Sound of Biden's War Drum is getting louder threatening Korea and China with the support of Japan

Dr. Joseph H. Chung, Ph.D. (정희수) Professor of Economics, Quebec University in Montreal

(지난 호에 이어)

The Indo-Pacific Economic Forum (IPEF) is, in fact, an additional China containment policy in order to strengthen the effectiveness of anti-China strategies. Up to now, the previous strategies have not been effective.

Since the time of Barack Obama, Washington has been trying to contain China through several strategies, but none of them has yielded expected results.

The deployment of the U.S. Naval task force in the South China Sea led to the militarization of Chinese reefs.

The Trans Pacific Partnership Agreement (TPP) went nowhere, because it had two contradictory objectives, namely trade promotion and China containment. If the objective was regional trade promotion, China should be there. If the objective is China containment, China will retaliate and the member countries' trade with China will fall. The ensuing loss of trade with China could be greater than the gain of trade with its TPP member countries. So, it is a deficit game for member countries unless Washington compensates the deficit. The question is:"Can Washington afford it?" No wonder why Trump decided to withdraw from it. TPP has now become Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for TTP CPTPP, which seems to be more for trade. But, to the extent that Japan leads it, it could become a China-containment weapon, because Japan still has the ambition of ruling Asia.

The effectiveness of Australia-UK-US Security Pact (AUKUS) as military alliance remains to be proved. The new Prime Minister of Australia may have different idea about Australia-China relations. The new Foreign Minister of Australia, Penny Wong, is known to be pro-China and her boss Anthony Albanese, the new Prime Minister of Australia, proposed softer approach to China policy.

The effectiveness of Australia-India-Japan-US Security Dialogue (Quad) depends on how India would react in case of shooting war with China. India belongs to several multinational organizations such as Brazil-India-China-S. Africa informal group (BRICS), Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnersjip (RCEP) where India maintains good relations with China. India is not sure of Washington's security guarantee in the long run. India is disappointed of being excluded from AUKUS. India is fearful of Chinese retaliation. For all these reasons, India's membership in Quad does not seem to be as strong as that of Japan.

The IPEF is Biden's idea of containing China. This replaces the TPP and it is supposed to trade-oriented with hidden objective of destroying China. Therefore, it has the same dilemma as TPP. Whether its objective is for trade or China containment, the probability of success is low. Remember that all the member countries depend heavily on China for trade and investment.

However, the most serious stumbling block to the U.S. global hegemony is the worsening internal problems.

The inflation which could become galloping, intensifying street killings, decaying infrastructure, increasing number of people suffering from hunger, crowed city streets by the homeless and the jobless, soaring medical care cost preventing millions of people from getting medical care and rising number of school kids who starve due to ugly income inequality are all the sign of declining Pax Americana. It appears that the priority should be given to the solution of the internal problems.

Some people may say that Biden, the great expert of diplomacy, has harvested rich rewards from his Asian tour. I do not share such praise.

I think that he has demonstrated the diplomacy of a falling empire.

There are three way of dominating the world: economic domination, ideological domination and military domination. But the military domination is powerless without economic domination and ideological backing.

The America's economic domination is weakening due to its endless economic war; its ideological domination is fading due to wrong management of democracy. What is left is military domination.

Biden is resorting to the military domination without strong economic support and ideological backing. This is the symptom of falling empire. Biden's diplomacy is, perhaps, the desperate efforts to save the falling empire through military might.

But, Biden's pursuit for military domination will inevitably lead to global suicide of humanity and its shameful end. May God save us!

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