If you are one of the world's two superpowers and you receive a clear and specific challenge from the other power, essentially a threat to your existence, how do you respond? China did it in an unexpected and very Chinese way. Basically: which of us is stronger, difficult to say, but we are smarter and therefore we will win.

NATO challenges Beijing, China provides unexpected response

BY Dmitri Kosyrev

This is what happened at the recent NATO summit in Washington. And the “third plenum” of the CPC Central Committee that concluded on Thursday, announced in advance by almost all of the world's media as a momentous event for the entire world, not just China.

The West, let us recall, for the first time placed Beijing ahead of Moscow, declaring in the final declaration that the Asian power “challenges NATO interests, security and values” and outlining several measures to eliminate this “threat”. Naturally, Chinese diplomats found words to respond. But the global community of experts was waiting for a different answer, that is to say the results of this same plenum – the third after the Party Congress, and traditionally devoted to the economy. The fact is that words are words, but concrete measures are serious.

Some might have expected the Chinese economy to be put on a war footing, with nationalization of everything imaginable and a concentration of efforts to repel military threats and so on. But for most, the expectations were different: what about finances, investments, etc.? The fact is that, for months, an information war has been going on around the idea that “China is slowing down and dying.” It is dying because of the senseless three-year quarantine imposed by the virus, and because it is during this period that the United States' economic war against a global competitor has intensified, with a total restriction of all high-tech exports from China to Western countries.

It must be said here that the NATO summit and the Beijing plenum are just new episodes in the struggle for global leadership, and this struggle began in 2018, with the first restrictions of the Donald Trump administration to against the communication systems of its rivals. Since then, the whole world has been watching every detail of this fierce battle. Which is understandable: the existence of virtually every country depends on it. It doesn't matter who is the first economy here and who is second (the answer depends on the counting system), what matters is that they each represent about 18% of global GDP. So even seemingly purely national measures on the economy, in the PRC or the United States, affect literally everyone. It is important. And what is even more important is that today, each of the opposing parties puts forward its own clearly established ideology on how the world of tomorrow should be built. Furthermore, each side actively strives to ensure that its ideology and vision of the future prevails.

The seriousness of the intentions and the issues: it couldn’t be more serious. The attacking party – the United States – believes that it is not a question of who is first or second, but of the systemic crisis of the entire American project. This is true, and this truth is not only about the collapse and degradation of the political system, the confrontation between the two halves of society, and everything else. The fact is that the mentioned 18% of world GDP – in the two powers is of a different nature. A recent example: we recently learned that Russia has entered the top 10 countries with a trade surplus. The leader of this top 10 – that is to say of the world – is the leading power in terms of foreign trade, China. And the United States is not second or third, it is also first, but in a completely different list, that of deficit countries. And let's not forget who is the world's leading producer (of goods, not services) and many other things.

The answer to the question “what should America do” is given today, for example, by JD Vance, vice-presidential candidate under Trump. Its strategic recipe is to extricate the United States from the Ukrainian crisis and European affairs, and to concentrate on crushing China, including militarily (with the help of Taiwan), otherwise America will not will not be able to regain its manufacturing and technological advantage. In reality, Mr. Vance is just repeating what the Republican half of the country has been saying for years, while the Democrats have, in word and deed, a watered-down version of the same doctrine. This doctrine is simple: to save the United States, we must crush China. Economically, politically, whatever. Deploy all members of the Western alliance to this fight, and force even those who are not part of the alliance to join the fight. This is a decades-long task, requiring the total mobilization of all the forces of the nation, not just one nation.

And now, China's response to this challenge. Everything here is subtle and requires, as always, decryption. It should be noted that the “third plenum”, which took place behind closed doors, did not make any spectacular declaration and was content, in its final document, to confirm the continuation of the process begun several years ago month. But even before the plenum, the Chinese expert community tried to explain the importance of the event.

First: no mobilizations and nationalizations, no military economy in isolation, no “return to Mao Zedong”. The course of support for private businesses and the revitalization of private initiative is confirmed. Then, on a purely internal level, the tax system will be modified to prevent provincial governments from engaging in speculation and going into debt. But the third and most important point is that Chinese leaders confirm that they see their ideal world as exactly the opposite of that of the United States. And they will build it. This is not their internal affairs, but ours. The American version of the global economy, and with it politics, involves a camp under siege for the United States and its allies. In this camp, decisions are made not on the basis of profitability, but with the aim of preventing China (and, naturally, Russia and many others) from accessing their markets. In other words, this camp must win the competition with others on the basis of political and ideological opportunism.

While China, like Russia, talks about opening the world. And there, there is an ideological innovation, which already dates back several months, but it is the “Third Plenum” which has seized it for good. The idea is this: China has made a historic leap from “peaceful coexistence” to a world of “common destiny.” Let us add that all of us on this planet have also made such a leap, at least that is how the Chinese leaders see the situation. It does not matter who, the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Georgy Chicherin in 1922 or Mao Zedong negotiating with India in 1954, was the first to imagine the principle of peaceful coexistence. What is important is that in previous times it was possible to talk about two or more economic systems that could more or less live their lives behind an insurmountable barrier, come closer together or open up to each other. one to another, having ideological discussions, competing in technology and any other field….. And now the economy has changed, it can only function properly if the markets are as open as possible . Because even a market of one and a half billion people (India, China) is no longer suitable for many new goods and services, it must be bigger.

The world of common destiny is a world which trades openly according to common rules and without sanctions, and which is multipolar, that is to say which respects the difference of civilizations and political systems, where no one threatens the other . In fact, this is our world, and the Chinese concept of “common destiny” is, in some places, textually similar to Russian foreign policy documents. This is not surprising. What will be surprising is what happens next, when the Western bloc and the rest of the world create their own common or private destiny. And this competition will take more than a year.

source: RIA Novosti

https://en.reseauinternational.net/lotan-lance-un-defi-a-pekin-la-chine-apporte-une-reponse-inattendue/