Taunting the Dragon: Background to US-China Trade War and Hong Kong Protests

The Hong Kong protests are escalating, just as the US-China trade war is also escalating. None of this is out of the blue. For quite some time now, the US has been shifting the focus of its hegemonic and imperial ambitions towards China, recognizing it – even more than Russia – as its main rival superpower. Author Graham Allen published his 2017 book entitled Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’s Trap? addressing growing US-China tension and the potential for a future US-China war. James Corbett also offered his analysis.

The term Thucydides trap is derived from ancient Greece to describe a situation when a rising power gains enough strength to challenge and disturb the existing ruling power. With this phenomenon in mind, let’s take a look at the background to the current US-China trade war (which is becoming more bitter and intense by the week) and the Hong Kong Protests.

Step 1: Identifying the Enemy

Quotes from top US officials, military and non-military alike, show that China has gradually been replacing Russia as the #1 enemy, although this is not clear cut; there is still a lot of hatred towards and fear of Russia. In 2018, the USA changed its official defense strategy. Terrorism was no longer the #1 threat and was replaced by Russia and China. The DoD report accused China of wielding predatory economics and building fake islands in the South China Sea to intimidate nearby countries. Admiral Harry Harris, former commander of the US Pacific Command, said this about China in 2018:

“China remains our biggest long-term challenge. Without focused involvement and engagement by the United States, and our allies and partners, China will realize its dream of hegemony in Asia.”

He also said this:

“China’s intent is crystal clear. We ignore it at our peril. I’m concerned China will now work to undermine the international rules-based order … China’s impressive military build-up could soon challenge the United States across almost every domain.”

Earlier this year, DNI (Director of National Intelligence) Dan Coats said:

“[The] rule of law, international norms, and fairness in trade and international engagements is not the Chinese model … Chinese leaders will increasingly seek to assert China’s model of authoritarian capitalism as an alternative—and implicitly superior—development path abroad, exacerbating great-power competition that could threaten international support for democracy, human rights, and the rule of law.”

Previously in 2018 Coats had followed Trump’s lead by blaming China for interfering in US elections (where have I heard that one before?). He stated:

“[China is targeting] state and local governments and officials … It is trying to exploit any divisions between federal and local levels on policy, and uses investments and other incentives to expand its influence.”

All this rhetoric comes against a backdrop of intertwined economies, where many US companies have outsourced and offshored their labor to China. The arrangement seems to have been working pretty well for the Chinese factory owners, US companies and US consumers; it seems the real loser is the Chinese laborer who has to work incredibly long hours each week in horrible conditions, sometimes in factories with ‘suicide nets’ to prevent people from killing themselves when they jump.

Step 2: The Pivot to Asia

Militarily, the first stage of realigning US forces towards tackling China was the Obama’s Pivot to Asia which I discussed in this 2015 article Pivot to Asia: Ongoing US Militarization of Pacific An Alarming Trend. This involved the massive shift of US forces to the Pacific – 60% of US Air Force and Navy resources were moved from the Middle East to the Pacific.

Step 3: Claiming ‘Freedom of Navigation’ as a Pretext for Provocation

On multiple occasions, the US has made a point of sailing its ships through Chinese waters (or disputed waters near China) and then trying to claim that it was innocently sailing there due to freedom of navigation. To free thinkers, it’s transparently obvious that these stunts are not about navigation but rather provocation. Just last Friday (August 23rd), the USS Green Bay, an amphibious transport dock ship, sailed through the Taiwan Strait that separates China from the island of Taiwan. Like Hong Kong, Taiwan is an island which is part of China through retains some autonomy in the way it rules. The US has likewise sailed its warships many times (September 2018, May 2019) near the Spratly Islands, which China claims it owns but which are still under international dispute. On the earlier occasion, the guided-missile destroyer Decatur nearly collided with an oncoming Chinese warship.

Step 4: Targeting Chinese Institutions, Initiatives and Projects

The US has taken a dim view of practically every Chinese effort to develop itself in the last decade. The US has opposed China’s gigantic OBR (One Belt, One Road) Initiative which has been dubbed the New Silk Road. The US has directed propaganda against BRICS, China’s SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organization), its development bank and many other trade initiatives. The US accuses China of trying to control the world, yet such accusations must be difficult to receive with a straight face given that the US routinely threatens both its allies and enemies with economic warfare, sanctions, trade wars, governmental overthrow, invasion or even nuclear annihilation if they don’t toe the line.

Step 5: Funding and Training Muslim Uyghurs – Sometimes as Part of ISIS

You may not have heard of them, but there is a Chinese minority group known as the Uyghurs or Uighurs. Many are Muslim and of Turkic ethnicity. They live in the semi-autonomous region of north-west China in a province called Xinjiang. Well, guess what? The USG has been funding them for various reasons. Marco Rubio, Zionist neocon and warhawk, sponsored this 2018 bill pushing the US to get involved. Rubio, for those who don’t recall, was the very same guy itching for war with Venezuela earlier this year in 2019. He was also the one who mysteriously happened to find out before almost anyone else that Venezuelans’ power grid has been taken down. Hmmm. However, much of the funding is done under-the-table by the soft power network of NGOs, illustrious among them the National Endowment for Democracy of NWO (New World Order) insider George Soros. The UHRP (Uyghur Human Rights Project) admits on its website that it was “founded by the Uyghur American Association (UAA) in 2004 with a supporting grant from the National Endowment for Democracy (NED).”

Since when does the USG deeply care about oppressed minorities in other nations? It’s a rhetorical question, but I’ll answer it this time: if – and only if – US interests are aligned with that minority, and for the (usually short) time period the interests are aligned.

In his article Turkish-Uyghur Terror Inc. – America’s Other Al Qaeda, geopolitical author Tony Cartalucci writes:

“The alleged “struggle” by the Uyghur people in Xinjiang, referred to by the terrorists and their foreign sponsors as “East Turkistan,” consists of two essential components – a foreign harbored political front including the Washington D.C. and Munich-based World Uyghur Congress (WUC) and a militant front clearly backed by the US and NATO through intermediary groups like Turkey’s Grey Wolves … Encouraging separatism in China’s western Xinjiang region, if successful, would carve off a substantial amount of territory. In conjunction with US-backed separatism in China’s Tibet region, an immense buffer region stands to be created that would virtually isolate China from Central Asia.”

So, just as the US funded and trained Operation Gladio warriors to fight communism in Europe, Mujahideen fighters to battle the USSR, ISIS to battle Syria, it is also preparing for war with China by funding and training the ‘separatists’, whoever they may be, in this case the Uyghurs. In another article, all the way back in 2014, Cartalucci quoted a Reuters article that admitted that ISIS was training the Uyghurs:

“Chinese militants from the western region of Xinjiang have fled from the country to get “terrorist training” from Islamic State group fighters for attacks at home, state media reported on Monday.”

Step 6: Initiating a Trade War

There is no doubt that it was the US under Trump who initiated the US-China trade war. Even before he took office, Trump took to twitter bashing China for its supposed economic exploitation of the US. Trump says the objective is a better trade deal with China to benefit all Americans, but this trade war is producing a massive fallout and host of negative effects for American consumers, farmers and manufacturers. Chris Kanthan writes:

“How about China’s economy? Are Trump’s tariffs crushing the Chinese economy? Not really. During Jan-May 2019, China’s exports to the US fell about 5%, but China’s exports to the EU rose more than 14%. And, guess what, EU is China’s #1 trading partner (and ASEAN is the #2 trade partner), while the US is #3. So, China keeps growing at a healthy pace — even the IMF predicts a healthy 6.2% real GDP growth for China this year!

But here’s the kicker. While China’s exports to the US fell 4.8%, the reverse — US exports to China — fell by a whopping 24% (for the first five months of 2019). So, US exporters and farmers are hurting real bad. And Trump cannot win re-election without the support of those “great soybean/corn/pork farmers.””

Step 7: Attacking Huawei, China’s Leading Cell Phone/Wireless Company

The Trump Admin has come out with all guns blazing against Huawei, China’s telecommunications giant, which is now the 2nd biggest smartphone producer in the world, second only to Apple and within striking distance of them.  The USG has accused Huawei of assisting Chinese Intelligence by placing backdoors in its software and hardware that allow surveillance by Chinese authorities. Trump has even pressured allies like the UK to stop using Huawei altogether, despite the fact that Britain relies heavily of Huawei for its infrastructure. The attacks against Huawei escalated on December 1st 2018, when the US orchestrated a totally illegal kidnapping and illegal detention of Meng Wanzhou, Huawei’s CFO (Chief Financial Officer). Wanzhou is still being held against her will in Canada on US orders.

Step 8: Approving $8 Billion Deal to Sell F-16 Fighter Jets to Taiwan

Whether its Xinjiang (Uyghurs), Taiwan or Hong Kong, the US is an expert at destabilizing a country by targeting areas where there is dissent. Recently on August 20th, 2019, the USG announced its intentionto sell Taiwan 66 F-16 C/D Block 70 aircraft, related equipment and support for an estimated $8 billion. This move infuriated China which considers Taiwan a Chinese region or states, not a separate nation.

Step 9: Instigating a Color Revolution by way of the Hong Kong Protests

One of the most significant examples of US aggression against China is the instigation of a color protest or color revolution in Hong Kong. The aim is to provoke China into reacting harshly and violently, which would reinforce the Western perception that China is heavy-handed, tyrannical and totalitarian. China has already moved troops to its southern mainland border, just across the water from Hong Kong. It is possible that another US objective is to push the protestors into declaring Hong Kong independent of China. There are some who say the Hong Kong protests are a grassroots affair. There is usually a grassroots element to many of these protests, but almost always the bigger factor in the shadows is US interference (or US-UK, or US-UK-Israeli, interference). Here is a very telling comment about the Hong Kong protests found under the article Violent Protests In Hong Kong Reach Their Last Stage on the MoonOfAlabama.org website:

“The Extradition Law revision that started this was only a convenient proxy for those wanting chaos in HK to create chaos. The instigators behind the initial protest march are the same ones who started Occupy Central five years ago. They are the ones who huddle with operatives from US/UK Consulates, who travelled to the Washington/London/Brussel/Taipei, etc. to see politicians and plot strategies, to arrange for funding, and to recruit dare devils for the carnage. Lucky for them that HK was ripe for such shenanigans because HKers in general are sullen over their loss of superiority complex against mainland Chinese, brainwashed subconsciously through schools and churches about CCP wickedness, and desperately stressed under HK’s economic realities. Most of the protesters don’t even know what the Extradition Law is all about …”

“The instigators, however, are well versed in all the intricacies. They know who they can easily recruit and order to do violence … they know the fifth column within the government and business … If large casualties result what do they care? … [T]hey know their foreign backers are only too glad to see Chinese killing Chinese …”

“By the way, the US Consulate in HK has over 1,000 on payroll (an estimated 200 CIA agents), UK’s is over 500 (among them MI6 agents). That size of consulate in a city of less than 400 sq. miles of land (over half of which mountainous) is a laughable anomaly, wouldn’t you think? What are they all there for?”

And yes, there is proof. The senior US consulate member Julie Eadeh was photographed secretly meeting with the top 2 leaders of the Hong Kong protests, Joshua Wong and Nathan Law.

hong kong protests julie eadeh joshua wong nathan law

Remember – the NED now does overtly what the CIA did covertly decades ago. Allen Weinstein, one of the founders of NED, confessed that “A lot of what we do today was done covertly 25 years ago by the CIA.”

Conclusion: Fomenting the US-China War

China is hardly a bastion of freedom. The extent of government surveillance, censorship and control is extreme and tyrannical. It is not surprising that NWO insiders such as the late David Rockefeller extolled China as a paradigm for society; it’s the kind of hierarchical, dictatorial example the NWO controllers want for a world government. This article is by no means praising China, but rather to point out that, right now, it is the victim of US aggression. The very same tactics of subversion the US has been using for decades on all sorts of countries – Russia, Iran, Guatemala, North Korea, Venezuela, etc. – it is now using against China with the Hong Kong protests. Are some of the protestors genuine? Surely. The truth is never black-and-white, but always shades of gray. However, the Hong Kong protests can be seen as a color protest and part of the bigger US geopolitical strategy to encircle and target China, to ward off a rising power and to prepare itself for a possible WW3 scenario.

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This article was originally published on the author’s blog site, The Freedom Articles.

Makia Freeman is the editor of alternative media / independent news site The Freedom Articles and senior researcher at ToolsForFreedom.com. Makia is on Steemit and FB.

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*https://thefreedomarticles.com/sesame-credit-gamification-control/

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