While Europe and the United States inevitably link their trade and investment relations to moral issues, China, the newly reawakened economic dragon of the East, does not let such irrelevant issues as democracy and a respect for human rights interfere in its commercial imperialism.
Consequently, China today is making significant commercial and economic inroads, not only into Africa and Latin America, but inside its own region, with a zealous manifest destiny that would shame Genghis Khan, the original Mongol expansionist.
With little regard for social and political stability in the nations it engulfs in its signature foreign encroachment policy, Beijing, under the aggressive leadership of President Xi Jinping, has unabashedly proclaimed its ambitious plan to revitalize the imperial greatness it enjoyed during the Han Dynasty, creating a modern version of the ancient Silk Road trade route.
With foreign currency reserves surpassing $4 trillion (the largest in the world) and massive surpluses in real estate, cement and steel, Beijing is looking beyond its borders for both investment and trade opportunities.
And like the 1st century Silk Road empire, the new Chinese expansionism is based almost entirely on economic diplomacy, not armed aggression.
That is, until any of the neighboring nations raise their hands in protest, and then, well, a little flexing of the Chinese military muscle comes in handy to show the dissenters who is boss (see “China’s Misguided Expansionism,” which ran in this space on July 13).
Yup, Beijing is ready and willing to revert to any means — economic, diplomatic or militaristic — to assert its regional leadership in Asia.
Resistance to the new Silk Road plan doesn’t only come from outside China’s borders.
The indigenous Uighurs in China’s far western semi-autonomous Xinjiang region, for example, have resorted to violence and unrest to show their disapproval of Beijing’s new Go-West-Young-Man policies.
But China does have some willing partners in its expansionism, particularly the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, all of which benefited from increased trade with the Asian giant, and all of which have willingly endorsed Beijing’s push to build pipelines needed to access resources for further territorial development.
War-weary Pakistan has also been eager to jump on the Silk Road bandwagon, courting both investment and trade from Beijing.
Somewhat more leery of China’s Silk Road initiative are countries that are already doing well economically on their own, like India and Vietnam.
And, of course, Russia, with its own Eurasian expansionist plans, is not happy about having a contender for its regional authority.
Xi’s dream of a new Silk Road domain may be a long-term initiative, but China has already started work on the plan, and China has shown its ability to dominate the global commercial market.
Beijing is now out to build an economic empire, and, if past history is any indicator, there is not much chance that it will fail in that goal.
Thérèse Margolis can be reached at [email protected].
