Obama's Pacific Pivot.

[DFab420]

An interesting read. Helps in understanding where our attentions will be for this next decade or so.

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"Asia’s return to the center of world affairs is the great power shift of the twenty-first century. In 1750, Asia had roughly three-fifths of the world’s population and accounted for three-fifths of global output. By 1900, after the Industrial Revolution in Europe and America, Asia’s share of global output had shrunk to one-fifth. By 2050, Asia will be well on its way back to where it was 300 years earlier.

But, rather than keeping an eye on that ball, the United States wasted the first decade of this century mired in wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Now, as US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton put it in a recent speech, American foreign policy will “pivot” toward East Asia."


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If China becomes a bully in the Asia-Pacific region, other countries will join the US to confront it. Indeed, that is why many of China’s neighbors have strengthened their ties with the US since 2008, when China’s foreign policy became more assertive. But the last thing the US wants is a Cold War II in Asia.


http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/nye101/English

[AdHocSolver]

1. After reading the linked article, "dan's" comment seemed appropriate.

(snip)
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In a way, reading Harvard (Harvard!!) Professor Joseph Nye's article makes me sad.

He writes that "After the 2008 financial crisis, many Chinese expressed the mistaken belief that the US was in terminal decline". But what evidence is there anywhere that we (the US) are not in terminal decline? And especially that we are not in steep decline relative to China?

China has more miles of high speed railroad than any country on earth (and much more than us). China manufactures more than 50% of the world's solar cells---while in the US we have (or, had) Solyndra. China has a vibrant, advancing space program, while we have distant memories of the arts we've lost in the Apollo project. China is building huge new research-level universities every year, while the only thing really growing at our schools is their tuition. This kind of list goes on and on, but basically China is a country on fire, like the US in the late 19th century, while the US is a country on fire, like the time of Rome burning.

Fundamentally, the problem, for us, is that China has great leaders---for God's sake, engineers are heading the government---while we have lawyers and MBAs at the helm. Thus we burn up 10 times the military budget of China, despite the fact that it has 4 times the population, more land, and 14 bordering and sometimes hostile neighbors.

None of this underlying reality is apparent from the text here, or, indeed, is heard in the main stream media.

Thus we drift, from self-inflicted crisis to self-inflicted crisis, ever towards the pits.

Of cousre we could be saved: we could withdraw, unilaterally from Japan, Korea, and especially the troubled nations near the Mediterranean, and try to regroup and rebuild.

But first our elites---which means Professor Nye, his colleagues, and his students, need to become thoroughly aware of how far we have sank.
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