Posted by
Akagi on Monday, February 25, 2008 2:00:00 AM
The protectionist/anti-immigration crowd continues to harp on the "unfair" trade deals like NAFTA and CAFTA, etc. Obama using NAFTA to attack Hillary in Ohio and it will no doubt gain him some ground there. It is easy to blame your ills on some foreign menace or some treaty put forward by shadowy elements such as the CFR or the Trilateral Commission (and the black helicopters no doubt).
The truth is that NAFTA has benefited the US more than it has Mexico. There are always winners and losers, but the US has gained more. One reason for the number of illegals coming into the US from Mexico is the fact that NAFTA has basically destroyed the peasant-based corn economy of rural Mexico--unable to compete with Midwestern corn farmers.
Central America has an economy about the size of Wisconsin. Chile? About the size of Mississippi. If you have to worry about the economic power of Central America and Chile it is time to close shop and ask China to annex you.
As for China, the most recent "yellow peril" (recall the Nippon-phobia of the late 1980s and early 1990s?), it's economy is 1/6th the size of the US using the official rate. Most of China is still very poor. Those in places like Yunan, Qinghai and Gansu among others live on less than $2 a day. While Shanghai is wealthy (on par with Taiwan) and places like Shenzhen, Xiamen and Fuzhou are well off, most of China is on par with that other great economic power--Haiti.
Militarily it has modernized, but still mostly has equipment based on Soviet designs of the 1970s. The mainline fighter the J-8 rated to be comparable to the American F-4 (some non-Chinese sources rate it as well as early F18A versions, thus as good a American technology of the late-1970s). It has bought some SU-27s and developed its own Su-27 based design the J-11, but the J-8 still make up the majority of PLAAF aircraft.
The PRC spends about the same percentage on its military as the US, but even if they spend more, they would have to spend 24% of their GDP to simply keep even with the US. Taiwan still holds the balance of power in the strait, although that is starting to shift toward the PRC.
Economically, the SOEs suck billions of Yuan from the economy, the banks are bankrupt using western standards and there is peasant unrest on an almost weekly basis. China is not much of a threat to the US and won't be for decades. A war with China would be short and one-sided and China knows this. China has no interest in moving against Taiwan and as long as Taiwan continues to hold to the myth that it is part of some-China by not declaring formal independence, China will not make any aggressive moves. Since the KMT/PFP (aka Pan-Blue) destroyed the DPP/TSU (aka Pan-Green) in the January Li Fa Yuan elections and the carpet-bagger Ma Ying-Jeou will most likely do the same to Hsieh Ch'ang T'ing in next month's presidential election, the risk of any moves of Taiwan moving toward formal independence is zero.
You will see a much more cooperative administration with China under a Ma administration than you have under Chen's. Even if Hsieh wins, he will have to deal with a Li Fa Yuan that is dominated by the KMT/PFP and any moves he wanted to pursue toward formal independence would be killed by the anti-independence forces in that body. Hsieh also is less a hard-liner in regards to creating a separate Taiwan identity, so even a Hsieh regime would be more cooperative vis-à-vis China than Chen's has been.
If Ma wins (as he is expected to), expect new talks on technical issues between the non-official bodies of Taiwan and China.