Bob Koure
2 min readJul 25, 2022

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Major counterpoint here, sorry to be ‘that guy’…

I'm not sure China as a nation is going to be around for the next decade.

It comes down to the US having been one of the 'tentpoles' for the 'Global Order' since WWII (Bretton Woods Accords - we open our consumer markets and provide naval overwatch of blue water international trade on our own dime as a bribe to keep allies out of the USSR ‘sphere of influence'. With the USSR collapsed as of 89/90, and the shale oil revolution in the 2010s making North America energy independent there isn't much geopolitical reason to keep it up — and less will in the US. Makes sense as we gave up a lot, particularly internal manufacturing capabilities - which has caused plenty of pain - on purpose. Now demagogues can repeat “Chyna!” as shorthand for that pain — and those jobs lost — and people vote for them because they’re pissed off at the situation

China got added to this group in 68/69 by Nixon to pull the USSR/China alliance apart. It worked spectacularly well.

Now China is going through a period of irrational growth-at-any-cost and they're using the Global Order as a way to essentially 'dump' excess production wherever they can all over the world. The focus of China’s manufacturing is full employment, not manufacturing to sell things for a profit, so they tend to run full-tilt in spite of that producing more steel/aluminum/concrete/etc. than is needed in China — and our open market means they can dispose of it here — even if that’s below the cost of materials. I call that ‘dumping’ — unless you have a better term(?)

For more on that growth-at-any-cost and how it's backed by 'land inflation' check McMahon's "China's Great Wall of Debt". As of July 2022, their housing bubble appears to be popping (not in that book - just something I'm tracking).

I see 'Belt and Road' as yet another way to dispose of excess production — and gain control of nations that have natural resources to boot.

I don't see China lasting for more than another decade because of their dependence on oil (you're Navy, pull out some charts and track the distance an oil tanker has to go from the Persian Gulf to say, Shenzen). Now remove US Navy overwatch. What happens? Do they have vessels with the legs to escort that distance? Past oil-hungry South Asia and pirates in the Malacca Straits? Not to mention that China seems to have been doing everything possible to piss off the nations of the First Island Chain. I don’t expect them to be particularly helpful.

Meanwhile, China’s zero-Covid policy — and the subsequent shutdown of port cities has been prompting manufacturers that had manufacturing steps done in China to migrate away. Even Apple, the last China die-hard has started migrating.

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Bob Koure
Bob Koure

Written by Bob Koure

Retired software architect, statistical analyst, hotel mgr, bike racer, distance swimmer. Photographer. Amateur historian. Avid reader. Home cook. Never-FBer

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