In 2001, author and China expert Gordon Chang wrote “The Coming Collapse of China”. His premise was that due to demographics and a state-run Communist economy, China would collapse under the weight of inefficiency, similar to what happened to the Soviet Union.
Of course, Chang was wrong; China was shrewd. It convinced the West to accept its entry into the World Trade Organization. China was given preferential treatment, and with cheap labour and precision-like manufacturing, it created a huge source of affordable products sought by the world. Companies in the West were priced out of the market until they realized that they could garner huge profits from Chinese labour.
Meanwhile, China converted from a socialist economy to a capitalistic one while retaining a Communist regime restricting civil rights and political persecution. The result is that China, arguably, is the most powerful country on the planet.
While China is outward-looking and vibrant, America today has a President in Joe Biden who is a metaphor for the nation. Like Biden, America is sclerotic, in cognitive decline and impotent. China is definitely on the march.
It saddens me to utter these words as I have several American friends. I have always greatly respected the USA and its ideals, including these words spoken from the Declaration of Independence––a beautiful document.
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Over the past couple of decades, America has gone off the rails. It appears to be collapsing before our very eyes. The recent pull-out debacle in Afghanistan has brought things to a tipping point. After spending 2.1 trillion dollars and lives lost over 20 years, what was achieved? America’s debt is now 29 trillion dollars and set to go up another 3.5 trillion with another stimulus bill about to hit Congress. The U.S. appears so weak; it is now subservient to the Taliban, a rag-tag bunch of fighters. People who lost loved ones on 9/11 and war veterans must be in despair.
You don’t need to be a psychiatrist to see that President Biden is suffering from early dementia. The prospect that he could be running things is scary. What’s scarier are the pronouncements from some of his top generals. Who is in control?
What country starts evacuating its military without making sure that its civilians are airlifted out of the war-torn country of Afghanistan? What government prioritizes other people’s energy over its own? What country attacks its own police forces and then wonders why crime is out of control? What country opens its borders wide open to illegal immigrants, Covid-19 notwithstanding? That is the America of today. In fact, at the current rate of illegals flooding across the U.S. border, the year will see two million illegals enter the country. That is the population of Perth, Western Australia!
A country that tears itself apart from within can not last long. Many believe that America is in its darkest moment since the civil war. Since the fall of the Soviet Union, traditional American values have deteriorated. The uniqueness that made America unique is gone. The “shining city on a hill”, as Ronald Reagan described America, is no more.
So those living in Australia, the U.K. or the European Union may say, why should I care what happens to America? It doesn’t affect my life. Oh, yes, it does. Have you noticed inflation is surging? That is a reflection of what is going on in America. Debt spending is at record levels in many countries which are following the U.S. lead. Fuel prices are going to record levels. This is due to U.S. policy that is penalizing the largest producer in the world––America. Today in Australia, to fill up your tank, it costs $1.75 a litre ($5.11 U.S. a gallon)
America is at the mercy of China. Drug production, most consumer products, clothing and technology, is produced in China. The U.S. and others have instituted totalitarian policies previously only associated with China to add insult to injury. Lockdowns, mask mandates, vaccination mandates, and other police-state actions are no longer the purview of China; without getting into the opiate death epidemic, the destruction of jobs in Middle America and homelessness at record levels. The unique identity of America is gone. The U.S. has adapted to a Chinese ethos, not the other way around.
As American influence around the world diminishes, China is on the march in every continent. They are doing so without firing a shot. You have to admire their strategy. Meanwhile, America has recklessly spent and focused on dangerous and inane social narratives.
If the American economy is destroyed, the United States—and the rest of the world—will sink into an abyss, a new Dark Age. Gordon Chang needs to update his 2001 book to reflect the “Coming Collapse of America”. Let’s hope that someone, somehow, a leader comes along who can rise up beyond the fray and put America on the right track. It would need a Herculean effort at this stage.
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