Weekend reading: Links & comments 10/30/2015

The Midwife to Chaos and Her Perjury by Andrew Napolitano for The Unz Review.

Republican attacks on President Obama and the Clintons generally amount to straining at gnats while swallowing camels.  The House Benghazi Committee’s questioning of Hillary Clinton fits this pattern.

She was questioned for 10 hours, nearly continuously, for her alleged neglect of security leading to the murder of an American diplomat in Benghazi, Libya.  But nobody asked her about why she instigated a war against a country that did not threaten the United States, throwing innocent people leading normal lives into bloody anarchy.

And incidentally providing a new recruiting ground for terrorists..

The 6 Reasons China and Russia Are Catching Up to the U.S. Military on Washington’s Blog.

China Sea Blues: A Thing Not to Do by Fred Reed for Fred on Everything.

Just because the United States has the world’s largest and most expensive military doesn’t mean we have the world’s best military.  We Americans are complacent because of our wealth, and because we have not faced a serious threat to our existence in 70 years.

Our leaders think we can afford to waste money on high-tech weapons that don’t work, and military interventions that aren’t vital to American security.  Other nations, which have less margin of safety and would be fighting near their own borders, may be a match for us.

FBI Accused of Torturing U.S. Citizen Abroad Can’t Be Sued by Christian Farias for The Huffington Post.

Nowadays the Constitution stops where national security and foreign policy begin.

Drifting toward war with China

The U.S. government treats China’s claim to the Spratley Islands in the South China Sea as a threat worth the risk of war.

It reminds me of 1960, when John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon debated whether it was worthwhile going to war over Quemoy and Matsu, two tiny islands off the coast of China claimed by Beijing but controlled by Chiang Kai-shek’s rump government on Taiwan.

Yet Washington stands by while U.S. manufacturing industry is hollowed out by China, which is a much more real threat to the well-being of Americans.

If China really is a danger to the United States, our priority should be to free ourselves of financial dependence on China, and dependence on Chinese factories for vital electronics components.

But military power takes precedence over American civilian needs, and corporate profits take precedence over all.

LINKS

Beijing summons U.S. ambassador over warship in the South China Sea by Tom Phillips for The Guardian.

The U.S. Ought to Un-Swivel Its China Pivot by Buddy Bell for Counterpunch.  (Hat tip to Bill Harvey)

Is the South China Sea Worth War? by Patrick J. Buchanan for The American Conservative.

The New China Syndrome: American business meets its new master by Barry C. Lynn for Harper’s.

The passing scene: Links & comments 10/24/2015

Anxious Hours in Pivotland: Where’s My Sailthrough? by Peter Lee for China Matters.

Neither South Korea nor Australia support the U.S.-Japanese opposition to Chinese efforts to claim islands in the South China Sea.  The Chinese Navy meanwhile made a point about freedom of the seas by sailing through Alaska’s Aleutian Islands.

Trey Gowdy Just Elected Hillary Clinton President by Matt Taibbi for Rolling Stone.

Or at least greatly strengthened her bid for the Democratic nomination.  The Benghazi hearings made Republicans look like fools and showed Clinton as someone who is a match for them.

Are Canadian progressives showing Americans the way? by Miles Corak for Economics for public policy (via Economist’s View)

America’s Civilian Killings Are No Accident by Peter Van Buren for We Meant Well.

The bombing of the hospital in Kunduz, Afghanistan, had many precedents.

What Is life? by Matthew Francis for Mosaic.  (via Barry Ritholtz)

If humans encountered extraterrestrial life, would we know it when we saw it?

The passing scene – July 29, 2015

Is This the End of Christianity in the Middle East? by Eliza Griswold for The New York Times.

Christian communities in the Middle East, which have existed since the time of St. Paul and which survived under the rule of Iraq’s Saddam and Syria’s Assad, are threatened by ISIS and other extremist Islamist movements.

I think this is the fruit of U.S. interventions, which created the anarchy in which groups such as ISIS can flourish, and U.S. support of extremist groups to overthrow the governments of Libya and Iraq.

The Balance of Power in the Middle East Just Changed by Peter Van Buren for TomDispatch.

The real reason Israel, Saudi Arabia and neo-cons hate the Iran deal: They fear that Tehran will join the community of nations by Fred Kaplan for Salon.

The sanctions against Iran were never about fear that Iran would develop nuclear weapons.  They were about the fear that the balance of power in the Middle East would change in favor of Iran and against Saudi Arabia and Israel.  But Iran is a more reliable partner against ISIS and Al Qaeda than either of those two countries.

Jewish Americans support the Iran nuclear deal by Fred Kaplan for The Washington Post.

Interestingly, polls show that Jewish people in the United States are more supportive of the Iran deal than the general public.

The risk of war in the South China Sea

The Chinese People’s Republic seeks to control the South China Sea.  It is building artificial islands which it will claim as Chinese territory.

Its claims are in conflict with the claims of smaller nations of Southeast Asia, which, so far as I can tell, are equally valid in international law.

The Obama administration is preparing to confront China militarily over these claims.  This is a big mistake.

The sea routes in the South China Sea are vital to China and not vital to any other nation.   The South China Sea route is the cheapest and most convenient sea route for Japan, Korea and the nations of Southeast Asia.  But if worst comes to worst, they could take a longer route.  The Pacific Ocean is a big body of water.

The United States government is currently confronting Russia and China, the only two nations in the world that are beyond the reach of American naval and air power, over matters that the Russian and Chinese governments see as vital to national survival, and which are not vital to the United States.

In the case of Russia, it is the goal of bringing Ukraine into an anti-Russian military alliance and making Crimea a possible base for NATO forces.  In the case of China, it is the goal of U.S. domination of the sea routes to eastern Asia.

I am not an admirer of the Russian or Chinese governments.  They both abuse human rights.  They both believe in their own versions of exceptionalism, believing they have the right to dominate their smaller and weaker neighbors.   An increase in Russian or Chinese power is a bad thing, not a good thing.

But I don’t think trying to roll back the existing Russian or Chinese spheres of influence is worth risking war over, any more than Russia or China would think it worthwhile to risk war over U.S. domination of the Caribbean and Central America.

China, the USA and the world’s oil and gas

China’s oil imports. Click to enlarge.

The other day I read that China has overtaken the USA as the world’s largest oil importer.  Earlier I read that China has overtaken the USA as the world’s largest market for automobiles.  As the world uses up easy-to-get oil, there will be conflict between the USA and China to get what’s left.

China needs access to the world’s oil and gas if it is to raise the material standard of living of its people.  But the USA needs access to the world’s oil and gas if it is to maintain what we call the American standard of living.

What this means is that, unlike with the situation between the USA and Russia, there is a real conflict of interest between the Chinese people and the American people.  The world may not have enough fossil fuels to satisfy the desires of both.

China has one of the world’s largest reserves of coal and one of the world’s largest coal industries.  It is a leader in developing solar energy technology, although this as yet serves only a tiny fraction of its energy needs.  China has extended pipelines into central Asia, and recently signed an agreement to build a new oil and gas pipeline into Russia.

The quest for energy explains China’s disputes with Japan, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and other countries over control of islands in the East China Sea and South China Sea.  Control of these islands not only gives China control over offshore oil and gas.  It enables China to protect its shipping from the Persian Gulf.

Access to oil is a vital interest of the USA.  The Carter Doctrine, back in 1980, said that access to the Persian Gulf was a vital interest of the United States, meaning the U.S. would go to war if necessary to protect it.  The first President Bush said in 1991 was the Gulf War was about “jobs, jobs, jobs,” which meant “oil, oil, oil.”

In recent years, the United States has increased domestic energy production, with fracking and offshore oil drilling (both of which President Obama strongly supports).   But this doesn’t mean the USA doesn’t need imports.  Seeming inconsistencies in current U.S. policy in the Middle East make sense if you think of U.S. policy as a quest for oil rather than a quest for democracy.

The world’s easy-to-get oil and gas have been used up and competition for the rest of the world’s oil is bound to become more intense.  The European Union, in its need for oil and gas, may find itself in conflict with both the USA and China.

I don’t see any obvious way to resolve this.  It would be good if the world’s energy-importing countries could reach an agreement based on compromise.  It would be good if the world could switch to renewable energy.  But I don’t see either one happening anytime soon, and to the extent that either compromise or renewables are feasible, it might entail a more frugal way of life than most North Americans (myself included) would be willing to accept.

LINK

 Whose Oil Will Quench China’s Thirst? by Chris Dalby for Oil Price and Naked Capitalism.

China’s power is more than military

I can remember when people in the West feared invasion by starving hordes from an overpopulated China.   In more recent years we have come to fear China’s growing economic power, which is now being transformed into assertive military power.

In an article in Foreign Affairs entitled The Geography of Chinese Power, the military journalist Robert Kaplan describes how China is building a strong navy with the intention of dominating the South China Sea, much as the USA dominates the Caribbean Sea.

Kaplan stated the Chinese within the next 10 or so years will be in a position to attack U.S. allies in eastern Asia, including Taiwan (which is in international law a part of China, but in fact an independent US ally).   He called for a U.S. naval buildup to counter growing Chinese naval power.

But the USA cannot counter China’s strength merely by building more ships.  We Americans have a trade deficit with China.  We depend on foreigners, including the Chinese, to finance a significant portion of our national debt.   Our economic position in the world depends on the willingness of the Chinese and other nations to do business in dollars.  Much of our electronics production, which is crucial to national defense, is outsourced to China.

The Chinese are increasing their control of the world’s food supply, but not by invasion or immigration.  Chinese corporations are buying up land in Africa, Australia and other parts of the world, and importing the food.

The weakness of China in the 19th century and the breakup of China in the early 20th century were aberrations.   During most periods of history, China has been one of the world’s most powerful nations  by reason of its geography, its demography and its patriarchal culture.

It is the world’s third largest nation in area, behind Russia and Canada.  It has reserves of coal sufficient to maintain its industrial economy for many decades and maybe centuries, and it has access to the resources of central Asia and Russia.

It is the world’s largest nation in population, comparable to Europe or to the entire Western Hemisphere.  This  gives it a flexibility beyond what is possible to smaller nations.   China could surpass the USA, Japan or Germany in the number of scientists and engineers, and in the number of highly-skilled technical workers, and still have reserves of more low-paid sweatshop workers than Bangladesh or Indonesia.

Finally China has a cultural unity based on patriarchal loyalties.  These consist of, on the one hand, the filial obligation of the son, the subject and the student to obey the father, the ruler and the teacher.  In return, there is the partenal obligation of the father, the ruler and the teacher to rightly guide their sons, their subjects and their students.

These cultural values have served the Chinese people well.  Through more than 2,000 years, they have come together, after the fall of each dynasty, to form a strong and united state, which is what happened in the 20th century.

That’s not to deny that the Chinese have problems or that China’s continued rise is inevitable.  There is a great deal of labor unrest, and there have been many strikes in sweatshop factories.   Chinese companies may have expanded too fast, and may be unable to sell all that they can produce.  The Chinese economy is subject to the same boom and bust economic cycle as ours is.   I don’t claim to predict the future, except to say that China will be an important country no matter what.

The problem for us Americans is not the growing strength of China, but the eroding strength of our own country.   Our power is a legacy of the past.  As a nation, we are becoming like an old retired person who no longer earns wages and lives on savings.

We are not building for the future by investing in education, public health, scientific research and physical infrastructure.  Neglect of vital needs is a worse threat to American power, including military power, than the size of the Chinese navy or anything else that foreigners are doing.

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