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‘Previously Unlikely Options’ Are Now On The Table: Reassessing The Odds Of China Going ‘Nuclear’
"With our belief that China is unlikely to make further concessions unless the US offers compromises
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I meant to post this here.
Two points:
The Chinese do not have to dump treasuries. They can merely boycott the increasingly huge UST auctions. How will Trump respond? MMT, here we come!
Rare earth materials. I keep reading that supply will appear elsewhere. Uh, have any of the geniuses pushing that narrative ever examined how long it takes to bring a mine on line? Especially for very toxic minerals? Then there are the needed refineries. We are not talking weeks or months. Look back at 2011 for a primer. Those commentators should be embarrassed.
Dumping Treasuries, devaluation, restricting rare earth metal exports, reprisals against Apple, these all hurt China in the long run too. Rare earth minerals are not rare, just not available in commercially convenient, easily to mine deposits and cause great environmental degradation to get at. But it can be done, and once done, like in Greenland or Australia, that export market is gone and that fixed environmental damage already undertaken becomes pointless.
China needs to hurt the United States without punching itself in the face too, and the way to do that is by punishing countries that would host companies forced to leave China. Multinationals escaping China to avoid tariffs are going to Third World countries with large domestic markets and cheap labor, countries very likely to be influenced by China. Through Belt and Road projects, land leases, territorial disputes, oodles of cash, and sheer geopolitical heft, China has a lot of carrots and sticks to get the new hosts to make life difficult to new hubs in global supply chains at no cost to China itself.
Back to my favorite comment…..Geopolitics and how it interacts with the political and economic scenarios….If the myriad of fronts in CIA playbook ever hatch , potentially in consortium , China could be forced into dealing with overtly choosing sides or just protecting it’s interests..The energy grab of 2019…Libya, Venezuela , Iran as well as Russian issues and Saudi events could harden Chinese resolve which already has a long term flavor…..