Korva is a scroll of the internet’s best ideas.
China's Temptation
That gap is the imbalance of power that tempts China into thinking hegemony in Asia is possible. Without a really heavy American weight on the balance scale, it can't be stopped. China's size is not the whole story, because the rest of Asia has fallen behind.
If India, Indonesia, and Vietnam are all growing, China will eventually understand that Asia is too big for China to eat. Nobody can eat it, and China will need to learn to live with its neighbors, as Germany has done in Europe.
The Same Logic in Europe
Europe works the same way. If Russia is stopped in Ukraine and Ukraine becomes a prosperous country like Poland, that door closes without American soldiers fighting and dying to keep it closed. The goals are that no great power dominates Europe, no great power dominates Asia, and no power can interrupt the flow of oil in and out of the Middle East on commercial terms. A natural balance of power in these theaters could give America a world that is good for it economically and in security, without an ever-escalating defense budget or ever-escalating commitments.
Why did China's economy outgrow India's so fast?
China began market reforms in 1978 under Deng Xiaoping and opened special economic zones such as Shenzhen in 1980. Those zones drew foreign factories, and China became the world's leading exporter of manufactured goods. India kept tight controls on imports and licensing until a balance-of-payments crisis in 1991 pushed it to liberalize. By then China had been growing at high rates for more than a decade.
How did Germany come to live with its neighbors?
After 1945 West Germany tied itself to its neighbors through institutions. It joined the European Coal and Steel Community in 1951, which pooled the coal and steel industries that had fed two wars, and it joined NATO in 1955. Chancellor Konrad Adenauer made reconciliation with France the center of his foreign policy. The Franco-German friendship treaty was signed in 1963.
Why has Poland grown so steadily?
Poland opened its economy quickly after 1989 under a program of rapid market reforms. It joined the European Union in 2004, which gave its firms access to a much larger market. Eurostat data show Poland was the only EU economy to avoid a recession in 2009 after the financial crisis. Its output per person has grown several times over since 1990, according to World Bank figures.
More from Invest Like the Best with Patrick O'Shaughnessy
