It’s over. But you would never know it from the mainstream media. Last week in Anchorage, AK, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and his team met with their Chinese counterparts.
After Blinken’s opening remarks warning the Chinese to follow “rules-based international order,” and the follow-up by National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan who told the delegation the U.S. would not tolerate Chinese “economic and military coercion to assaults on basic values,” the Chinese delegation, in Mandarin, told them to both to go “F” themselves.
The meeting was the first between the two countries since President Biden took office. It has been a source of speculation of how Biden will approach China, and if this meeting were any indicator, he will attempt to continue former President Trump’s tough posture against Beijing.
As with the Trump administration, China will not submit to U.S. demands and will do as it pleases.
In a show of force, just a day before the meeting, the U.S. slapped 24 Chinese officials with economic sanctions that prompted one of the officials from Beijing to say, “This is not supposed to be the way one should welcome his guests.”
One of the key topics discussed was human rights. Blinken mentioned Xinjiang and the crackdown in Hong Kong. His Chinese counterpart mentioned the Black Lives Matter movement and how “many people in the United States actually have little confidence in the democracy of the United States.”
Yang Jiechi, the top diplomat from China, said the U.S. took a “condescending” approach to the meeting and essentially said Washington should get its house in order before accusing other countries of human rights abuses, according to The New York Times. He, too, pointed to the Black Lives Matter movement that gained steam after the death of George Floyd in police custody last year.
“I don’t think the overwhelming majority of countries in the world would recognize the universal values advocated by the United States, or that the opinions of the United States could represent international public opinion,” Yang said, according to The Times. He said he found it unlikely that the “international order” would follow the guidelines put in place by a “small number of people.”
2021 TOP TREND FORECAST: As we had forecast as one of our Top Trends for 2021, and what was clearly evident by the words and outcome of the Anchorage meeting, “CHINA 2021: THE CHINESE CENTURY,” is the new world order.
The 20th century was the American century. Throughout that century and into the 21st, the business of America is war. While America spent countless trillions waging and losing endless wars and enriching its military-industrial complex, China has spent its trillions advancing the nation’s businesses and building its 21st-century infrastructure.
And while America and Europe have outsourced their manufacturing to China and developing nations to increase profit margins, China’s dual circulation/self-sustaining economic model is directed toward keeping jobs and trade and profits within the nation, thus relying less on global trade.
It should be noted that U.S presidents, especially Barack Obama, used to brag about “American exceptionalism.” As the nation declines financially, socially, physically, and mentally, that phrase is no longer repeated by American politicians.
And, while the Western world locked down and now with some re-locking down their economies, China, where the virus first broke out, was and has been completely reopened.
On the economic front, the business of business is business. Tao Wang, Chief China Economist and Head of Asia Economic Research at UBS, told CNBC that investors from the U.S. “continue to be very interested in investing in [the] Chinese market. Especially from the bond market perspective, there is a structural increase in the interest.”
So, too, with Hong Kong. As Beijing stamped down the protests and took full control of the city, we have reported the series of major financial institutions and banks moving into Hong Kong to position themselves to cash in on “The Chinese Century.”
Militarily, the U.S. will not confront China, and, in time, the Chinese will take what they want and do what they want in their region.
TRENDPOST: A senior official from the U.S. told the Financial Times last week that the Biden administration warned China it will continue to enforce sanctions against Iran as reports indicate that Beijing has been increasing its imports from Tehran “for some time now.”
The consensus being promoted by Washington is that President Biden is in favor of reviving the 2015 nuclear deal that President Trump had pulled out of, which gave Tehran billions in sanctions relief in exchange for it suspending its nuclear program. Iran has made it clear that it wants all of the Trump-era sanctions lifted before it sits down to negotiate.
The FT reported that energy analysts say Tehran has been offering Beijing generous discounts, and the Chinese seem all too willing to take advantage of the deal. The paper, citing Kpler, the energy research company, reported that in February, China imported about 478,000 barrels of oil each day from Iran and plans to increase the number to one million in March.
We note this business deal between China and Iran to further illustrate Beijing’s disregard for not only U.S. sanctions, but its willingness to do what it wishes, knowing that in the near future, China will be #1… and will be giving, not taking, world orders.
