Canada shouldn’t follow Trump’s suicidal path
Peter Frankopan, in his superb book “The Silk Roads: A New History of the World,” describes the present turmoil in central Asia as “the birthing pains of a region that once dominated the intellectual, cultural and economic landscape and which is re-emerging. We are seeing the world’s centre of gravity shifting — back to where it lay for millennia.”
Frankopan then goes on to recount why this is happening. The most important factor, he holds is the rich endowment of natural resources, including hydrocarbons, rare earths, precious metals, copper zinc and others. He describes the booming cities throughout the region from the western shores of the Caspian Sea to the Pacific Ocean. Oil and gas pipelines link the region to domestic and foreign markets in Europe and Africa.
Railroads, one more than 11,000 kilometres long, run from China to Duisburg in Germany using trains more than threequarters of a kilometre in length that can make the trip in less than 16 days. This is far shorter than the sea routes from Asia to Europe. And plans are being made to build rail links from Beijing to virtually every capital in central Asia. Similarly, air connections between cities throughout the region and to most of the major world centres are already as dense as air routes in Europe or North America. Telecommunications are also growing at an impressive speed using satellites rather than ground-based wires and cables.
All of this lends credence to former U.S. president Barack Obama’s conclusion on reviewing a report prepared by the Department of Defence in 2012: Our nation is at a moment of transition. As the report made clear, to meet the challenges facing the world and the U.S. and to take advantage of the opportunities these changes create will require a complete re-orientation of U.S. policy and presence towards the Asia Pacific region.
But President Donald Trump, at least in these first few weeks, seems focused on pulling the U.S. into a shell of protectionism that will undoubtedly encourage China to become ever more assertive in its relations with other nations in the Far East, thereby displacing and reducing the influence and power of the U.S.
In rejecting the Trans Pacific Partnership, so laboriously and diligently negotiated over several years, Trump threw away a treaty that would strengthen trade under a defined set of rules.
Nations could have relied upon that treaty to withstand pressure to bully them in the acquiescing to China’s push to have their way on intellectual property, compensation on trade and tariffs. Most traders devoutly wish for such a rule-based regime in which trade can thrive.
Indeed, instead of killing TPP as a sop to his anti-globalization base, Trump should have seen it for what it was — a triumph for American diplomacy — and sold it relentlessly to Congress and to the voters.
Its success might well have persuaded China and other nations throughout Asia to consider joining. But that was all thrown away without thoughtful analysis by a president whose intellectual rigour has the consistency of warm jello.
Given what has happened to TPP, what should Canada do? First we need to determine, with the other remaining 10 members of TPP, whether it can be successful without the U.S. as a member.
Is there some alternative that preserves the major benefits of the treaty? Then there needs to be a full-fledged conference of the 11 nations someplace in Asia, perhaps Singapore, to hammer out an agreement and push for its early ratification.
We should leave the Americans and the Chinese to deal with their mutual concerns while the new multilateral partnership is negotiated and then let them both know they would be welcome to join at some future date — on the terms established by the 11 founders of TPP2.
Failing that, if the Americans want to commit economic suicide, there is little we can do.
David Bond is an author and retired bank economist.