“It’s been 20 years since China entered the global trade body, the World Trade Organization, a move that gave it access to the international trade system.”
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“China’s WTO accession has rendered the U.S. undeniable gains. Consumers have enjoyed two decades of relatively inexpensive imported consumer goods, which boosted their buying power and the economy. A 2019 analysis by the London School of Economics of the impact of China’s WTO entry on U.S. consumer prices concluded that “each US household saw its annual purchasing power increase by $1,500 thanks to lower prices caused by increased trade with China from 2000 to 2007.”
WTO-brokered access to the Chinese market for U.S. agricultural products has reaped an export boom for farmers and agribusiness. And the U.S.-China Business Council’s 2021 member survey revealed that “ninety-five percent of respondents report that their China operations were profitable over the last year.”
But there is compelling data that China’s WTO entry helped accelerate America’s deindustrialization. A 2020 analysis by the nonprofit Economic Policy Institute, a labor-oriented think tank, estimated in January 2020 that the U.S. trade deficit with China resulted in the loss of 3.7 million jobs from 2001-2018.
The Chinese government’s willingness to push its economy to a more market-oriented setting broadly ground to a halt by around 2008. And that may have been the plan.
“When we promised to adopt a market economy, we made it absolutely clear that it would be a socialist market economy,” Long Yongtu, China’s chief negotiator for WTO accession, said in an interview in May. That effectively meant that China exploited foreign market access while blocking the U.S. from the Chinese market through measures largely outside of the WTO’s supervision and enforcement mechanisms.”
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“Practically..the WTO may be incapable of bringing China’s unfair trading practices to heel because all 164 member nations — including China itself — need to accede to any new agreements.
“I don’t think the WTO can adequately discipline Chinese government practices because the rules of the WTO are now old,” Barshefsky said.”
“If the world is to “avoid the worst consequences of the climate crisis,” said Kerry, the challenge boils down to changing economic policy in a small group of large countries that he said were not doing enough to lower their greenhouse gas emissions.
He called them out by name: “China, Russia, India, Brazil, Mexico, Indonesia, South Africa and Saudi Arabia.””
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“France, Germany, the U.K., U.S. and the EU agreed — pending the outcomes of a task force — to shift an initial $8.5 billion to assist South Africa to retire its fleet of coal-fired power plants and retrain mine workers. South Africa in turn significantly raised its 2030 climate target ahead of the COP26 climate summit.
Kerry said the South Africa model was “a pretty damn good template.”
Timmermans told a POLITICO event on Wednesday that other countries “like Indonesia, and indeed, India” were interested in similar deals.
But South Africa’s position was unique. The financial woes of public power utility Eskom meant it had a “unique problem” for its partners to solve, said Kerry. “Every place is going to have its own set of challenges.””
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“China, on the other hand, is being approached altogether differently. The world’s second-largest economy and largest CO2-emitter is an equal and a rival — there will be no buying off Beijing. Kerry wants China to fund other countries’ renewable energy sectors, but he didn’t invite China to partner in any of the specific deals the U.S. and Europe are working on.
Relations between Beijing and Washington are tense. The Trump administration’s backtracking on the Paris Agreement has China questioning whether the U.S. will stick to its renewed climate commitments if a Republican wins the presidency in 2024.”
“Many people seeking an escape from Afghanistan do not qualify for the pathways available to Afghans who served the U.S. military effort in some capacity. Women and girls, human rights workers, journalists, judges, and others must now look instead to a little-used tool of the U.S. immigration system called “humanitarian parole.”
This measure, outlined by the Immigration and Nationality Act, allows certain individuals to enter the U.S. for a temporary period under the discretion of United States Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), on the basis of “urgent humanitarian reasons or significant public benefit.” There is no defined set of criteria as to who may qualify for parole, and anyone may apply for it.
Though humanitarian parole allows for faster processing of applicants, it still involves robust vetting. For Afghans, that has meant biometric screenings, cross-checking with intelligence agency watchlists, and other security and identity verification steps. Senior government officials must approve individual applications.
Since July, more than 28,000 Afghans have applied for entry to the U.S. on humanitarian grounds, and the Biden administration reportedly plans to use parole to evacuate up to 50,000 Afghans. But only about 100 applicants have been approved so far.
In large part, this is because this year’s application volume dwarfs the 2,000 parole applications USCIS would receive in a typical year. Staffing issues are also a factor.”
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“Applying for parole carries a steep $575 filing charge as well—and an application is no guarantee of protection. USCIS has received roughly $11.5 million from Afghans in just the past few months, according to Al Jazeera, but it has approved few applications in that time.”
“The big idea behind Europe’s Global Gateway strategy is to mobilize up to €300 billion in public and private funds by 2027 to finance EU infrastructure projects abroad. That means building next-generation infrastructure such as fiber optic cables, 5G networks and green energy plants in the developing world, while also trying to compete with China on transport facilities, such as highways and airports.
It’s a long-shot as far as games of catch-up go.
Even if private investors join in, the EU’s spending plan languishes way beneath what it is estimated China is coughing up, and Beijing has bought its way to influence with first-mover advantage in countries from Greece to Sri Lanka. The EU boasts its main selling point is more transparency and higher environmental standards than China, although that doesn’t always go down well in many of the potential partners, which prefer opaque Chinese deals.”
“In all three of the previous crises, the U.S. and its allies concluded that the territory in question was not vital. In Georgia and Ukraine, the U.S. did not have the military capability to engage Russia directly and made clear to partners it would not enter the conflict. In Syria, Washington was unwilling to continue supporting the opposition to Bashar Assad in the face of Russian military action, focusing more on de-escalation including a military hotline to Russian forces. These moves assured Putin that the geopolitical outcome he feared was not forthcoming, discouraging him from upping the ante.”
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“At the same time, the U.S. took military steps to limit Russian success, hedge against further aggression or signal determination. The riskiest move was President George W. Bush’s order to airlift a whole Georgian brigade from Iraq to Tbilisi in 2008, while sending U.S. naval assets to the Black Sea. In 2014, the U.S. and NATO initially provided Ukraine with non-lethal military aid, but gradually expanded that to include lethal defensive systems, training and small rotational deployments. In Syria after 2015, the U.S.-led anti-ISIS coalition indirectly put military pressure on Assad while avoiding confrontation with Russian troops.
In each case, the U.S. signaled that “no military solution” was not an absolute, underlining that although the U.S. did not seek direct conflict with Russia, a robust military response was on the table to defend vital interests, including treaty allies.”
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“The U.S. and Europe have used sanctions to respond to Russian aggression by targeting top decision-makers, the Kremlin’s military-industrial complex, and the key sources and intermediaries for Putin’s personal wealth (in the Syria case, Damascus and Tehran were also sanctioned). Though sanctions could not undo actions Russia had already taken, they helped deter Moscow from pursuing more expansive aims.”
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“In all three conflicts, the U.S. effectively mobilized allies. The Bush administration blessed French President Nicolas Sarkozy’s lead on the 2008 negotiations that prevented further fighting between Russia and Georgia, and similarly backed France and Germany on the Normandy format talks that brought Russia—not just Russian-backed proxies—to the table with Ukraine. Syria crisis management was a cooperative effort by the U.S., EU states, the Arab League, and eventually Turkey and Israel under pro forma U.N. leadership.”
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“Finally, U.S. administrations have used face-to-face meetings and calls between top leaders to convey this message of de-escalation backed by firm resolve.”
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“Though critics often decry engagement with the Russians as a reward for bad behavior, the crisis management playbook shows that it is essential. Earlier this year, during the last Russian buildup along the Ukrainian border, Biden defused the situation with direct high-level dialogue, particularly face-to-face meetings with Putin and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. With this week’s Biden-Putin call, and the launch of a follow-up dialogue on European security that will include U.S. allies, Washington is again choosing wisely to engage.”
“U.S. pressure on OPEC+ to pump more oil and cool red-hot crude prices has shone a spotlight on a relatively new problem for the producer group: it doesn’t have much extra capacity to hike output faster, even if it wanted to.”
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“OPEC+, which includes Russia, has resisted pressure for swifter hikes, sticking to its plan of gradually raising output by 400,000 barrels per day (bpd) each month since August, saying it worries a faster increase will lead to a glut in 2022.
Yet OPEC+ can’t even hit those goals. Production by OPEC+ was 700,000 bpd less than planned in both September and October, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA), raising the prospect of a tight market and high oil prices for longer.”
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“plunging investment in production caused by the pandemic and environmental pressure on oil majors, particularly in poorer OPEC states, means just three OPEC members – Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Iraq – have the extra capacity in place to hike supplies relatively quickly.”
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“Saudi Arabia is now producing close to 10 million bpd but has never produced more than 11 million bpd for a sustained period of many months, even though it says it has more capacity available.”
“US Secretary of State Antony Blinken recently met with his Ukrainian counterpart Dmytro Kuleba in Washington and declared that the US commitment to Ukraine’s security and territorial integrity is “ironclad.”
The meeting between the two officials came as Moscow stationed 90,000 troops near the Ukrainian border, leading many to fear that a large-scale Russian invasion of Ukraine could be imminent. Ukraine has been mired in a war with Russia and Russian-backed separatists in the eastern Donbas region of the country since 2014.
Blinken’s comments are just the latest example of a top Biden administration official failing to accept the geopolitical reality of Ukraine.”
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“Is Biden really prepared to send young American men and women to fight and die over Ukraine? This kind of rhetoric from the Biden administration does not serve US interests and counterproductively increases the risk of the United States being dragged into a war with Russia.
By continuing to provide quasi-security guarantees to Ukraine, Washington is playing a dangerous game of escalation with Moscow. Russia’s deployment of 90,000 troops near the Ukrainian border is likely Moscow calling Washington’s bluff.
The United States has provided $2.5 billion in military aid to Ukraine since hostilities broke out. Despite this significant investment, the war has continued because the underlying geopolitical causes of the conflict have not been addressed — namely Russia’s concern that Ukraine will be granted NATO membership.”
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“Russia has proven that it is willing to bear significant monetary and human costs to prevent a western-aligned Ukraine. Years of tough economic sanctions and the estimated loss of several hundred Russian soldiers has done little to change Russia’s objectives in Ukraine.
Unlike Russia, the United States simply does not have a strong enough interest in Ukraine worth risking a potential nuclear war over.
Ending the conflict will require a comprehensive political settlement that takes Russia’s geopolitical anxiety into account. One may not agree with Moscow’s security concerns; however, it is necessary to address them in pursuit of a peaceful resolution. Such a settlement should see Ukraine’s territorial sovereignty restored and position Ukraine as a neutral buffer state, neither aligned with Russia nor the West.”
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“Working toward a realistic resolution in the form of a neutral and non-aligned Ukraine could provide an opportunity for the world’s two largest nuclear powers to form a stable and predictable relationship.”
“Ukraine is central to this vision. Culturally and economically, Putin sees Ukraine as tied to Russia. Putin used his hot vax summer to publish an article about how Ukrainians and Russians “were one people — a single whole,” according to an English translation posted on the Kremlin’s website. For him, the ex-Soviet Republic is not really a sovereign state but belongs to Russia, or at least would if not for the meddling from outside forces (read: the West) that have created a “wall” between the two.
“Step by step, Ukraine was dragged into a dangerous geopolitical game aimed at turning Ukraine into a barrier between Europe and Russia, a springboard against Russia,” Putin wrote.
This issue of Ukraine being a “springboard” for military action against Russia is also unacceptable to Putin. He wants to recreate a “sphere of influence” for Moscow, and Ukraine is the buffer between it and NATO. As Ukraine moves closer to the West, that buffer crumbles.
“The reason there’s a war in Ukraine has a lot to do with Russia’s perception of the post-Cold War order in Europe, this notion that Western states have been moving closer and closer to Russia’s borders, and indeed, gobbling up its natural sphere of influence,” Oliker said. “Ukraine’s the front line on that.””
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“NATO and member states within NATO like the US and Great Britain are cooperating with Ukraine on security, they’re helping in training and reforms, and providing (or selling) military equipment. But a close partnership is not the same as membership, as it doesn’t come with the obligation of mutual defense, and the NATO countries don’t exactly want to sign themselves up for a potential war with Russia.”