Peak Oil is You
Donate Bitcoins ;-) or Paypal :-)
Page added on March 2, 2015
Financial collapse leads to war
Scanning the headlines in the western mainstream press, and then peering behind the one-way mirror to compare that to the actual goings-on, one can’t but get the impression that America’s propagandists, and all those who follow in their wake, are struggling with all their might to concoct rationales for military action of one sort or another, be it supplying weapons to the largely defunct Ukrainian military, or staging parades of US military hardware and troops in the almost completely Russian town of Narva, in Estonia, a few hundred meters away from the Russian border, or putting US “advisers” in harm’s way in parts of Iraq mostly controlled by Islamic militants.
The strenuous efforts to whip up Cold War-like hysteria in the face of an otherwise preoccupied and essentially passive Russia seems out of all proportion to the actual military threat Russia poses. (Yes, volunteers and ammo do filter into Ukraine across the Russian border, but that’s about it.) Further south, the efforts to topple the government of Syria by aiding and arming Islamist radicals seem to be backfiring nicely. But that’s the pattern, isn’t it? What US military involvement in recent memory hasn’t resulted in a fiasco? Maybe failure is not just an option, but more of a requirement?
Let’s review. Afghanistan, after the longest military campaign in US history, is being handed back to the Taliban. Iraq no longer exists as a sovereign nation, but has fractured into three pieces, one of them controlled by radical Islamists. Egypt has been democratically reformed into a military dictatorship. Libya is a defunct state in the middle of a civil war. The Ukraine will soon be in a similar state; it has been reduced to pauper status in record time—less than a year. A recent government overthrow has caused Yemen to stop being US-friendly. Closer to home, things are going so well in the US-dominated Central American countries of Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador that they have produced a flood of refugees, all trying to get into the US in the hopes of finding any sort of sanctuary.
Looking at this broad landscape of failure, there are two ways to interpret it. One is that the US officialdom is the most incompetent one imaginable, and can’t ever get anything right. But another is that they do not succeed for a distinctly different reason: they don’t succeed because results don’t matter. You see, if failure were a problem, then there would be some sort of pressure coming from somewhere or other within the establishment, and that pressure to succeed might sporadically give rise to improved performance, leading to at least a few instances of success. But if in fact failure is no problem at all, and if instead there was some sort of pressure to fail, then we would see exactly what we do see.
In fact, a point can be made that it is the limited scope of failure that is the problem. This would explain the recent saber-rattling in the direction of Russia, accusing it of imperial ambitions (Russia is not interested in territorial gains), demonizing Vladimir Putin (who is effective and popular) and behaving provocatively along Russia’s various borders (leaving Russia vaguely insulted but generally unconcerned). It can be argued that all the previous victims of US foreign policy—Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria, even the Ukraine—are too small to produce failure writ large enough to satisfy America’s appetite for failure. Russia, on the other hand, especially when incentivized by thinking that it is standing up to some sort of new, American-style fascism, has the ability to deliver to the US a foreign policy failure that will dwarf all the previous ones.
Analysis have proposed a variety of explanations for America’s hyperactive, oversized militarism. Here are the top three:
1. The US government has been captured by the military-industrial complex, which demands to be financed lavishly. Rationales are created artificially to achieve that result. But there does seem to be some sort of pressure to actually make weapons and field armies, because wouldn’t it be far more cost-effective to achieve full-spectrum failure simply by stealing all the money and skip building the weapons systems altogether? So something else must be going on.
2. The US military posture is designed to insure America’s full spectrum dominance over the entire planet. But “full-spectrum dominance” sounds a little bit like “success,” whereas what we see is full-spectrum failure. Again, this story doesn’t fit the facts.
3. The US acts military to defend the status of the US dollar as the global reserve currency. But the US dollar is slowly but surely losing its attractiveness as a reserve currency, as witnessed by China and Russia acting as swiftly as they can to unload their US dollar reserves, and to stockpile gold instead. Numerous other nations have entered into arrangements with each other to stop using the US dollar in international trade. The fact of the matter is, it doesn’t take a huge military to flush one’s national currency down the toilet, so, once again, something else must be going on.
There are many other explanations on offer as well, but none of them explain the fact that the goal of all this militarism seems to be to achieve failure.
Perhaps a simpler explanation would suffice? How about this one:
The US has surrendered its sovereignty to a clique of financial oligarchs. Having nobody at all to answer to, this American (and to some extent international) oligarchy has been ruining the financial condition of the country, running up staggering levels of debt, destroying savings and retirements, debasing the currency and so on. The inevitable end-game is that the Federal Reserve (along with the central banks of other “developed economies”) will end up buying up all the sovereign debt issuance with money they print for that purpose, and in the end this inevitably leads to hyperinflation and national bankruptcy. A very special set of conditions has prevented these two events from taking place thus far, but that doesn’t mean that they won’t, because that’s what always happens, sooner or later.
Now, supposing a financial oligarchy has seized control of the country, and, since it can’t control its own appetites, is running it into the ground. Then it would make sense for it to have some sort of back-up plan for when the whole financial house of cards falls apart. Ideally, this plan would effectively put down any chance of revolt of the downtrodden masses, and allow the oligarchy to maintain security and hold onto its wealth. Peacetime is fine for as long as it can placate the populace with bread and circuses, but when a financial calamity causes the economy to crater and bread and circuses turn scarce, a handy fallback is war.
Any rationale for war will do, be it terrorists foreign and domestic, Big Bad Russia, or hallucinated space aliens. Military success is unimportant, because failure is even better for maintaining order by forcing through various emergency security measures than success. Various training runs, such as the military occupation of Boston following the staged bombings at the Boston Marathon, have already taken place. The surveillance infrastructure and the partially privatized prison-industrial complex are already in place for locking up the undesirables. A really huge failure would provide the best rationale for putting the economy on a war footing, imposing martial law, suppressing dissent, outlawing “extremist” political activity and so on.
And so perhaps that is what we should expect. Financial collapse is already baked in, and it’s only a matter of time before it happens, and precipitates commercial collapse when global supply chains stop functioning. Political collapse will be resisted, and the way it will be resisted is by starting as many wars as possible, to produce a vast backdrop of failure to serve as a rationale for all sorts of “emergency measures,” all of which will have just one aim: to suppress rebellion and to keep the oligarchy in power. Outside the US, it will look like Americans blowing things up: countries, things, innocent bystanders, even themselves (because, you know, apparently that works too). From the outside looking into America’s hall of one-way mirrors, it will look like a country gone mad; but then it already looks that way. And inside the hall of one-way mirrors it will look like valiant defenders of liberty battling implacable foes around the world. Most people will remain docile and just wave their little flags.
But I would venture to guess that at some point failure will translate into meta-failure: America will fail even at failing. I hope that there is something we can do to help this meta-failure of failure happen sooner rather than later
26 Comments on "Financial collapse leads to war"
Plantagenet on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 9:53 pm
Orlov has turned into a kook.
1. Afghanistan is not being handed back to the Taliban. Obama just doubled the number of US troops he is keeping in Afghanistan.
2. The US government has NOT been captured by the military industrial complex. Under obama the sequester has massively cut military spending.
3. No one ever said the US has “full spectrum dominance” over the planet except Orlov. Its nutty for him to make up this phrase and then attack it—-its his OWN fantasy, for crises.
4. Orlov has a fantasy that the US military is there to protect the US currency, when in actuality the military has nothing to do with the US currency.
I repeat—Orlov has turned into a kook.
Dave T on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 10:03 pm
Sorry Plant, I cannot help it friend, but in your case, it takes one to know one.
GregT on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 10:08 pm
The American citizens should be demanding that their government stops all of their endless Wars, immediately brings the troops back home, shuts down the hundreds of military bases around the globe, and focusses on a concerted effort to prepare the country for a reduced energy future. The coming financial collapse will be difficult enough on it’s own, without not having a plan B in effect. The American people are being used by the globalist elite, and when the dust settles, the globalist elite will be doing quite fine, the vast majority of the American population, not so much.
GregT on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 10:16 pm
LOL lil planter.
Wrong on all points again. Keep drinking the MIC, globalist corporatist kool-aid. It must be really tasty.
Tom on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 10:25 pm
“Full spectrum dominance” is not a term invented by Orlov. It is a concept set forth in the neo-con, Jeb Bush, Donald Rumsfeld, etc., pre 911 policy document entitled, “Project for a New American Century”. It was/is a blueprint for how American can rule the world.
GregT on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 10:37 pm
A little known tidbit for most, I’m sure. Robert Kagan was the founder for the “Project for a New American Century”. Robert Kagan is Victoria Nuland’s husband.
Things that SHOULD make you go hmmm.
apneaman on Mon, 2nd Mar 2015 11:59 pm
Tomgram: Engelhardt, The Ten Commandments for a Better American World
http://www.tomdispatch.com/post/175962/tomgram%3A_engelhardt%2C_the_ten_commandments_for_a_better_american_world/
American Idiot on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 3:17 am
The whole sense of Delusion is beyond reach for an average American Idiot. They still think they are a world super-power when they are nothing more than a bankrupt third world filth. There is a total disconnect between REALITY and FANTASY.
These idiots will never wake up because they are too stupid to even understand their own history.
There will be total chaos in few years…
Makati1 on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 4:34 am
Has anyone here considered that the western middle class has to be destroyed before a one world government can be possible? There can be no group with the ability to protest in any meaningful way. And to accomplish that means off shoring their incomes, inflating their expenses, putting them into debt servitude for life (student loans), and on and on. That it will likely lead to world war three is also in the cards.
Who was in power after WW2? The wealthy elite. Who are still in power today? The same wealthy families.
Orlov paints a likely picture, but maybe for the wrong reasons? After all, sanity is NOT typical in the world today. Especially the puppets leading the Western countries. Anyone with a few working brain cells can see the imperial ‘pivots’ over the last 15 years from one ‘axis of evil’ to another, to another. And from one ‘Satan’ to another: Saddam, Gaddafi, Osama, now Putin.
Meanwhile US debt goes from $5.6 trillion in 2000 to $18.1 trillion as of today. 47 million are on food stamps. Real unemployment is over 12%.
Real inflation of necessities is over 10%. And the beat goes on…
Davy on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 6:30 am
I knew this anti-American would shake the bushes and rustle up the local anti-Americans. I have said this countless time that this blame game is a two way street. The anti-Americans feel compelled to blame all global issues squarely at the feet of an unraveling American empire. I agree there are facts galore to support this. The anti-Americans play the same propaganda game as the DC & WS cabal. Yet, they are less sophisticate and more rabid in their fight. The DC bunch is professional and subtle. They have the global MSM corruption sewed up. Even mighty Russia that has taught the world state sponsored subversion of free speech is struggling against these folks.
Money buys this power. I am not going to argue against the ant-Americans. They have ample facts to support their cause. Where I argue is they rarely mention the other side of the equation. BAU is corrupted everywhere. There will be no winner and all will lose. All major powers are playing the same game. These anti-Americans want to talk up Russia, China, and the other Brics. These other countries are basket cases and heading for the same collapse the US and west is in. Asia is in vast population overshoot and rapidly into consumption overshoot. Russia is a criminal state run by a dictator of a cabal of oligarchs. Nowhere is there a viable option.
The financial situation is a global problem. You can’t decouple from the US just as the US is locked into the global system. The dollar will fall but with no viable alternative. We have no idea how the BAUpocalypse will unfold. We cannot know the severity or time frame. I can tell you this there is a likely brick wall in a decade for the reality of POD & ETP of BAU’s foundational commodity oil. The meat eating black swans circle especially with war and financial collapse.
Where these anti-Americans are right is exposing the lies and corruption of the end days of the American empire. Where they are wrong is playing the exact same game as the US MSM with distortions and selective use of facts. The anti-Americans have an agenda and that is anything and everything anti-American. They have nothing good to say about the US and all world problems lead back to North America. This is cat piss and anti-American’s reek of cat piss. They disgust me except for a few who make a big attempt to be objective and fair.
The US is the primary root of the global political problems but the rest of the predicaments are global problems with all players involves. I would argue the US has been hijacked by the global power network. It is just a pawn of this cabal of global plutocrats. The US is a mercenary country for hire to the highest bidder. Money buys power everywhere but especially in DC.
These anti-Americans show the lessor traits of those who engage in blame games, agendas, and hate. They are truly a scourge to this site. IMA whoever posts these articles on PO is also guilty. I cannot remember a positive article on this site about the US. The articles are either clearly anti-American or clear examples of the stupidity of DC & WS thieves. We need positive article with indigenous heroes struggling against tyranny and the subjugation of the US constitution.
You can’t rid the world of the US. The US is a global power with NUKs and a significant part of the global economy. You can only reform it from within. That is not likely so you adapt and mitigate the damaging effects of the end of an empire. Your hate games are counterproductive. Everyone know the bad side of the evil empire. You hate filled spew is redundant.
It really doesn’t matter because the reality of collapse could give a shit about nations or ideologies. All people will be put into the meat grinder. I would mention this in conclusion do you anti-Americans want to get closer to the truth or spread your message at the same level of those you hate. I find you have chosen the low road. Good luck in your failed deception.
Makati1 on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 6:40 am
Maybe… “Meanwhile, the other major powers of the world are going full steam ahead to ensure that, when the US and EU reach their Waterloo, the rest of the world will carry on independently of the dying empire.
They are not merely waiting along the sidelines for the collapse to come, awaiting their turn at the top of the pecking-order. They are actively preparing their position to, as seamlessly as possible, take the baton at a run.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-02/next-empire
Davy on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 7:39 am
I highly recommend the second part of this article from ZH for an excellent summation of the debt trap we are in. It starts at:
We are in a World of Debt
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-02/breaking-bad-debt-episode-3
ghung on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 8:08 am
Tom points out how the neocon/neoliberal line has been blurred (two sides; same coin, so to speak). Literally in bed together these days, perpetrating American imperialism. Those who accuse Obama of being an “ultra-liberal”, “Marxist”, etc. simply haven’t dug very deep into his staff appointments, especially in foreign policy and economics. True liberalism is effectively dead in the US. The US has abandoned reason for madness (HT to Gandalf) in its desperate attempts to maintain global imperial control, and it’s inconceivable to some that Pax Americana has run its course.
Signatories to Statement of Principles of The Project for the New American Century (per wikipedia):
Elliott Abrams
Gary Bauer
William J. Bennett
John Ellis “Jeb” Bush
Dick Cheney
Eliot A. Cohen
Midge Decter
Paula Dobriansky
Steve Forbes
Aaron Friedberg
Francis Fukuyama
Frank Gaffney
Fred C. Ikle
Donald Kagan
Zalmay Khalilzad
I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby
Norman Podhoretz
J. Danforth Quayle
Peter W. Rodman
Stephen P. Rosen
Henry S. Rowen
Donald Rumsfeld
Vin Weber
George Weigel
Paul Wolfowitz
Davy on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 8:44 am
Despite Russian Warnings, US Will Deploy A Battalion To Ukraine By The End Of The Week
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-02/despite-russian-warnings-us-will-deploy-battalion-ukraine-end-week
G-man, here is another example of the insanity in DC currently. This is a either a calculated risk to call Putin’s bluff or a calculated risk that a Russian invasion will end badly for Putin. We know Russia can’t be stopped but a Russian invasion will ruin Russia’s fragile economic situation with little immediate cost to the Americans but a huge cost to the Europeans and Russians. IMA with the knock on effect to a financial collapse in the US when the Ukrainian contagion strikes will happen eventually.
This action could also be just an example of how far into unreality the DC political machine has progressed. This is entirely possible because power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely. At least in the US itself the base of power is hijacked by a fascist alliance of industry, the political establishment, and the Military. Unreality strikes from a combination of actual distorted policy for delusional players and policy directed from individuals with an agenda desiring unreality.
Unreality of foreign policy is the only way to achieve the goals of the fascist in DC desiring to maintain the unraveling American empire. These policies we are seeing today do not serve the best interest of the American people or the global world. This is a lose lose for all involved including the Americans. It is only a benefit to a few at the expense of the many at home and globally.
I hope Putin ignores it and lets the Americans play their game. There is no amount of training or arms that can protect Ukraine from Russia. A Ukrainian war with Russia will destroy and disrupt gas to Europe and release an energy crisis induced financial collapse contagion. Worst case is NUK war which is always a possibility. This could be a regional tactical war but it could also escalate into a global NUK war with MAD results. This may just be more bluster and counter bluster but I am taking it serious.
penury on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 9:11 am
Actually Davy it will be six battalions of “National Guard” plus lethal weapons.
A;together now USA USA USA
ghung on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 9:15 am
Meanwhile, let’s not overreact:
After The Bloody 20th Century——-No Existential Threats To America’s Security
“Last week, John Kerry seemed to be auditioning for the role of Dr. Pangloss.
Despite jihadi violence across the Middle East and ISIS terror in Iraq and Syria, Kerry told Congress, we live in “a period of less daily threat to Americans and to people in the world than normally – less deaths, less violent deaths today than through the last century.”
Feel better now?
J-Gav on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 9:32 am
Makati – “Has anyone here considered that the western middle-class has to be destroyed …?”
Yes, as a matter of fact, I have. It was, after all, the French middle class who managed the Revolution there, not the downtrodden masses (they fucked it up pretty badly too, in my view, otherwise, the French Republic might have taken hold earlier).
Then there’s the simple proposition that holding down uneducated and poverty stricken masses is easier than dealing with a restive, educated class.
Two classes rather than three would suit the oligarchs quite nicely I think.
GregT on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 10:56 am
Davy,
It is good to see that your eyes are opening up. You still have a ways to go, however.
“There is no amount of training or arms that can protect Ukraine from Russia.”
Russia is not attacking Kiev Davy. It is the Kiev junta installed by the DC mafia that is attacking ethnic Russians in Eastern Ukraine. The Kiev junta that is not representing the interests of Eastern Ukrainians, and the junta that the Eastern Ukrainians did not vote for to represent them.
The DC mafia have created this conflict, and no matter what Russia does, or the Europeans do in attempts to broker a peaceful diplomatic solution, DC will continue to fuel this fire in attempts to draw Russia and others into a broader conflict.
This is all about the globalist agenda for a New World Order, a one world financial system owned and operated by the corporate globalist elite, by the oligarchs, for the oligarchs. Their plans do not include you or me Davy. We are all nothing more than debt slaves, and/or cannon fodder.
It is not the Russians that are the threat to world peace and security Davy, it is your country’s military industrial complex, and the other countries who’s governments have also been hijacked by the corpocracy, like mine.
Davy on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 11:34 am
Greg, I am not going to argue that point because there are two sides to that discussion. Russia is no angel and is doing their own aggression but I agree with the gist of your comment. My point is strictly on a military basis. If Russia wants to invade and take over Ukraine nothing is going to stop her short of tactical NUK’s. Nato, does not have the ground component in place nor the will to stop Russia.
Greg you can argue all day long about who the aggressor is. Both sides are involved in aggression. I will not stop saying Russia is up to no good in Ukraine. They are supplying arms and people to fight there. That fact is crystal clear.
My acknowledging point would be this is no place for the US or Nato to be messing with Russia. It is her backyard, her ethnic people, and her history. It is bullshit the US, Nato, and the fascist Ukrainians are conducting this civil war.
But please don’t try to blow the poor Russia smoke up my ass because I will not buy it. Russia is a criminal run country by the criminal Putin. Putin is a blue eyed devil bent on regional domination if given a chance there is little doubt about that. Putin is no saint being a liar and a thief. He is nothing but a smart criminal that has advanced to a place of absolute power in a country run by mafia Oligarchs.
To keep this balanced we constantly hear how bad DC is so do I need to add a redundant paragraph on that? No. That is plain to see The US is the number one threat to peace in the world at the moment. Yet, you are wasting your time trying to seduce me with poster girls like Putin’s Russia.
GregT on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 11:36 am
Oh, and if I might add;
In my minds eye, the only true anti-Americans, are those that are allowing this corrupt group to continue to control American foreign policy. These people are the ones who are going to destroy America, not the people that are speaking out against them. The pro-Americans are the ones that are attempting to expose the corruption, they are the true patriots.
Davy on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 11:57 am
I agree Greg to a point. It is counterintuitive in a sense because the real anti-Americans are those that have hijacked the US. Yet, Greg, the PO board is full of flaming hatred for everything American. It is obscene and points to agenda’s and lack of fairness and balance. IMA is typically a demonstration of lower end intellectual behavior to engage in the blame game. “IF”, there were a viable option in this world I would be promoting them.
If the US was the only problem then this whole discussion would be different. One the level of geopolitics the US is the number one threat to peace at the moment. But Greg on every other level the problems and threats are global and spread across the globe. I am not going to listen to the cat piss here from the anti-Americans that think their shit don’t stink.
I will acknowledge the sins of the US especially with the neocons and the fascists in DC but please don’t try to tell me Canada is a Garden of Eden or Putin is honest. Don’t tell me China is the next super power. Don’t tell me the Brics are going to decouple from a failed US. That is all agenda cat piss I am not going to buy into. I am not pointing a finger at you Greg you are the balanced one of the bunch. I am pointing to the many others that love to engage in the lust of hatred so enjoyable in an evil sort of way.
I am a flag waiver but this is my flag:
Here is the relevant part of the US Code of Laws regarding how to fly the flag when in distress: THE UNITED STATES FLAG CODE. Title 4, Chapter 1. § 8(a)The flag should never be displayed with the union down, except as a signal of dire distress in instances of extreme danger to life or property.
GregT on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 12:35 pm
Davy,
Very few people fly the Canadian flag. I happen to be one of the few that do. I am proud to be a Canadian, and I will be one of the first to say that our current government is also instigating a war with the Russians. My government has also become corrupt, and my government is on the wrong side of the conflict in Ukraine.
I have read everything that I can get my hands on in regards to Putin. There are two sides to the story Davy. The Russian side is much different from the western MSM side. Putin is not an angel without a doubt, but he does have the support of the vast majority of 145 million Russian citizens. The same cannot be said for Obama, or for Harper. Putin has done more for Russia, than any other Russian leader since the end of communism and the breakup of the former Soviet Union.
China IS going to be the next superpower Davy. This has been discussed and acknowledged here in Canada for over 20 years. The BRICS are not GOING to decouple from the USD, they already ARE decoupling from the USD. I have no agenda here Davy. I am only telling it like it is. The BRICS are not in my best interests. As a Canadian, my best interests would be served by the continuation of a USD reserve currency. This is simply not going to be the case. No country will be unscathed from the end of USD global hegemony, including the BRICS nations. What will emerge when the dust settles, is going to be a world with a much reduced western standard of living. It is already happening, and it is going to continue to become worse.
We are faced with a plethora of dilemmas Davy. The human race is in serious trouble. The corruption runs rampant globally. No nation is exempt. Wars, emerging water, food, and energy crises, climate change, ocean acidification, deforestation, and on and on it goes. The last thing that we need right now is a global thermo-nuclear war, unless you believe that to be the answer to human population overshoot.
Maybe that is the real agenda Davy. Maybe that is how the DC oligarchs plan on continuing on, without the rest of us.
Davy on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 1:26 pm
Damn Greg, have you been sipping the BAUtopian koolaid Mak has been offering? So you are saying China and her pathetic Bric siblings have a future post oil and post BAU? That is what you are saying?
China is in the worst possible position of any major power on multiple levels and you are claiming superpower status in the making? I find that humorous because I am wondering where all those economic activities are going when the oil stops. I am wondering who is going to feed all those Chinese when food exports stop.
I will be the first to admit I see the U.S. superpower status nearly over but forget any other stepping up in the vacuum. I see no proof of a plan B strategy post BAU from any of the sick Brics.
Greg, surely you agree we all collapse together. Surely you are not drinking Mak’s Koolaid of the 1000 year Asian Reich rising from the ashes of the destroyed American Empire? Mak is in a fantasy world. I know you are above false agendas.
GregT on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 2:25 pm
Davy,
What we have grown accustomed to from an economic standpoint, is coming to an end. Our economies are the result of cheep energy, not the other way around. It is our Western standards of living that are going to suffer the most. The Asians already know what it is like, to live in the world that we are about to join them in. They are very resourceful, we in the West, are not. We mostly forgot what they are now used to, 2 generations ago.
The Russians are not the only ones looking Eastward, the Canadian Federal government is also, as are our Provincial and Municipal bodies. The Chinese are buying everything here, from real-estate, to natural resources, and now even tourism. Chinese national oil cos already own interests in Alberta tar sands, as well as offshore in the GOM. They are building LNG export terminals, and already own an interest in our Nat Gas here in BC. We have been shipping our natural resources Eastward for a very long time now.
While the US has been waging wars in the Middle East, and now in Eastern Europe, the Chinese have been quietly buying everything around the globe that they can get their hands on. Their plan B strategy is very much in effect. We don’t even have one.
What is coming isn’t going to be recognizable from a BAU standpoint. The West is a dead man walking, that relies heavily on energy inputs from places that it has been oppressing for decades, and consumer goods that it no longer has the resources and the skilled labor force to manufacture for itself.
The collapse is coming, and as I have said above, no country will be left unscathed. China has 1 billion more people than the US Davy, and Asia has 4 billion more people than North America. Superpower status in the future is not going to be the countries with the most internal combustion engines, it is going to be the countries with the most manual human labour, that already know how to utilize it. Populations are going to be decimated, those that already eat insects will not notice as much of a difference as those that rely on fast food restaurants, and JIT food delivery systems.
China has been around in one form or another for over 3000 years. The Chinese are survivors. Our “culture” has existed for 300 years, is not sustainable, and has very little history of living sustainably off of the land. Chinese “medical” practices are believed to be some 5000 years old. Our medical system in it’s current iteration has existed for mere decades.
We are ill prepared for what is coming Davy. A large percentage of people alive in Asia today, are already living it.
Davy on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 3:55 pm
Alright Greg, let’s give it a rest. We generally agree on core issues across the board where we get sideways is the details. I think you are over the hill like me (50ish) if I remember right. That means our brains are stubborn and yield little ground on issues of passion. It is the combination of our views that we will learn the way ahead.
Makati1 on Tue, 3rd Mar 2015 6:59 pm
GregT, thank you for saying what I would have said, but you did it from the Canadian viewpoint. I do not read any of Davy’s rants, but I do read other’s rebuttals.
The Chinese are buying up the world’s resources and are also slowly moving security forces into those areas to protect their interests. They have about 20 million or so military age males with little chance of marriage to Chinese girls due to the imbalance of genders resulting from the One Child Laws. So, sending them to another country to find mates is a plus.
Meanwhile, they are spending USDs as fast as they can while keeping the value from crashing … yet. It takes a while to spend $4 trillion at $50 billion a pop. Especially when billions are constantly coming into the country as a trade imbalance from the US. And interest on those USTs every month adds up.
If we can avoid a nuclear war, some of us might just make it through this bottleneck. I hope so. I have family in the US. But the US that comes out the other side will resemble 3rd world Asia, not 2015 America, if it is lucky. Or Central Africa, if it is not.