Noteworthy….
"The continent must not be like a beautiful fruit tree by the wayside. Every passer-by plucks a share and the fruit tree seems to forget that it could one day grow old.." Words of caution to Africans as both Russian and American leaders make trips to the continent
African leaders have denounced the ICC and refuse to extradite Sudan's president Omar al-Bashir, while others attempt to decipher what, exactly, this means
Niall Ferguson and James Fallows discuss the influence of China on the U.S. economy at the Aspen Ideas Festival
Win in China: a great documentary on the rise of entrepreneurship in China
And if the Chinese scramble wasn't enough, Russia wants a piece now, too
Via the WSJ, Ariel Cohen writes:
[...] Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and more than a hundred Russian businessmen last week visited Egypt, Nigeria, Namibia and Angola on the longest tour of Africa a Russian leader has undertaken since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Unlike President Obama, who is going to Africa next week for a brief stop to talk about global warming, Mr. Medvedev and his team targeted oil, gas, diamonds and uranium. Mr. Medvedev is trying to score points before his G-8 meeting with Western leaders in Italy July 8-10.
[...] By all appearances Mr. Medvedev and, by extension, Prime Minister Vladimir Putin are reviving the old Soviet Africa strategy. The Soviet Union maintained friendly relations with many African countries, including Egypt, Sudan, Ethiopia, Somalia, Namibia, Angola and Mozambique.
[...] Africa lost its significance as an ideological chessboard after the collapse of the Soviet Union, and the current volume of trade between Africa and Russia is trivial. But the continent remains an economic prize. China has spent billions of dollars in the past few years gaining friends, influencing dictators, and tying African countries to Beijing.
Now the Kremlin is trying to regain its status as a global player, including re-asserting itself in Africa. Mr. Medvedev's visit to Africa appears to be the first coordinated attempt by Moscow to do so. Where once the Soviet Union sought political hegemony, today's Kremlin is after economic objectives like trade and access to raw materials. But a shift in Africa's relationship with Russia will have consequences for many.
Indeed, it will surely be fascinating to observe how Russia's Africa policy will unfold and the extent to which - if any at all - the Kremlin will seek cooperation with China, which currently has the upper hand in the continent - arguably even more so than do either the U.S. or Europe.
How China sees the world: A lesson from The Economist
The most recent cover of The Economist has caught the attention of cartographers (self-proclaimed and otherwise) and Chinese scholars (ditto) alike. Falling more squarely into the former category (though without the self-proclaimed epithet), the folks over at Strange Maps offer an interesting analysis of the depiction:
In the ocean immediately beyond the city are a few islands of particular interest to China:
- Japan: the old rival, whose rapid modernisation preceded China’s, but now eclipsed and reduced to a few harmless islands.
- Taiwan: similarly superseded by China’s massive economic progress, but still relevant as the rival claimant to be China’s ‘legitimate’ government. Even more repulsive to mainland China is a competing strand of current Taiwanese politics, striving for ‘independence’ and thus eschewing the ‘One China’ policy still officially espoused by both the communist mainland and nationalist Taiwan.
- Hong Kong: the former British crown colony that was handed back to China in 1997 and which has been allowed a degree of autonomy unthinkable elsewhere in China (e.g. Tibet) under an agreement often referred to as ‘One Country, Two Systems’, whereby Hong Kong was allowed to retain its capitalist system and its civil liberties, including inchoate democratic institutions.
- Spratly Islands: a sprawling archipelago of over 600 islets, atols and reefs in the South China Sea, between Vietnam and the Philippines, with barely 5 square kilometers of dry land between them. Because of their strategic location, the Spratlys, or parts of them, are claimed and partly occupied by China, Taiwan, Vietnam, the Philippines and Malaysia - and as such are a flashpoint waiting to happen.
Across a narrow representation of the Pacific Ocean lies the continent apparently most on China’s mind - America. And especially, apart from a tiny slice labelled Canada and a small appendage being dug up for minerals called South America, the United States. The US is a crumbling empire, with the Statue of Liberty clutching a begging bowl and holding up a sign saying: Please give generously. Next to some shacks is a sign saying Foreclosure Sale (a reference to the house repossessions that are symptomatic of the credit crunch which triggered the present economic recession). Wall Street is a fault almost splitting the US in two.
Europe is much smaller and more irrelevant than America, in the ocean beyond it. All that distinguishes it are Prada and Hermes, two brands of luxury fashion accessories, and presumably very popular with the wealthy Chinese elite - suggesting that Europe is only interesting to China as a glorified shopping mall.
Next to Europe is Africa, equally distant from China, but at least decked out with some of the implements of industry, referring to the large investments China is making in Africa, benefiting the poorest continent with new infrastructure and providing China with access to much-needed raw materials for its burgeoning industry.
Visibly missing from the "map" are the Middle East (with especial attention paid to Iran) and a demarcation of Russia, both of which are vital Chinese allies. The Economist especially should be aware that much of China's world view is informed by its need for natural resources, predominant among them oil, for which both the M.E. and Russia are essential. Alas, I'm willing to forgive this wonderful publication for such a glaring oversight (this time).
With somewhat of a different conundrum, however, is Will Lewis of Experience Not Logic - a brilliant China law blog - who asks whether the Economist cover might possibly infringe on copyright law. He draws on the important copyright dispute in Steinberg v. Columbia and offers up a most interesting discussion. If you look closely, the cover even alludes to this very case: the sign above the Imperial Palace reads: "With apologies to Steinberg and the New Yorker." Who would have thought that one can learn so much without even opening The Economist?! Sheer brilliance, I say.
Confessions of a (Chinese) shopaholic
I didn't see the film, nor have I ever read the book, but am quite certain that the title (at the very least) nevertheless does well to encompass China's latest buying spree:
Squeezed between falling profits and the credit crunch, a growing number of troubled corporations and countries are turning to cash-rich China for a bailout. And with foreign assets cheaper than they have been for years, Beijing is going on an international spending spree.
It appears that while the Chinese economy has also been hit by the crisis, the Chinese banks have not been so badly damaged, and policy banks seem ready to lend. And lend they are.
Last week, the Chinese government signed a landmark $10bn agreement with Brazil that will ensure long-term supplies of oil to China while delivering much-needed financial assistance to help Brazil develop oil and gas reserves recently discovered in coastal waters. Also last week, China signed off on $25bn in loans for Russia in return for oil supplies from newly discovered fields in Siberia for the next twenty years. Venezuela will likewise supply Beijing with up to 1 million barrels per day by 2015 in return for $6bn from China to top up an existing development fund. Indeed, not only is China taking full advantage of the economic downturn, but it is quickly assuming the role of Global Lender Extraordinaire.
I must say, however, China's " loans-for-oil" policy reminds me in part of the now infamous Oil for Food Programme. While I trust that Chinese loan money is being employed for its intended purposes, I would be shocked - shocked! - if at least a small portion of it wasn't unlawfully being diverted to help prop up recipient regimes. And when the recipient regimes are states like Russia and Venezuela, it would be a miracle indeed if that weren't the case.
We all live in a (Chinese) submarine, a (Chinese) submarine, a (Chinese) submarine...
Is it just me, or are my postings increasingly coming to be inspired by Beatles' songs? The Anglophile in me is seemingly making a formidable comeback. No matter. Onto more important things - the Chinese navy, for instance.
China's increasingly capable navy has indeed been in the headlines lately for its first distant-waters deployment to combat Somali pirates in the Gulf of Aden. In early January, too, China's national defense spokesman made it clear that the Chinese navy is in the market for an aircraft carrier (though Chinese capacity to actually deploy carriers is at least a decade away - which, in fact, is not that long), and most recently, the government released its White Paper on National Defense, which highlights China's steadily growing military and naval capabilities.
But what is really drawing attention from rival navies and the country's neighbors is action below the surface: Chinese submarine power! [enter Beatles' music here]. The Chinese have been making substantial investments in subs - buying from the Russians (typical) and building their own. Just last week, the Federation of American Scientists issued a report saying that U.S. naval intelligence counted 12 "patrols" by Chinese attack submarines in 2008 - twice the number in the previous year, and the highest thus far.
The number of patrols still remains below the likely level of U.S attack submarine patrols, though higher than that of Russia. It's unclear as to what, exactly, constitutes a patrol, but it's thought to mean an extended voyage.
The larger question, however, is what does all of this mean? If we think about this linearly, we quickly come to the conclusion that China is harnessing its military and naval capabilities (duh). But for what purpose? If the submarines deployed into the Pacific, for instance, this would break with Chinese policy of not deploying nuclear weapons outside Chinese territory. So, either Chinese policy will change (which presently appears unlikely), or the focus is directed elsewhere, most likely Taiwan, which Beijing considers a renegade province.
Indeed, second only to its economic development, Beijing's foremost focus is on national unity - the so-called "One China" policy. Now don't get me wrong, I'm not suggesting a Chinese naval advance on Taiwan - heaven forbid! What I am suggesting, however, is that the buildup and modernization of China's naval forces is in the short term intended to secure China's sphere of influence in the Pacific. I would be very surprised if the motivation was discovered to be otherwise. If we accept this as the case, the subsequent question then becomes what does this mean for geo-politics and, from the American standpoint, how concerned should we be? Is China's naval buildup of greater consequence than its global economic and diplomatic advances? And how, if at all, should the U.S. parry this perceived threat?
The China factor in the Russo-Georgian conflict
A report in The Voice of America notes that Georgia has asked China to use its influence to push for a resolution to a territorial flare-up with Russia. According to the report, Georgia's ambassador to China, Zaza Begashvili, made no comments on the Chinese response, but remains optimistic that:
as a member of the U.N. Security Council, [China] will express its opposition to this aggression against an independent state
As the WSJ's Gerald Seib notes, it probably isn't feasible to try to play China and Russia directly off against each other, as was sometimes possible when they were the two Communist behemoths during the Cold War. Nonetheless, I'm curious to see what China will do in this situation. Let's consider the two most obvious options:
Option 1: China does not assist Georgia
The likelier option if you ask me. As a still emerging power China is heavily dependent on its strategic partnership with Russia and isn't about to make any move that would place that partnership in jeopardy. Furthermore, if China intends to stick to its policy of "non-interference" (which, if one considers China's activities of the past five or so years, appears to be debunk regardless), interfering in the conflict becomes even more unlikely. While China may express its concern verbally, we all know that actions speak louder than words.
Option 2: China assists Georgia
I'm still trying to play this one out in my head, so bear with me. At present I can think of only two conditions under which any such thing would be likely. The first is China's image in the international community, especially now during the Olympics. Then again, if China was concerned with its image, I doubt the country would be complicit in the Darfur and Zimbabwean crises, among others. Nor would it bear such an atrocious human rights record with respect to its own people. Right. Condition #1 scratched.
Condition #2: Oil. The WSJ again reports that the conflict in Georgia is placing grave doubt on the country's reliability as an energy corridor bringing Caspian crude to global oil markets, and sending shockwaves through the world-wide supply chain. Indeed only today BP shut down a pipeline over security fears in Georgia. It's no secret that China is resource hungry, pursuing oil wherever it can get its hands on it. If the Chinese are to intervene (and that's a big "if") then I speculate that their only reason for doing so would be over oil. Indeed, China and Georgia maintain friendly relations and I doubt China would want to lose a potential oil resource. Then again, much depends on China's relations with other key players like Iran and various African states like Angola, Nigeria and Sudan from which China derives most of its oil.