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| China-Japan-Koreas |
| Beijing wants to do with loans what the Soviet Union failed to achieve with tanks |
| 2020-09-27 |
| [Daily Mail, where America gets its news] Around the world, the Communist rulers of China are planting flags with the speed of a Victorian adventurer claiming lands and seas that others once thought their own or neutral. Using debt instead of gunboats, the Chinese are tying new nations into their own imperial order. It looks like Barbados may be the latest trophy in Beijing’s imperial string of pearls. Last week, the island announced that, after nearly 400 years, the monarchs of Great Britain would no longer rule over them. Not that this Queen ever really did. As a constitutional monarch, Queen Elizabeth has never exercised any power over the 300,000 inhabitants. Barbados is, and has been for decades, an independent constitutional realm and a democracy in the Commonwealth. So why the change? What has triggered the Barbadians to find a new head of state and end the symbolic rule of the world’s most respected head of state? If there’s one thing we know for certain, it’s nothing the Queen said or did that triggered the change. In fact, it’s nothing the British Government did either. The move we’re seeing has everything to do with a new scramble for power. The Great Game has given way to the Great Gamble as countries are taking loans from Chinese state banks and betting they can pay them back before the default clauses come due. |
| Posted by:Skidmark |
| #8 @ #6 - Or, poor countries accept loans they cannot repay. |
| Posted by: Clem 2020-09-27 12:45 |
| #7 I don't get this "China panic". We poured money into these places and got exactly zero for our efforts. Zero results and zero thanks. Well, actually I do get it. From what I've heard, China is offering a better deal than the former colonial masters. These ex-rulers got lazy and happy having everything their own way, and got used to it. Like any ruling class, they are absolutely outraged that someone would dare to mess with their pat little schemes. |
| Posted by: Muggsy Hapsburg5230 2020-09-27 12:43 |
| #6 China gives poor countries loans that they cannot repay, then plunders their assets and resources when they default. |
| Posted by: Alaska Paul 2020-09-27 11:58 |
| #5 |
| Posted by: Shuse Thud3222 2020-09-27 10:36 |
| #4 We need to be patroning more African restaurants. |
| Posted by: Clem 2020-09-27 10:17 |
| #3 In Africa, it's pretty much the equivalent of loaning mass to a black hole. Was it rayciss to say that? |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2020-09-27 09:55 |
| #2 Because loaning money to poor people (nations, entities) always ends so well... |
| Posted by: M. Murcek 2020-09-27 09:53 |