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The US Lost to Iran – Now China Is Unstoppable | Silk and Steel · UK Column Radio

0:00
Speaker 1: By the man himself, Carljah, what's going on, my man?
0:05
Speaker 1: How are you doing? You're doing okay today.
0:07
Speaker 2: I'm doing good. How are you? Jamark? Always good to
0:10
Speaker 2: talk to you.
0:11
Speaker 1: It is always good to talk to you too. To Carl,
0:13
Speaker 1: I always enjoy these conversations, and I think the audience
0:16
Speaker 1: also enjoys these conversations. You were gracious enough at last
0:21
Speaker 1: minute to take my thing. I think that's in trut
0:23
Speaker 1: to thinking like three this morning or something like that.
0:26
Speaker 1: So I appreciate you for that. I was the reason
0:28
Speaker 1: I hit you up is because there's several articles that
0:31
Speaker 1: are out that I find to be fascinating in this
0:34
Speaker 1: kind of American context. One was the Wall Street Journal. Now,
0:40
Speaker 1: as we know, the US has decided to start a
0:43
Speaker 1: war of aggression against Iran. The US wanted to overthrow
0:47
Speaker 1: that government within the first few weeks and failed to
0:49
Speaker 1: do that. And not just failed to do it, Iran
0:52
Speaker 1: took war booty by the fact that it'll take in
0:54
Speaker 1: the straight up from something that said it was going
0:55
Speaker 1: to do in the beginning. The Wall Street Journal is
1:00
Speaker 1: now reporting that the US because of and I'm pointing
1:06
Speaker 1: that out, because of the ammunition that it's spent in
1:10
Speaker 1: the war with Iran in two months for two months,
1:13
Speaker 1: that it no longer has the capability to militarily defend Taiwan.
1:18
Speaker 1: It China gets hands. Now this is funny to me
1:24
Speaker 1: because I guess I think the argument is inverted. If
1:28
Speaker 1: you couldn't defeat Iran, then why are you talking about China.
1:33
Speaker 1: I think they've inverted the argument. Give me your take
1:35
Speaker 1: on this. I'm I'm a namor by that, I mean
1:39
Speaker 1: you're looking for But.
1:40
Speaker 2: For anyone who has been watching this, it's it's it
1:44
Speaker 2: couldn't be even more obvious that, uh, there's diminished likelihood
1:49
Speaker 2: of a high kinetic conflict in US Asia. Now, given
1:54
Speaker 2: what happened in West Asia, as you mentioned, if the
1:57
Speaker 2: United States cannot handle you wrong, forget East Asia. You
2:01
Speaker 2: know China has magnitude, more missiles, more advanced missiles than
2:06
Speaker 2: you wrong. You know, all the countries on in East Asia,
2:11
Speaker 2: the US come on to contain China, and talking about
2:14
Speaker 2: South Korea, Japan, the Philippines, Australia must look very nervously
2:20
Speaker 2: right now at what's happening to GCC countries in West Asia.
2:25
Speaker 2: All their bases are getting lit up, their their Amazon
2:28
Speaker 2: data center are getting lit up, their oil facilities are
2:32
Speaker 2: getting lit up. You know, that will be them if
2:36
Speaker 2: US goes to war against China. But that's the that's
2:40
Speaker 2: their designated role anyway by the United States, because US
2:43
Speaker 2: has always intended for these countries to serve US missile sponge,
2:47
Speaker 2: to sponge up the income in Chinese missile branch, so
2:51
Speaker 2: less will be hitting US, you know, US seventh Fleet.
2:56
Speaker 2: But but now now it's it's more obvious for every one.
3:00
Speaker 2: And the fact that you know, I know, there's a
3:05
Speaker 2: lot of think tanks in the United States that had
3:08
Speaker 2: been talking about choosing chokepoint to choke off China's energy supply.
3:14
Speaker 2: They had been talking about this for decades. This is
3:17
Speaker 2: nothing new. But you also have to look in practice.
3:22
Speaker 2: Let's remember even the Iraq War. According to Allen's green
3:26
Speaker 2: Spans memoir, the Iraq War was fought for United States
3:30
Speaker 2: to control the flow of oil coming out of the
3:33
Speaker 2: Middle East. And at that time, you were back in
3:35
Speaker 2: two thousand and oh three, Alan Greenspan said, because they
3:39
Speaker 2: saw that China is increasingly dependent on energy imports from
3:44
Speaker 2: the Persian Gulf. By controlling that the oil flow, they
3:48
Speaker 2: will be able to dictate turns to China. Well guess
3:51
Speaker 2: what happened? You know right, there's a grand there's grand strategy,
3:56
Speaker 2: then there's execution. Confucius famously said, you know tin chien
4:02
Speaker 2: guan chi chin, which means lessen to one's words, but
4:07
Speaker 2: watch one's action in practice. All these US military interventionist
4:13
Speaker 2: abroad it is, in actual implementation, it just serves to
4:20
Speaker 2: in in a in a sound sword, to wash vast
4:27
Speaker 2: sum of money from tax basis of North America and
4:31
Speaker 2: Western Europe into the hands of a small trans transnational
4:36
Speaker 2: security That's what they're actually designed to do. There is
4:39
Speaker 2: designed for grift, it's not. It's not designed The one
4:43
Speaker 2: trillion dollars military budget, which is assumed to be one
4:47
Speaker 2: point five trillion dollars if Trump's proposal goes through, is
4:51
Speaker 2: not designed to win wars. It's designed to make the
4:55
Speaker 2: fact ads even fatter. Uh that's that they do that
4:59
Speaker 2: very wow. This is why we have bundagos like F
5:02
Speaker 2: thirty five, which they don't even there to use in
5:07
Speaker 2: uh in yourana anymore. After their first uh F thirty
5:11
Speaker 2: five getting hit the you know, forget about forget about
5:15
Speaker 2: hitting China's United like United States depend on eighty percent
5:21
Speaker 2: of its pharmaceuticals from China. You you want to go
5:26
Speaker 2: to war that's providing you eighty percent of your antibiotics?
5:30
Speaker 2: Are you crazy? I mean, like so this the whole
5:34
Speaker 2: idea that somehow US is going to choke off China
5:37
Speaker 2: is preposterous. But China is taking this very seriously because
5:41
Speaker 2: China has taken over the over the years. You know,
5:45
Speaker 2: the whole reason that build the road, build and roa
5:48
Speaker 2: initiative is bypass all these choke points, you know. But
5:52
Speaker 2: they recognized the Strait of Malacca could be the single
5:55
Speaker 2: point of failure. So they're like, okay, we'll build ports elsewhere,
5:58
Speaker 2: will pilot the Arctic right out, we will build real
6:01
Speaker 2: links and and right now today China people have no
6:07
Speaker 2: idea how large China strategic oil reserve is. China strategic
6:13
Speaker 2: oil reserve, which they have built up over the last
6:15
Speaker 2: four years taking advantage of the historically low oil prices,
6:20
Speaker 2: now sits bigger than United States, Japan, and all Western
6:25
Speaker 2: Europe combined. That is how big China strategic oil reserve is.
6:29
Speaker 2: It's about one point for trillion the barrels of oil.
6:33
Speaker 2: I sent you a link of X so people think people.
6:40
Speaker 2: People think I'm just people, So I'm not just making
6:45
Speaker 2: stuff up. That chart is from the US Department of Energy, right,
6:50
Speaker 2: so so like this is not Chinese government propaganda here,
6:55
Speaker 2: So China will be okay, and they're the China Strategic
6:59
Speaker 2: Oil Reserve hasn't even gone down since the war started
7:02
Speaker 2: because oil keep on coming to China. You know, they
7:06
Speaker 2: will that that amount of the reserve will last China
7:10
Speaker 2: about you know, somewhere between three to six months if
7:13
Speaker 2: all oils stopped coming to China. But right now, oil
7:17
Speaker 2: are still flowing to China from Russia, from Africa, from Venezuela,
7:22
Speaker 2: from all places, and and from Iran. Of course, now
7:26
Speaker 2: now that now that Trump is blocked putting up blockade,
7:30
Speaker 2: it's that number is getting reduced. But like I said,
7:34
Speaker 2: Uran's contribution. So even though Iran export ninety percent of
7:38
Speaker 2: its oil to China, but that's equivalent about thirteen percent
7:44
Speaker 2: of China's own oil imports. So it's not it's not
7:49
Speaker 2: it's not ideal for China that that that's thirteen percent
7:54
Speaker 2: is going to shrink down to maybe even single digits.
7:58
Speaker 2: But they will find oil elsewhere. This is why oil
8:02
Speaker 2: prices has been going up. The thing is oil is
8:05
Speaker 2: a global commodities, globalized commodity. If China can't buy oilfon Iran,
8:11
Speaker 2: you will buy oil on Canada, you will buy oil
8:14
Speaker 2: fon elsewhere. What that means is the oil price is
8:17
Speaker 2: gonna go up for everyone. You know if China, the
8:21
Speaker 2: more Iranian oil and Russian oil China buy actually is
8:26
Speaker 2: less China had to buy elsewhere, which makes an oil
8:30
Speaker 2: price cheaper for everybody else. Once the China enters a
8:33
Speaker 2: globalized oil market to buy buy oil like everyone else,
8:38
Speaker 2: that makes price go up. I mean, this is simple.
8:42
Speaker 2: This is simple mathematics and economics. So right now China
8:47
Speaker 2: is actually doing relatively okay. They are the one who
8:50
Speaker 2: are putting a ban. Now. China has stopped export of
8:57
Speaker 2: some petroleum products gas line, diesel, jet fuel, and they
9:03
Speaker 2: also stop exporting chemical fertilizers and sulfuric acid, which is
9:10
Speaker 2: using everything, all the industrial components, so they are saving
9:14
Speaker 2: They're making sure their domestic industry gets priority, which is
9:19
Speaker 2: bad news for everyone else because China is one of
9:22
Speaker 2: the largest exporters for all these goods. Chinese is a
9:25
Speaker 2: big exporter of gasoline, diesel, and jet fuel to Asia.
9:31
Speaker 2: China is supplying thirty percent of the sulfuric acid to
9:37
Speaker 2: the world, and sulfuric acid is used in copper mining,
9:41
Speaker 2: car batteries, semiconductor manufacturing, basically all the basic building blocks
9:47
Speaker 2: of modern civilization. So this is gonna be bad for everyone.
9:51
Speaker 2: It's not like chi right now. You know, people think
9:57
Speaker 2: this is going to be like cod War two. It's
10:00
Speaker 2: gonna be like a replay of cod Ward one. Oh,
10:03
Speaker 2: but so many you didn't have a very little economic
10:07
Speaker 2: relationship with the Red West. You know, it was two
10:11
Speaker 2: relatively self contained system. China is fully embedded inside the
10:17
Speaker 2: local global economy. If you fuck with China, you fuck
10:21
Speaker 2: the whole global economy, including the United States. US is
10:24
Speaker 2: not immune, immume you know people don't I don't know,
10:28
Speaker 2: Like people keep on like, oh with oil. Yeah, but
10:32
Speaker 2: did you know that United States itself is an oil
10:35
Speaker 2: net crude importer China. United States export about three million
10:41
Speaker 2: barrels of oil per day but imports six million barrels
10:45
Speaker 2: of cude per day. So what United States do export
10:50
Speaker 2: is gas natural gas. United States have a lot of
10:53
Speaker 2: natural gas, and US produced what's called the liquified petroleum liquids,
10:59
Speaker 2: which is a byproduct of you know, like the all
11:02
Speaker 2: the shell fracking, but those petroleum liquid, petroleum liquids is
11:08
Speaker 2: not oil. They're not they're not oil, they're they're a
11:10
Speaker 2: gas product, and and so on paper if you look
11:15
Speaker 2: at all the aggregate petroleum products. Oh, United States sufficient
11:19
Speaker 2: that exporter. But actually United States is not oil self sufficient.
11:25
Speaker 2: It is it is selfisi natural gas. It exports a
11:28
Speaker 2: lot of natural gas. But but you know there's a
11:32
Speaker 2: united but US economy itself is very heavily dependent on oil.
11:36
Speaker 2: It's forty percent more dependent on oil than China is.
11:40
Speaker 2: Because China has did a big push to electrify their country.
11:45
Speaker 2: That you know that their high speed trains runs on electricity,
11:50
Speaker 2: and they can generate electricity from other sources of energy,
11:53
Speaker 2: from solar, from wind, from nuclear, from hydrol, and from coal.
11:58
Speaker 2: China has world's large just cold deposit, so you know,
12:02
Speaker 2: if it's not ideal, but if they have to, they
12:05
Speaker 2: can always fall back to coal to generate electricity. And
12:09
Speaker 2: they have a lot of electricity. You know, China have
12:13
Speaker 2: a lot of electricity production, like more than twice of
12:17
Speaker 2: the United States and China. So energy wise, China is
12:21
Speaker 2: about eighty six percent self sufficient in primary energy production,
12:26
Speaker 2: and that that share is continued to grow as China
12:31
Speaker 2: more nuclear power plants, more hydro plants, more solar, more wind,
12:36
Speaker 2: and so yeah, I think China will be hurting, but
12:41
Speaker 2: China will be hurting a lot less than all the
12:44
Speaker 2: country around the globe right now. All the US allies
12:47
Speaker 2: in East Asia are hurting a lot more right now
12:49
Speaker 2: because they're actually more dependent on the Persian Gulf oil
12:54
Speaker 2: and gas. You know, I'm talking about Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Philippines, India,
13:00
Speaker 2: all of them depend heavily because they were cut off
13:03
Speaker 2: by United States from Russian from the Russian oil and gas.
13:07
Speaker 2: This is why they have to lift lift sanction on
13:10
Speaker 2: Russian oil and gas. So now now we're back to
13:13
Speaker 2: the situation where okay, so back to your original questions. Yes,
13:20
Speaker 2: the United States do have all these grand strategy of
13:23
Speaker 2: choking China's energy supply, but we have to look at
13:26
Speaker 2: the actual implementations right now. A lot of the you know,
13:30
Speaker 2: if you look at a lot of the policy papers
13:33
Speaker 2: on think tanks, you know, half of them are just
13:34
Speaker 2: mental masturbation. The other half are just ass kissing Trump administration.
13:40
Speaker 2: And that's what that's a purpose they serve. You know,
13:44
Speaker 2: they're not real like mathful, real like detailed plans for
13:50
Speaker 2: warl domination and even the ones that are when they
13:54
Speaker 2: put into practice. Jimorrow, we're wrung by some very stupid people.
13:59
Speaker 2: You know, we have president who just announced to the
14:01
Speaker 2: world he saves a life, so aid Ai generated round
14:06
Speaker 2: you woman from execution. Okay, we're not dealing with evil
14:11
Speaker 2: geniuses here.
14:14
Speaker 1: I agree with you, right. Like, my take on this
14:17
Speaker 1: stuff is just because somebody writes something down doesn't mean
14:19
Speaker 1: it can implement it. And you can write down any
14:22
Speaker 1: grand strategy, any plan that you want. Obviously you're writing
14:27
Speaker 1: it down so other people can read it. There's that.
14:30
Speaker 1: And two, just because you're doing it doesn't mean other
14:32
Speaker 1: people aren't taking counter moves to try to rectify the
14:34
Speaker 1: things that you're effectively trying to create the problems you're
14:37
Speaker 1: trying to create. And as you point out, we are
14:39
Speaker 1: run by very dumb people who start wars of aggression
14:43
Speaker 1: and then get thrown back on his back heel without
14:46
Speaker 1: a way out of the war. And I guess from
14:48
Speaker 1: your point of view, do you think this is Do
14:52
Speaker 1: you think the blockade is a fallback position? Or do
14:54
Speaker 1: you agree with some of the analysts, I mean, even Spoot.
14:57
Speaker 1: I think they came out with a thing this morning.
14:59
Speaker 1: If I were saying this is about Russia. Lever Off
15:01
Speaker 1: and Wee Yi when they met, they were like, the
15:03
Speaker 1: US needs to fail and its subjectives because the US
15:06
Speaker 1: is trying to strategically control energy markets or let's say
15:10
Speaker 1: global shipping. What do you I mean, how do you
15:12
Speaker 1: place this? I placed this as if this was about China.
15:17
Speaker 1: It was about China in the context of taking down
15:20
Speaker 1: Iran or putting a government in that's a patsy for
15:22
Speaker 1: the US, or turning into a failed state kind of
15:24
Speaker 1: like Syria in this case. Or do you think that
15:28
Speaker 1: was the original plan. I tend to think that the
15:30
Speaker 1: original plan of it was taking down Iran. This is
15:33
Speaker 1: something they've been playing for like last twenty years. Where
15:36
Speaker 1: do you follow this branch strategy or straightforward?
15:43
Speaker 2: Look, they said, just just you know, listen to their
15:49
Speaker 2: own words. They said, originally their plan was regime changing.
15:53
Speaker 2: You wrong, but now that's proving impossible. Now they're continually
15:57
Speaker 2: shifting the goal post. Now the go post is who
15:59
Speaker 2: reopened straight or horror moves straight Hormus was opened before
16:03
Speaker 2: you started the war against you. Wrong. But anyway, so
16:06
Speaker 2: they're just throwing fishies on the wall to see what
16:09
Speaker 2: sticks right now to justify their action. This is Trump man,
16:12
Speaker 2: I mean, this is Trump. He he like like he
16:16
Speaker 2: literally he will flip the script within twenty four hours
16:21
Speaker 2: in a true social post. And you can't you can't
16:24
Speaker 2: take this guy seriously. But the blockade do present a
16:29
Speaker 2: big problem for the world economy because you wrong already
16:34
Speaker 2: gave him an off ramp. You know, like a week
16:37
Speaker 2: ago when when Young agreed to reopen the street or
16:41
Speaker 2: hor Moose and then Trump has to go on his
16:44
Speaker 2: true social and say eround surrender. They agreed to give
16:47
Speaker 2: us all their enraged Uranian and then your round promptly
16:51
Speaker 2: shut down the straight of hor Moose again. So again
16:54
Speaker 2: it's Trump doesn't have any cars, so he's desperate. This
16:57
Speaker 2: is why he is doing a blocking I mean, he's
17:03
Speaker 2: he's blockading the specifically Iranian ships coming and going from
17:08
Speaker 2: the Iranian ports. So this this UH, he's the intended
17:14
Speaker 2: purpose to apply pressure on Iranian government to you know,
17:18
Speaker 2: to agree to more UH terms advantageous to the United
17:23
Speaker 2: States because some of the Uranian demands obviously Uh, it's
17:28
Speaker 2: very hard to swallow for the Trump administration. Uh. You know,
17:31
Speaker 2: Uranian basic demand is guarantee of yourn security withdraw of
17:36
Speaker 2: U S forces on West Asia, allow Uron to keep
17:39
Speaker 2: its rached Uranian Uh, recognize Iran's control of straight or
17:45
Speaker 2: Homus and have everything enshrining U N resolution. Right. I mean,
17:51
Speaker 2: if if Trump agreed to that, that's basically complete surrendered.
17:56
Speaker 2: This is basically the defeat of US Empire in West A.
18:00
Speaker 2: This is why they can't. It's it's very hard for them.
18:03
Speaker 2: It's very bitter pill for them to swallow. This is
18:06
Speaker 2: why we have a dead, deadlocking negotiation.
18:10
Speaker 1: Uh.
18:10
Speaker 2: But again the fact that Trump extended the ceasefire, it
18:15
Speaker 2: shows they really don't have any good cards. So so
18:18
Speaker 2: they tried this block eight thing.
18:20
Speaker 1: Uh.
18:21
Speaker 2: The idea is, okay, we'll starve you wrong from funds. Well,
18:25
Speaker 2: guess what even if Uran do not even if Uranian
18:29
Speaker 2: ships do not leave the port, uh, and no Uranian
18:33
Speaker 2: ship goes goes back in and out. Uran can still
18:38
Speaker 2: charge the toe on straight our own moods. They can
18:41
Speaker 2: make all that money back from the Toe and Uh, Okay,
18:47
Speaker 2: So if Iranian ship cannot go go, what about Chinese ships.
18:51
Speaker 2: What about what about Russian ships? Can they? I mean
18:54
Speaker 2: your US navy gonna block a Chinese ships and Russian
18:57
Speaker 2: ships from from going to Iran? Uh? That that you know,
19:01
Speaker 2: you want you really want to expand the war. You
19:03
Speaker 2: really want to start a ward three, you know, So
19:06
Speaker 2: I you know, and this is this is this is
19:11
Speaker 2: a Trump face saving measures, you know, and you know,
19:17
Speaker 2: I think this negotiation will likely to drag on for
19:20
Speaker 2: a while. But fundamentally, this is this is a this
19:25
Speaker 2: is a complete cluster fuck this they but but it's
19:29
Speaker 2: it's very very bad for the global economy because the
19:33
Speaker 2: last ship oil containers that had left Persian Golf before
19:37
Speaker 2: the war started, they are imports, right imports right now.
19:40
Speaker 2: They have already arrived. So you know, people will have
19:44
Speaker 2: actually have not felt the true impact of this this war,
19:50
Speaker 2: but they were kind of feel it very very soon.
19:53
Speaker 2: I mean, the price has already gone, but you haven't
19:55
Speaker 2: seen nothing yet because the true shortage is going to
19:59
Speaker 2: start pick up shortly. And and another thing is fertilizers.
20:05
Speaker 2: You know, right now is planting season farmers, and they're fertilizers.
20:09
Speaker 2: If they don't have that, we're gonna have food shortages
20:12
Speaker 2: several months down the road. But that looks like increasingly
20:17
Speaker 2: likely because even if they open the street over Moose today,
20:20
Speaker 2: you will take more month month to restore production and
20:25
Speaker 2: redirect the shipping traffic because a lot of containers shipping
20:31
Speaker 2: companies like right now, they're not going to the Pershing Golf.
20:34
Speaker 2: They're like, no, that sounds crazy. They already re directed
20:38
Speaker 2: those ships to go to Africa, to go to go
20:41
Speaker 2: to South America, to go to go to the United States,
20:44
Speaker 2: go to go to so they already re arrange the
20:48
Speaker 2: shipping route. So to kind of have that reset, it's
20:52
Speaker 2: gonna take pretty strong guarantee for the insurance company and
20:58
Speaker 2: the shipping company that this war will not start up again.
21:02
Speaker 2: Right then they will they will do that commitment to
21:05
Speaker 2: to to bring the ship back, but that's gonna take
21:08
Speaker 2: take long time. Like the ship traveling from Persian Gulf
21:12
Speaker 2: to United States, for example, that takes fifty days, right,
21:16
Speaker 2: and it takes about twenty days to Asia. So that's
21:19
Speaker 2: the kind of time time lag. So even if they're
21:22
Speaker 2: gonna settle down everything today and issue guarantee you to
21:27
Speaker 2: all the shipping company that everything is safe to go
21:30
Speaker 2: back in it's it's gonna take them up a month
21:33
Speaker 2: just for the traffic, the shipping traffic to get get
21:36
Speaker 2: work rerouted, and it's gonna take them even more time
21:41
Speaker 2: to actually repair the oil facilities to get the production
21:44
Speaker 2: going again. So the world economy is fuck already fucked.
21:49
Speaker 2: We're just talking about how much more fuck we will be,
21:52
Speaker 2: you know, like how long this war will drag up.
21:56
Speaker 1: I know China rationally has set up a military in
22:02
Speaker 1: order to defend China, meaning the this military is meant
22:06
Speaker 1: for attack. It's kind of like, you know, a boxer
22:08
Speaker 1: that's meant to have flying kicks and stuff like that,
22:11
Speaker 1: where somebody else is meant as a porcupine. But do
22:15
Speaker 1: they have the ability to project forced militarily from the
22:18
Speaker 1: standpoint of the navy if they needed to be on
22:20
Speaker 1: their shoes? Well?
22:24
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, this is people keep on talking about, like
22:26
Speaker 2: why why didn't China fight send military to fight on
22:30
Speaker 2: the side of you. Wrong? Look, Chinese military is set
22:33
Speaker 2: up to fight a defense of war, a wrong China's
22:36
Speaker 2: borders currently, I have the same kind of But just.
22:42
Speaker 1: To be clear, I'm not making that case because sorry, you're.
22:44
Speaker 2: Breaking up a little bit.
22:46
Speaker 1: I'm sorry, can you hear me, Well, I I'm sorry interrupt.
22:50
Speaker 1: I was making a point of saying, that's not really
22:52
Speaker 1: the case I'm making. I'm not making I'm not really
22:54
Speaker 1: asking a question of accept that some people might have
22:57
Speaker 1: said that that was That's not really my thinking of this,
23:01
Speaker 1: because it wouldn't occur to me for China or Russia
23:04
Speaker 1: to do that, if that makes sense. But please could
23:06
Speaker 1: think I just wanted to make sure that you were
23:08
Speaker 1: clear that that's that. Well, that's not what I think.
23:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, no, I understand, I understand that's not what
23:13
Speaker 2: you're saying. But I'm just a lot of people are
23:15
Speaker 2: saying that. So I'm trying to explain China's military is
23:19
Speaker 2: not set up to do the kind of expeditionary war
23:23
Speaker 2: that United States military structure for, you know, US military
23:27
Speaker 2: structure to fight global wars. You know they talk about
23:32
Speaker 2: homeland security was the US homeland now includes the entire world.
23:38
Speaker 2: But actually, you know when nine eleven happened, they actually
23:41
Speaker 2: had trouble to get get enough jets scramble to to
23:45
Speaker 2: over to cover the sky of New York. That's that's
23:48
Speaker 2: a state of US military. US military is is a
23:52
Speaker 2: military design for maintaining and rung An Empire. Chinese military
23:57
Speaker 2: is designed to fight a defensive war around China as
24:00
Speaker 2: periphery in China's immediate neighborhood. And for Chinese this is
24:07
Speaker 2: why like right now, China only have one oversea military base,
24:11
Speaker 2: it's Sinjaputi in the Horn of Africa. But in order
24:15
Speaker 2: to have a sustained military operation like what United States
24:19
Speaker 2: right now is doing uh in West Asia, you need
24:23
Speaker 2: a lot more military basis where you need you can refeel,
24:27
Speaker 2: restock your ammunition, refeel. This is very important, and this
24:32
Speaker 2: is why United States just before the Wars, they signed
24:36
Speaker 2: a treaty with India which allowed US military to to
24:39
Speaker 2: do Portia, and the US already have military basis all
24:46
Speaker 2: around the region. China does not have that. You know,
24:50
Speaker 2: to give a historical example, a lot of people might
24:54
Speaker 2: have aware of Russo Japanese War of nineteen oh four
24:58
Speaker 2: nineteen oh five, when Russia had to send this Baltic
25:01
Speaker 2: fleet from Europe all the way around Atlantic sail around Africa,
25:08
Speaker 2: going through Indian Ocean to far East. That one of
25:13
Speaker 2: the biggest problems is that British control a lot of
25:17
Speaker 2: the colony along the way and they made a lot
25:20
Speaker 2: of trouble for the Russian fleet to refuel, just simply refuel,
25:25
Speaker 2: because back then they're steamships and e coole, and so
25:30
Speaker 2: they were already kind of running haggardly and and and
25:33
Speaker 2: demoralized even before they arrived in uh in uh in
25:37
Speaker 2: East Asia, and that led to their complete annihilation at
25:41
Speaker 2: the Battle of Tsushima by the Japanese fleet. So so this,
25:45
Speaker 2: this is this is the how war is rung. You know,
25:49
Speaker 2: war is wrung on logistics. China simply do not have
25:53
Speaker 2: the kind of same kind of logistics to support a
25:57
Speaker 2: oversea kind of military expedition the United States military structure
26:02
Speaker 2: for so so that that I'm just speaking of capability.
26:05
Speaker 2: I'm not even talking about intention here. I'm just saying like,
26:09
Speaker 2: even if China wants to, it lacks the power projection
26:13
Speaker 2: currently too into into the into the Persian Gulf.
26:20
Speaker 1: Well yeah, I guess.
26:22
Speaker 2: But but China military is designed to very effectively shut
26:27
Speaker 2: down any you know, US attempt to start war in
26:34
Speaker 2: South China Sea, in East China Sea, all around First
26:38
Speaker 2: Island chain, you know, the Chinese, because China has enough
26:41
Speaker 2: missile to shut down all the military US military basis
26:45
Speaker 2: in the first island chain. I'm talking about Okinawa, the Philippines, Japan,
26:50
Speaker 2: uh uh uh, South Korea, all those military US military
26:54
Speaker 2: basis will be gone within thirty minutes of a war
26:57
Speaker 2: with China. But that that that is what US China
27:02
Speaker 2: Chinese military is designed to do. It's not designed to
27:05
Speaker 2: sail into Indian Ocean and to fight the fight a
27:08
Speaker 2: war with US navy over there.
27:10
Speaker 1: Yeah, I think you're right. The Catcher's Mit thing, I
27:12
Speaker 1: think exaccurate. I mean, if you're looking at the golf
27:14
Speaker 1: state and it's well right, Aaran said specifically what it
27:17
Speaker 1: was going to do. We're going to take the straight
27:19
Speaker 1: up removes and all of those bases are weaknesses because
27:22
Speaker 1: they are effectively going to be Catcher's myths for our missus.
27:25
Speaker 1: And they did exactly that. They did exactly that. And
27:27
Speaker 1: so if you are Taiwan, if you are as you
27:30
Speaker 1: pointed out, on those countries where the United States has
27:33
Speaker 1: affiliated themselves with a you better man, you better be concerned.
27:38
Speaker 1: I am curious about something else. Donald Trump is supposed
27:41
Speaker 1: to meet Zijing Ping in May, I believe the middle
27:44
Speaker 1: of May. What do you think that conversation is ultimately
27:47
Speaker 1: going to be about Obviously, the US and China are
27:50
Speaker 1: not necessarily on the greatest of terms, especially since a
27:55
Speaker 1: lot of the chatter is about stringling China. In addition
28:00
Speaker 1: to this kind of conversation that Trump is going to have,
28:02
Speaker 1: you know, dealing with the economic stuff, what do you
28:05
Speaker 1: think this is ultimately going to be about?
28:07
Speaker 2: Well, first, well, first of all, China hasn't officially confirmed
28:13
Speaker 2: the dates yet. So first of all, Trump administration is
28:18
Speaker 2: not a credible source. So then back in so so
28:26
Speaker 2: so so back then when when Trump administration first announced
28:30
Speaker 2: they're going to China in like end of March and
28:33
Speaker 2: early April, China also did not confirm the dates, and
28:37
Speaker 2: then then then Trump unilaterally announced he delayed the trip.
28:41
Speaker 2: What's the official Chinese government press release said, they're working
28:46
Speaker 2: closely with their American counterpart on the time and scheduling
28:50
Speaker 2: of the planned uh Trump visit. So so so once
28:56
Speaker 2: we I received we see confirmation of the day it's
29:00
Speaker 2: from the Chinese government, then we know, okay, for sure
29:02
Speaker 2: that trip is going going to happen. Right now, how
29:06
Speaker 2: China said, what you're still talking about? But but okay,
29:10
Speaker 2: let's let's say it does take place. Let's say it
29:12
Speaker 2: does take cares Trump original originally he planned to you know,
29:21
Speaker 2: like all these all those ass kissing new think tanks
29:26
Speaker 2: was puffing up like, oh Trump is gonna go go
29:30
Speaker 2: with Chi Jinping with powerful leverage. He got China by
29:34
Speaker 2: the balls, he got to Venezuela. He got you wrong.
29:39
Speaker 2: What what's he gonna gonna do? Now? Trump will travel
29:45
Speaker 2: to China with a very we cand And this is
29:49
Speaker 2: this is one reason Trump announced he delayed the trip
29:52
Speaker 2: because he would just look very foolish. But I I
29:57
Speaker 2: think he might be even openly optimistic that everything will
30:00
Speaker 2: be wrapped up by what what he said May fifteenth
30:03
Speaker 2: was the day. Yeah, because because yeah, because it just
30:08
Speaker 2: doesn't make sense for Tuccide, you know, to to suddenly
30:12
Speaker 2: sit down and while there's a huge international crisis still
30:16
Speaker 2: going on in in the Persian golf. Because usually this
30:20
Speaker 2: kind of summit it takes place, is to expect it
30:24
Speaker 2: to reveal some kind of uh it's like a press
30:27
Speaker 2: release event where they announced some kind of deal, right uh,
30:31
Speaker 2: and those those deals are work out weighing advance of
30:35
Speaker 2: the meeting, so they'll have something to announce to the public.
30:39
Speaker 2: And right now, I just don't see any kind of
30:41
Speaker 2: grand deal that it's more important than what's going on
30:46
Speaker 2: in the Persian golf right now. And and so you know,
30:51
Speaker 2: originally Trump went to what's going to China to talk
30:55
Speaker 2: about trade, about the tariffs, about China's export control on
31:00
Speaker 2: rare earth, you know, conceivable if US do have energy
31:06
Speaker 2: chocode on Chinese energy supply that could be leveraged used
31:11
Speaker 2: by Trump to say please, now you have to give
31:14
Speaker 2: us rare earth. We'll give you, you know, we'll lift
31:17
Speaker 2: the blockade.
31:18
Speaker 1: Whatever.
31:19
Speaker 2: But right now, what what what? What?
31:21
Speaker 1: What's what?
31:22
Speaker 2: What's what leverage does Trump have? Why would Chijinpin give
31:27
Speaker 2: him rare earth so US military industrial complex can build
31:31
Speaker 2: more weapons that could be used against China. But but
31:36
Speaker 2: that is the thing that that the concern the Trump
31:39
Speaker 2: administration the most right now is because China do have
31:41
Speaker 2: this this lock on the critical mineral supply chain, and
31:47
Speaker 2: and and there are there are snows that are getting
31:50
Speaker 2: depleted to a dangerous level. They're now digging into the
31:53
Speaker 2: reserve that they originally say for the big conflict with
31:58
Speaker 2: China in East Asia. You know this is reported by
32:01
Speaker 2: by Wall Street journals. They so so so so they
32:06
Speaker 2: want to restock but China is like, no, sorry, you're
32:10
Speaker 2: not getting no rare earth for you. But if if
32:17
Speaker 2: Trump did lockdown, you're wrong and Venezuela. Conceivably he had
32:20
Speaker 2: some leverage to do a trade off for the rare
32:23
Speaker 2: earth deal. But right now, but does he yeah?
32:27
Speaker 1: HHM, I mean I guess the thing is, how do
32:30
Speaker 1: you how? Like?
32:32
Speaker 2: I mean, but I guess, well, I mean there's one
32:35
Speaker 2: deal he could offer, you know, potentially he could have
32:39
Speaker 2: offered Taiwan China. My saying okay, okay, okay, okay, well
32:46
Speaker 2: you can't have some rare earth, you know, just just
32:49
Speaker 2: uh okay, I want that deal. I think China would
32:53
Speaker 2: take that deal. I think you.
32:57
Speaker 1: I think you have a point, right because he said
32:59
Speaker 1: two things. One what you said a few things, But
33:01
Speaker 1: one is in the US really going to board a
33:03
Speaker 1: Chinese ship? So meaning if you have a blockade and
33:07
Speaker 1: China runs the blockade, do you attack that ship? Do
33:09
Speaker 1: you board that ship?
33:11
Speaker 2: What do you do?
33:12
Speaker 1: If the answer is no, then what leverage do you
33:14
Speaker 1: have in negotiations? They kind of work in tandem, right Yeah? Yeah,
33:23
Speaker 1: I don't know what leverage. I mean, all things been equal,
33:25
Speaker 1: I mean, Trump can make an economic argument I suppose
33:28
Speaker 1: he can offer things, he can bribe, he can try
33:31
Speaker 1: to bully. None of that has worked up to this point.
33:34
Speaker 1: And you make another point, right, when you lose a
33:37
Speaker 1: war to reach you no power and the leverage that
33:40
Speaker 1: you've been using is this kind of threats and military
33:42
Speaker 1: force around the world. What does it mean?
33:45
Speaker 2: Right?
33:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't know what leverage.
33:49
Speaker 2: You know what it means, Jamaar, if you look at
33:51
Speaker 2: you wrong. They have to spend decades trying to negotiate
33:55
Speaker 2: with the United States in order for US to lift
33:58
Speaker 2: the sanction. They even agree to the j cpo A
34:01
Speaker 2: deal where they agreed to give up all their rachi
34:03
Speaker 2: Uanian that got them nothing, that got them, just Trump
34:07
Speaker 2: to tore up the agreement in his first term. They
34:09
Speaker 2: got the you know, they tighten the sanction. But within
34:13
Speaker 2: weeks of the war, and when when uruan start hitting
34:16
Speaker 2: all the US miss bass with missiles shutting down Street
34:20
Speaker 2: Over Move, suddenly they're getting sanctioned waivers and they're getting
34:25
Speaker 2: sanction waivers and Russians oil sanction as well. You know,
34:29
Speaker 2: you know what they say, They keep on saying, all
34:31
Speaker 2: these natives, you know, the only language to understand is force.
34:35
Speaker 2: Apparently that's one hundred percent projection. That's you know that
34:38
Speaker 2: in order to make people in the United States understand,
34:42
Speaker 2: you have to speak their language, you have to speak
34:44
Speaker 2: the language of force. And then that's the only way
34:48
Speaker 2: you really make them sit down and negotiate with you
34:51
Speaker 2: in good faith, so good you know, actually, just get
34:55
Speaker 2: that bomb, Berry, They should just get the bomb. They
34:58
Speaker 2: should just just you know, by by this time, I'm.
35:01
Speaker 1: Oh, please, I'm sorry. There's a slight flag in the
35:04
Speaker 1: on the back and forth. I apologize, Please continue, and
35:12
Speaker 1: one of us is frozen, one of us is frozen.
35:14
Speaker 1: Can you hear me?
35:17
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, I hear you, I hear you. I thought
35:19
Speaker 2: they were going to make a point.
35:21
Speaker 1: No, no, there was a like there's a slight lag
35:23
Speaker 1: in the back and forth. I apologize, please, god it.
35:30
Speaker 2: No, I'm done. I'm done. I'm dunge. I'm I'm okay,
35:33
Speaker 2: down with my ranting.
35:35
Speaker 1: Well, no, that's not a rent. You're making the point,
35:37
Speaker 1: and I appreciate that point. I I one last what time?
35:40
Speaker 2: Is it?
35:42
Speaker 1: Okay? One last thing? Did China push ran to go
35:47
Speaker 1: to the negotiating table? That was something that was people
35:51
Speaker 1: were whispering that that part of the reason that Iran
35:53
Speaker 1: decided to sit down in regardless to negotiations was because
35:56
Speaker 1: China was effectively pushing me to do so. Did you
36:00
Speaker 1: do you even think about that? Do you take that
36:01
Speaker 1: as credible?
36:02
Speaker 2: And A yeah, I mean it's first of all, it
36:06
Speaker 2: was reported in the main Western mainstream media. You know,
36:09
Speaker 2: you always have to take that with a lot of salt,
36:12
Speaker 2: But I mean it's possible. I mean, China do have
36:15
Speaker 2: a motive to wrap up the war because China doesn't
36:19
Speaker 2: like the fact that there's a war going out. The
36:22
Speaker 2: thing that China hates most is actually instability and war
36:26
Speaker 2: because that disrupts business. And and what you're wrong, because
36:32
Speaker 2: China do have a lot of investment also throughout the
36:35
Speaker 2: region and those are being put at jeopardy right now.
36:39
Speaker 2: But it's also it's it's it's more like A. I
36:44
Speaker 2: don't think China would ever force you wrong to do anything.
36:47
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't think anybody can force your wrong
36:50
Speaker 2: to do anything at this point. I mean, I think
36:52
Speaker 2: China might have given it n I mean, China pi
36:55
Speaker 2: plays the role of a of a mediator, you know,
36:58
Speaker 2: the role that China played during the wrong Saudi piece deal,
37:03
Speaker 2: because China, they have good relationship with you, wrong, they
37:07
Speaker 2: have good relationship with GCC countries and Pakistan. Remember Pakistan
37:13
Speaker 2: is an official mediator. They have a unique role because
37:17
Speaker 2: they're they have good relationship with you wrong, with GCC,
37:21
Speaker 2: with China, and with the United States. And we know
37:24
Speaker 2: US wanted that negotiation because the Pakistan Prime minister accidentally
37:29
Speaker 2: sent out that tweet as with the draft says message
37:35
Speaker 2: the X message for the Pakistan prime minister. So we
37:38
Speaker 2: we know United States really pushed Pakistan to to to
37:43
Speaker 2: to do this for them. Uh. But but I mean,
37:46
Speaker 2: I think I think China serve as an honest broker.
37:51
Speaker 2: You know, this is China is uh can actually come
37:54
Speaker 2: in and say, okay, you're wrong, we can uh probably
37:58
Speaker 2: provide you some certain gear and tea uh that that
38:01
Speaker 2: you wanted for for this negotiation to succeed. That's probably
38:06
Speaker 2: the road China play. Well.
38:10
Speaker 1: That leads to another question security guarantees. So any deal
38:14
Speaker 1: that's made, I would imagine it's gonna have to be
38:16
Speaker 1: some kind of guarantee to the deal. You can't trust
38:19
Speaker 1: the US. Iran is not going to trust the US,
38:21
Speaker 1: Oran is not going to trust Europe. So guarantee would
38:24
Speaker 1: have to be China and Russia with additional sign on
38:27
Speaker 1: ands to maybe the European powers. Who knows me powers
38:30
Speaker 1: and quotes right, what China even do that? I mean
38:33
Speaker 1: when they put themselves on the hook in that way
38:35
Speaker 1: in case there's a violation that they would getting involved.
38:39
Speaker 2: That is the trillion dollar question. Jamar with China plays
38:45
Speaker 2: sanctioned on the United States. You know, I think, I
38:48
Speaker 2: think what you know. I had a commenter in our
38:52
Speaker 2: tangan on my show to talk about this earlier, and
38:54
Speaker 2: he said, the bricks should should really come together, you know, uh,
39:00
Speaker 2: to serve as a coalition of nations and to tell
39:03
Speaker 2: United States, hey, look, if you keep on this doing this,
39:07
Speaker 2: we're gonna have to sanction your ass, you know, to
39:10
Speaker 2: to to make sure you play nice. Because right now,
39:14
Speaker 2: you know the problem is US is on this like
39:18
Speaker 2: unchecked running on rampage, and it's hurting everybody. It's hurting
39:22
Speaker 2: all the countries in the world. Uh, it's it needs
39:26
Speaker 2: to be reined in. I think, you know, I think
39:29
Speaker 2: you can't just be China. It has to be everybody. China, Russia,
39:34
Speaker 2: the bricks, h and even Europe have to join in
39:37
Speaker 2: and say, look, this is this is going on too crazy.
39:41
Speaker 2: You needed to show out. But we'll have to see
39:46
Speaker 2: how how that that works out. I don't know. I
39:49
Speaker 2: don't I because you wrong, definitely for you wrong to
39:52
Speaker 2: agree to kind of uh you know, to to to
39:57
Speaker 2: to a permanent cease fire. They will need guarantee that
40:02
Speaker 2: this will not happen again, because you know, they don't
40:05
Speaker 2: want just to have a pause for us to build
40:08
Speaker 2: back its arsenal to do this again, you know, like
40:11
Speaker 2: six months from now.
40:14
Speaker 1: Last question, do you see a third way? There's either
40:18
Speaker 1: people have put up the idea of Trump just walking
40:20
Speaker 1: the saying about this was a moment of success.
40:24
Speaker 2: About dude, Trump had that opportunity, man, Like last last week,
40:31
Speaker 2: I told you, like when Iran said they agreed to
40:34
Speaker 2: reopen the street or her movies. But he just can't
40:37
Speaker 2: keep his stupid big mouth shut. And you know he
40:42
Speaker 2: The thing is, Trump do have some you know, hardcore
40:47
Speaker 2: supporters who will go with him no matter what. So
40:50
Speaker 2: and the rest of us knew Trump just you know,
40:53
Speaker 2: making up yes all the time. So he doesn't actually
40:56
Speaker 2: suffer anything if he this, if he like changes one
41:02
Speaker 2: hundred and eighty degree and say calling it a victory.
41:05
Speaker 2: You know, this this is this is actually dragging on
41:07
Speaker 2: way too long. I haven't expected him to to to
41:10
Speaker 2: to call it quits a long time ago. But I
41:13
Speaker 2: do think there's a lot of pressure on him, uh
41:16
Speaker 2: you know, probably from Israel for he's really lobby to
41:19
Speaker 2: keep this going because uh, this is one party that
41:22
Speaker 2: really wants this conflict uh going. That is is reel
41:27
Speaker 2: and they we do know they have they must have
41:30
Speaker 2: something on Trump. I mean, come on, like for the
41:32
Speaker 2: past seven US presidents who were able to resist it
41:36
Speaker 2: is really pressure to go to war against Irq. It
41:38
Speaker 2: took Trump to do it. You know, I don't know
41:41
Speaker 2: what is in the rest of this Epstein file. It
41:44
Speaker 2: must be very damny damning.
41:48
Speaker 1: Yeah, it does look like so they have some compromising
41:50
Speaker 1: what is a comproment to whatever they is called compromising
41:53
Speaker 1: off on President Carl Man. I've always enjoyed these conversations.
41:57
Speaker 1: I apologize for the thing there seems to be a delay.
42:00
Speaker 1: It's funny, six months ago we were basically the same time,
42:04
Speaker 1: so we were flawless at thirty hours away, and all
42:11
Speaker 1: of a sudden, this is what you can Carl. You
42:13
Speaker 1: have my appreciation with this man, thank you for this.
42:15
Speaker 1: I always appreciated your conversation, always appreciate your explanation of
42:19
Speaker 1: these events, and just for the audience to know, because
42:22
Speaker 1: I don't think I gave you the intro. I think
42:23
Speaker 1: I went immediately into the show, which with Carl Jah.
42:26
Speaker 1: He is sorry. He his host of Silk and Steel
42:31
Speaker 1: podcast focused on China and surrounding regions in their history,
42:34
Speaker 1: culture and politics. You can follow Carl on Twitter at
42:37
Speaker 1: Carl Jah. You can follow this podcast on Twitter at
42:41
Speaker 1: Steel Silk the Letter In. You can subscribe and support
42:44
Speaker 1: the podcast on Patreon, dot com, slash Silk, and still
42:48
Speaker 1: definitely check out Carl's work. It is some of the
42:52
Speaker 1: best content you're can find on Asia and the basically
42:56
Speaker 1: the history of Asia, going all the way back from
42:58
Speaker 1: the very beginning Carlofore. But what year are you currently
43:01
Speaker 1: on now?
43:02
Speaker 2: I just reach year two hundred and twenty one BC,
43:07
Speaker 2: the China's unification under the Chin dynasty. I just got
43:11
Speaker 2: to the first import, finally reached the Imperial age. So
43:15
Speaker 2: like the real for the.
43:17
Speaker 1: Real parts, you have found something that you could do
43:21
Speaker 1: for life.
43:24
Speaker 2: That's a plan, that's a flat See. I was thinking.
43:29
Speaker 1: You have a good one. Man, thank you for this.
43:30
Speaker 1: Carl be saying okay sure ay bay bye bye o