In the meantime, shipments of rare earths have been halted at many ports, with customs officials blocking exports to any country, including to the U.S. as well as Japan and Germany, sources told the Times. China’s Ministry of Commerce issued export restrictions alongside the General Administration of Customs, prohibiting Chinese businesses from any engagement with U.S. firms, especially defense contractors.
They’re clearly calling Trump’s bluff, but why include Japan and Germany in this? Worrying. The article doesn’t explain.
BTW I don’t buy into the narrative that China is the better world dominator. Their human rights record is abhorrent, and they clearly aren’t a democracy. And I don’t see that changing anytinme soon.
but why include Japan and Germany in this?
To stop US companies routing shipments through Germany and Japan.
Precisely this. You route a shipment to an un-tarriffed/un-embargoed country, usually to a shell company or something, and then ship it to wherever using THAT country as the country of origin. It’s a pretty common way of avoiding arms embargoes.
Because these are all loopholes used to bypass any serious moves. Like everyone is still buying Russian oil even in Europe. The blockade is an ineffective joke. This move is China saying fuck your instability and stupidity, we are serious and can back it up. There are no back doors and no way out of this insanely stupid mess.
It is not so much that China is the better world dominator, it is more that the US is already dominating more than any one nation should and it is a good thing if politicians keep dependencies on nations like that in their minds as a concern.
the US is clearly not a republic
that change did happen recently
The US is a Republic, not just a democratic one. Republic means the power is in the hands of a few, which is exactly the case. It is not democratic at core, because votes mean shit.
An Oligarchic Republic, your wealth determines how many votes you get. In this system, the 99% of poor voters are shit.
We will need wealth floors and ceilings in a revised Constitution in order to get rid of this issue. Economics, politics, and violence, are just different faces of power. The great mistake of the Founding Fathers was failing to recognize that money needs checks and balances, else it runs out of control.
BTW I don’t buy into the narrative that China is the better world dominator. Their human rights record is abhorrent, and they clearly aren’t a democracy. And I don’t see that changing anytinme soon.
China’s human rights record is abhorrent, but they’re mostly willing to keep it in their pants and not overthrow governments or fund genocides on the other side of the world.
They sure like waving their sticks an awful lot in the South China Sea and pissing off all their neighbours though. And in some cases outright hostile. The US needs to be strong to keep China at bay and the reverse needs to be a true, a weaker US will let China get even more belligerent and as someone who’s a neighbour of the Chinese, it’s not a good sight to see.
They sure like waving their sticks an awful lot in the South China Sea and pissing off all their neighbours though.
Oh yeah absolutely, but then again look at what the US does and has done in the Americas. It more than evens out I think, hence my focus on stuff they do away from home.
not overthrow governments
Uhhhh…
Not overthrow governments on the other side of the world.
It does not make the slightest difference for location of where a country is overthrowing governments
Of course it doesn’t, but go back to the original statement.
Yeah saw and it’s still such a silly thing to say. Like is a genocide better because you keep it to yourself? Christ.
You do realize I’m talking geopolitics right? The comment I replied to said “BTW I don’t buy into the narrative that China is the better world dominator.” What China does within and next to its borders is literally not what we’re taking about.
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You’re correct, but are getting downvoted by people who treat the whole topic like they’re supporting a sports team.
tell that to someone who lives in an EU country where corrupt politicians are building out surveillance systems with chinese tech, and bringing the country into other large chinese projects from even larger chinese loans, along with chinese battery factories that are polluting our environment!
to someone, like me.
a neighboring country is also neck deep in this shit
I mean that’s not what I’m talking about though, and in the first place does it really matter if the surveillance systems are Chinese or American/Israeli?
does it really matter if the surveillance systems are Chinese or American/Israeli?
what matters here is that chinese influence initiated the project
to be fair they havent been at war for decades.
the us has been at constant war for decades.
the choice here is easy.
