China wins the wars

WITHOUT firing a shot, without sacrificing the life or limb of a single soldier, without incurring budget deficits that do the economy no good, China is emerging as the victor of the Russia-Ukraine war, and the United States and Israel versus Iran war. China produces hardly a trickle of the energy fuel that its vast economy requires. The trickle was not even China’s in the beginning. It had to seize and colonize neighboring territories to acquire this little indigenous supply. As things have turned out in this current decade, China may have acquired among the biggest reserves of oil on the planet, and they are not underground. They are above ground. Contained in depots, ever increasing in size and number. It does not matter how crude the oil is: China has refining capacity, and the reserves can be put to use in no time at all.

China has bought and been buying these reserves on the (very) cheap. It has taken advantage of the tight situation war-torn countries have found themselves in because of US and Western sanctions to strike the proverbial Chinaman’s bargain. For the oil flowing through the pipeline China and Russia agreed to build, China demanded that its price be the same as Russians pay at their gasoline stations. For the same money the Chinese pay for oil, they have in addition obtained concessions for developing natural resources in the Eastern or Asian part of Russia that China has a historical claim of owning at lease terms tantamount to owning the lands the resources are found in.

A triumph that US President Donald Trump claims to have made during his last visit to Beijing is that he got Chinese President Xi Jinping to agree that the Strait of Hormuz should be open to international waters and all ships should be able to cross the strait toll-free. This was no victory for Trump, since the reason Xi agreed is getting clearer by the day. The strait remains closed; a tanker was struck recently by Iranian projectiles. Unbeknownst to the public, tankers crossing the strait are paying the exorbitant toll placed by sources at a million dollars per barrel. The strait is closed, and the toll must be paid by everyone except for China. During the US blockade, Chinese purchases of Iranian oil discounted in huge quantities allowed the economy not only to survive but to thrive. China continues to import oil from Iran big and cheap. (Can anyone be blamed if he becomes suspicious of what exactly Trump and Xi negotiated in Beijing, and what his negotiators, Trump’s son-in-law and a close associate of the Trump business empire, strangers to negotiating for the national interest, with representatives of the Islamic Republic of Iran whose legitimacy is currently doubted by much of the world? An apparently very lucrative joint tolling venture?).

China’s depots are awash with cheap oil from Russia and Iran. While the rest of the world, including especially China’s adversaries, are groaning from high oil prices or their supply not coming in on time at all. China has so much more oil than it needs that it has thought of using the excess in a war strategy favored by ancient Chinese strategists: of winning not by wielding a stick but by dangling a carrot? It has offered Taiwan, so dependent on imported oil and natural gas, energy security in exchange for its minds becoming more positive about linking up with the mainland?

But the Chinese strategists of old did not have peace in mind. They are about winning a war without fighting. The carrot is bullying made subtle. China has made Taiwan only aware of the weak and dangerous position it is in.

Logistics, such as energy supply, being more important in deciding a war than bravery, it is not surprising that the level of Chinese bullying in the West Philippine Sea is escalating. Alas, the aggressive activities of the Chinese in the South China Sea nowadays catch the attention of the Philippine public less than internal affairs that shake the confidence of the people in their own government and leaders. President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. has called on the Armed Forces of the Philippines to be vigilant about the moves of the foreign countries in the South China Sea as if the peace in the region is the exclusive domain of the military.

These internal squabbles have made many among us unaware of the dangerous world we live in. The leader of the country with whom the Philippines has the only mutual defense agreement has joined the ranks of autocrats thirsting for territorial conquest. He has ignored the destructive effect on his country’s alliances of his own desire to invade countries that are members of his country’s alliances. He is dreaming of warring on so many fronts that even the biggest military in the world would be at a loss to fight with equal effectiveness.