Who’s a Nationalist? Who’s a Globalist? How will a world war end between these two polar opposites?
The great international battle today is between radical nationalism on one hand, and democratic globalism on the other. The ground upon which this battle will be fought is technology.
The principal countries favoring radical nationalism are Russia, China, and Iran. These nations are composed of authoritarian governing styles which demand a top down decision making process.
The nations supporting democratic globalism include the United States, Japan, South Korea, Australia, the UK, Europe, the Philippines, and Israel. These states are organized along classical liberal ideals where decisions are made along democratic processes where the people have the final say on what is adopted.
Out of these two groupings, a dominant player from each has emerged. China and America have become the two indispensable players whose behavior against the other will determine the world of the second half of the twenty first century.
The key variable upon which each will weigh its victory or defeat will be technology. In other words, it is a war of technology. And one way to measure technological superiority is through market flexibility and military readiness.
At the heart of technology is creativity and creativity is best suited to the country with the highest degree of freedom to operate. And the technologies that pushes a country to victory will be technologies yet to be discovered. For example, Artificial Intelligence is best described as the hall of ever unfolding mysteries resulting in new, and very surprising, economic growth and military superiority. According to Jon Schmid of Rand Corporation, who is better to unfold them the fastest: China with a state run system? Or America with an open entrepreneurial system?
Again according to Schmid, China has produced more scientific papers on Artificial Intelligence, while in America more AI products have reached the consumer market. In other words, AI is in use everyday creating new wealth in America, whereas in China, scientific papers do not create wealth, they only establish the potential to create wealth.
That brings us to military readiness. No doubt China has a formidable military in the South China Sea, but how strong is it up against America’s military? Along with her allies, America expresses her strength globally while China remains a regional player. Since the end of WW2, America remains the behemoth enforcing a rules based international order.
This takes us to the present with China building small military platforms through out the South China Sea. They compose runways, munitions buildups, and military posts. According to reports from the highly regarded magazine the Diplomat (Schmid, ibid) there’s just one problem, they’re starting to sink. This goes along with other reports pointing out sub-par quality control compared to American products. Again, that takes us back to AI, where America’s military has the benefit of trying out a continuous flow of market driven AI products to see what works and doesn’t, whereas, China’s implementation is slower, less tested, with more slipshod results.
So what of the second half of the twenty first century? What two nations will face off against one another? China and America are the polar opposites, with China being the great state run nationalist nation, and America being a great open market global democratic nation. It is unlikely a world war will break out between the two nations. More likely, the two nations will compete for ascendancy in technologies such as Artificial Intelligence with America’s flexibility allowing it to outpace China. However, Beijing’s top lradership will continue to probe areas of American military for weaknesses. Present data strongly suggests that Bejing’s leadership will act cautously, while producing propaganda full of puffery and misinformation. The possibility exists that America will not only remain ahead of China, but will significantly outdistance it.
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