China and the future
While official Beijing assures the world that the Chinese foreign policy concept of “common destiny” promises harmony, prosperity and “good for all” to humanity, Samantha Hoffman, a leading analyst at the Australian Institute for Strategic Policy’s International Center for Cyber Policy, argues that China’s true desire is to transform the whole world in Chinese patterns of high-tech management based on traditional Confucian values. (See: Aurora News Agency, E. Larina, “Chairman Xi: data is preferable to words,” November 23, 2019). Exposing “Chinese insidiousness” is, of course, one of the main tasks of Western analysts, as, incidentally, the desire to “blow up strategic fog” is China’s usual way of communicating with the outside world. Therefore, in order not to be bogged down in Western bias towards China on the one hand, but not to “buy into” the natural disagreements and deliberate distortions that are natural for China, based on the global audience, on the other hand, let’s try to think about what they write about for the sake of greater objectivity The Chinese themselves are communicating with each other and apparently not really wondering how their reasoning is perceived by a foreign audience.
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The blogosphere of China’s revelations is Zhi Hu’s website (translated: “Know!”). Anonymous Material "Will China Overtake the US?" Will it be the first power in the world? ” (August 24, 2018):
“One can dream of becoming the first power in the world, but there is no need to set a specific goal to achieve world leadership, for it is easy to make mistakes on this path, especially when you strive for a goal without choosing ways to achieve it.
What is considered the rise of China? Politically, the rise of China means its transformation into a significant force that balances the United States, the European Union, Russia, the Middle East, into a force that influences the formation and maintenance of world order. Economically, the rise of China means its transformation into one of the three largest economies along with the United States and the European Union. In quantitative terms, the Chinese economy has almost caught up with the US and EU economies, but so far inferior to them qualitatively, and overcoming precisely this kind of lag is the direction of China's further efforts. Discussions about the hegemony of China are unnecessary, there is no reason to talk about where China will strike, where its boot will set foot. The policy of hegemony is fraught with problems that you first take upon yourself, and then strive to shift them to someone else, as in the parable of a man who first puts his own horse on his saddle and then looks for someone to replace him with for this activity. ”
(In the modern “strategic triangle” of the United States - China - Russia, China, unlike the United States and Russia, does not have historical experience of military-political world domination, so the prospects are in the real role of the global military-political hegemon (“where to strike, where to step with a boot ") look risky and frightening for him. At the same time, China wants, is ready and constantly demonstrates this, to proclaim the concept of a“ common destiny of mankind "and involving other countries in being equal to world" centers of power ", influencing the formation of world order his initiative “The Belt and the Way.” As Sharikov used to say: “I will take military records, and fight - shish!” - A. Sh.).
“In the world of the future, balancing centers of power will be presented. First, the US-led American Union. The United States will focus on the consolidation of both Americas. But this will be a minimum task: being the undisputed leader of the American continent, relying on its rich natural resources and huge population, the USA will eventually become the first power of the future and create a new Western civilization, different from the European one. Secondly, the European Union, the old western civilization. The contours of the European Union have already been formed; in the next century it will be increasingly consolidated, but this process will not be linear and smooth. Thirdly, the East Asian Union. It seems that consolidation processes will take place in Northeast and Southeast Asia, as in the era of the power of ancient China. The core of this consolidation process in East Asia will be China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, North Korea, Vietnam - the countries where the largest human and material resources are concentrated, the East Asian Union will become the center of East Asian civilization. Fourth, Middle Eastern civilization as a kind of Arab civilization, which, due to the possession of rich natural resources and in the process of scientific and technological development, will acquire a secular character, will become an independent center of power, a pole. Fifth, the African Union. Outlines of this union are indicated. Africa is a continent where ultimately the modernization of mankind will begin, African countries will develop rapidly with the help of other states and unions, the population of Africa exceeding a billion people, its rich natural resources, the activation of the productive forces of African countries will renew the face of the continent, which was formerly called hopeless, will make it one of the most developing. One can only imagine how developed capital construction will be in Africa, what roads and railways will be built connecting African states, ports on the western and eastern coasts of the continent, included in the first hundred ports of the world, as the level of education of Africans will be higher and higher. Of course, this whole process will be slow, it will take many years, but as a result, a new type of force will appear on the African continent, taking part in peacebuilding. And there are still many other states and regions, for example, Russia and Central Asia, South Asia, where India is the main one, etc., and for each of them a specific analysis is needed.
When all of the above alliances are finally consolidated and formed, humanity will enter a new era of its comprehensive prosperity and development. Of course, on this difficult, winding long-term path, much will not happen as described above, but the main tendency of world development will be just that. ”
(The Chinese futurologist, like official Beijing, sees the distant future, the world of universal development and prosperity, through the traditional Confucian prism of “great unity.” But the path to “great unity” for this futurologist does not lie through global concepts and initiatives of the Chinese state with a smack “ “Chinese hegemony”, and through relatively independent processes of forming the five main world power centers balancing each other, where China is assigned the role of just one of the key states of the “East Asian Union.” The Chinese author speaks of China’s global leadership as a philosophical dream, but not as a practical goal to which one must strive at all costs. He does not see Russia at all in the top five world centers of power of the future. - A. Sh.).
China’s entry into the world of global civilization gave him access to the advanced achievements of mankind, made him one of the creators of these achievements, but at the same time “awarded” the inevitable “diseases” of globalism capitalistically. An expert in the field of industry, Liu Pinjie, discusses this topic on the Zhi Hu website on April 7, 2017 in the article “How will Chinese society change in five years?”
"Population. Within five years, the working-age population of China will decline from 5 million to 10 million people a year. In 2023, the working-age population of China will decline by 11 million. In the future, the working-age population of China will be reduced by more than 10 million people a year. According to forecasts, by 2025, a reduction in the number of able-bodied people in China will cause a decrease in economic growth in China by 1%. Between 2013 and 2016, the number of deaths in China consistently amounted to 9 million 700 thousand people per year, but over the next 5 years the number of deaths in China will exceed 10 million people per year. In 2035, when the decline in the total population of China begins, it will not exceed 1 billion 450 million people.
In the future, due to rising prices, the real estate market will become unprofitable, the most growing and prosperous in China will be 1) medicine; 2) social sphere; 3) the funeral industry. Gradually, there will be a shortage of financing of social and medical insurance in China, so the reform of the pension system, social security system, and medical care system in China will be carried out in the same way as the reform of the medical care system in the USA. Without reforming the pension system, the social and medical welfare systems in China today, the problems associated with them will be postponed for the future and will inevitably worsen.
Education. In five years, out of every 100 thousand people in China, there will be more than 15 thousand people with a university level of culture.
Economy. In parallel with the reduction in the number of able-bodied people, the scope of application of robotics and automated equipment is expanding in China, the level of qualification of the population is increasing, and overall labor productivity and labor productivity per capita continue to grow. In turn, the continued economic development of China contributes both to raising the level of science and technology in the country, and to increasing competition in the industry.
When the current round of growth in housing prices ends in China, they will roll back and stabilize for 2-3 years. Over the past few years, housing prices have also jumped briefly in countries such as New Zealand, Canada, and the United States. Foreign media and foreign think tanks have been talking year after year about the debt and economic crisis in China, about Chinese ghost towns, about the water crisis in China, but in the next 10 years the likelihood of economic crises in China will be lower than in Europe and Japan. However, if there is no large-scale economic crisis in the leading economies of the world (Chinese, American, European, Japanese), further growth in property prices in China in the long run will be inevitable. Due to high housing prices in the four economically largest cities in China (Beijing, Shanghai, Guangzhou and Shenzhen), these cities will become the most expensive in the world, bypassing Monaco, Xiangang, London and New York. The main and inevitable cause of rising housing prices in China is the huge population of the country.
Sino-US relations. If China’s economic growth, due to its technical development, compensates for the economic damage from declining working-age population, China will continue the race for the United States. If technical development does not provide China with a technical advantage over Europe and the United States, and China will remain in the middle and bottom of the international division of labor, then taking into account the gradual decline in the well-being of the population, taking into account environmental problems and problems associated with the lack of natural resources, the Chinese economy it will be difficult to beat the American.
The United States and Russia only through the sale of oil, forests, minerals, agricultural products can be richer than China. The United States has much more oil reserves than China, the United States is the first in the world in terms of explored oil fields. The United States is among the top ten countries in the world with the highest water resources per capita, while China is one of the 13 countries in the world with the most limited water resources. In terms of mineral reserves, the United States is not inferior to Australia and Brazil, while the US population is four times less than in China. In order to negate the natural advantages of the United States, China will need to surpass its opponent in the scientific and technological field.
However, even if a relative decline in US economic potential occurs over the next few years, it will still be difficult for China to surpass the United States.
With the continuous technological development of China, the nature of Sino-US economic relations is changing, they cease to be complementary and gradually become competing. However, this does not mean that Sino-US economic competition will ultimately end in war. weapons. So, a few years ago, China purchased computer and service equipment from the American company IBM, and, possibly, in a few years, Chinese Tensent, one of the largest investment and venture capital companies, will have a controlling stake in the American electric vehicle manufacturer Tesla; the Chinese company Alibaba will become a shareholder of the largest company in the market of e-commerce platforms - the American Amazon, and the Chinese company Hua Wei will become a shareholder of one of the world leaders in the production of PCs and software - the American Apple. In turn, perhaps even more US companies will become shareholders in Chinese enterprises, even giants such as China National Petroleum and Gas Corporation (CNPC) and China Integrated Energy and Chemical Company (Sinopec). ”
(Regarding Tensent, the owner of the largest Chinese social network WeChat, whose services are used by 889 million people every month, the optimism of the Chinese author was explained by the fact that in March 2017 this company acquired a 5% stake in Tesla for 1,8 billion In the spring of 2019, Amazon admitted defeat to Alibaba in China, and now the competition between the two largest e-commerce platforms has unfolded on the European, in particular, Russian markets. According to Strategy Analitics, in the second quarter of 2019, Samsung took the first place in the global smartphone market (76,3 million devices, an increase in supply by 1,9%), the second place is Hua Wei (58,7 million devices, an increase in supply by 1,7%), Apple is in third place (38 million devices, 0,7% reduction in shipments. - A. Sh.).
“Without the economic community of China and the US, China’s free trade zones (FTAs) would not make any sense.”
(The first Chinese FTZ was established on September 29, 2013 in Shanghai, since then 12 FTZs have been created, the construction of the twelfth one began in April 2018 on Hainan Island. - A. Sh.).
“The US has spent $ 6 trillion on the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. If a war starts between China and the United States, the cost of such a war will amount to tens of trillions of dollars. In addition to enriching Europe, there will be no benefit from such a war. ”
(In principle, earning more than the United States is, of course, the cherished dream of modern China, but he understands that in the foreseeable future it is unlikely that he can objectively pass the United States in direct economic competition. Therefore, some kind of “economic community "with the United States as a close economic partnership with the USSR in the 50s of the 20th century, when China's growth was ensured by drawing closer to an economically more powerful partner in the socialism camp. At the initial stage of the policy of" reform and openness "in the early 80s In the 20s of the 50th century, China was able to significantly become closer to the “camp of capitalism”, which was economically stronger then himself, and, like in the 20s of the 70th century, it benefited from rapprochement with the USSR, win again in its development, this time from economic rapprochement with the West. Today, China is no less interested in economic rapprochement with the West, primarily with the United States, and even more from this rapprochement. However, the “trade frictions", the "trade wars" unleashed by the Americans, who "saw the light" and perceive China no longer as a counterweight to the USSR / Russia, as in the 20s of the XNUMXth century, but as their most direct, economic in the first place a rival’s turn destroys China’s plans to move closer to a stronger economy in order to achieve its own benefits. Thinking of what to do next, China is still responding to American economic pressure with counter-sanctions, according to its ancient principle of "answer the one who attacked you first so as to curb it so that it does not attack you again." - A. Sh.).
“The problem of Taiwan. I do not think that China will unite before 2025. It is not yet possible to solve the Taiwan problem because the masses are not sufficiently active in resolving it. On both sides of the Taiwan Strait, people simply do not want to hear each other.
Change of social contradictions. Previously, the key contradiction of Chinese society was the contradiction between the growing material and cultural needs of the people and backward production, but now this contradiction has been eliminated. Now, backward production is left in the past, and a huge amount of goods has appeared. Now you can buy, and buy very quickly, any thing that is in the world. Thus, the problem of the growing material and cultural needs of the people somehow gradually lost its significance. At the same time, social stratification becomes flashy, which entails nihilism, worship of the "golden calf", populism, extremism. All this will be the reality of China in the coming years. ”
Zhi Hu website, January 30, 2019, a user of Fekda (Fekda is a star in the Big Bucket asterism of the constellation Ursa Major. - A.Sh.), article “Will China become a developed state?”, Chapter 5 “Future”.
“After the great turmoil, widespread restoration of order is necessary, and then peace comes to the empire for a hundred years. The old generation is leaving, the next generation is prospering, prospering and the next generation ... there is an upsurge, and material resources are concentrated in the hands of clan representatives, social strata are consolidating, the society is doomed to the “curse of thingism”, new “social elevators” are opening, and a new “ golden age". In the next 50 years, the era of the "clan aristocracy" begins and the decline in the birth rate accompanying this era, and the more developed the economy, the lower the birth rate in society. Thus, according to statistics from 2016, China ranked 160th in the world in terms of fertility, Japan - 180th, Xiangang - 195th, and South Korea was “the first from the end”. That is, the "golden age" creates enormous material wealth in society, but the population is decreasing. And if China loses in global competition, it will have to achieve an advantage by increasing the birth rate. ”
(The Chinese author, in principle, described the period of the newest stories China and its foreseeable future. "The End of the Great Troubles" is the formation of the PRC in 1949. “Broad rule of law" is the period of China’s basic economic development and domestic political turmoil before Deng Xiaoping came to power and the beginning of the “reform and openness” policy, which was launched by the decisions of the 3rd Plenum of the CPC Central Committee of the 11th convocation in December 1978. The “centennial pacification” in China that ensued after the “widening of order”, therefore, should last until the 80s of the 21st century. The Chinese author divides the period of this “centennial pacification” into two 50-year stages. In accordance with his logic, the first 50th anniversary should end at the turn of the 20s and 30s, which corresponds to the officially proclaimed “complete building of a society of prosperity” by the centenary of the founding of the CCP in 21, and then the implementation of the state program "Made in China 2021", which implies the transformation of China by 2025 into a "powerful industrial power", surpassing Germany and Japan in terms of industrial production. During the second fiftieth anniversary of the Golden Age, predicted by the Chinese author as the "era of the" clan aristocracy ", the officially planned task of building a" prosperous, democratic and cultural country of socialism "by the centenary of the founding of the PRC in 2035 should be solved in China. . However, according to the Chinese author, the second fifty years of “centennial pacification” in China, which should begin in the 2049s of the 30st century, will be characterized by a noticeable decrease in the number of able-bodied people, which may complicate the solution of the historical problems facing the country, creating problems and for its economy and to ensure the mobilization resource it needs. - A. Sh.).
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If we talk about whether China has openly aggressive plans for the future, then, probably, in this connection it is worth recalling its modern concept of "strategic defense" in combination with the possibility of an "operational-tactical attack" on the enemy who attacked first. (See: “White Paper. National Defense of China in a New Era,” Ministry of Defense of the People's Republic of China, July 24, 2019. - A. Sh.)
The basic concept of an "active defense strategy" has officially existed in China since March 1956. In the 60s - the first half of the 80s of the 20th century, this concept was mainly oriented towards the strategic defense of the northern borders of China from the USSR, the military threat from which the Chinese took all these years absolutely seriously. Then the leadership of the country and the masses sincerely believed that Soviet troops concentrated on the western and especially on the eastern sections of the Sino-Soviet border could attack China at any moment, and the deployment of the Soviet military contingent, the 39th Soviet army in the MPR , literally a few hundred kilometers from Beijing and from the strategic internal regions of the PRC, these fears were brought to a state of hysterical counter-aggression, which at times flashed into armed clashes on the Soviet-Chinese border. In the second half of the 80s of the 20th century, having managed to normalize interstate relations with the land northern neighbor for the long term and on very favorable military-political conditions, the Central Military Council of the CPC, aka the Central Military Council of the People's Republic of China, and the PLA General Staff concentrated its focus on the development of the basic concept of an “active defense strategy” as applied not primarily to the PLA Ground Forces (SV), but to the PLA Navy, as well as to the PLA Air Force to counter military threats from ocean directions to China’s mainland coast of more than 18 thousand kilometers. Today, the focus of attention of the Chinese military planning a “strategic defense” combined with an “tactical offensive” is focused on the so-called “near sea”, by which they mean not only a 200-mile sea zone off the coast of mainland China, but and the entire water area of the Yellow Sea, East China Sea, South China Sea, the water area adjacent to the Nansha (Spratly) archipelago, the island of Taiwan, a group of Okinawa islands, as well as the water area of the North Pacific Ocean. The main model of the use of military forces and means fleet and military aviation China in these areas are "asymmetric measures" that prevent the invasion of enemy forces. Western experts call this model A2 / AD (anti-access / area denial), "restricting access, maneuvering and preventing them", that is, deterring the enemy (for China today it is the Navy and the US Air Force and their allies in the "near sea") using a complex of various weapons, primarily missile ones, by creating an increased threat to the deployment of enemy forces in areas protected by China, especially in the South China Sea.
Such a military strategy of China is completely dependent on the current military-political situation in the Asia-Pacific region, since taking into account the Indo-Pacific strategy of the United States, aimed at military-political deterrence of China, the Chinese military is increasingly focusing on the southern and southeastern strategic directions.
But if the long land border with Russia and, in addition, the border with the MPR for China are no longer a source of military threat; if the status quo with a greater or lesser degree of tension is maintained on the high western borders with powerful India - a strategic partner of the United States; if in the southeast, in the Asia-Pacific region, China and a large American military contingent with the closest US military allies in the region (Japan, Kazakhstan, Australia) walk in front of each other “along the edge of the red line”, “trunk to trunk”; if China really wants, but cannot "pull the Taiwan splinter" out of its own "soft underbelly"; if in the east the DPRK was, is and will be for China “lips protecting teeth”, then in the south there is a state in which, like 40 years ago, one can, if appropriate and relatively unpunished, try to demonstrate his undisguised rhetoric of the “common good” and “Harmony” is a growing force. And, most importantly, the “resolution of the issue” with Vietnam allows China to gain a foothold on the strategic frontier along the logistics routes of the Chinese initiative “21st Century Maritime Silk Road,” which means, first of all, the spread of China’s economic influence in such important regions of the world, as the Persian Gulf, the Red Sea and further access to the Mediterranean Sea, Africa.
An anonymous user discusses this topic on the Zhi Hu website in the article “What does the South China Sea mean for Vietnam?” (January 17, 2016):
“For Vietnam, the South China Sea is an outlet to the Pacific Ocean. Therefore, the Chinese borders in the Chinese interpretation of the sea borders in the South China Sea practically allow China to lock Vietnam off its own coast, just like US control over the “first island line” (Japan Islands, Taiwan, Philippine Islands, Sunda Islands. - A. Sh.) Creates a blockade of China.
For China, the South China Sea is an outlet to the Indian Ocean, so to speak, "the whole world is Celestial in the sight of the Chinese ruler." For China, losing the South China Sea is like losing your legs. ”
(A feature of Chinese foreign policy is to wait for the right moment, the right conditions to achieve the desired result. That’s why the calm reasoning of Chinese users about whether, and, if possible, how, to inflict another (after 1979) attack on Vietnam Reading these arguments, it is believed that if there really is a “favorable situation” in the region, in other words, if the US first of all closes its eyes for some reason, China will really hit Vietnam, discarding its tinsel about the “common destiny” of mankind. ”- A. Sh.).
Zhi Hu website, an anonymous user, article “Can China strike Vietnam with a landing force from the South China Sea?” (July 1, 2017):
“You can first deliver a fire attack directly on the territory of Vietnam, or you can first land troops there, but it’s best not to disclose plans for this at all. Let's talk about the possibility of a Sino-Vietnamese war with the non-intervention of other states.
In naval battles in the waters of the South China Sea and in air battles over it (if this happens), modern PLA and air forces, possessing an overwhelming superiority over the naval and air forces of Vietnam, will quickly destroy them in a month. Thus, a month after the outbreak of hostilities, the PLA will have the opportunity to land troops in Vietnam under the guise of the Chinese navy and aircraft. Fighting with Vietnam can also begin in the reverse order, directly from the landing of PLA troops on its territory, which is probably not as effective as the first option. Of course, all these are not calculated conclusions, but general, vague reasoning. However, in any case, it is indisputable that, given a favorable set of circumstances, a direct fire strike deep into Vietnamese territory is completely justified.
The possibilities of the SV PLA are not in doubt; in the event of a war with Vietnam, the question will not be whether the SV PLA will be able to win, but what will such a war cost China. If the PLA encounters difficulties in battles in the mountainous regions of North Vietnam, then thanks to the PLAA gaining dominance in the air and the PLA’s Navy gaining dominance at sea, the PLA aircraft will be able to completely disrupt the supply of Vietnamese troops in North Vietnam with bombing attacks. But even without the occupation of Vietnamese territory, a rapid fire attack from the waters of the South China Sea against the deep rear and at significant sites will cause an internal crisis in Vietnam, and thus China’s political goals will be achieved. ”
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So, is it true, according to an Australian analyst, that China “seeks to transform the whole world into Chinese patterns of high-tech governance based on traditional Confucian values”? Maybe. How is it also possible that in the vaults of the Chinese centers for strategic military decision-making there are plans to defeat Vietnam and complete control of China over the South China Sea, plans to deter and defeat American and allied forces on the "first island line" and on the "second island line" (Japanese islands, Guam island, Northern Mariana Islands, Pacific island groups to the coast of Northern Australia. - A. Sh.), Plans to conquer Taiwan and defeat India, even plans to deploy naval infrastructure of the PLA along the routes of the Silk Road Maritime 21 century ”. And, perhaps, in some very deep and secret Chinese safes in a tiny little inconspicuous daddy there is a plan for the very distant future, when “under favorable circumstances” China will be able to try to oust the Russians in Siberia and the Russian Far East, as it is in recent history, By the way, he already did it twice: in 1929 on the CER and at the end of 1942 in Xinjiang.
In short, China may have the most incredible plans, perhaps even those that we do not know about. If we resort to allegory, China is a Dragon, a powerful creature and therefore dangerous by definition, but, most importantly, it is a mysterious, obscure creature. Run and shout: "China seeks to transform the world based on traditional Confucian values!", "China will conquer Siberia someday!" and so on, it is completely pointless and completely unproductive. The only thing that can be done in order to try to understand the deep intentions of China and, if necessary, counteract them: continue to study the Dragon in a real way in their own national interests.
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