China warns of 'trap' because it is weak | Hour 1

What's going on? Thank you so much for listening to this podcast. It is heard live every day from noon to three on WBT Radio and Charlotte. And if you want exclusive content like invitations to events, the weekly live stream, my daily show prep with all the links, become a patron, go to dpekclendershow dot com. Make sure you hit the subscribe button, get every episode for free, write to your smartphone or tablet, and again, thank you so much for your support. Now. I don't know about you, but I spent my weekend becoming an expert on China. I did that mainly by reading social media posts from anonymous people and such, just to try to get an understanding of, you know, what all went down with the president's visit over there to see Winnie the Pooh and you know, celebrate the chi Coom project. So just a couple of points here from a Chinese journal list. I don't know whether to believe this person or not, but probably not because they're I mean, if you're a journalist in China like I'm, I'm thinking you're just basically a propagandist for the commis right, And what do I always say rule number one about communists they lie. So some key takeaways from the roughly five minute dialogue between President Xijiping, who looks like Winnie the Pooh and hates it when people point that out, and President Donald Trump. So here's what Ji said. That the world has come to a new crossroads. Can China and the United States overcome the Thucidides trap? I will explain what that is in a moment. Can they overcome the Thucidides trap and create a new paradigm of major country relations. He also said, our two countries have more common interests than differences. Success in one is the opportunity for the other, and a stable bilateral relationship is good for the world. We should be partners, not rivals. We should help each other succeed and prosper together and find the right way for major countries to get along well with each other in the new era. And let's make twenty twenty six a historic landmark year that opens up a new chapter in China US relations. Trump said, you and I have known each other for a long time now, in fact, the longest relationship of our two countries that any president has had. He said, We've had a fantastic relationship. We've gotten along. When there were difficulties, we worked it out. They're here today to pay respects to you and to China, and they look forward to trade and doing business and it's going to be totally reciprocal. On our behalf. He was talking there about all. Of the the CEOs that he brought with him, which I saw some people saying that that was like a that was a flex that was a sign of like, look at what I'm bringing here to the table, all of these CEOs, Like we are the innovators, we are the eight hundred pound guerrilla. Right, We're the the global Hegemont so the Thucydides trap and this idea of stability. First, always keep in mind communists lie, and so what Jijinping is telling the Western audience is not necessarily probably completely true, right, much like foreign leaders like in Iran, for example, and they see stuff like for a Western audience and they don't say the same thing to their own audience. Their domestic audience. Right. So there's a fellow by the name of Isaac Stonefish, that's his name. He's a CEO and founder of Strategy Risks. He's a columnist for Barons, and he is a visiting fellow at the Atlantic Council, and he is an adjunct professor at NYU, and he went to the social media and he said, stop saying that Xi wants stability. He does not want stability. He wants to increase China's power globally. That is intensely destabilizing. You can love China or hate it. You can feel like the Chinese Communist Party is good for the world or bad. Stability in US China relations does not help Jixiping accomplish his international goals. Why do people keep making this keep Why do people keep making this mistake? Because they keep taking Jijenping's remarks at face value. It's a mistake journalists don't make nearly as often with politicians. But somehow they decide that Xi Jinping communicates what he actually means, and I think that's exactly right. The two sides agreed on a framework for China US relations. They called it constructive strategic stability. This is meant to guide the relationship for the next three years and beyond. What does it mean? Means cooperation comes first, a positive kind of stability. Competition has limits, so it's got to be healthy competition, not destructive disagreements have to stay manageable, right, not crisis driven, just kind of you know, normal working through disagreements. Peace remains possible. China says it's ready to work with the US to turn this new framework into real action and to keep the relationship stable, healthy, and sustainable over the long run. Again, stability is not in China's interest, right, because what they are interested in is becoming the global Hegemont right. They are an exporter of their communist ideology. They are funding all sorts of destabilizing agents in America and throughout the Western world and in other countries as well, in the UH, you know, in their neighborhood too. This is what they're about. This is the Red Green Alliance, if you will. Now, during the summit, Jijinping asked Trump if they can avoid the Thucidides trap, right, And that is in case you're interested, it's th huc Why d I d E s Thucididies. It's a theory that suggests high likelihood of war between rising powers versus established powers. I'm not really sure like how this thing became like such a popular theory or whatever, because it just seems like, well, i mean, Yeah, like countries go to war, people go to war. Basically we've been doing that since human history began. Right, But the journalist Melissa Chen, she points out that Jijinping has flip flopped a bit here. Back in twenty fifteen, he said, quote, there's no such thing as the so called Thucididies trap in the world. So what has changed in what eleven years? She just sat across from Trump in the Great Hall of the People and asks whether they can overcome the Thucydides trap and forge a new paradigm for great power relations. Funny because a decade ago he used the phrase so called to describe it outright denied that it was an applicable concept. So why the change. Of tone, She says, This is what you would call a tell, an involuntary admission that Beijing's position has deteriorated sharply since twenty fifteen. You know, stories are powerful. 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They are your life told through the eyes of everyone around you and all who came before you, and they will tell others to come who you are. Visit creative video dot com. The journalist Melissa Chen noting that Chinese President Xijinping a decade ago said there was there wasn't such a thing as the Thucidides trap. But now he says. In a warning like we have to be able to navigate this so we don't fall into this trap. In other words, go to war. Back then, twenty fifteen, China was at the height of the post financial crisis boom. Beijing was surging with double digit growth on paper, the Belton Road Initiative was rolling out to great fanfare. Island building in the South China Sea was barely met with any Western response thanks Obama, and the American President was still preaching strategic patients. Today, decade later, the material reality is flipped. China's much hyped century of rejuvenation has slammed into structural headwinds that no amount of state media's spin can hide. A demographic death spiral, a property sector collapse that wiped out trillions in household wealth, local government debt bombs lurking on the books, and a tech ecosystem increasingly isolated by US export controls and friend shoring. She goes on to say that the GDP overtake narrative that once enthralled the elites at Davos has quietly died. Projections now show America pulling further ahead in nominal terms for GDP, Ji's China dream is at best delayed and at worst never materializing. Trump two point zero brought tariffs back on the table, hardened alliances with Japan and the Philippines, accelerated arms sales to Taiwan and an American public finally awake to the CCP's game. Knowing that China requires continued access to Western markets and capital and technology in order to avoid stagnation at home, Jijinping now does a U turn and reaches for the historical analogy that he once dismissed. Basically, when you're strong, you deny any threat exists, hoping to luw the bigger power into complacency. But when your power and strength wanes, will then warn that resistance will produce the very conflict you claim to fear. Xi is essentially saying to America, don't contain us, don't push back too hard, or you'll be the paranoid Sparta that started the war against Athens. That's where the Thucydides trap comes from. It's actually a veiled threat, that's what he said. It's a veiled threat to keep the one way transfer of power and wealth open or else. This one hundred eighty degree shift proves that the balance is tilting back toward American strength. The correct US response is to reject the premise entirely and continue to maintain unrelenting pressure on every front and force Xi to choose choose between genuine reform at home or managed decline on Beijing's terms. His sudden invocation of the Thucydides trap, something he used to dismiss, simply confirms that the pressure is working. Americans should take this as a sign that their country is not in decline, despite the insane amount of propaganda now also being touted by American influencers and podcasters. And I think she's exactly right. All right, let me jump over here to dude get ray On. Hello, ray welcome to the show. Hey, thank you for taking my call. Yeah, you know, he's no different than any other politician in the Western world. He is just talking a lot of boloney. And I pay attention to those that show action after their words. So all of the hype that you know, he was boasting about and building islands during the height of their success in China has proved to be nothing. They are declining themselves. And this, you know, what you have just read is I believe this spot on. I think if people just sit back and don't pay attention to what our politicians or foreign politicians say, just pay attention to their actions, and that paints the picture right. So, you know, We've been promised a better healthcare system than Obamacare. We don't have it. It never will materialize. I don't care what they say, watch what they do, Okay, And it's no different than any other politician and any you know, civilized nation. Well this and this is why I say, don't ever fall in love with a politician, because they'll break your heart. They're people, right, and so you're better off voting for issues and then you support politicians that support that issue. But if they don't support your view on a particular issue, then you don't owe them anything. That's absolutely you know, you know, you made a reference to China island building, and then you followed up and you followed up with thank you Obama. I think, don't you think that the intelligence that we may have had there that maybe that was the best thing, letting go and build islands, because they're spending all this money they think they have it, and look at the shape that they're in now, all of the energies and money that they spent in doing that really hasn't put them any further ahead of us economically in the world. Right. Well, the biggest problem, yeah, the big the biggest problem they've got is the communism. I mean, that's the. Like every single time this philosophy has been enacted all around the world for the last you know, one hundred plus years now, it always leads to the same thing because at the root of it, it is denying human nature and then you must force people, uh into that, into that ideology. Yeah, and so that's the biggest problem they've got. That's that is the biggest problem. And you cannot find a communist nation that has the level of success as our country. Now. We are not perfect. We are still growing and learning and evolving as a nation. Until we learn the lessons of our mistakes in the past and correct that, we're going to continue to do the same thing and think that there will be a change, right, Yeah, which is the learn lessons from the past. Now, we don't do that, No, no, no, we don't do that. But we're Americans. See, we are a representative republic, and at least we identify that and make an effort and have the opportunity. We're in a communist nation, you don't have the opportunity. In fact, if you if you recognize the mistakes of your government and you vocalize that you're gonna get killed for it. Yeah, hey, Ray, Yeah, I appreciate the call. Good points, sir, good to hear from you. Thanks, Yeah, you get tossed into the gouleg no doubt. A couple of things she mentioned in Melissa Chen mentioned the demographic death spiral. So it was only in twenty sixteen that China got rid of its one child policy. So it's only been ten years, but the impact is evident, right. There are a whole bunch of dudes and very few women, and so like the long term impact on their population, they're now in it. They have a replacement rate of one kid per woman and that is way below the replacement rate of two point one. Now we are a little bit better. America is at one point six. So they're not even replacing their own population. They're actually looking at a population decline by sixty million people within the next ten years. Deaths now outnumber berths in China. So yeah, they've got a lot of problems. And the mention of this Thucidides trap Bijijinping after a decade ago he's called it so called trap indicates weakness. Please don't hurt us, Please don't be too hard on us, because why because they're not strong. All right, we'll go over some more of the uh this trap and why it's like popular. I don't even know this idea. We'll get to that in a minute. Let me jump over to the text line driven by Liberty Buick. Gmc robert says, Gordon Chang has an excellent assessment of the Chinese summit with Trump, much like yours. Oh okay, well that's good. He's yeah, Gordon Chang's awesome. He's usually on with Brett Winnable talking about China and such. Yashua says, you said it pete no stability with China long term, and David says, it's only a Thucidides trap if you believe we will be overtaken by China. China has a whole bunch of its own problems, indeed, and I think that's why Jijinping brought up the trap. A couple of other items. Would the US defend Taiwan if it came to it? And Trump said, I don't want to say that question was asked to me today by President g I said I don't talk about it, which some people are like, oh my gosh, I can't believe, like he left it ambiguous, like that's the whole point. It's strategic ambiguity. Yeah, what's it got? Robert Pape, This is the guy who talks about the escalation trap and says that we should just, you know, surrender to Iran. They're gonna be a global superpower now and all of this. He says, Trump's statement distancing US from Taiwan is exactly what she wants. Us is the biggest loser in the Iran war. US allies facing high cost to for America's colossal mistake. Taiwan is paying the most immediate price thus far in Asia because Trump said I'll make a determination about arms sales to Taiwan. So he didn't say no, he didn't say yes. He was ambiguous. He said I'll make a determination. He was asked if he confronted xixenping over cyber attacks, and he said I did. And he talked about attacks we did in China. You know what they do, we do too. We spy like hell on them too. I told him, we do a lot of stuff to you that you don't know about. And then on the question of tariffs, did you agree with President Xi to extend a truce on tariffs, and Trump said, we did not discuss tariffs. It wasn't brought up. Okay, So what is the deal with this Thucidides trap? I swear I had never heard of this before Xixenping mentioned it, but apparently it's it's been going around for a while. There's some guy he came up with this term. His name is Graham Allison, and he popularized the idea of the Thucidides trap. And apparently he has gone to China to talk about this. So on Thursday. This is a piece by Aaron McLean Over at the Free Press. He said on Thursday, as the two leaders gathered for their summit, she gave introductory remarks in Chinese and warned that the US and China should beware. Per an official English language translation, we should be beware of the Thucydides trap. It was not the first time she has invoked the concept, which he has raised as far back as twenty fourteen. The idea is straightforward. In his account of the Peloponnesian War, Thucydides asserted that war between Athens and Sparta was inevitable because of the fear that Athens rise inspired in Sparta. Okay, so Sparta was strong, Athens was rising, the Spartans got afraid of Athens's rise, and that's the trap quote unquote. Allison's now extremely well popularized gloss is an attempt at elevating this specific claim to a universal principle. When a status quo power is challenged by an upstart, war is the result most of the time. He wrote a book about it in twenty seventeen, apparently, and he said that twelve out of sixteen historical cases since the year fifteen hundred have resulted in war. Avoiding bloodshed requires quote radical changes in attitudes and actions, not least for the established power. Okay, so we're going to have to make some room at the table for China. I guess is what That's the only way to avoid the war is to a commodate the comis the radical change in our position required to avoid war would involve various forms of accommodation. We must learn to stop worrying and love Chinese power. We have to accept a Chinese led world order. If you will notice there is a through line among the people on the left that were, you know, out in the streets chanting no kings and then you know, also celebrating the Palestinians and the and lamenting the Nakba I've got yeah, that was this weekend too. I'll get to that. But there's a through line between them on the left and the quote unquote horseshoe right right, there's this same belief that our time is over and so we should just step away and let China lead the world. Right, That's that's what they're pitching. I mean, they call it multipolarity, but that's what they're pitching, which I wish they would just you know, come out and just be honest and say that this is what this is what they want. They want somebody else in charge of the globe to be the Hegemont. I mean, and if you're looking around the globe, and this is one of the arguments that I have made to Capital l hardcore libertarians over the years. That's why I consider myself like more of a lowercase L libertarian, more of a Conservatorian. I don't really fit any of those party labels. But the Capital l ones were isolationists, and I would ask them, Okay, if you don't support America projecting its power beyond its borders, and you don't think we should be doing that, Well, then who would you prefer replace us? Right? Who's got the model and the ability to do that? Because somebody will. I mean history has always had some global powers that project their power outside their border, So who would you prefer? And they have to be able to do it, and China is really the only one that could. I mean maybe Russia. No, not really anymore. But is that the kind of world you want to live in led by communists? I do not. She's deployment of this Thucydides trap at the summit then, was no friendly expression of some shared desire for peace. It was an entirely unsubtle warning, even a threat. You could call it a threat. It's no mystery why he has eagerly embraced Allison's theory, given how it involves the inevitability of China's rise and the urgent necessity for America to accommodate it now, right, Because if we're stronger, then that's all you can ask is for accommodations. You can't force us to accommodate. You just have to beg and plead. In Allison's conception, if China's campaign of territorial expansion and its relentless bullying of its neighbors in the Western Pacific leads to war. The fault would be ours, that's our fault. See, it's all but the perfect tool of information warfare for targeting an elite American audience, which is why he invoked it. That's who he was talking to talking about the Thucydides trap. It's the term that everybody was using since Xijinping mentioned it during this summit, and again he mentions it because China is weak, China is weaker, and so they need us to, you know, make accommodations for them. Please please don't don't do anything that would harm us, because they know that they are in the weaker position. That's why he makes the threat. And that's what that was, in my opinion. The guy who came up with this term and has been shopping at Graham Allison is his name. He has apparently made numerous. Visits since his notion of the trap came to prominence, including at least one meeting with Jijinping and multiple meetings with the Politbureau members and CCP house intellectual Wang Hewning. Don't know who that is, but apparently he's like going around going to China telling them all about his theory. It isn't it isn't this again from the Free Press Aaron McLean. He says, it isn't Allison's apparent comfort at being used as a tool of propaganda and psychological warfare by America's adversary that grates me the most. It is that his theory is deeply misleading on the merits, the risk of confrontation, and the fact that war could be its result. Like these are mere elementary commonplaces, the irresponsibly transforming it into something like a universal principle, right, Like well, if you have an upstart country, then the existing established power is. Going to get all afraid and then they're going to war. But that's. Like that ignores so many other factors, like are they on the other side of the planet? Are they ideological. Enemies? Does one value things that the other dismisses as worth nothing? Right? What doesn't get enough mention in Allison's efforts to promote his notion of the Thucydides trap are the risks of accommodation, right, Because there's another side of the ledger there. If you're going to keep just you know, giving China what it wants. What is the risk of doing that? Right? I mean, this was the whole appeasement argument with Hitler. Right, China under the Communist Party is the world's most impressive pioneer at using the amazing new tools available to humanity for utterly repressive and wildly effective totalitarian control. They were in. Iran telling the Iranians how to control their population. This is what they export, is authoritarianism, right. The increasingly complete dominance of the state over the individual, paired with an aggressive foreign policy that seeks old fashioned territorial expansion and a new global system where China. Calls the shots. Is that what we want. Resisting the coming of that world does indeed risk war, and it is no unseerious business. But accepting it risks slavery. That's the other side of the ledger there. And so this trap is just like, oh well, nothing to be done. If you're the established power, you're just going to have to make room from the text line. Ian says, a professor I had in college was Henry Kissinger's aid during the first Nixon administration. I'm pretty sure he's the one who made the advanced trip to China before Nixon went in nineteen seventy two. He tried to warn Nixon off of drinking Mao Thai and embarrassing himself. He also told us how Chinese intelligence works, and that every Chinese student at the University of Minnesota was a spy, whether or not they knew it. Yeah, we've talked about this as well, that you know, when students from China come to America, they are blackmailable because their family is still back in China. And so whether they are you know, toldically to go do something, you know, whether to engage in espionage or whatever. Like, I don't think it's coincidental that there have been like at least two different occasions where Chinese nationals have been caught with like bio stuff, you know, like biological materials and whatnot. Joseph says, imagine how weak China would be had we not exported our manufacturing base to them and let them pirate our tech and patents. Thanks globalism. Yeah, people were drunk on this idea that China would become more like us, you know, by welcoming them into the fold of the you know, the global trade partners and all of that. Does Vicinity's adventure was brought up by a British statesman in the eighteen hundreds. The other guy just happened to find it and is reading apparently is just a bogus thing that the Britain's Banish people rather. Okay, I can't read all that. It's not making any sense. And then this is from Eddie. There's a group of leaders that g answers to. They can replace him and change political course. If they feel the present day structure will not be successful. They can replace him and he wouldn't be able to do anything about it. I'm not sure that's true anymore. He has systematically removed all of those people in the Pollit Bureau and put them put his own people in place. All right, that'll do it for this episode. Thank you so much for listening. I could not do the show without your support and the support of the businesses that advertise on the podcast, so if you'd like, please support them too and tell them you heard it here. You can also become a patron at my Patreon page or go to thepetecallanarshow dot com. Again, thank you so much for listening, and don't break anything while I'm gone.