Does the World Actually NEED another "Great Depression"?

[PeterCH]

My apologies for going back to an earlier post, but i feel this needs correction and clarification.

Nevertheless, despite these successes, the strategic partnership remains fragile and vulnerable to bilateral and international developments. A negative historical legacy, enduring cultural prejudices and strategic suspicions, and even commercial disagreements threaten, over time, to undermine many of the gains of the recent past. In the transformed global environment after 9/11 there are signs that Moscow is rethinking its approach towards China as part of a more general evolution in Russian strategic calculus in the Asia-Pacific region and beyond. China's emergence as the next super-power, the spectre of increased Sino-American tensions, the changing balance of power between Moscow and Beijing, and rival agendas in Central Asia all have the potential to rekindle once dormant political differences and security fears.

http://www3.interscience.wiley.com/journal/118753932/abstract

 

[PeterCH]

This happy state of the relationship may end in the longer term when the disparities of national power will become obvious and lead to China impacting more directly and decisively on the situation inside Russia. This will produce tension resulting either in aninstitutionalized appeasement policy by Moscow or in an open conflict between it and Beijing. It should be noted that these conclusions rest on the premise of Russia continuing to exist in the medium and long term as a more or less coherent whole. Should the processes of disintegration of the old fabric of the Russian state and society grow too strong, and thecountervailing processes of new state and society building remain weak and ineffectual, the world – including China – will be challenged with an unprecedented and possibly impossible task of managing a geopolitical catastrophy of enormous proportion. This, however, is a subject of a separate research. Dr. Dmitri Trenin Deputy Director of the Carnegie Center, Moscow

http://64.233.179.104/scholar?hl=en...army.at/pdf_pool/publikationen/03_jb00_46.pdf

I think it's incedibly naive to believe that the Russian/Chinese relationship at present is stable, least knowing
how the relationship is based entirely on Chinese domination (reversal of earlier relationships) over
Russia now. Russia is a nationalistic, defensive and rather paranoid nation state.

 

[cerebus]

There is nothing stable about Chinese/Russian diplomatic relationships, but at least for the time being neither will attack the other for fear of retribution. So it's a status quo, as long as they both continue being as powerful as the other.

 

[PeterCH]

More here:

http://72.14.235.104/search?q=cache...+little+to+say+about+each+other&hl=en&strip=1

 

[PeterCH]

There is nothing stable about Chinese/Russian diplomatic relationships, but at least for the time being neither will attack the other for fear of retribution. So it's a status quo, as long as they both continue being as powerful as the other.

Which as you know has changed with
Russia being on the defensive, being now the 16th largest economy vs
Chinese 3rd, coupled with the Sino-Russian border war in the past we
may see conflict.

However, if the US were to back off from Asia and the Chinese
were to continue their rise, while the ever more paranoid Russia
were to see itself threatened more from breakaway regions
and the presence of NATO, a conflict between the two could
easily errupt.

There is room for tension and there has been war in the past,
not just in 1966 but before under the Tsars too.

 

[cerebus]

Russia may be on the defensive but it has always had the most formidable obstacle to invasion that you could hope for - itself. The interior of Russia has always been militarily inviolate, so they have really no need to worry about Chinese aggression.

 

[vxv]

Russia is never on the defensive, as Medvedev said, any US forces in Georgia will be a declaration of war against Russia.

If the US don’t watch out, they will be brought to their knees by everyone they have piss**-off since 911, and maybe since WW2.

 

[PeterCH]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Treaty_of_Aigun

Nice read there....

 

[PeterCH]

Russia is never on the defensive, as Medvedev said, any US forces in Georgia will be a declaration of war against Russia.

If the US don’t watch out, they will be brought to their knees by everyone they have piss**-off since 911, and maybe since WW2.

Russia has delusions of grandeur but anyway. That's a problem they had
since Peter the Great. Anyway...

 

[Turiko]

With regards to comments made about China.

I don't think PeterCH is even aware that some of his friends, shipmates from years past, are now fully settled in China. They left SA, and came back for a short period to sell up and left SA never to return. What does the fact that China is now becoming an emigration destination for South Africans say about the country?

 

[vxv]

Might be, but I doubt they will make the same mistake as WW2 ending in the cold war.

China might just be the one to equalize all.

 

[Nanfeishen]

China and Russia have a lot going for them , more than most realise especially economically, and you dont go to war with your economic partner.

October 2004 - Russia and China sign a protocol finalizing border demarcation. Russian gas giant Gazprom and Chinese oil company CNPC sign a strategic partnership deal.

March 2006 - Chinese President Hu Jintao and visiting Russian President Putin agree to extend energy cooperation.

27 November 2006
''Russia-China Security Cooperation''

ussia and China have joined together in a strategic partnership aimed at countering the U.S. and Western "monopoly in world affairs," as was made clear in a joint statement released by the Chinese and Russian presidents in July 2005. The long standing border disputes between the two countries were settled in agreements in 2005, and joint military exercises were carried out in the same year. Furthermore, Russia, in addition to its arms exports, has been increasing its oil and gas commitments to China.

March 2007 - Commercial deals worth $4 billion are signed to crown Chinese President Hu's visit to Russia. Putin says bilateral trade grew five-fold from 2000 to around $30 billion.

14 August 2008

Russia and China signed a landmark deal on July 21, officially ending all outstanding territorial disputes between the two countries. Under the agreement, Russia will hand over Yinlong Island (known as Tarabarov in Russia) and half of the Heixiazi Island (Bolshoi Ussuriysky) at the confluence the of Amur and Ussuri rivers, clearing the way for closer strategic and economic relations with China.

The deal flowed from an initial agreement signed in 2004 by former Russian President Vladimir Putin that proposed a 50-50 division of the disputed islands. While Russia returns Yinlong and half of Heixiazi, totalling 174 square kilometres, China has given up its claim to the other half of Heixiazi.

Sources:
http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-Russia/idUSL1912530020080519?pageNumber=3&virtualBrandChannel=0
http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=588&language_id=1
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/aug2008/ruch-a14.shtml

 

[vxv]

What does the fact that China is now becoming an emigration destination for South Africans say about the country?

I have friends there in HK, and there are many Chinese here as well. (AA rules updated).

Africa and China, helping each other.

 

[vxv]

China and Russia have a lot going for them , more than most realise especially economically, and you dont go to war with your economic partner.

14 August 2008

Sources:
http://www.reuters.com/article/GCA-Russia/idUSL1912530020080519?pageNumber=3&virtualBrandChannel=0
http://www.pinr.com/report.php?ac=view_report&report_id=588&language_id=1
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2008/aug2008/ruch-a14.shtml

WOW! Again facts, nicely done. Clearly this is fact now that China and Russia are enabling each other. Revelations...

 

[cerebus]

Your predictions also make a number of very large assumptions as well Peter.

1: Russian/Chinese border wars.
2: Attenuation of worldwide demand for oil.
3: The present crisis resolving itself without impacting the fundamentals of the US economy.
4: The present problems with competing nations' economic growth never being resolved through future policy change.

 

[PeterCH]

My predictions are not predictions but points that unlike the US which has stable borders and is seperated by SEA, Russia and China border various states including each other
and they do not have such friendly relations with each other - if any friendliness exists-
its there primarily for co-operation vs the USA. If we look at the Soviet-Sino split
in the 70's we can see that it also culminated in a war by proxy (Kampuchea
vs Vietnam) and that ethnic prejudices, past injustices (treaties) and economic disparities and even the competition between the two and lack of co-operation
after the split, are all points which can errupt into discord between the two. China is on its way UP, Russia is on its way DOWN.

Its naive to believe that just because companies have cross border deals that
relations between two countries are secure. They are for the moment, but
there is a lot going against them remaining so in the future.

Nanfeishen I am aware of the current situation, however you must realise this
historical fact. Countries fight wars with their neighbours (especially over land,
especially when one needs it and other has it, Russia is depopulated,
China we all know is not). Just because Russia and China have
bilateral relations, have had common military exercises and some of their companies
do business does not mean this will last forever. Compare this with the USA
where most of its border is beach or north pole - which will last forever
and where instability can never be found.

 

[PeterCH]

Let's look deeper at some slowly emerging tensions.
You know once Chinese make the majority in the contested regions,
they'll annex them.

In an article posted on the Kreml.org website this week, Yevgeniy Kolesnikov says that that the number of Chinese residents in the Russian Far East has jumped from 2,000 in 1989 to just under a million now, only one-quarter of whom are officially registered with the government.

Those numbers may seem relatively small relative to the population of the Russian Federation as a whole, the Royal Haskoning consultant says. However, they are quite large in comparison to the 4.9 million people living in the southern portion of the Russian Far East and even the 7.9 million who live in that region as a whole.

Moreover, Kolesnikov suggests the Chinese there are increasingly settling in for the long haul. Polls show that "half live with their families, more than half speak Russian, 70 percent of the youth plan to live in Russia, and their children are studying in Russian schools," even though the Chinese "do not mix with the local population."

Moreover, he continues, "the majority of residents of the Far East are negatively disposed to the Chinese immigration, not only because of their maintenance of a distinct community but also because as a result of their numbers, there has arisen a "de facto new national territorial formation ever less attractive for migrants belonging to European culture."

Moscow must take that into consideration, Kolesnikov argues because "the 'sinification' of the Far East and Siberia is a poor choice for Russia" as a whole. Not because there is any threat that Beijing will seize the region -- "we are all the same a powerful military state," he says -- but because of its social consequences.

Russia is very nationalistic. Has always been. Even now Russians are becoming Skin-heads in Moscow, but beyond that Russia will see an influx
of foreigners as a threat. After all Russia used these tactics in South Ossetia itself, it understands the danger very well.

 

[PeterCH]

oD: From the Russian point of view the demographic imbalance between the countries looks pretty scary.

Bobo Lo: The reality is that there are 110 million people in northern China (this is the most common figure, but it is probably more) compared to fewer than 7 million Russians east of Lake Baikal. More generally, we are speaking about a total population of 1.3 billion and rising as against one of 142 million and falling. This clearly plays on the Russian mind.

fears and entirely rational concerns take a variety of forms, including

· The fear that the Russian Far East is being depopulated while the population on the other side of the border continues to multiply

· The fear that a heavyweight player - which not so long ago called for the ‘return’ of Siberia, the Far East and parts of Central Asia – has suddenly appeared on the border without much warning

· The fear that Russia’s role will be just to export raw materials to China (the dynamics of the bilateral trade system give grounds for this fear)

· The fear that China will be destabilised: a situation in which Beijing will no longer be able to regulate migration or the activities of individual warlords (as has happened before in China's recent history).

Bobo Lo mentions some of these fears, which are part of a more general rise in the level of xenophobia. Leading Russian demographers, political analysts and international jurists try and play down the irrational aspect of these fears. But even they have to admit that bilateral trade has deteriorated, and that if the People’s Republic were destabilised, it would pose a threat to Russia.

http://www.opendemocracy.net/russia/article/Russian-fears-of-China-not-based-in-reality

 

[BigAl-sa]

After all Russia used these tactics in South Ossetia itself, it understands the danger very well.

O, so how do you rate the tactics that the US used in invading Iraq?

 

[PeterCH]

O, so how do you rate the tactics that the US used in invading Iraq?

Irrelevant. Don't go OFF TOPIC.

The current topic is Russia and China not US and Iraq. USA did not give US passports to Iraqis before
declaring Iraq a US state and annexing it because of the huge US population there.