Recently, a friend asked me if I understood what a collapse would mean for China. Short answer: yes. Long answer: as much as one can understand before such an event, I believe so, yes.
My friend was aghast at the idea that China would collapse because of what it would mean for the people of China and the rest of the world. He’s not wrong to worry about such things but a better question is what happens if China doesn’t collapse?
Xi is a leftist – that translates to old school Chinese communist. He’s not kidding with that ‘common prosperity’ stuff. Judging from his actions, he wants to return to state control of the economy. Deng Xiaoping once said that ‘poverty isn’t socialism‘. Xi Jinping seems to beg to differ.
For those not up on their communist China history, Deng took over after Mao Zedong. Deng probably wasn’t the reformer the West believed him to be but he was realist enough to know that grinding down the population and the economy any further wasn’t going to end well for anyone. They could go back to attempting to eradicate sparrows and starving people or they could open up to the West and try freeing up their markets a bit. Deng was smart enough to pick the latter.
But that was fifty years ago and Xi seems to think it’s time to get back to being communist. Given that controlled economies have succeeded exactly never, you’d think Xi would consider trying something else. You’d be wrong. ‘Something else’ has put the CCP in a bad spot. Economies don’t grow forever in the developed world (at least not so far). China is eventually going to hit a downturn even if it weren’t already driving off an economic cliff. Either way, this poses an existential crisis for the CCP – if it can’t keep the country prosperous, why does it exist?
Now, the real answer to that question is to hold power. But that doesn’t sell so well even to the True BelieversTM so if the CCP wants to continue to hold power, it needs a reason it can sell. National pride, return to the ‘good old days’ no one wants, common prosperity – whatever sounds half decent will do. But the uptake is that the CCP is returning China to the days of yesteryear.
The days of Mao.
This is not a maybe. Xi has built up a similar cult of personality and he even has his own little red book. There are already atrocities – granted, China never really quit violating human rights but opening concentration camps is a new low. I doubt the now multiple occasions of people screaming in desperation from their windows is a publicity stunt. Farmers have literally been barred from working their fields and donated food tossed in the trash while people literally starve.
Sound familiar? The estimates are that Mao’s Great Leap Forward had a death toll of between 45 to 70 MILLION people. These are the days to which China is returning. Five year plans that result in mismanagement and poverty at the very best. Insane schemes that result in death and destruction at the worst. This is what China is heading for at breakneck speed.
Yeah, I know – it’s stupid and no one would believe it. All those people just wanting a decent life are going to be subject to old style Chinese communism? That makes no sense.
Unless you are the CCP, specifically the leftist wing thereof, then it makes perfect sense. This is the path to control and maintaining power. Chinese communists have never been squeamish about stepping over bodies along the way – even when they’re the bodies of their own people.
A full nation-state collapse is no cakewalk. Make no mistake, people will be hurt, lives ruined and even lives lost. It’s no joke and there’s only one thing good about it: it’s better than trying to survive full communist rule by the CCP.
Let’s deal with the elephant in the room while we’re at it. The world has allowed China to become its manufacturing center. A collapse in China does nothing good for the world economy, right? Eh, yes, to a point. Fortunately for us, Xi stinks at subtle. Even those businesses that most wanted to believe China would return to the normal of ten years ago have begun to look for the exit on China.
There have been ongoing pullouts and efforts to minimize exposure to China since 2016. That’s not to say everything will be all rosy – it’s gonna hurt. But not nearly as bad as you might think. If Apple can get it in gear and move iPhone production to India, you might not even notice when number 15 rolls around. Viet Nam is also getting a big piece of the Leaving China pie. And reshoring manufacturing worldwide does shorten those pesky supply chains. It will take time but the Developed World has lost its appetite for dependency. The Leaving China Express is underway.
So, what about Russia? Pretty much the same thing but different reasons. Putin does seem nostalgic for the Soviet Union but at least Russia had enough sense not to go by bullet train. Well, before it invaded Ukraine, anyway, but that seems to be mostly miscalculation and not insanity. Historians can hash that out because Russia is now so far gone it is extremely unlikely to not collapse. Ah, but there’s the rub.
See, Putin’s government can collapse without taking the Russian Federation with it. At least it’s in the realm of possibility unlike China and the CCP. But there are several problems with this. While cycling through strongmen is a Russian government past time, the actual framework of the Russian Federation is still brand new. It may not survive a real battle for power and the way Putin has set up his regime, it’s probably not meant to survive. Next, there are a lot of internal cracks in Russia and a lot of possibilities for breakaways. If every province decides to go its own way – or even a third of them do – the Federation collapses and so does Russia as a nation-state. Finally, if the Russian Federation does survive, it’s in hock up to its neck for the next hundred years. That’s a big problem with a destroyed economy and no possibility of Western aid.
Personally, I suspect Russia survives in some form but I’m hoping for Balkanization. Last week I’d have said it was unlikely; this week, I give it a 25% shot of happening.
Why would I want such a thing? Nuclear weapons spread out in a dozen different directions? Are you crazy, you cranky old lady?
Chill, it’s best for two reasons: the Russian people have GOT to learn how to govern their government or someday, some idiot really is going to get them nuked. They aren’t going to be able to do that with some variant of historic Russia – the political culture simply isn’t there and the government is always going to be too big to get good control of with the Russian people just starting out with real representative government. The best option is in much smaller Balkanized states. Don’t believe it will be easy; it won’t, but it is much more likely that some will succeed and open a path for others.
Second, tiny half-broke nations don’t want a nuclear war of any sort. Nor do they want the nasty kind of attention the weapons can bring when you are tiny and have no military. What they do want is stability and CASH. Especially cash as it can buy a lot of stability. No terrorist, state sponsored or not, can out bid the US. China, assuming it’s even still able, doesn’t need the headache of a biding war with its largest customer – yeppers, that is the US of A. I imagine a few weapons will make it to China but the majority will quickly be scarfed up by the US and disposed of – honestly, the ones China gets will probably be trash, too.
It should go without saying that I could be wrong. Russia and China could both survive and unite to rule the world. I would put my money on pig’s flying first, but I’m not stupid enough to not realize that nation-states are incredibly resilient little buggers and I haven’t recently become omniscient.
But nothing good happens if I am wrong. Countless Chinese and Russians will suffer under brutal regimes and eventually, they will spread their lust for power worldwide. I don’t want to see China and Russia collapse to see their people hurt; I want to see them collapse because I don’t think their people can be saved any other way.
At least not in the Earthly sense.
There is nothing but pain in a return to the days of Mao and Stalin. Thankfully, I sincerely doubt either China or Russia survive the decade as they are now. As painful as having two massive nation-states collapse will undoubtedly be, it’s far, far better than letting them drag the world back into the Cold War or worse.
Because even conventional, we don’t need a World War III.
