hello and welcome to crossfire for all things considered i am peter lavelle what if china ruled what if china were a military superpower on par with the united states what kind of world would we live in with china put into check washington's appetite for unilateral military action and manipulation of the global economy or would we witness another cold war where both beijing and washington been tainted chile the relatively peaceful world . to cross not china's rise i'm joined by han in washington he's a visiting fellow at the hudson institute we also have dan low balts in cincinnati

he's a coeditor of new politics journal of socialist thought and in philadelphia we crossed him and then he is a political commentator and writer for a counterpunch all right gentlemen crosstalk rules in effect i mean you can jump in anytime you want and i very much encourage it lynn if i go to you first in philadelphia what will the world look like today if china where the same military strike had the same military strength of the united states you know on par. it won't be a cold war i think it will be a series of wars by proxies because both countries need. quite a bit of energy quite a bit oil natural gas to survive and since we are past the point of cheap oil and cheap energy these countries will have to jocky each other out of the way and they will fight each other frankly it is already happening and it will only intensify in the future and this is not necessarily china's fault because it has to do this to survive. you know it needs to. import have of its food for example.

is the pentagon so much from the outside to survive. so it must fight for survival so and the u.s. will also be founded status so it won't be a cold war it will be a series of hot wars if not. the right confrontation between these two powers ok dan not a very optimistic future what do you think. the proposition is china is the same military strength of the united states go ahead well i would disagree with something you said in your introduction which is that the united states is a unilateral power today i think we live today in a world of multilateral power i think we're in a kind of pre-one nine hundred fourteen moment where you have several great powers certainly the united states is that has been the dominant superpower but if you look right now at any place in the world you can see for example that russia can be a check to u.s.

power in one place. in other areas and what about iraq states what about iraq that's very unilateralist. well i don't think so at all i think that we're seeing that there are other powers in the region that are i mean look at the whole you can't just look at a loan you have want to look at a bit less noise limited iraq everybody little child everybody rather great powers and from the people of the middle east which is most important a great challenge coming from below in society and so i did hear what you were very well what do we say with china what would the world be like if china if china were on par militarily with the united states this topic of the program well i think i agree to a good extent with what lynn said that is we have a world of multilateral competition and we see many powers that are competing for the world's resources that is this is a something like a return to the great empires in the pre world war one period and we have and i

think the likelihood is the development of world alliances in my own view of the question is can the united states will the united states and china have a kind of transition such as we saw in the past when great britain ceased to be the dominant power and there was an allegiance of power from great britain to the united states will we see something like what happened when holland was the great power but how holland shared power within lenin later england will the united states will the coincidence of economic interests lead to a kind of u.s. chinese alliance that would then dominate the world and if so would the world's people be able to challenge such great powers and how would they do that ok and challenge would likely do you think that is the. stream lee unlikely that would be a scenario. i think first of all i think america still the dominant military power you know world even china i think become

superpower i agree that the clash between the resin new power and the existing power will be intensified history have told us that. there's always happen more likely it's going to happen again and the most recent example is the u.s. and civic duty in cold war and the world and up in the more dangerous position so i think china. and also china. chinese dream is their party state. a party state only curse about their own interests there are mentally expanding power they don't put. their well being something the world's first put their only interest first so that will cost lots of clashes and also i think if you look at what happened in the past

what china did what china is doing now to mystically and internationally you can see they would do more harm than good in the future and they're still bullying big people or putting their labors. and. disputes and they still occupied tibet and things like that i think china. destabilized that world will cause lots of turmoil in the future ok when it sounds like we just heard of yet a reflection of the of the units go to when firstly you know the united states is preeminent it doesn't want to give up power it sounds like what china wants. first off every country looks out for its own interests or not china aggression or you know every want every country must look out for its own self interest so let's look at africa united states have troops in thirty five countries over there but china is africa's biggest trading partner so has

a lot invested over there in the last decade a million chinese have moved to africa some of them live in the illegally so there's a lot of money and chinese money in africa so sooner or later it would have to protect its investment is money and his people living there the united states action in libya for example was to push china that away the u.s. who used the pretext of the war against terrorism to protect its economic interests and to bump china other ways to some point china will have to respond militarily so that's another flashpoint that you might see chinese troops in africa you know to to protect what it has in africa ok dan and those chinese troops might be invited to africa as well well of course would troops are invited it's very much it's very often because of the growing economic power and i agree with what's just been said you see chinese investment not only in africa but also in latin america which is

really an area that has historically been part of the u.s. sphere of interest no doubt also china is of course neighbor on the edge of russia so there could be challenges between russia and china because of the growing power of china though it happens that at the moment there are naval exercises the largest ever too large and i don't think you can look at any one moment i was going to say that going back to an earlier point that said the rising power always challenges the old power that i think that's just not true when the united states was the rising power of the eight hundred ninety s. challenging domination. the world including drive you know until america you know their names in this week is that all race they're not israeli anglo-saxon thinking hello saxon we're talking about the same culture here this is why it's very different we go ahead jump in washington but it's not it's not just economic so i

think china is much more bishan much bigger ambition in this world you know you in the past in the fifty's and sixty's china is competing in the dominance of the third war with the soviet union and china still want to dominate the world and that's their dream. i think. because the ideology it's a still ideology. we talk about diversity of value and stuff like that charlie is rick lies that the discourse framework is not the in their favor they try to create a new discourse which is to use a socialist ideology the so-called socialist. core values too to. come front to compete against the universal value i think that's clearly indicate it's not only limited to

the colombia. it's certainly expand to political arena when you know a lot of people do look to china you know in the for investment things like that because they don't care you have a lot of extra baggage the americans always have baggage human rights etc etc it's attractive to a lot of other countries. yes yes peter yes i think the left is some of the some some people enough romanticizing china bit too much. extolling china's soft power charm offensive in contrast to america's military ism but. down the line china may just prove itself to be a smug of a bully america right now it's just not in position yet to be belligerent but look at what's happened in the south china sea and i want to disagree with you slightly to peter about the cultural factor this won't be a kind of a pain asian. formation against the west because china is.

is pushing the philippines and vietnam and japan around so it's not. you know it's not going to war against the west it's going to is fighting for his own survival for his own interests so china is establishing a strong alliance with russia for example which is not a cultural langston's alliance but because together they form a very a formidable bloc because china can use russian oil and russian natural gas as a kind of leverage and russia can use chinese money so. you know russia has a lot of leverage over europe because much of your gentlemen i need to jump in here i have to jump in here we're going to go to a short break and after that show for it we'll continue our discussion on china stay with. the.

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welcome back to cross talk we're all things are considered i'm peter all about to mind you we're discussing the rise of china. ok dan if i can go back to you in cincinnati i mean we've talked a little bit of a lot about confrontation in differences but what about the economy that are being in there interdependent the u.s. and china i mean how do we balance this well i think again you know this is part of the argument that i've been trying to make here that is why did in the end in the united states become allies it wasn't because they were just of their language or culture it was because of the millions hundreds of millions of dollars of british capital invested in the u.s. economy and so you see that the u.s.

has become a big investor in china people think of course of boeing and wal-mart and other companies that have been there for a long time but i think that the question is obviously whether those this kind of imbalance can those lead to the linkages if you. and lead therefore to political alliances as people defend their their economic interests or will they lead to the divergence of those countries because of competing economic interests which have also to do with the fact that these become imperial powers it seems to me that's that's the kind of the question before us and and i can really see this i find it odd that people don't see the possibility of a us chinese alliance giving them out say done and and richard nixon embraced and created an alliance that lasted for a quarter of a century or so that that's a pretty good evidence that you can have cross cultural alliances based on shared in that case more shared political interests

a world of imperialism where we're great powers are always rivaling each other how do you think the united states and china can find equal ground in the middle east for example that's america's backyard that's america's backyard. there's a very good barrier but china has already had this strategy called to launch the west much west they're going to go from there west china's province to bet towards me to used that long term strategy so call it but they're just still debating strategy i think china's interests interests. are very different china clearly was to have a socialist. ideas socialist ideology with the chinese kirk terroristic acts. that certainly put into the ideology war almost like war. i don't

see how. this compromise that ok you know also the they have made it clear what kind of socialism are you telling me to tell you that. yeah this socialism if you read. political report made it clear that in principle carrying it out from marxism that's number what that common idea of socialist ideology of number two. is some number three and those are. so much of this letter of workers violating workers' rights well i don't think you call your social rights all right gentlemen i don't think most people think of china as being very communist anymore let me go to lynn ok lynn what we just heard here is that. the west is on compromise and saying china is uncompromising this is what we're hearing go ahead lynn go ahead in philadelphia. well. i agree that conflict is inevitable because it's already happening the u.s.

has the pacific pivot so if china is marching west the u.s. is you know he's around in china the u.s. doesn't really have a long term economic strategy is has a military strategy to protect its the line an empire that's why had troops over the place to protect the petro dollar and it has sabotage chinese investment in several places already so you already have them you know. subverting each other so like i said it's only intensified and the u.s. is enjoying is status at the moment because of the petro dollar because it is military the funds that are petro dollars and china is already trying to bypass that by establishing trade with countries including us allies in their own currencies ok so the u.s. is not a gang of illusion right now or rather because i had originally planned shall go ahead jane i just one quick point because china's you work for the u.s. and china to co-exist china i mean u.s. has to first of four rick lies that china is the superpower power status that's

number one number two us must respect china's so-called core you interests this core you interests are very i ever you grew in change and what they really want is their territory territory integrity if they want to see territory use china sea territory they want thai what if mirka do not agree do not respect that type of korea interests that clear it will cost clash they won't be i call existence between the united states and china dan in cincinnati do you want to react to that. no compromise well i think that. once again i don't think that you know great powers make compromises all the time they compromise in the short term to achieve a short term goal the united states and china have reached or have had for some

some time did have anyway a modus vivendi regarding. the the china's core territorial interests that is things were more or less let to stand pat i think the question is what would be what would exacerbate these conflicts clearly the united states is going to try to strengthen its interests in asia and strengthen other powers in asia and china is going to put pressure on them has already been mentioned so i don't i don't see these compromises being longstanding this is a thieves' den these imperial powers are this is a den of thieves all of them the european powers the european union russia china the united states and the and the thieves then it's a question of shrewdness of strength of ingenuity and certainly all at the expense of the nations and peoples of the world and of and at the expense of international

human rights and universal values ok clinton in philadelphia peter i just added please please to jump in just a minute yeah i have i think is just temporary you know that that's what china is sick in now so called deal with the new great power relations with the united states they think that they can live together happily with the united states but china has a scene which says two takers can't live one. that's you know china right now it's a couple little cup of course they won't fight the united states fight for that mud to budge eventually they will become a big tiger. it will be too small for the the pacific ocean will be too small for them ok when you pointed out i mean the united states is a militant want to add something lynn go ahead jump in. yes yeah i just want to say

what we exacerbate this problem also is the chinese growth the growth in china economic growth the last few years the insane growth that they've been joined to is unsustainable. globally countries everywhere in trouble in that it and unemployment is up living standards down so the expectation for the future will be disappointed so many countries will be disappointed. about their future prospects so that will intensify this scramble for the remaining resources so just to survive and just to placate they populations we will see more conflicts and the not just between china and usa ok dan it sounds like if the preamble to the first world war and the second world war. well as are to the first world war in the great depression that is i think that's very right that is that these countries are now all integrated into one huge world capitalist economy they must all in that economy struggle for resources struggle for markets struggle to dominate nations where they

can exploit the labor of those nations and almost all of them as they invest abroad i think every single one of them as they invest abroad carry their their idea of creating the export zones where they can exploit people for low wages and take advantage of low wages in poor countries and so on so i think that in this world capitalist economy as we know there are ups and downs there are certainly the regular business cycle of depression that is now back to about every five years and never recovering from the previous depression and then people have also talked about that the idea of the long wave cycles of fifty years i don't know if that that's theory has real weight or not but in any case we know that these build up periodically to really deep world depressions we might be right now still that the two thousand and eight. depression has not been overcome so i think that we may actually be what we may actually be seeing is china drawn into

a alice drama of this economic crisis gentlemen i want to ask all of you because we're running out of time here which country will prevail lynn first in philadelphia. i think china for the short run is in better shape because. they had a man or manufacturing base and it is practical things to improve itself whereas the u.s. has no economic vision to speak of ok. in washington d.c. who will pull their i think. well if you look even to the way that's what i want to know that's really what people want to know who's going to win. i think the market will when in the end because china has so much current domestically. random events will cost collapse within from that with because they create so much station within the party with people in the party and within that i think groups so i leave. you know reached a tipping point moment i think that's

a mistake you shoes will cause them collapse if they fight. against you. japan and taiwan they will truly reveal their nature there will be isolated by international community i think there will be costs. and i want to give dan the last word who will prevail over whom why he so you're looking at a possibility where no one wins and the losers of the world's people as we had the economic crisis military conflict and a terrible environmental disaster that none of these nations are facing up to. particularly. the world but it will believe that we have all of these we had three different points of view and that was an accomplishment for this program many thanks today to my guest in washington in cincinnati and in philadelphia and thanks to our viewers for watching us here darkie see you next time and remember crosstalk .

you feel bad for european banking system will just go by and by the action since people feel. for this up in cyprus happens by forcing it to. react to situations i haven't read the reports so i'm not in a position to know i will leave them to the state department to comment on your point of the month to say it's ok because i'm not talking no.

no more weasel words. when you made a direct question be prepared for a change when you punch be ready for a. president of speech and down to freedom to question. what if china were a military superpower on par with the united states what kind of world would be live in what china put in to check washington's appetite for unilateral military action and manipulation of the global economy or would we witness another cold war where both beijing and washington maintained a chilly the relatively peaceful world you know how sometimes you see a story and it seems so you think you understand it and then you glimpse something else you hear or see some other part of it and realized everything you thought you knew you don't know i'm tom harpur welcome to the big picture.

breaking news this hour live rounds are reportedly fired at supporters of the ousted president morsi in cairo it's claimed many people have been killed or wounded as mass protests continue nationwide. fresh revelations from edward snowden he claims the us national security agency had worked closely with germany contradicting chancellor merkel's recent anger at america's pulled cold war tactics. plus the wounds of civil war in mali are yet to seal as a country heads towards his first post conflict election security threats still looming.