Rise of china? Will it even happen?

[ray245]

Well, recently with all the talk about global warming and etc, it makes me wonder with all the talk about rise of china, will it even happen?

Will china be able to rise to a first world country level? And will it even have a chance of matching the US influence in global politics?

[Shroom Man 777]

China has already risen.

As for matching the US influence in global politics, that's really hard. You could say that the US influence of global politics was, like, the historical equivalent of a freak of nature. I mean, the US was lucky in a sense that it was a pioneer in lots of great technological inventions - transportation, weaponry, power-generation, telecommunications. If China discovered nuclear fusion, or achieved space dominance, discovered a wonder drug, or something that gave it a nigh-exclusive and vital edge, then it would match the US' awesome influence in global politics.

China needs something to set itself apart, to put itself right on top. A billion starving peasants... doesn't quite do that.

[Darth Wong]

Throughout the history of the world, countless empires have risen and fallen. The United States had the good fortune to be rising during a critical time in world history, when technological development proceeded at an unprecedented pace. It also had the good fortune to be doing this at the same time that competing empires were tearing themselves apart, and to be doing so from an optimal foundation of resources and geography.

None of these conditions apply to China. They're rising at an unfortunate time when we are going to be looking at serious global resource shortages in the near future. Their geography isn't ideal. The existing world hegemon is still very much alive and kicking, and in no serious danger of tearing itself apart or de-constructing its own power base.

[irishmick79]

China's political control is also very contingent upon maintaining economic growth and at least relative prosperity. The US navy can still utterly fuck Chinese maritime commerce in the ass if it wanted to, which would in turn cause severe economic disruptions on the mainland.

China is becoming a powerful nation, no doubt - it's still a nation who's power hinges on maintaining good relationships with more powerful actors like the United States.

It's really tough to predict what the future holds for China because the country is just as likely to come flying apart at the seams as it is to become a true global hegemon.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

China's political control is also very contingent upon maintaining economic growth and at least relative prosperity. The US navy can still utterly fuck Chinese maritime commerce in the ass if it wanted to, which would in turn cause severe economic disruptions on the mainland.

China is becoming a powerful nation, no doubt - it's still a nation who's power hinges on maintaining good relationships with more powerful actors like the United States.

It's really tough to predict what the future holds for China because the country is just as likely to come flying apart at the seams as it is to become a true global hegemon.

The trouble with destroying Chinese commerce, is that the US is also destroying its own commerce. Not exactly the best proposition is it? These days, one has to eat one's hand to attack some big power.

[irishmick79]

China's political control is also very contingent upon maintaining economic growth and at least relative prosperity. The US navy can still utterly fuck Chinese maritime commerce in the ass if it wanted to, which would in turn cause severe economic disruptions on the mainland.

China is becoming a powerful nation, no doubt - it's still a nation who's power hinges on maintaining good relationships with more powerful actors like the United States.

It's really tough to predict what the future holds for China because the country is just as likely to come flying apart at the seams as it is to become a true global hegemon.

The trouble with destroying Chinese commerce, is that the US is also destroying its own commerce. Not exactly the best proposition is it? These days, one has to eat one's hand to attack some big power.

right, and that's more of a reflection of just how far the US has fallen as a global power and the impact of globalization than anything else. Those two factors have made it very unlikely that we'll ever see a full-blown US-China war, but I would still argue that in the event of a war the US would be in a much better position to economically recover from such a disruption than the Chinese. When push comes to shove, the US still would remain in the dominant position (albeit with a badly bruised economy).

[Nephtys]

Wait... the US has fallen how? The economy is doing poor at the moment.. relative to how the US Economy has always performed. It's still DOZENS of times larger than the Chinese one, with far higher per-capita EVERYTHING as well.

Globalization also does not hurt the US. It's the main reason why US is so strong. Why be an empire on the old model to capture resources, when you can use money and technology to do the same thing, faster and easier?

[Ariphaos]

Well, recently with all the talk about global warming and etc, it makes me wonder with all the talk about rise of china, will it even happen?

Define 'rise'. In some senses, it's already happening. In other senses... it's simply impotent. America was backed by immense energy reserves, and in some ways, still is - the remaining US shale and coal reserves far outstrip China's, as does America's biofuel capacity.

In the mean time, China is known to be overestimating its declared coal reserves, and underestimating its usage. An it's still suffering coal fires.

America has a distinct intolerance for corruption that - while you may laugh given the seeming apathy over the Bush administration, is nothing compared to what goes on in China (or many other nations). This allows the US to perform things with an efficiency that China simply is not capable of, and will not be for some time. The government, of course, is well aware of this, and is taking measures (ie execution) to try and curb it, but it's still endemic.

China faces several combined ecological disasters that are only worsening as time goes on. Falling water tables, extensive water pollution, retreating glaciers and the Asian brown cloud, to name a few.

[K. A. Pital]

I'm with Darth Wong here.

The US established hegemony during the times when the rest of the world destroyed it's own industrial infrastructure many times over, and large colonial empires desintegrated.

What will help China to dominate? The US fucking itself over? Even if the US does fuck it's own economy over, and competing nations step up, China will face nations such as Russia, EU, India as fierce competitors.

China has already risen as a powerful nation, but domination is something else. You don't just get it because you're so kewl. China will need another industrialization wave, but under resource shortages that may not occur, and thus EU, Russia and the Unied States remain in a vastly superior position to China.

[Shroom Man 777]

Besides, isn't a "one superpower world" a sort of fluke? Even in its highest days, Britain still had to contend with France and Spain and other nations, rite? Even the Romans weren't the single biggest entity in their world.

If anything, we'll just see a return to the good old crappy shitty days where we have a bunch of big powers jostling for position and fucking one another over so they can get resource-rich areas and fuck the natives of those lands over.

Like good old-fashioned colonialism, with cluster bombs. Hooray.

Maybe we can have the EU land Spaniards in my home country, the Philippines, and then have them booted out by the Americans. And then the Chinese (instead of the Japanese who by then will have gone old and pruned up and senile) can come over and put us in their Co-Prosperity Sphere (or some other obtuse sounding geopolitical sweatshop of great justice).

Yes.

[irishmick79]

Wait... the US has fallen how? The economy is doing poor at the moment.. relative to how the US Economy has always performed. It's still DOZENS of times larger than the Chinese one, with far higher per-capita EVERYTHING as well.

Globalization also does not hurt the US. It's the main reason why US is so strong. Why be an empire on the old model to capture resources, when you can use money and technology to do the same thing, faster and easier?

Let me clarify - I was not trying to say that globalization is bad for the US. The economic benefits are huge. What I'm saying is that globalization has integrated the US economy with powers like China in a way that has decreased overall American economic power. The US hasn't fallen at all, but its global economic weight has certainly decreased. The fate of the US economy is more closely tied to foreign economies than ever before. That wasn't necessarily true 40-50 years ago at the peak of American dominance.

[Shroom Man 777]

But don't you see? If America goes down, we ALL go down! If America can't rule the universe, then there'll BE no universe!

[K. A. Pital]

Hehe.

In case the US will be hit by a huge crisis, it will suffer capital flight to other nations - which will mitigate the crisis in those nations but exacerbate the same in the US.

The US economy failing will not cause other economies to vanish, like some boo-boo people love to say on the TV.

[brianeyci]

Let's talk specifics. What is a superpower? It certainly is not because Jack Bauer's dad made a prophecy about rising to a first-world level. And you certainly can have huge masses of poor or disenfranchised people and be a superpower like Rome.

France, Spain and so on were not superpowers. The defining characteristic of a superpower is power projection. The British had the most powerful navy in the world for centuries, and massive overseas holdings. Other countries did as well, but they could never match the British's ability to theoretically utterly dominate with their ships-of-the-line, and did not possess the physical mass of colonies. Whether or not blockade runners could defy this is an issue for academics, but the British Empire is generally regarded as a superpower.

So we have two criteria so far:

• Land mass, especially land mass of colonies. The British Empire had India, the New World, and Africa.
• The ability to supply, unchallenged, large military expeditions.

China's only route to superpower status is to exploit Africa and the Middle East. As in, sending tens of millions of men to crush tribal violence in Africa and seizing territory for exploitation. I believe Shep has posted articles about the untapped potential of Africa. The main obstacle is the dominance of the United States Navy, and the lack of a blue water Chinese Navy. Navies require not just resources, but scientific and technical expertise. Not even the Soviet Union was able to field an appreciable navy, and the Russians were annihilated when they tried against the Japanese. The Soviet Union made up for this with sheer land mass in satellite republics. The Chinese cannot do this, even if they wanted to, because polarization has made shit holes like Afghanistan allies of the United States. And again we come back to the single problem: the Chinese cannot antagonize the United States.

However, there is a more fundamental problem (or reason -- who the fuck needs another imperialist power) than the United States. In case anybody's thinking the US is cockblocking China's rise, they are not. Even if the US disappeared tomorrow as a global power, China could not automatically rise to superpower status. China is not unified enough to be even looking out of Taiwan and Tibet, let alone Africa or the Middle East. All of its vaunted military, its security forces, are constructed to destroy internal opposition and dissent, and to defend its motherland.

You would literally have to reconstruct the foundations of Chinese society for China to become a superpower.

[Glocksman]

Hehe.

In case the US will be hit by a huge crisis, it will suffer capital flight to other nations - which will mitigate the crisis in those nations but exacerbate the same in the US.

The US economy failing will not cause other economies to vanish, like some boo-boo people love to say on the TV.

Vanish? Of course not.
However, any country whose economy is export driven would be hurting until they found other markets.
Could the EU soak up the Chinese exports?
Perhaps, but would domestic EU politics permit unlimited imports of Chinese textiles, electronics, etc?

[His Divine Shadow]

They don't do that now. There's constant talk about preventing chinese goods from coming in and putting tariffs on it and whatnot.

[ray245]

Well...rise as in two form of rise.

The first rise is rising to achieve first-world country status.

The second which has been answered by members here is rise to power in influencing global politics.

[Sikon]

Well, recently with all the talk about global warming and etc, it makes me wonder with all the talk about rise of china, will it even happen?

Will china be able to rise to a first world country level?

A large segment of the Chinese populace is still much impoverished, and such is often focused upon by international media coverage and popular perception.

Yet, even now, China's total economic output is already way above any individual first-world country with the exception of the U.S. For example, China's GDP is now more than triple that of Russia (purchasing power parity).

Chinese GDP is frequently seen as relatively low due to an unusual artificial exchange rate by which the government makes their goods cheap to outcompete other sources in export. But the real picture is shown better by looking at economic output adjusted for purchasing power parity or by considering fundamentals like manufacturing production figures.

For example, nominal Chinese GDP was just $2.04 trillion in 2006, a little less than Germany, if just judged from exchange rates. However, one estimate of purchasing power parity adjustment shows Chinese economic output to be actually $7 trillion.

The latter corresponds far more to the real situation of relative Chinese industrial capabilities and economic output. The second largest energy consumer in the world (U.S. = #1), China produces about 5.6 times as much electricity as Germany. Chinese steel production is literally ten times that of Germany and more than double the whole E.U. combined. Those are just a few examples to save time compared to a broader discussion but illustrative of the general picture.

Here's another estimate of PPP GDP figures, showing change over time:

Chinese economic output:
1980: $0.47 trillion
1990: $1.5 trillion
2000: $4.9 trillion
2006: $8.9 trillion

Every year, every decade since the 1970s, some people have predicted imminent disaster from resource depletion within a few years for China and the world. While it's hard keeping up the expanding supply of resources consumed, they've been managing as illustrated above. For example, their iron ore consumption went from 98 million tons in 1990 to 194 million tons in 2001 but with the world ore reserve base being more than 230000 million tons of iron content.

Despite oil prices having skyrocketed over the past few years, China's GDP continues to rapidly grow at 10% in 2002, 11% in 2003, 11% in 2004, 10% in 2005, 10% in 2006, and then 11% in 2007. Only 20% of China's energy consumption being from oil and their focus on public transit helped them in that regard.

Predicting the probable future is possible because China is following the historical path and precedent of some other Asian countries. First Japan went from a society of mostly peasants to an industrialized nation with many times the GDP. Korean industrialization started decades later but gave similar end results, as did industrialization in Taiwan, etc.

China is typically estimated as overtaking the U.S. in total GDP by the 2020s, although that's largely from having quadruple the population, as obtaining even half of U.S. GDP per capita could take another decade or two beyond then.

Analogies such as Korea and Japan suggest China's rate of economic growth will eventually slow from the current 10%/year to plateau or otherwise drop to no more than several percent a year. When per capita income is $10000, a $1000 increase gives a 10% rise. When per capita income is $20000, each $1000 increase gives only a 5% rise. But, even in percentage terms, growth still continues fast for long enough to add up.

Here's an example prediction from a study:

Projected Chinese GDP per person, purchasing power parity:

2010: $8000
2020: $13000 to $15000
2030: $19000 to $27000

For perspective, U.S. per capita GDP (PPP) is currently $46000, while the E.U. ranges from $11000 in Romania to $46000 in Ireland or an overall average of $33000 (excluding tiny Luxembourg).

Chinese economic output is increasing fast compared to the rest of the world:

Well, recently with all the talk about global warming and etc

Global warming is mostly a separate topic. Still, let's address Chinese agriculture:

There's a mixture of negative and positive effects. The temperature change is mostly harmful, while the increase in the concentration of atmospheric CO2 is fertilization beneficial in itself. Overall, projected net change in agricultural yields between now and the 2080s from global warming is an increase for China. That's before the additional effect of adaptation and that of technological change, which has much increased yields over recent decades and continues to do so. As illustrated below, some other countries can be much worse off from the changes, but this is considering one of the northern hemisphere countries, China.



For the world, predictions of global warming's economic effect by the year 2100 vary, as discussed here, with such ranging from net loss on the order of 280 G$/yr, like -0.4% of current $66000 billion/yr world GDP (PPP), to net economic gain on the order of 40 billion $/yr.

That's from a combination of agricultural, heating / air conditioning, water, forestry, and coastal impacts. Part of the complication for the estimates is the mixture of negative and positive effects which largely but not entirely neutralize each other economically. The different results from different studies illustrate the uncertainty in such future prediction, but the real observation is the general order of magnitude.

Of course, the mixture of effects in the agricultural sector are proportionally greater than in the overall economy. As an oversimplified random example with arbitrary figures, if the number of farmers needed to produce an unit of food changes by 10% in one location but farmers comprised 10% of the total workforce in that nation, the percentage of the total overall workforce being reallocated is 1%.

The preceding GDP change estimates (e.g. such as 0.4% of world GDP) appear small in part because agriculture is a small segment of overall GDP in percentage terms, for large, wealthy economies. It is those nations that dominate total world GDP. For example, the preceding overall economic estimates would be considering the effect on the U.S. around 350 times more than the effect on Bolivia, since the former comprises a $14000 billion segment and the latter a $40 billion segment of world GDP.

Global warming is vastly more unfortunate for some countries, unless the 20th-century trend of yield increase from modernization is continued in the 21st-century or unless the northern hemisphere countries sent enough of their surplus food. But China itself is relatively well off, like the U.S., Canada, etc.

The preceding is for the late 21st century. Near-term effects of global warming over the next two to several decades are a little more relevant for China's current rise, and those are lesser.

For example, while anticipated rise in sea level between now and 2100 is 0.2 to 0.6 meters, the IPCC estimate for between now and the year 2030 is closer to 0.1 meters. Although many people didn't notice and are unaware, there was about 0.2 meters sea level rise in the 20th century. Sea level rise doesn't have an economic effect large enough in the timeframe here to be of much relevance to this discussion's topic.

Of course, much of the reason to want to avoid global warming is not a matter of economics but its environmental effect on other species and ecosystems. For example, reduction of arctic sea ice is an economic benefit for human commercial shipping but a loss for polar bears.

Yet the rise of China is primarily an economic question, for which the economic effects of global warming are not so large as to much affect the overall answer.

And will it even have a chance of matching the US influence in global politics?

The U.S. is both the world's top economic power and the world's top military power.

China's relative military strength may lag quite a number of years behind their relative economic power. Even as they gain the ability to afford expanded military expenditures, it takes subsequent years to decades for modernization. For example, even once China someday could afford to start development of a F-22 equivalent, there would be an additional time lag before the concept goes from R&D to production and full-scale deployment.

Besides, at least so far, China hasn't displayed as much interest in obtaining the capability for worldwide power projection as the U.S., not trying to be a global policeman, so to speak.

Yet another factor with a lag time is perceptions of China in the international public. Many people still don't fully realize the difference between the China of today and that of two or three decades ago. The perception of China given by the news media can easily be just that of an impoverished populace, depending upon what is chosen to be focused upon, whether poor rural peasants or the expanding middle-class in many modernized cities.

Unlike the U.S. with global cultural exportation from Hollywood to Coca-Cola, China doesn't attract the attention of the international public quite as much.

The U.S. is likely to retain greater military capability and more influence in global politics for the next several decades, but China is headed towards transitioning from already being the world's #2 economy today to reaching #1 status within a couple decades.

It's no coincidence that if the average American looks around their house, chances are that more of their goods are made in China than in any other foreign nation, and that's even now, before the Chinese economy's near-term future growth, like their GDP increased by a factor of 2.6 (!) during the recent ten years between 1996 and 2006 (PPP).

[Luzifer's right hand]

They don't do that now. There's constant talk about preventing chinese goods from coming in and putting tariffs on it and whatnot.

There is a lot of debate about what to do with poisonous toys coming from China, it seems there are a lot of them. An embargo on those things could pave the way for others.

[Darth Wong]

They don't do that now. There's constant talk about preventing chinese goods from coming in and putting tariffs on it and whatnot.

There is a lot of debate about what to do with poisonous toys coming from China, it seems there are a lot of them. An embargo on those things could pave the way for others.

They're not going to ban all Chinese toys. It's just not remotely feasible, not when most mass-manufactured toys in the market nowadays come from China.

[brianeyci]

Sikon,

1. How is purchasing power parity calculated? Are US Treasury bonds included in PPP?

2. Calculating future trends with extrapolation until 2030 is dangerous unless we know what assumptions the study makes. What kind of assumptions do they make, or do they just draw a best fit line and make vast assumptions?

3. A strong rebuttal to the point that China will eventually overtake the US in military might is that military might is not based solely on economic factors in the modern age, but in technological force multipliers. And arguably unless there is a brain drain into China, this will not happen. How is China on immigration and naturalization?

And of course the king question:

3. At what point do you anticipate all this economic power leading to a turnover in government, if at all?

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

China's only route to superpower status is to exploit Africa and the Middle East. As in, sending tens of millions of men to crush tribal violence in Africa and seizing territory for exploitation. I believe Shep has posted articles about the untapped potential of Africa. The main obstacle is the dominance of the United States Navy, and the lack of a blue water Chinese Navy. Navies require not just resources, but scientific and technical expertise. Not even the Soviet Union was able to field an appreciable navy, and the Russians were annihilated when they tried against the Japanese. The Soviet Union made up for this with sheer land mass in satellite republics. The Chinese cannot do this, even if they wanted to, because polarization has made shit holes like Afghanistan allies of the United States. And again we come back to the single problem: the Chinese cannot antagonize the United States.

I don't get your reasoning. What correlation is there between superpower status and colonies? The US rose to superpower status not on the backs of colonies, but largely other reasons, such as being the only major power after World War II having its economy largely unscathed. The Chinese are steadily moving towards a blue navy which is the long term goal.

However, there is a more fundamental problem (or reason -- who the fuck needs another imperialist power) than the United States. In case anybody's thinking the US is cockblocking China's rise, they are not. Even if the US disappeared tomorrow as a global power, China could not automatically rise to superpower status. China is not unified enough to be even looking out of Taiwan and Tibet, let alone Africa or the Middle East. All of its vaunted military, its security forces, are constructed to destroy internal opposition and dissent, and to defend its motherland.

The US is restricting technology transfers and blocking Chinese companies from taking stakes in US companies. Quite frankly, if that isn't cockblocking, I don't know what it is. For that reason, the Chinese have been looking elsewhere where their money won't get blocked.

And you are mistaken that the security forces are constructed to destroy internal opposition and dissent. There are entire tank armies and such, and using all that to crush dissent is tad overkill. You probably need at most one to do the job.

You would literally have to reconstruct the foundations of Chinese society for China to become a superpower.

Again, incorrect. The problem with the Chinese is that their growth, though large, is not filtering down to the bottom. There is a huge rich-poor divide that must be seriously addressed before China can even entertain superpower status.

[brianeyci]

I don't get your reasoning. What correlation is there between superpower status and colonies? The US rose to superpower status not on the backs of colonies, but largely other reasons, such as being the only major power after World War II having its economy largely unscathed. The Chinese are steadily moving towards a blue navy which is the long term goal.

Colonies are used in a loose term. Without American funding and support Israel would have fried. Without the Marshall Plan, Europe would have gone under. Whether they like it or not they were colonies in the loose sense, in that America supported them militarily and contributed to their economy, while expecting them to participate in NATO against the Soviet bloc. America has military bases all over the world. You cannot generally call the Soviet republics "colonies," yet they were satellite states. The autonomous nature of Roman "colonies" caused serious trouble for the Empire, and they moved with little political direction from Rome. Governors had complete local authority over the military which caused problems for Rome in its fading years with the barracks emperors. I trust we will not get into a semantic whoring game of what is the definition of colony.

Like it or not, land mass and territory matters, particularly your sphere of influence and buffer states.

The US is restricting technology transfers and blocking Chinese companies from taking stakes in US companies. Quite frankly, if that isn't cockblocking, I don't know what it is. For that reason, the Chinese have been looking elsewhere where their money won't get blocked.

Only if you define cockblocking as letting them suck your cock. The Chinese can go elsewhere for the vital technology, and the Americans don't want to render military assistance to the Chinese. That is loads different than declaring a belligerent policy like the US vs the Soviet Union. Those days are over.

And you are mistaken that the security forces are constructed to destroy internal opposition and dissent. There are entire tank armies and such, and using all that to crush dissent is tad overkill. You probably need at most one to do the job.

There is no such thing as overkill. Mao's Little Red Book wanted the army to be self-sufficient, to be peasant fighters. Whether this is the reality now is unknown, as the Chinese haven't had any major expeditions like Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam. You cannot disregard that China does use its security forces on its own population, and does use tanks.

You would literally have to reconstruct the foundations of Chinese society for China to become a superpower.

Again, incorrect. The problem with the Chinese is that their growth, though large, is not filtering down to the bottom. There is a huge rich-poor divide that must be seriously addressed before China can even entertain superpower status.

If you do not call changing the leadership and governmental style of China as insular to imperialist as changing the foundations of Chinese society, I don't know what you call that. Sikon already debunked the myth that the rich poor divide matters. Who the fuck cares about whether there's a few hundred million poor farmers when judging superpower status? Absolute power matters, and moreover willingness to use it.

[Fingolfin_Noldor]

Colonies are used in a loose term. Without American funding and support Israel would have fried. Without the Marshall Plan, Europe would have gone under. Whether they like it or not they were colonies in the loose sense, in that America supported them militarily and contributed to their economy, while expecting them to participate in NATO against the Soviet bloc. America has military bases all over the world. You cannot generally call the Soviet republics "colonies," yet they were satellite states. The autonomous nature of Roman "colonies" caused serious trouble for the Empire, and they moved with little political direction from Rome. Governors had complete local authority over the military which caused problems for Rome in its fading years with the barracks emperors. I trust we will not get into a semantic whoring game of what is the definition of colony.

No we will not, but we will have to quantify how much Europe and Israel meant to the US in the grand scheme of things. Economically, Europe bought a lot of US goods and capital. But that has changed. Now, Europe is also purchasing a lot of Chinese goods and some capital. In turn, they are fueling China's rise and not too different from the post-WWII era.

Like it or not, land mass and territory matters, particularly your sphere of influence and buffer states.

While that is true, it is not as absolute as it was before. Plenty in Asia are enjoying Chinese capital and products. It is not such an easy affair of encircling your enemies with buffer states as before. Australia for example, isn't so certain about entertaining a US offensive against China, and they have stated so. Japan might want to but Japan also knows that their companies invest heavily in China. The same holds even more for S. Korea which is a next door neighbour.

There is no such thing as overkill. Mao's Little Red Book wanted the army to be self-sufficient, to be peasant fighters. Whether this is the reality now is unknown, as the Chinese haven't had any major expeditions like Iraq, Afghanistan, Vietnam. You cannot disregard that China does use its security forces on its own population, and does use tanks.

The PLA has grown quite a lot smaller as the years go by. They may still be huge, but that pales to the height when it was a wholely conscript army. They still do use tanks, but the majority of the army still sits on the barracks on the border with Russia and India. You might like to know, that the Chinese and Indian military clashed on a disputed border before.

If you do not call changing the leadership and governmental style of China as insular to imperialist as changing the foundations of Chinese society, I don't know what you call that. Sikon already debunked the myth that the rich poor divide matters. Who the fuck cares about whether there's a few hundred million poor farmers when judging superpower status? Absolute power matters, and moreover willingness to use it.

Which government in the world isn't imperialist by nature? The only reason they can't even behave imperialist is because they have no means to do so. And Sikon fails to account for Chinese history where the farmers have constantly been responsible for bringing down the government. Some 50% of the population isn't on the coast of China and they are far poorer than those on the coast. You are kidding that a few hundred million farmers, some tens or so percentage of the population, who are dirt poor won't shake the Chinese society back to the warring periods if their needs aren't met.

[brianeyci]

No we will not, but we will have to quantify how much Europe and Israel meant to the US in the grand scheme of things. Economically, Europe bought a lot of US goods and capital. But that has changed. Now, Europe is also purchasing a lot of Chinese goods and some capital. In turn, they are fueling China's rise and not too different from the post-WWII era.

Yes, but the equation still favors America in that America has moving islands. So even though America has less territory and foreign bases are politically undesirable, it still has carrier supremacy. Technology has negated the need for an Airstrip One or traditional colonies for the US, but that doesn't mean China doesn't need land to project power. If China wants to project power it'll need land, and if that doesn't come from aircraft carriers they'll just have to... get land.

Either by bringing countries into their fold in a Greater Asian Co-Prosperity Sphere Mk. II or as I suggested, going for Africa where the West doesn't give a shit about but has huge untapped potential. They don't need an aircraft carrier force, but they do need the US to turn the other cheek while they land divisions. In case you think that China can just buy its way in without resorting to force or security, Iraq should prove the foolishness of trying to exploit land without security. Africa is an unsecure shit hole. And there is nowhere else on the planet with so much potential that isn't yet tapped.

While that is true, it is not as absolute as it was before. Plenty in Asia are enjoying Chinese capital and products. It is not such an easy affair of encircling your enemies with buffer states as before. Australia for example, isn't so certain about entertaining a US offensive against China, and they have stated so. Japan might want to but Japan also knows that their companies invest heavily in China. The same holds even more for S. Korea which is a next door neighbour.

No it is not. But China still needs the ability to influence others, and needs raw resources. If the US decides to do more "cockblocking" then China will have to take it, or simply have so much territory and military that the US is loathe to get in a conflict.

The PLA has grown quite a lot smaller as the years go by. They may still be huge, but that pales to the height when it was a wholely conscript army. They still do use tanks, but the majority of the army still sits on the barracks on the border with Russia and India. You might like to know, that the Chinese and Indian military clashed on a disputed border before.

Okay, that is a good point. But it still doesn't change the fact that Chinese power projection in the modern age is unproven, particularly in the face of American deterrence. If and when a Taiwan happens, we'll talk again.

Or even right now in Tibet. We will see in Tibet, what happens. The key will be if they can crush the revolt and still keep the Olympics.

Which government in the world isn't imperialist by nature? The only reason they can't even behave imperialist is because they have no means to do so. And Sikon fails to account for Chinese history where the farmers have constantly been responsible for bringing down the government. Some 50% of the population isn't on the coast of China and they are far poorer than those on the coast. You are kidding that a few hundred million farmers, some tens or so percentage of the population, who are dirt poor won't shake the Chinese society back to the warring periods if their needs aren't met.

Well then we are arguing in circles. If these tens of millions can't have their needs met, and they revolt, they will either be crushed by the Army or China will have a revolution. Either way, whoever wins, China won't be a superpower. There can be more than one reason China won't be a superpower.