth the effort needed to avoid such a nightmare in the first place. After the nuclear dust settles, they'll simply move on and create a new war zone, no muss, no fuss.
A nuclear war, assuming that it's not limited, would kill a lot more than 90 million people; it would kill a lot more than that in the U.S. alone, and likely make the Earth unlivable for the foreseeable future.
Yes China has been working ruthlessly to grow economically. But the same Blob/MIC voices now desperate to stir up hysterical fears were the exact same people who surrendered the West's industrial advantage to China (and enormous middle class wealth) so that banks could earn outsized fees from globalization deals and so that the stock prices (and executive compensation) of the companies moving production to China could be hugely inflated and so the direct competition from Chinese (and similar places) would massively surpress the wages of domestic workers (further inflating stock prices and executive compensation).
Anyone in Washington and Brussels who thinks that China's Belt and Road initiative presents a major economic threat is braindead or cynically dishonest. Upgrading a few China-Europe rail links is useful for everyone but not a big deal. These links have existed for decades and remain totally uncompetitive with ocean shipping. Most BRI projects are make work projects for Chinese companies; few of the ports and freight terminals make any sense, and the process of client governments who cannot possibly pay for projects that don't produce any revenue turning against Beijing angrily has already begun.
Everyone has understood for decades that the autonomy of Taiwan was never going to be sustainable forever. No one has done more to to hasten the inevitable end of Taiwanese independence that NATO, who have shown Chinese military hawks that the people running the Western military are paper tigers incapable of doing anything more than pounding tables in order to maintain taxpayer funding that can't accomplish anything in Afghanistan, much less Ukraine or the South China Sea.
A quibble or two, Chris. The US government debt and the debt service are not actually a problem for reasons that would take too long to explain and belong in a different forum. It's also possible that the loss of reserve currency status may not be a bad thing.
Actually, the level of private debt, including mortgages, student debt, car loans, credit card debt, etc., is the real problem. People are spending so much of their income on debt service, their discretionary income for consumption is dropping and wages aren't rising enough to make a difference. As we move into a recession, private spending will fall causing more problems for the economy.
That being said, the rest of your analysis is spot on. The sanctions we have imposed on Russia have backfired tremendously and that, plus any specific retaliation by Russia and/or China (if we start sanctioning them) is what will sink the American economy. There is no substantial amount of manufacturing in the US anymore, we exported it all to China and other Asian countries, except for armaments. You can't eat armaments.
Otherwise, all that is left in the US is the predatory elite of multi-national corporations and Wall Street who control our economy and politics and the financialization that has been part and parcel of the neoliberal project for the past 50 years.
I'm in my 70's, so I don't expect to live to see the Jackpot (if readers aren't familiar, Google it), but I grieve for my children and grandchildren. We are well and truly fucked.
Support and stand with Russia which fights for all of us against corrupt and criminal US “elite” and its bipartisan War party (Biden, Pompeo, Obama, Pelosi, Cotton, Blinken, Nuland, McConnell, Schumer, etc…).
We live in choreographed and constructed endless lies starting with Russia-gate immense hoax. We are totally controlled by a criminal and immensely corrupt “elite”. Ukraine was their bottomless goldmine since even before 2014. They provoked Russia’s special military operation to protect its goldmine -- hence immense hatred of CAPITALIST Russia which has infinitely higher moral values than US ruling “elite” gangsters.
Interesting comment, Boris.
There's no doubt that the good old US of A can stand a major change in its foreign policy by brutality.
There is no doubt that the US of A and the Military Industrial Complex control much of our so called "Democracy" (where people who do not get the majority of votes can win elections).
Citizens of the US of A are given choices from which to vote depending upon what the establishment of both parties decide we can vote on.
Media and conspiracy theories drive many to vote against their own best interest.
Yes, there is a lot that needs to be improved in our government, but Russia is not an example as it is governed by a dictator and billionaires who have stolen the soul of true Russia as Alexei Navalny and many more bear witness to Putin's control. https://www.imrussia.org/en/political-prisoners
Jimmy Dore 2024 Thoughts On The Role Of Third Parties And Can They Win
https://youtu.be/pzBGlOceQjc
OUTSTANDING int’w – including that commission’s chairman, Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs, concluded that Covid virus was made --- in a US LAB !!
The Lancet COVID-19 Commission, an interdisciplinary initiative set up by the prestigious medical journal to improve the world’s response to the pandemic, last month quietly and abruptly dissolved its origin task force after 10 months of work. That news was preceded by a dispute over academic freedom, and also reflects the deep and bitter divisions that have been steadily escalating over whether a natural spillover of a virus was the trigger or whether laboratory studies might have played some role.
Jimmy Dore is another conspiracy theorist whose diatribes inflame more than inform. So easy to find fault and ridicule. Tucker and Sean do it daily for a fabulous reward of riches.
Please see a doctor ASAP -- to pull your head out of your ass ;-))
Thanks for the medical advice, Boris. I know it was intended as a sweet thought.
One more sweet input:
Feb. 1 – Ep. 32 -- Russiagate: A New Deep Dive into the Media’s Stunning Lies, Corruption, & Complicity -- https://rumble.com/v27vze6-russiagate-a-worthwhile-deep-dive-into-the-medias-stunning-lies-and-corrupt.html -- Damning Autopsy on Media’s Russia-gate Lies
Boris, my apologies. I much more get where you were/are coming from now.
Recent readings and interviews with Sachs, Hedges, Kuchenich, McGovern and more have opened my eyes to the big picture that goes back to perestroika, the expansion of NATO, etc. I can see how we have provoked, through our quest for global hegemony, the disaster of today's Ukraine.
Jussmartenif - it is all OK. We are friends in spirit --as of Navalny - he is CIA front now... ;-))
You are out of your #*€¥ing Mind. Russian Troll!
Jimmy Dore 2024 Thoughts On The Role Of Third Parties And Can They Win
https://youtu.be/pzBGlOceQjc
OUTSTANDING int’w – including that commission’s chairman, Columbia University economist Jeffrey Sachs, concluded that Covid virus was made --- in a US LAB !!
The Lancet COVID-19 Commission, an interdisciplinary initiative set up by the prestigious medical journal to improve the world’s response to the pandemic, last month quietly and abruptly dissolved its origin task force after 10 months of work. That news was preceded by a dispute over academic freedom, and also reflects the deep and bitter divisions that have been steadily escalating over whether a natural spillover of a virus was the trigger or whether laboratory studies might have played some role.
;-)) -- I am not of Russian origin and, unfortunately, don't speak Russian. If spoken slowly I can understand some Ukrainian though.
Scott Ritter Interview | Vladimir Soloviev | Russian Special Military Operation in Ukraine
https://youtu.be/F0P7d4GDZY0 - --- July 7, 2022
This Is Why Trump Won – Russell Brand - July 8, 2022
(plus Ukraine coup against its democratically elected government)
https://rumble.com/v1bbkjz-this-is-why-trump-won.html?mref=6zof&mrefc=3
Thank you for this, Chris. It's not going to make you any more popular with TPTB and their gullible mass-media adherents, but it is a truth that must be told. With the end of the Cold War, NATO's purpose was clearly over, but the militaristic hegemons who run the USA and her allies decided to pump the organization up into a global bully serving a new goal: beating down any nation that dares to stand between U.S. allies and full global hegemony. NATO has become an ugly and monstrous presence on this planet, an excuse for avoiding diplomacy, cooperation, and mutual respect among nations. NATO does not by any means represent the interests of the citizens of the nations who comprise it; it is utterly non-democratic and dishonorable in methods and objectives.
I dearly hope the American people will wake up to the fact that NATO does not represent who we are as a people and what we want for our future.
I agree except for your last sentence (not the hope aspect of it). NATO and other war machines are EXACTLY what Americans are: violent thugs and bullies. The latest poll on the subject showed that the U.S. military is the most trusted federal government institution in the U.S., and has a 64% approval of the public. That's what Americans are, not some fantasy version of freedom or some such nonsense.
You are delusional
The points made about China's economy are well-taken, but I'd argue that there' s persuasive evidence (from the IMF, and probably other sources) that it has already surpassed the USA's. It of course depends on how you measure, but in the article by Dean Baker that I've linked here, he argues that China passed us in 2017. This is what really has American elites desperate to hose things up for them. https://cepr.net/china-has-the-worlds-largest-economy-get-over-it/
I have seen the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative spanning the Mekong in Laos and their initiatives in Vietnam. They will, if not already, control the electrical power supply to that part of the world. They have already won there.
Are all our light bulbs made in China? Then what happens when they go out?
Wall Street demands for more profit has driven our sources to the cheapest labor markets, China the greatest of them.
Our national greed and unchecked capitalism has provoked our own weakening.
Very good, Chris but I have a few issues. One, NATO is not an entity unto itself like, say, France or Germany. It is, in reality, the US foreign legion. Officially speaking it is made up of forces belonging a variety of NATO member states but as Libya, Afghanistan, and Syria have demonstrated, it has much less of a bite unless the US is leading the charge (i.e. by providing weapons and manpower). NATO today is really just a collection of US vassal states; kill the master and the vassals will start wandering around aimlessly. By attacking Russia the US has made a strategic mistake. Your description of the plan is spot on. Destroy Russia financially with sanctions and isolate it diplomatically which should all lead to the ousting of Vladimir Putin so another drunken incompetent like Boris Yeltsin can be put in office and we can go back to plundering the country. Funny thing happened on the way to the forum. The US and our vassals have been unable to destroy Russia financially (the latest effort to impose a price cap on Russian oil is a hilarious response to the failure of that destruction attempt) and Vladimir Putin has an approval rating over 80%. This is not going well and it will destroy our vassals in Europe if Russia decides to play hard ball. At the same time, we've piss everybody else on the planet off and the only countries trying to isolate Russia are the US and our vassal states. As a side note, Crimea in the hundreds of years that it was in the Russian empire was never a part of the Ukraine. Khrushchev no more made Crimea a part of Ukraine than East St. Louis was made a part of Missouri when it was put in the St. Louis Statistical Metropolitan Area.
You are correct that China is the main course and this is yet another strategic mistake. The chances of our success in the Asia Pacific region is smaller than in the Ukraine. We can pump weapons into the Ukraine for Russia to destroy through useful idiots like Poland, Germany, and France but no such arrangement is possible in the vicinity of Taiwan (or, if you prefer, Formosa). The US has no place to mount an attack from.
I see this playing out as either the financial collapse of "The West" or nuclear holocaust.
All one needs to do is read the speeches and interviews of Lavrov, Putin and Xi to understand what is taking place now. They are very clear in stating that the U.S./NATO are doing everything in their power to prevent the emergence of a multipolar world, which seeks balanced economic prosperity while respecting the rights of individual countries to practice their own forms of government free of outside interference. Since the collapse of the Soviet Union the U.S. has been systematically engaged in establishing full spectrum, unipolar domination under the guise of promoting “Western values”. Ukraine and Taiwan have become staging points for the U.S. to try and obtain this dominance. Putin and Xi are well aware of this and have decided that the time is now for them to form a new Eurasian Empire outside the control of the U.S. and NATO. The outcome of this struggle will probably determine humanities future on earth.
And your point is? Russia/China Good. USA. Bad?
Not that simple, but close. If you live in the American death cult (we're #1!), you have a unique responsibility to hold it accountable for its many crimes... otherwise you are either complicit in them, or a completely ignorant and well propagandized sheep. We are the number one purveyor of war crimes on the planet... by far. Pointing fingers at other countries... especially those you are directed to by the death cult's court jesters and presstitutes, is lazy and dangerous. Clean your own filthy house before bleating about the the state of other's.
Lmao! Riiiight. Ya know what? The problem is. There are just too gif damn many people on the planet.
Thanks for the incoherent musings of an ankle-biting troll. More of this, please!
Fuck you
Well.. not really ankle-biting ...but still an inspired effort! BRAVO!!!! So original.
That's the one thing you've written in this thread that's correct. But overpopulation is an ecological and environmental problem more than it's a political one, though it causes problems in every aspect of life. Way too many people of every kind everywhere! Since you recognize this problem, you should support China, which is the only country to actually do something about it with its one-child-family program.
My point is I agree with Chris Hedge’s commentary. It’s why I support his venture on Substack. What do you think.
This OP is Bullshit… I am sickened by this ideology that Russia is a Nobel protector. You people are crazy! You fret about NATO as American fascism explodes. Get a life take off your John Lennon glasses. Signed, Red Neck Liberal
It’s spelled, “noble”.
Oh U R sew write! Ur intellegents just makes me week at the nees and I qriver with envi!
What can I say? I’m a sucker for low hanging fruit.
Actually… just admit it. You are a elitist bully. 😘
Nah, I’m just some guy.
Naw. Your a prick. It’s ok. I watch my fellow over educated liberals hunting for any grammatical or spelling errors to beat up on those you assume are unintelligent because of a misspelling or grammar error or damn even a typo. Makes your prickle parts quiver does it not!? Bully. We have bigger fish to fry no?
Chris, I usually enjoy your reporting because I get what seems like an objective perspective. As a previous commenter pointed out, and I agree, Wray’s warning about China isn’t hyperbole or inflammatory- it’s overdue. And to say -
“ NATO expansion and the 2014 US-backed coup in Kyiv led Russia to first occupy Crimea, in eastern Ukraine, with its large ethnic Russian population, and then to invade all of Ukraine to thwart the country’s efforts to join NATO.”
- is to really let Putin off the hook for his aggression. I don’t think there’s any doubt the military/industrial complex is out of control- but I see their response as exploitive more than manufactured. W think George Carlin said? “Just because your paranoid doesn’t mean they aren’t out to get you!”
Just because Russia was wrong to invade Ukraine doesn't meant that the U.S. & NATO didn't provoke it and aren't the root causes of the invasion, because they did and they are.
And for an American to obsess on China gaining economic power is the height of hypocrisy. Good for China, it's about time someone else got a chance. That said, it would be much better for the entire planet, including the vast majority of life here which isn't human, if ALL humans stopped being materialistic and worshiping money. Humans need to consume a lot less, and to live a lot more simply and naturally, or we will continue Destroying the Earth and all the life here.
Whew!
"Wray warned the business leaders they addressed that the Chinese government was “set on stealing your technology, whatever it is that makes your industry tick, and using it to undercut your business and dominate your market.”
"This inflammatory rhetoric presages an ominous future."
Inflammatory rhetoric? This is absolutely true and has been going on for several decades and has already presaged an ominous future for the western middle class... but not the elites expecting to profit from the Chinese connection.
From my perspective, anyone that criticizes these criticisms of China are on the take, or love communism... or both.
Your perspective seems to be capitalist and anticommunist in the extreme. As a Marxist, I can only deplore your defense of American imperialism. It is sickening.
Carolyn, As you know from our last Trump administration, a great percentage of the American people are very ignorant. Our education programs are controlled by right wing fanatics at the grade school by school boards. They are driven by Fundamentalist ideology, outright lies and distortions. There is a complete social media system that feeds them lies, FOX being the most prominent. That is truly sickening.
American imperialism is not a real thing. Other than what is the 50 US states, name a territory taken over by the US my military force or even by diplomatic means. You cannot.
Yes, communism sucks. Marxism sucks too. Neither are sustainable ideologies. But Democratic capitalism has lifted the world to the point that we have a lot of malcontent people with spare time on their hands to try and destroy all that goodness.
Frank - last week you openly outed yourself as a Fascist - now an Imperialist too?
Nope... just an anti-collectivist, anti-Marxist. Because they are murderous and terrible ideologies.
You’re welcome to be those things. Can you also strive for anti-retarded?
We are all special needs. For example, you have special needs for deprogramming and reeducation.
Iran. In 1953 the CIA and British Intelligence over threw their Democratically elected elected president Dr.Mohammad Mossadegh. All for their oil, oil, oil.
It gets a hell of a lot worse, Google it.
That is not an example of imperialism. Google it.
Frank, I don't want to visit with you anymore if you are really that stupid.
Learning begins with an open mind, which your is not.
Adios
Likewise. Who owns all that oil, oil, oil? Not the US.
That is the problem with that weak "American imperialism" canard that claims America stole the oil. Pursuing global economic opportunities is not imperialism. Interfering in the elections of enemy regimes to replace leaders with those friendly to the US is not imperialism.
How do you Marxists that make up this American Imperialism claim square it with you corresponding love of the liberal global new world order? It sure seems that you are criticizing the country for not being more nationalist and isolationist.
The Louisiana Purchase would like a word.
"purchase" is imperialism? Alaska too? Your house?
I seem to recall quite a bit of diplomacy in order for the purchase to happen.
Fuck me, you’re an idiot.
Fuck me, so I negotiated hard for my last real estate purchase, I guess I am an imperialist. Who knew!?
You're either a lying propagandist or you have no idea what you're talking about. Read Confessions of an Economic Hit Man, for just one example of American Imperialism, which started with the invasion of what is now the U.S. by Europeans, continued to places like the Philippines and Cuba, and has continued to this day.
The fact that you love crapitalism means that you worship money, greed, and material things, making you about as unevolved as it gets. Really nothing else to say here.
LOL. Sure, the “invasion of the US by Europeans”. You write your own stuff? Hilarious.
Philippines… your mean that independent country? Cuba… hahaha… you mean that old puppet of Putin and his ghosts of communist power?
Again, global economic expansion is not imperialism.
So maybe you can list some countries that are NOT guilty of imperialism based on this really sketchy definition.
I support capitalism - democratic capitalist systems to be exact - because it actually works as a sustainable system and your worshiped collectivist dream is a nightmare that has never worked and is not sustainable. Maybe you can tell me of any existing example historically or present that you think is da bomb we should all follow?
Cue the sound of crickets.
Capitalism works? Try asking one of the hundreds of thousands of homeless people in the U.S., the wealthiest country in the history of humanity. Try asking any of the majority of people who live paycheck-to-paycheck, with the extreme stress that entails. Try asking one of the U.S. children who are suffering hunger and make up the majority of children here. And most important, try asking the Earth and all the nonhuman life here, which the cancer of capitalism is destroying and killing at an even faster pace than humans had been doing before capitalism.
You're either rich or want to be rich, so you benefit from this evil system. But the large majority of the planet, including everything not human, is being harmed, killed, and/or destroyed by it.
And BTW, saying that economic expansion outside one's own country is not imperialism shows total ignorance on your part. I suggest a book, try reading it instead of posting your evil ignorant comments.
What a fatalistic, negative, America-hating person you appear to be. Either that, or you get your social status virtue signaling "care" that is a false front.
I work in liberal land territory in an industry that seeks to develop more affordable housing and also bring in more small business to create more jobs. The liberal progressives that have adopted the global warming religion and other environmental extremist positions are the NIMBYs that block any and all significant development. Capitalists like me want to build it. People in your political tribe prevent it. People like me want to stop the flow of drugs over the southern border that is contributing to homelessness. People like me support building more asylums and committing the insane to treatment. People like me want to restrict homelessness and consider it a crime in certain areas and circumstances. People like you want to keep the border open. People like you oppose more asylums and external commitment of the insane to treatment. People like you implement ordinances and laws that prevent law enforcement from criminalizing homeless behavior. Look in the mirror for the fault of increasing homelessness.
The people that live paycheck-to-paycheck... something my single-wide trailer family did, and I did when younger with my young family and almost everyone else besides the average elite social justice virtue signaling liberal raised with a silver spoon and an over-paid government position... has done. But yes, the path to a better financial position has been depleted, but by corporatism... the same that Biden Democrats are transparently engaged in with their billionaire boys club, Wall Street and the globalist cabal,... and not capitalism.
But there is a need for workers and the jobs are going unfilled... because the snowflakes got a meaningless degree in gender studies and don't want to do any physical labor. Meanwhile someone with a high school education makes $125 per hour as a C-4 certified welder.
No, American corporations doing business in foreign countries and the US government supporting policies that protect those businesses is not imperialism. Japan has many Toyota and Nissan manufacturing facilities in the US and Japanese officials work with American politicians to encourage policies to protect those economic interests. If that is an example of Japanese imperialism then WTF are you supporting globalism? How can there be a liberal global new world order if nations expand their economic footprint to other counties and implement policies to help protect those interests? Please, don't be a fool. You were told by your political tribe that the US is imperialist and so you believed it... without doing the actual work to understand that the term means and research the real facts that back the claim.
The US, after it formed its states, has been involved in stopping the imperialist expansion of other countries.
Your first problem is that you seem to be only able to focus on negative and completely ignore everything else that capitalism has provided. Like inexpensive energy and food. Air conditioning. Modern medicine. I could make a list a mile long on this marvelous device that capitalism built. But it would not help you because you are like other people I know that are steeped in your own victim mentality because you have failed to achieve the level of social and economic status you think you deserve, and so you are just a negative malcontent committed to nihilism of everyone else that shows you up.
Yes
Lmfao!
This written by someone who has benefited by western colonialism and imperialism. If you're American, you're living on stolen land. Who cares if China takes some of your ill-gotten wealth, you shouldn't have it in the first place.
Fuck me, the retards are on full display here.
If you go back far enough, everyone stole their land from someone. Part and parcel with the human story.
Respond to my last sentence. The point is that if you're OK stealing other people's land, you have nothing to complain about when someone steals yours.
That’s true.
Good thing I haven’t stolen any land here in the good ole USA.
Well you too are living on stolen land and have ill-gotten wealth. So give it up and move away.
Oh, Chris, can't we ever win?
I can’t tell if he’s praying for this or not.
How can people be so gullible as to believe they are fighting a noble war. At its very core you have one person consciously deciding to end the life of a person they have never met. The profiteers are well known and no where to be found.
Thank you for this article. It speaks to me of truth and sadness