Beware the Ides of March
Jonathan Fenby describes a newly assertive and aggressive China:
Deng Xiaoping counseled caution in international relations. China should, he advised, keep a low profile while enriching itself and not alarm the countries whose markets for its exports would replace deficient domestic demand. Hu Jintao and his leadership colleagues must have decided that the time has come to shed such caution…
During three months just spent in Beijing, I was struck repeatedly by the sharp tone adopted towards the US not only by ideologues and media propagandists, but by senior economists who insist that failure of American economic policy is responsible for the world’s ills…
A survey by the Japanese newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun published in mid-November found that 87 percent considered China to be untrustworthy and that 90 percent thought relations between the two countries were bad. A simultaneous poll by China’s Oriental Outlook Weekly, run by the state news agency, found similar figures on views of Japan held by Chinese…
As the mainland moves up the technological and value chain under its next Five-Year Plan, trade tensions are set to rise. China trade was once all about cheap exports. But if Chinese development goes to plan, import substitution for big-ticket items will become the order of the day. In a little noticed development this month, China unveiled a prototype of a 150-seat airliner due to go into service by 2016
For a long time now, China’s growth has been 70% dependent on exports. We don’t think it will be an easy job to transform the economy. If that proves true, it certainly would be convenient to blame the US. And if China is becoming aggressive militarily as well, perilous times could lie just ahead.