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China's Silk Road Illusions

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Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#31

Post by meric »

justicezyx wrote: post #29
JumpCrisscross wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The outlook for their ROI is much brighter I agree that American ROI on military spending is negative, though the degree to which this is true is debatable. (The American defense industry doubles as a federal jobs and R&D program.) I do not see how China building an expensive, low-throughput transportation mode that is uncompetitive, even without a traversable Arctic Ocean, is productive.

Stills orders of magnitude more productive than killing people and destroy nations.

Fifty cents on the dollar versus negative fifty cents on the dollar. With the first approach, you lose 50 cents but you still have 50 cents.

Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#32

Post by gozur88 »

chiefalchemist wrote: post #7

Of course such projects have risk. Of course there is historical baggage. But while China is building an infrastructure legacy, the USA et al are using its resources to wages multiple wars. It's likely the USA's ROI (if you will) will be increased debt and enemies for years to come. China on the other hand seems hardly interested in such things. The outlook for their ROI is much brighter.

The US is using very little of its resources to wage wars. Military spending as a percentage of GDP is down to pre-WW II levels.

And you're underestimating the extent to which China is making enemies in the South China Sea region. These are countries with potentially significant military capability, too, like the Philippines and Japan, not bands of goat herders.

Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#33

Post by jcranmer »

dmix wrote: post #12

I read the entire article and it's a great read. It's fascinating how much we romanticize about past cultures and how much if it is wrong. I love reading history and this almost always turns out to be the case. Digging into any topic reveals they are always far more complex and multilayered than the the common caricatures you find in media and in generalized accounts. China's popular understanding of the Silk Road se…

> Particularly with how Germany really lost the war to the Soviets in late 1942 when they failed to subdue Russia in the early invasion. The west (US/UK/Canada) largely just cleaned up the mess from 1943-45, as the Nazi's were fighting an impossible war after that point. Even then Russia did most of the work in terms of raw combat. But even when this is noted in history books Russia's success is largely dismissed as merely due to their fortunate geography and willingness to treat their soldiers like expendable fodder. But it was in fact largely due to Russia having better technology than Germany (specifically better tanks/armour [1]) and the geography was far less of an issue to the Nazi's in 1942, who unlike Napolean had highly mobile tanks, aircraft, trains, and Blitzkrieg tactics.

That greatly overstates the USSR's role. While the USSR and the Germany were basically locked in a massive conflict hemorrhaging manpower, the USSR's side was largely propped up by the US lend-lease program, which supplied crucially needed supplies of logistics, particularly trucks. Without such support, the USSR would have faced the same problem that Germany did: a critical inability to properly supply their front-line troops.

Also, Russian geography also killed the Germans. Blitzkrieg, where every 30 miles you have to wait a week for supplies to be brought up, doesn't work when you're traversing 600 miles of terrain. It works even less well when the railroad is a single-track feature that's incompatible with your rail system, even the major roads are barely passable in the best times and impassable in the season of mud, and all of your supplies are being carted by horses (which have this nasty habit of dying in -30° weather).

Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#34

Post by DrScump »

dmix wrote: post #12

I read the entire article and it's a great read. It's fascinating how much we romanticize about past cultures and how much if it is wrong. I love reading history and this almost always turns out to be the case. Digging into any topic reveals they are always far more complex and multilayered than the the common caricatures you find in media and in generalized accounts. China's popular understanding of the Silk Road se…

  the KV-1 tank, which grinded Operation Barbarossa to a halt
Your own link says the KV-1 represented only 2% of Soviet tanks there.

The real key to the Soviet win is that they could endure 3:1 loss ratios and still outdeploy the Nazis at better than 3:1.

Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#35

Post by ant6n »

thablackbull wrote: post #13
chiefalchemist wrote: post #7

Of course such projects have risk. Of course there is historical baggage. But while China is building an infrastructure legacy, the USA et al are using its resources to wages multiple wars. It's likely the USA's ROI (if you will) will be increased debt and enemies for years to come. China on the other hand seems hardly interested in such things. The outlook for their ROI is much brighter.

What we're witnessing today is a chicken-and-egg problem. USA: America is the chicken. To be a modern country, it is hypothesized that the developing country needs immediately adopt American systems, laws, behavior & structures (the Washington consensus, etc.). In essence, and to keep it short, the 'free-markets' will take over, and standards of living will boom. China: China is the egg, because they view modernizati…

I'm not sure who's hypothesizing that a modern country has to emulate the US. That's a kind of cold war point of view.

Many modern countries these days don't adopt the American system, but are striving towards being modern, pluralist democracies with functioning social systems, good governance, and sane judicial systems.

Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#36

Post by sho »

gozur88 wrote: post #32
chiefalchemist wrote: post #7

Of course such projects have risk. Of course there is historical baggage. But while China is building an infrastructure legacy, the USA et al are using its resources to wages multiple wars. It's likely the USA's ROI (if you will) will be increased debt and enemies for years to come. China on the other hand seems hardly interested in such things. The outlook for their ROI is much brighter.

The US is using very little of its resources to wage wars. Military spending as a percentage of GDP is down to pre-WW II levels. And you're underestimating the extent to which China is making enemies in the South China Sea region. These are countries with potentially significant military capability, too, like the Philippines and Japan, not bands of goat herders.

> Military spending as a percentage of GDP is down to pre-WW II levels

No it's not[1]. As a % of the total budget it's around 16%, which is huge. And furthermore the appropriations for the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan are mostly not included - they have been funded by "supplemental" spending bills, which total well into the 10 figures.

The Philippines doesn't really have a navy worth talking about. Japan can defend itself but that's a different (also kinda dicey) sea - they could only really go on offence in cooperation with the USA. China's main military threats are on land and come from its western borders - Myanmar, Laos, Vietnam, and of course India. With the possible exception of India I don't see any of them picking a fight anytime soon.

[1] https://www.usgovernmentspending.com/spending_chart_1792_201...

Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#37

Post by DrScump »

the-dude wrote: post #26
spacetexas wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Russia didn't have better tanks they had more tanks

The T-34 was better than what the Germans had at the time. The better German tanks came too late and too little, true.

  The T-34 was better than what the Germans had at the time.
The T-34 platform was more effective because it vastly outnumbered all German tank models combined, ran on diesel, was easier to repair/replace, and the Soviets were willing to absorb more personnel losses.

If you're saying you'd rather go into battle with 5 fully operational T-34s than 5 fully operational Tigers, then we seriously disagree.

Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#38

Post by seanmcdirmid »

fspeech wrote: post #19
dmix wrote: post #12

I read the entire article and it's a great read. It's fascinating how much we romanticize about past cultures and how much if it is wrong. I love reading history and this almost always turns out to be the case. Digging into any topic reveals they are always far more complex and multilayered than the the common caricatures you find in media and in generalized accounts. China's popular understanding of the Silk Road se…

Unfortunately the author's analogy with the ancient silk road rings as false as the Chinese government's. For example in discussing the rail link, the author failed to note that beyond Xinjiang there lie Shaanxi and Sichuan, two of China's most populous inland provinces. And Xi'an was the ancient Chinese capital for over a millennium. The Chongqing-Europe railroad https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chongqing-Xinjiang-Euro…

There is a lot of space to cover if we are talking about the populated parts of Sichuan and shaanxi, which are mainly east. The most western city outside of Xinjiang would be like Lanzhou, kunming, xining, etc...

The railroads to Europe are still heavily subsidized, and are coming back to china mostly empty. They'll make more sense when trade becomes more balanced, but that isn't today.

Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#39

Post by fspeech »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #38
fspeech wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately the author's analogy with the ancient silk road rings as false as the Chinese government's. For example in discussing the rail link, the author failed to note that beyond Xinjiang there lie Shaanxi and Sichuan, two of China's most populous inland provinces. And Xi'an was the ancient Chinese capital for over a millennium. The Chongqing-Europe railroad https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chongqing-Xinjiang-Euro…

There is a lot of space to cover if we are talking about the populated parts of Sichuan and shaanxi, which are mainly east. The most western city outside of Xinjiang would be like Lanzhou, kunming, xining, etc... The railroads to Europe are still heavily subsidized, and are coming back to china mostly empty. They'll make more sense when trade becomes more balanced, but that isn't today.

You are right that they need to find more goods to ship on the return trip. The current route actually runs on existing tracks so didn't require a lot of investment.

For cities like Lanzhou, Xining, Urumqi etc it makes sense to develop a land route. The economics are even better than Chongqing since Chongqing actually has access to the Yangtze river.

Re: China's Silk Road Illusions

#40

Post by thablackbull »

ant6n wrote: post #35
thablackbull wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What we're witnessing today is a chicken-and-egg problem. USA: America is the chicken. To be a modern country, it is hypothesized that the developing country needs immediately adopt American systems, laws, behavior & structures (the Washington consensus, etc.). In essence, and to keep it short, the 'free-markets' will take over, and standards of living will boom. China: China is the egg, because they view modernizati…

I'm not sure who's hypothesizing that a modern country has to emulate the US. That's a kind of cold war point of view. Many modern countries these days don't adopt the American system, but are striving towards being modern, pluralist democracies with functioning social systems, good governance, and sane judicial systems.

> I'm not sure who's hypothesizing that a modern country has to emulate the US.

I'm just going to focus on one element due to space; one of the core pillars of American economic thinking is the idea of free markets. Through bilateral relationships or organizations like the IMF, etc., developing nations are given a road-map of how to modernize. It may not have to be a carbon copy of America (and that was not my point), but there is certainly an element of shaping developing countries to accept American ideals. However, have you ever noticed that no country has ever modernized through free markets, it always required a lot of protectionism. [1], [2]

Free-markets is a big topic that the American government likes to complain about with regards to China. Ironically, Americans seem to think protectionism doesn't exist in America. "For example, from 2008 to 2016, the US implemented over 1,000 discriminatory trade policy measures, followed by India and Russia, with both implementing nearly 600 similar policies each. Trade-impeding measures have also increased at a much faster pace than measures to liberalize trade." [3], [4], [5]. A little hypocritical if you ask me.

> Many modern countries these days don't adopt the American system, but are striving towards being modern, pluralist democracies with functioning social systems, good governance, and sane judicial systems.

I'll assume you are contrasting with China, so I'll go point by point

* Modern: Just to reiterate, my previous spiel was that China views modernization as independent to other society structures. Their experience has proven that to be the case. Without a doubt, cities like Shenzhen are modern.

* Pluralist democracies with functioning social systems, good governance: Ultimately, the purpose of a democracy is to get the voices of citizens heard. Note that surveys show almost 90% of citizens in China are satisfied with their government while in the West, we are perpetually annoyed at them. Democracy is not a panacea for stability, success, etc.

* Sane judicial systems: That depends how you view it. In America, look at the amount of people locked up for minor drug crimes. I call that insane. In China, the law is more flexible and based on circumstances. "Despite the tough laws, authorities have usually turned a blind eye to farmers growing their own low-THC varieties because they were an important source of income for some farmers." [6] It's also important to note westerners and easterners look at the concept of Law very differently. "Easterners and Westerners have fundamentally different understandings of the nature of contracts. In the West, a contract is unalterable; in the East a contract is continually renegotiable in the light of changed circumstances (Hampden-Turner & Trompenaars, 1993). This drastic difference of view has often resulted in conflict and bitterness between Eastern and Western negotiators." [7]

[1] PDF Warning: http://ecdpm.org/wp-content/uploads/PMR-15-Politique-Develop... (pg 38 and in French)

[2] "...free market approaches have not proven to be 'very effective' in helping countries achieve this." http://www.oliverwyman.com/our-expertise/insights/2017/oct/e...

[3] http://www.oliverwyman.com/our-expertise/insights/2017/oct/e...

[4] Is China the Most Protectionist Country? No, Not By a Long Shot https://piie.com/blogs/china-economic-watch/china-most-prote...

[5] http://www.eulerhermes.com/economic-research/blog/AllInfogra...

[6] http://www.scmp.com/news/china/society/article/2108347/green...

[7] Richard Nisbett, Kaiping Peng, Incheol Choi, Ara Norenzayan - 2001 - Culture and Systems of Thought: Holistic vs. Analytic Cognition

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