America is in Asia, but not of Asia – Asia Times

The United States of America&nbsp, ruined&nbsp, its&nbsp, potential as&nbsp, an Asian&nbsp, energy 143 years ago when it passed the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882, the second US law to prevent immigration&nbsp, of&nbsp, a certain citizenship.

China was turned upside down by internal conflict in ^the 19^th  era. The Opium War, ^the Taiping Rebellion, &nbsp, community rivalries, &nbsp, drought and droughts pushed waves of Taiwanese migrants&nbsp, out to&nbsp, all sides of ^the world&nbsp, – especially Sou^theast Asia, Europe and America.

Beginning with the California Gold Rush in 1848-1855, tides of Chinese immigrants fanned out across the western United States working in laundries, restaurants, and on construction projects. Foreign coolies&nbsp, were&nbsp, instrumental&nbsp, in&nbsp, the&nbsp, arduous&nbsp, construction&nbsp, of the&nbsp, Central Pacific course of the first transatlantic rail, cutting through the Sierra Nevada Mountains to join Nevada and California. &nbsp,

In his 1920 text” The Rising Tide of Color: The Threat Against White World-Supremacy”, eugenicist and cultural anthropologist Lothrop Stoddard of” The Wonderful Gatsby” disgrace wrote of Chinese work:

The typical Chinese person spends their entire life literally within a hand’s breadth of hunger at house. Consequently, when removed to the easier conditions of various land, the Chinaman brings with him the working capacity which merely appalls his opponents.

Stoddard was dismissed by F. Scott Fitzgerald by labeling him” Goddard” ( mistakingly called him” Goddard” ). On ^the issue of Foreign workers, but, Stoddard simply reflected ^the American view ^that prevailed in ^the 19^th&nbsp, era and ^that eventually resulted in ^the Chinese Exclusion Act.

By the 1870s, Foreign men made up a quarter of California’s labor. White employees were hard pressed to meet the industriousness of&nbsp, the&nbsp, Chinese, reflected in the fact that the Central Pacific Railroad paid&nbsp, Chinese&nbsp, workers&nbsp, a superior salary:$ 31 per year versus$ 30&nbsp, per&nbsp, year for white.

Resentments increased following the Panic of 1873, leading to a growing number of restrictions on Chinese immigration until the broad ban on the Chinese Exclusion Act was passed in 1882.

A harrowing “driving out period” followed the immigration ban, with Chinese&nbsp, evicted&nbsp, from communities where they had long settled. Particularly gruesome instances of anti-Chinese violence were the Rock Springs massacre of 1885 and the Hells Canyon massacre of 1887. &nbsp,

The Chinese Exclusion Act was overturned in 1943, but by that time, the harm had already been done. Today, there are 5.5 million Americans&nbsp, who claim&nbsp, full or partial&nbsp, Chinese ancestry, a mere 1.6 % of the population. &nbsp,

This compares with&nbsp, 38.6 million &nbsp, ( 11.3 % of the population ) claiming&nbsp, Irish ancestry, 49 million &nbsp, ( 14.4 % ) &nbsp, claiming&nbsp, German ancestry&nbsp, and 16.8 million &nbsp, ( 4.9 % ) &nbsp, claiming&nbsp, Italian ancestry. 3. 6 million more people live in Scandinavia than in China.

There are &nbsp, 26 million &nbsp, Americans&nbsp, who claim&nbsp, full&nbsp, or&nbsp, partial&nbsp, Asian&nbsp, ancestry, 7.2 % of the total population. There would be a lot more if the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882 had never been passed.

At ^the time, China had a population of 400 million, &nbsp, Europe 330 million &nbsp, and&nbsp, ^the United States 54&nbsp, million. It is not difficult to imagine today’s Americans in a counterfactual&nbsp, wi^thout ^the Exclusion Act’s history. &nbsp, Alcatraz&nbsp, Island&nbsp, could have &nbsp, been&nbsp, ^the West Coast’s Ellis Island, processing&nbsp, Asian&nbsp, immigrants well into ^the 20^th&nbsp, century. &nbsp,

Of course, this&nbsp, alternate&nbsp, universe&nbsp, America would be very different and&nbsp, we could have much fun&nbsp, speculating on&nbsp, the&nbsp, endless&nbsp, counterfactual&nbsp, possibilities. It suffices to say that an American with a United States that was not just a Pacific but also an Asian one would forever cement the republic as a nation of the Americas. &nbsp, &nbsp,

That is not the America we have today, whether or not, for better or worse. The United States&nbsp, today&nbsp, may be&nbsp, a Pacific power, &nbsp, but it is certainly not Asian. America acceded to the Pacific after 1852 because it feared being ruled out of the world by the European powers and sent Commodore Perry and his black ships to force, force, open, and open, Japan. &nbsp,

The United States has been a a  military , present in , Asia , and ever since through subsequent kerfuffles , such as , the Boxer Rebellion, World War II, Korea , and the Vietnam War. &nbsp,

As time goes on, it becomes more and more obvious that the United States is located in Asia, but not in that region. &nbsp, Korea is divided. China is also present. Vietnam, after much carnage, was abandoned. And it has also been sucked into stagnation, knee-capped, and into a culture of stagnation.

And now, the United States has just picked an economic war with China, which it is highly likely to lose and lose spectacularly ( see&nbsp, here ). The danger of America being , in , Asia but not , is that it is playing on alien territory, subject to information asymmetries, and prone to bad judgment. &nbsp,

There are so few Chinese Americans who, in essence, don’t have any political influence. &nbsp, Because of&nbsp, that, the expertise of the Chinese Americans who do exist is&nbsp, distrusted and&nbsp, dismissed as Washington takes its cues from grifters ( see&nbsp, here ) and China&nbsp, “experts” &nbsp, who “fell in love with Mandarin” at Princeton or the like.

In the counterfactual America of 100 million Asians, Chinese Americans would undoubtedly have accumulated significant political influence, and Washington would have access to real experts without any suspicion. &nbsp, America would trust&nbsp, Treasury&nbsp, Secretary&nbsp, Zhang to go up against China as much as it trusted Supreme Commander Eisenhower&nbsp, to&nbsp, take on&nbsp, Germany. &nbsp,

But alas, &nbsp, that&nbsp, is the&nbsp, counterfactual America. The factual America chose to fight China with the ignoramuses, trusts, and doesn’t need to, according to its founders. &nbsp, This is what happens when America is&nbsp, in&nbsp, Asia but not&nbsp, of&nbsp, Asia. America&nbsp, America&nbsp, started&nbsp, a&nbsp, fight as though it didn’t ;nbsp, know&nbsp, China&nbsp, is more than twice&nbsp, its&nbsp, size&nbsp, ( see&nbsp, here ).

To be&nbsp, in&nbsp, Asia but not&nbsp, of&nbsp, Asia when China is the size it is and still growing means to not be&nbsp, in Asia for long. The presence of the US, US, military, and other countries in Asia is a foreign distortion that costs both sides of the Pacific in terms of social, economic, and cultural costs. &nbsp,

The US&nbsp is not&nbsp, especially dependent on&nbsp, Asia economically ( 34 % of imports and 24 % of exports ) and has a few minor cultural differences.

English is&nbsp, the lingua franca&nbsp, in Europe and far more Americans speak Spanish than all Asian languages combined. English is not widely used in Asia, even among those with high levels of education, despite the country’s high level of education. Asia, as far as most Americans are concerned, is an exotic other and vice versa. &nbsp,

The costs&nbsp, of maintaining a forward US military presence&nbsp, in Asia&nbsp, are &nbsp, immense. Total defense spending is likely to be more than US$ 1 trillion ( including DOE, DOE, nuclear weapons, and other sources ). ), or approximately 3.4 % of gross domestic product ( GDP ). &nbsp,

The tyranny of distance, on top of a massive industrial base, allows&nbsp, China&nbsp, to&nbsp, impose highly asymmetric costs&nbsp, on the US.  , China’s total defense spending is likely to be around$ 300 billion, or about 1.6 % of GDP. &nbsp,

A more revealing comparison might be with industrial output because GDP can be squirrely given how services are accounted for in China. China’s defense spending is around 4 % of its industrial output versus about 25 % for the US.

One of the causes of the Soviet Union, the USSR, and the US collapsed was the US, which had the ability to impose asymmetric costs on the USSR, Soviet, and defense budgets, according to Ronald Reagan. &nbsp,

Analysts estimated that the Soviet Union was spending 12 to 20 % of its GDP on defense in the 1980s in an effort to keep up with Reagan’s and Pentagon budget increases and whiz-bang Star Wars demonstrations. &nbsp, This time around, China is implementing the Reagan strategy&nbsp, with annual PLA budget increases and whiz-bang demonstrations of 6th-generation fighter planes ( see&nbsp, here ). &nbsp,

Can Joe Six Pack American be blamed for asking what it is all for&nbsp, when he is living paycheck to&nbsp, paycheck? After all, America is not, in the end, an Asian nation; fatefully, for better or worse, it made the decision 143 years ago with the Chinese Exclusion Act and confirmed that decision with Japanese American internment camps. &nbsp, America is&nbsp, not&nbsp, full of&nbsp, Zhou Six Packs &nbsp, with deep&nbsp, historical&nbsp, ties to&nbsp, Asia. &nbsp,

Proponents of&nbsp, the&nbsp, pivot to Asia and/or China containment policy offer up a confused&nbsp, litany of reasons for America ‘s&nbsp, military&nbsp, presence. Elbridge Colby, who is currently undersecretary of defense for policy at the Pentagon, is the most well-known spokesman for this position and the author of the book” Strategy of Denial.”

The fear is that&nbsp, a hegemonic China in&nbsp, Asia would &nbsp, economically&nbsp, gate-keep&nbsp, the region from American commercial interests. We must acknowledge that a hegemon may behave poorly on” Liberation Day,” for no apparent reason, given President Donald Trump’s attempt to extort the world.

The issue we have &nbsp, with Colby is once again the issue of America being&nbsp, in&nbsp, Asia but not&nbsp, of Asia. How knowledgeable about the costs that Colby’s denial strategy necessitates? America&nbsp, currently&nbsp, suffers from&nbsp, a whole panoply&nbsp, of&nbsp, domestic&nbsp, ailments, from inadequate healthcare to lousy education to decrepit&nbsp, infrastructure&nbsp, to homelessness. Does Colby fully comprehend the goals of America?

Does Colby understand that China’s GDP is two to three times that of the US – something Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent and team surely ( dis ) missed? Does Colby comprehend that there are 45 times as many highly capable math students in Chinese high schools as there are in American high schools ( top 1.5 %, US basis )?

Does Colby understand ^that approximately 20-30 % of Chinese high school students can score in ^the 99^th&nbsp, percentile on&nbsp, ^the ma^th section of ^the SAT? The Gaokao system is ^the table stakes in China, wi^{th th}e 99^th percentile US ma^th level no^thing special.

Does Colby understand that China generates&nbsp, twice as much electricity, produces&nbsp, 13 times as much steel, 22 times as much cement, three times&nbsp, as many cars and has over 250&nbsp, times&nbsp, the shipbuilding capacity as the US?

Being in and around Asia is perfectly exemplified by Colby’s family history, but not being in or around Asia. He is a scion of the CIA/Carlyle Group/Yale University&nbsp, with a deep family history in&nbsp, Asia. The first Elbridge Colby ( great-grandfather ) served in Tianjin’s US Army and was stationed there.

Grandfather William Colby was director of the CIA and did god knows what in Asia during the Vietnam War. Father Jonathan Colby, who worked for Carlyle and spent much of his career there, is an executive. &nbsp,

The scion&nbsp, himself is&nbsp, a product of international schools in Asia&nbsp, ( but does not speak an Asian language ). Young Colby once claimed to be an “unexpert on Taiwanese society and politics,” an odd admission from someone whose life’s work is preventing Taiwan’s, China’s, and other nations ‘ reunification.

This is all quite illustrative of America’s confused presence in Asia. Colby used scare tactics in an interview to claim that an Asia dominated by China would eventually lead to embarrassment for America andnbsp, followed by the largest corporations and highest-ranked universities. &nbsp,

With 139 companies on the list and 129 in comparison to China’s 128 companies, the US retook the Fortune 500 crown last year. The two&nbsp, nations&nbsp, have been exchanging the top spot for the past few years.

This is a significant improvement over the list from 2010, when there were 139 US businesses listed and 46 Chinese companies. Similarly, China’s universities are rocketing up the league tables, &nbsp, capturing 16 of the top 20 positions on the Nature Index. &nbsp,

While an Asia predominated by China, which later made the decision to halt economic growth, is likely to be more dependent on first-order principles, such as investing in infrastructure, public health, implementing well-thought-out industrial policies, and putting an end to corruption and graft.

America is falling behind not because China is modernizing its military, but precisely because America wasted trillions of dollars on unnecessary wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and now threatens to militarily challenge the biggest player that ever was.

Colby describes himself as a realist, but it’s not clear if he truly knows who he is. Just like America does not know what it is. Although America may want to be an Asian power, the ship sailed in 1882. America is not Asian – it chose not to be&nbsp, on&nbsp, more than one occasion – and has demonstrated a&nbsp, limited&nbsp, capacity to understand any region outside its borders, even&nbsp, Canada.

For realist policies to be developed for Asian security, knowledge of the region’s politics and society is necessary. Otherwise, one is not weighing costs and benefits but merely pointing in ideological directions.

That, however, is now considered “realist” thinking by America’s Asia experts. When all is said and done, &nbsp, America is in Asia because it finds itself in Asia. There is no justification for there; instead, there is:” They are there because that’s where they are,” like students from international schools,” who don’t learn their native tongue. Not everything&nbsp, has &nbsp, a reason or lasts. &nbsp,