GOOD MORNING FROM LONDON
The New York Times (NYT) is focusing today on the rising confrontation between NATO and China. In a significant move, NATO stated in a new Mission Statement issued during the NATO summit in Madrid ““The deepening strategic partnership between the People’s Republic of China and the Russian Federation and their mutually reinforcing attempts to undercut the rules-based international order run counter to our values and interests,”
Days before NATO’s declaration, the Group of 7 countries said that they intended to raise USD600 billion to expand global infrastructure investment in developing countries, as a response to the USD1 trillion Belt + Road Initiative that Beijing started in 2013.
Hitherto NATO, which came into existence at the height of the US/USSR Cold War, has traditionally focused on protecting North America + Europe. But in recent years the military alliance has widened its global reach to include China citing what NATO refers to as China’s “growing military ambitions + rapidly developing offensive cyber capabilities.”
NATO’s views firmed up after XI Jinping said in February 2022 that China’s friendship with Russia had “no limits”, and subsequently China has refused to condemn Russia for the invasion of Ukraine, instead blaming Washington + NATO for provoking Russia with NATO’s military expansion in Central+ Eastern Europe
This switch of focus by NATO is part of the grand Geo-Political Change taking place in world affairs. China is on the rise + the US is on the decline. It is the big #1 issue in world affairs today, as this Column has repeatedly mentioned. China is uppermost in the minds of Washington/Pentagon and Wall Street strategic thinkers. This is the prism through which day-to-day events are to be viewed – whether it be Taiwan or Tibet or the Uyghurs or Hong Kong or the South China Sea or the Belt+Road Initiative. At the end of the day Washington remains mystified by the progress of China. It does not understand either the achievements of China or the significance of those achievements.
NEXT POST – MONDAY 4 JULY 2022
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