Comments:
Bill Pieper
Taiwan
October 18th, 2010
12:13 pm
While the behavior of the PRC government may well be despicable, one almost has to admire how they consistently school western “barbarian” nation, especially the oafish Americans, at nearly every turn. This time they might have overreached, but so what. They have gotten what they want and can sit back while the US officials wring their hands, desperate not to upset their mighty corporate pay masters with a response deemed too harsh. The hand wringers will of course be fully supported by an army of allied ideological warriors from DC think tanks, universities, federal regulatory sleeper cells and elected/selected members of Congress on both sides of the aisle.
The Chinese are masters of two classic strategic and tactical policies used in concert and with complimentary effects. One is divide and conquer, that is, pitting nations which should be naturally allied against the PRC to instead quarrel with one another. This is frequently accomplished by pitting the US exporters and financiers against their European counterparts for example. The other is to exploit an opponent’s weakness, using it as a weapon. In the case of United States, the weakness would be the American slavery to an ideology of “free” trade and unrestricted capital flow; an ideology that provides a near perfect cover for unfettered greed on the part of the nation’s political and financial class. In a hyper-financialized oligarchy such as the US, this fanatic devotion to ideology has benefited a handful of players enormously, while contributing greatly to the ongoing decimation of the middle class.
After the epidemic of tainted products from China, toys poisoning children, toxic drywall, pet food, bad baby formula (presumably none of which reached American shores) etc., etc., a responsible government would have simply imposed a flat out ban of any product that can be consumed, worn or used to build homes until the Chinese government can demonstrate that it has the ability and the will to police its own manufacturing industries. If the US had a government that cared about its people and actively worked in their long term interests, such a ban would have been in place years ago. As far as I can tell it would be perfectly legal within the framework of WTO and other international trade agreements to do so, since public safety interests trump trade deals. In fact, I imagine that if the shoe were on the other foot and US companies had routinely shipped tainted and dangerous products to the Chinese, the PRC would have stepped in and halted such trade until the US can prove it is a responsible trading partner.
The REE debacle illustrates an alarming trend that has been going on for decades. The loss of REE processing resources will take years to replace, so even if mining commences tomorrow, the ore cannot be processed until the plant and expertise is in place. But it is not just rare earths that should concern Americans. When a nation loses its ability to create things, even non-strategic industries will decline over time because there is a lot to learn by making stuff.
Even when products are produced using high level design, creation and engineering talent located in the US, many innovations in process and design are taking place in the locations that actually manufacture the products. The US is losing the “culture” of manufacturing, a culture that contributes to improvements of the products being produced. In addition to this, there is an enormous amount of technological transfer and outright theft of intellectual property from western companies going on, especially in China where western companies are forced to partner with local operations to produce at least some components. These local partners will flat out steal patented technology, even highly sensitive defense related technology, all while being protected by political allies in the PRC. The western companies go along with these risks and costs because they either feel they have no choice in order to remain competitive, or they are eyeing the alluring and thus far illusive carrot of a billion person market. Some companies are finding out too late that it has simply not been worth the cost. But the C-level managers who made the decisions to go to China in the first place - as well as their eager financier partners - have long since made their millions and care not a bit about the costs to their home countries and fellow countrymen.
Paul Cohen
Hartford, CT
October 18th, 2010
12:34 pm
Paul,
There are already too many conflicts around the world that could embroil everyone. We are fighting two endless wars to protect our access to oil, without which, our mighty military machine would collapse. Now you want to escalate tensions with China because they won’t share their rare-earth materials? Let’s throw in Panda Bears. And hey, they have the Great Wall for tourism too. We need to end our colonial foreign policy, not extend it. The greed and selfishness (the ever escalating concentration of wealth flowing to the top) of Corporate executives is the reason we export jobs to exploit cheap labor. If there were a more equitable distribution of wealth in this country, Americans could support demand without having to cut jobs and the opportunity for amassing wealth would still flourish. I’m a bit surprised at the hawkish tone of this piece.
19 October 2010
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