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by generic_user 2581 days ago
The fundamental issues surrounding China 2025 which has prompted a shift in trade posture between the United States and China affect every other developed manufacturing nation in the world. Including Germany and the rest of the EU Nations.

Just because the EU has not gotten publicly involved does not mean that they are not involved privatively in negotiations. Europe along with Japan, Korea etc have the luxury to stay quiet because the US is taking a very public and direct strategy.

The US is the only Nation that can take that very public role.

2 comments

> The fundamental issues surrounding China 2025

What are those issues? Why is the goal of advancing your local industries frown upon?

Why is the US in the business of telling sovereign countries what they should produce, buy or sell?

Nothing wrong with the goal of advancing ones local industries. Competition is good, but only if it's fair.

China uses and copies a lot of western technologies yet puts a lot of restrictions on western countries that want to do business in China. To get access to their huge market certain businesses are required to share their intellectual properties with the Chinese. Is that fair? Kawasaki Heavy Industries shared their technology and now the Chinese get more contracts to build trains than they do.

Facebook is banned, Wikipedia is blocked, and Google was kicked out some years ago. Nortel networks collapsed because it is alleged that Chinese hackers stole their IP which was used by Huawei to reach its present heights. I don't consider American governments as saints but regarding China's practices I am not surprised America is acting the way it is.

> Nothing wrong with the goal of advancing ones local industries. Competition is good, but only if it's fair.

Are you suggesting it's unfair to have a National Security Agency with the explicit goal of industrial espionage to help domestic companies?

Let's not pretend that the US doesn't do that, please.

I always assumed the NSA only did industrial espionage for the defense sector.. but it would make sense for them to steal e.g. foundry processes to hand to Intel. How's the hand-off work? How do they keep the (Chinese-American) engineers from realizing where the ideas come from?

It makes strategic sense to do industrial espionage but there's so many ways it can go wrong.

I don't know how they'd proceed after exfil, but I'm sure we can come up with lots of interesting ways to hide the origin of tech/IP.

Snowden mentioned more on NSA industrial espionage in an interview with German state-owned TV, but they didn't provide a lot of details. There was also quite a bit on NSA operations spying on all French companies that are active in IT/telecommunications, energy/power, natural resources, logistics, health care/biotech etc, so pretty much anything but how to make baguettes.

> What are those issues?

The issue is certainly not that China wants to advance there local industries. The US has spent the last 40 years+ helping china develop its industry and technology.

The Issue is that China was obligated to develop reciprocal free trade like the rest of the WTO members. Over the last 20 years they have been moving farther away from that into a state socialist mercantilist expansionist power.

A few of the issues includes the Theft of intellectual property, Industrial espionage, Lack of market access and state monopoly domination of there internal markets. Dumping of steel and other commodities. Currency manipulation, etc.

there is a very long list.

the EU has had been putting tariffs on Chinese steel for years due to aggressive dumping of steel which has harmed EU industry and distorted prices.

I think that this confrontation has been building for a long time. and now there is a consensus, a global consensus among the liberal democracies including the EU members that China 2025 is step to far away from the normalized reciprocal free trade system.

The US has pretty much withdrawn from all international organizations (or is simply ignoring them, see WTO). The US is not abiding by any international order.

The US is economically terrorizing the world by aggressively pushing the dominance of the US dollar. It has (successfully, to date) prevented the Iranian Oil Bourse (in €, 2008).

It interferes in the sovereignty of nations: for example, it has enforced the Iran embargo (against the will of the EU, which has been powerless to prevent it).

The world trade order is tilted in favor of the US, as are IP rules (favoring the incumbent power, with a head start of several decades), making the rest of the world subservient to the US, and forcing us to finance the life style of a minority of the planet's population (to be correct: to finance the lifestyle of a very small minority of the US population, since lots of Americans are also struggling)

The US has built its industrial and technological supremacy by industrial espionage during the late 19th and early 20th century, from the leading powers of the time (Europe).

The US has engaged in price dumping of agricultural products for ages, by illegally subsidizing farmers.

The US has interfered militarily, politically and economically around the world, often with devastating consequences in terms of life and property, creating power vacuums which have caused catastrophic consequences.

This is going on as we speak. The list is very long too.

I for one support the Chinese in this conflict, if for nothing else, simply for the possibility of putting some restraint on the out-of-control Hegemon.

I understand that US citizens will be siding with the US president on this one, and you may even feel you are being fair here.

You are not, and the rest of the world is pretty much not in agreement with the US.

> The world trade order is tilted in favor of the US, as are IP rules (favoring the incumbent power, with a head start of several decades).

This is not a US only issue.

the only incentive to create IP whether its scientific, technology, or the arts is that the creator can monetize there creation through copyright, patents etc. IP is the foundation of growth for this century for the entire industrialized world. I doubt the EU or anyone else supports Chinas IP theft, it has ill effects on all IP holders including EU companies.

> I for one support the Chinese in this conflict, if for nothing else, simply for the possibility of putting some restraint on the out-of-control Hegemon.

your entitled to your opinion. but I don't support the tariffs and other measures because I support the President of the US. I think the strategy behind China 2025 if implemented would lead to a destabilization of the global economy. that could very quickly lead to a serious war.

> You are not, and the rest of the world is pretty much not in agreement with the US

On some of your points Iran etc, sure there is a lot of the world that disagrees with the US position. including many US citizens. but on the issues of China's trade abuses and the Huawei ban I think most of the the world including those in the EU, UK, Japan etc, want to see China move away from there current ambitions.

There are a number of IP rights which have dubious value, century long copyright is one, software patents are another. They do benefit the Americans because they were the first movers in terms of Hollywood and the software industry, but these rights do nothing to advance innovation, yet the United States continues to push them on other countries via trade treaties.
> What are those issues?

When a country infamous for its theft of intellectual property declares its intention to usurp the dominant power in key technology and manufacturing insustries within six years, that's an issue for the incumbent.

Why would any leading power allow another to take its throne, especially through cheating?

The have the right to try, of course, but it would be irrational to aid and abet them.

If you look at US demands in this trade war, they amount to 'play fairly and openly'.

Meet the new hegemon, same as the old hegemon.

"Let them fight"