Posted on 02/14/2005 10:09:36 AM PST by FlyLow
(CNSNews.com) - Stratfor, a private intelligence and security consulting organization, has released a 10-year geopolitical forecast predicting the decline of China and Russia, the rise of Japan, the disintegration of the European Union and the continued dominance of the United States.
Stratfor said its forecast, released Monday, is based on its ongoing analysis of security, political, demographic, and other major trends in all key regions of the world.
The forecast is intended to help its clients (including corporations, governments, and financial institutions) form long-range strategic plan by "identifying potential risks and opportunities."
According to the 2005-2015 forecast, the United States will continue to dominate the next decade both economically and militarily; and the U.S. is "positioned to replicate the investment boom of the 1995- 2005 decade."
The forecast also says the U.S. gradually will shift its strategic focus from the Middle East to the Pacific basin. Stratfor predict the U.S. will triumph over the "jihadist" insurgents; and it predicts "major leadership transitions" in Egypt, Syria and Saudi Arabia.
The forecast also says Europe's political union will collapse but its economic union will endure. Tensions will increase over Muslim immigration to European nations, the analysis said. And it said Russian attempts to expand could present new problems.
Russia is collapsing and will become increasingly nationalist and anti-Western, Stratfor said in a "highlights" press release.
China's economic growth will slow down, the analysis predicted, leading to a "flight of investment." Moreover, China will experience "social upheavals" because of the gulf between rich and poor.
Japan will succeed China as the principal Asian power, and Taiwan will align itself with Japan, the forecast said.
Stratfor, based in Austin, Texas, said it draws on a global network of intelligence sources in formulated its global analyses.
Damn. Good forecast but Strafor is never right.
Was just about to ask that very question...
The USA SHOULD be number one. Those who stand with us, KUDOS!
Those who stand against us: DOOM ON YOU!
Wow... ya think?
They are partially right. US will dominate as long as Republicans hold power. The old EU will flounder, while the former East Bloc countries rise in world stature.
Sounds questionable.
I agree with most of this.
I think Russia could go in a number of directions - becoming anti-Western is one of them.
I also believe that Vietnam will become the next pool of cheap labor and may undergo significant Westernization - which will be the reason for the reversal of China's recent fortune.
Time will tell but America's future important partners are India, Japan, and Austriala.
The real question is: How much is this going to cost us? Seems that if America leads the world, it must pay all the bills and forgive all the debts owed to us.
I think this is a very expensive position for us to be in.
Japan will eclipse China????
> Japan will succeed China as the principal Asian power, and Taiwan will align itself with Japan,
When the moon is in the seventh house, and Jupiter aligns with Mars...
China has not yet tasted competition. As soon at that happens, the cracks in the banking system will show.
The problem with China is that its system cannot absorb creative destruction. And that is the problem the Soviet system had.
A democracy can absorb creative destruction. It could let the huge, subsidized state enterprises go bankrupt.
China cannot because a population wedded to the "iron rice bowl" would riot. So it has to export like crazy to get the cash to subsidize the money pit state enterprises because its system is to fragile to survive large scale unemployment.
I tend to believe that God means for us to remain dominant. We are the bastion of Christianity and it doesn't seem too far a stretch to think that He planned it that way for the final battles to come. Even as we seem to be heading for the cesspool of decline, the rest of the world is sliding even faster...
What does Wretchard of FR and Belmont fame think of this?
A broken clock is right a couple times a day. This makes more sense than anything else. I can not see how anyone can be high on the health of Europe longterm. Japan should be ready to roar again, and there is no reason the US won't keep its dominance. The biggest problem is I think China will remain strong.
Nah. Too much corruption. Too much cronyism. The Sov, er, Russian economy has the same world dominating potential the Nazi's economy had: none at all.
Remember when everybody thought the "tigers" of SE Asia were going to take off like a rocket, then they tanked? Look for Russia to go the same way.
If that genie gets out of the bottle - there will be no getting it back in...
The EU will not founder. Unfortunately it, or something similar to it will rise to be a major world power if not THE world power.
Cool! Sounds perfect to me :]
Actually, I foresee Russia selling Siberia to the US, just like it previously sold Alaska if it's economy goes into decline rather than have China annex it for free.
The advantage to Russia is obvious - several trillion dollars in cash, additional trade between the US and Russia and, let's not forget, a means to play the US against China, thus taking pressure off itself.
Actually, the poster you're responding to is thinking of the proverbial united Europe that will be led by the anti-Christ that is mentioned in the Bible.
The only way for this to happen is if Europe overthrows its socialist policies since it currently can't field any military force worth talking about since it doesn't have the money. Even now, most of it's best systems are a generation behind the US and this gap will just continually increase.
The advantage of the US is it brings complete integration of space, air, land and naval forces and operates all as a whole in theater. No one else can do that - thus no one else has a chance in hell of blunting an American offence.
And yes, that includes the unionized military of the continental Europeans.
I can't help but think of a Black Adder episode where Napoleon and his senior staff get frightened from an exploding shell, fan themselves, and admit they are "Whoopsies."
They wouldn't part with an inch of territory although I could see them allowing western firms to do the exploitation of Siberian reserves to complicate the potential for an attack.
Any Russian leader who parted with land as large and rich as Siberia would deserve the fate his people would bestow upon him. Just look at the low level anger over the recent handover of the Ussuri islands to China.
"Unfortunately it, or something similar to it will rise to be a major world power if not THE world power."
Not possible, France is part of the EU.
Never. There are still forces there that are furious that they sold us Alaska and want it back.
I have been watching Stratfor for a years. The organization has grown. I firmly disagree with them RE China. They have been laying a VERY strong foundation industrially-speaking and definitely militarily.
I think this assessment looks like the kooky "Word of Faith" aberration, rather than truth. As with all forecasts (like the weather, for example), we shall definitely see what China's long-term plans are as history unfolds. I'm not sure what tea leaves they are looking at, but I see China's behavior and activities for the last 15 or so years in an entirely different light, and I beg to disagree with their analysis. Good post, nevertheless. We need to watch China and the Taiwan Straits closely.
Reunification with Taiwan commie style is bedrock to the PRC and their Revolution. It serves to legitimize their regime by resolving the Civil War in their favor and to send notice that they will be calling the shots in that part of the world.
If you ever get a chance to see an 'official' map of China you will see a lot they claim as theirs that are others.
>> Japan will succeed China as the principal Asian power, and Taiwan will align itself with Japan,
>When the moon is in the seventh house, and Jupiter aligns with Mars...
This is the dawning of the Age of Oblivious, Age of Oblivious ... Oblivious!
Also on the same soundtrack: "... the youth of America on MTV. MTV, ABC, NBC, PBS. PBS, DNC, WJC, THC. MTVTHCWJC aaaaa beeeee ceeeeee."
Then God better put on a nice suit and start lobbying for a NRST, New Federalism, MSAs, and private pension accounts.
The next 50 years will be a competition among those who know that growth is the key to power and those that stumble or forget.
I pray He should also purge the RINOs.
Huh?
Where do you get that idea?
That will eventually change IMO. They're right up at the line right now and will eventually have to make a change to be a true international player.
Your analysis is 100% dead on and I agree with you on this one. The only way they can bring closure to the civil war is to take (not re-take, note) Taiwan.
Interestingly, China is being rough with neighbors other than Taiwan, whether it is fishing rights (NOTE: they use modern harvesting techniques which actually extend the range of their nets even BEYOND negotiated corridors), to other territorial and resource disputes.
The only reason why Mao-Tse-Ding-Dong was hailed as "legitimate" is because he won in his cultural revolution, and the Nationalists had to flee the mainland to Formosa/Taiwan. Had the tables been turned the other way, and had Chiang Kai Shek and the Kuomintang (KMT) prevailed, Mao-Tse-Dog-Doo would have gone down in the ashbin of failed revolutions. I see the Communist revolutionaries as being the rebels in the first case regardless, unlawfully rebelling against the established Government at that time. Had Japan not invaded China in the late 30's maybe Chiang would have prevailed and we would not have a sneaky, forked-tongue Communist regime on our hands. "What ifs" ..
No matter how you look at the historical picture (we all have our "disagreements" here and there on points in history), China today is a Big Problem and they have been gearing up their military for expansion in the Pacific and modernizing their forces at every single opportunity. Interestingly, China has some beefs with Japan over some territories also. Their subs lurking and mapping the ocean floor is of concern.. (Maybe their maps are more up to date than ours??)
There is more than one match that could set the smoldering campfire alight, an invasion of Taiwan and blockade of the Straits being primary. A serious disagreement with Japan over disputed territories and rights, being another. Lurking subs doing "questionable" things being another. Where it would go from there could lead us into a whole different ballgame.
We always need to be prepared when it comes to China. I sense they will try to sucker punch us when we are least expecting it and when they deem that they are good to go.
I think it'll be modified at least, based on the trend in Japanese military and political involvement over the last couple years. That's the future and eventually people will have to come to terms with it.
Just my opinion, of course, and it's one of those things that we'll have to bookmark and look at 5-10 years later ;)
I had thought with economic growth and power that the CHICOMS would morph into a more eaglitarian government. Unfortunatly thanks to 1 division of the PLA being in the right place at the right time during the Tianeman Sq. event that did not happen.
They know how to use the principle of leverage to good effect, when it comes to cracking down on dissident. (Unfortunately)
Good points . . . if we actually have 50 years...
RE: Russia, they are shadow-boxing with us and are trying to symmetrically mirror our every move, in each and every single theater of operations on every Continent. The "stans" are almost humorous. I find it ironic that we have military bases in the same damn country in at least one (public) case..
Let us hope that the WOT can "gloss over" our differences and clashing interests in some unspecified, hypothetical cases. Bury the details, bury them.
Their proxy strategy is what bothers me and their premeditated, calculated shadow-boxing is “not appreciated” ..
First, the time scale. For economic trends to produce results as broad as these predictions - China fading, for example - a ten-year window strikes me as far too short. Japan's rise will have to come at the tail-end of a demographic constriction that would be shocking were it not being repeated in Europe. Half a generation for this? I don't think so.
I have played with the idea of the EU restricting its rather ambitious aims a bit. It makes far more sense as an economic arrangement between otherwise fairly independent states than as a single, monolithic bureaucracy. That is, after all, what the Common Market was about. And if the world has learned anything about successful economic models in the past half-century it is that centralization is strangulation. Moreover, the degree to which current EU plans intend to restrict sovereignty of the member states in the area of foreign policy strikes me as unacceptable, especially to the British but also to the Nordic states. I am hopeful that the current model of puppet-masters in Brussels gives way to a looser, more workable federation. Here, too, ten years seems a bit short.
I suggest that both power politics and economy in Asia will pivot on the ability of South Korea to take on the staggering disaster that is the North. If the German model holds it will take them at least a decade to bring total productivity back to its current level, or longer - North Korea is much more a basket case than East Germany ever was. Japan and China will watch this closely, not as military powers but as economic competitors watching a rival submerge.
The U.S.? About the only thing that can radically change the current asymmetric geopolitical alignment would be some sort of catastrophic natural disaster - Yellowstone blowing, for example - that would collapse the economy down to something comparable with our rivals. The EU is touted as a bigger economy than that of the U.S. now, which it would be if it really were a true aggregate. It isn't, at least not yet. Short of a catastrophe on that level I'd say the next decade looks very promising indeed, and not just for the U.S.
Just my $0.02.
Ever hear of foreign aid or Bono?
a) Tiny part of our budget.
b) Singer, works for Steve Jobs.
What do I win?
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