Made in China 2025

Why China might reassess strategic naval control of the South China Sea in 2020.

• Made in China 2025
• New Silk Road Initiative

@john.grant, I am afraid I do not understand the map.

The Made in China 2025 sounds like a good forward plan, but does it depend on the New Silk Road Initiative? The New Silk Road seems to be built rather to prevent Chinese Belt And Road Initiative[1] than to support it.

Sourch China Sea seems to be of critical importance to China[2], as it has plenty of resources and is a major crude oil import path. If the sea is so important to China, then other countries working against China have major interest in slowing/stopping China.

Elections in the US are a big opportunity for China. If US will want to change the course of the politics based on the ressentiment to the current president, China may secure the sea. However, if that does not happen, tensions will rather escalate. So, I’d see it as:

Things that I cannot represent yet are who controls which components. I still consider Chinese partnerships to be weaker than US ones (this may be my own bias), which means that China can press only as much as not to cause more retaliatory actions than it can handle. On the other hand, it has to press to cause retaliatory actions to keep US busy.

The winner gets prosperity for the next couple of decades.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Belt_and_Road_Initiative
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_China_Sea

Thank you for your map and comments @chris.daniel. Interesting reading.

The MIC 2025 map is based within the context of this set of assumptions that will ultimately lead to a world of multiple reserve currencies:

• In October we’ll see a tsunami of small to medium sized business insolvencies
• The outcome of the 2020 US presidential election is by no means certain and the outcome is likely to be disputed
• During the chaos following the US election, China will see how far they can push strategic naval control in the South China Sea - perhaps even attempting to take control of Taiwan. This will probably fail
• The US response will be chaotic and that will destabilise the dollar. This will lead to a collapse in financial markets
• All banks will be nationalised by the end of the year in an attempt to maintain continuity in the economy
• Zombie companies will default and many institutions will become insolvent
• There will be a sharp increase in structural unemployment
• The value of gold, silver, bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies will appreciate
• China will introduce their CBDC

I have posted related Wardley maps in the Map Camp Slack for comments. I will post the remaining series of maps on this forum once completed.

The semiconductor problem, and the increasing vulnerability of China’s economy – and its military – to supply constraints, is what will lead China to consider, finally, outright military action against Taiwan.

War With China? The Economic Factor That Could Trigger It

@john.grant, what a catch!

If you assume Simon’s observations are correct, China is trying to defuse the situation by heavy investment in tech on multiple levels (RISCV, technology below).

The US might have a very short time window.

With favourable policies, China's chip industry has entered the fast lane of development | total telecom.

The military-technological race aside, there is a wider issue; the One-China policy.

MIC 2025 and maintaining the status quo are contingent on perspectives. At the same time, viewpoints on the One-China policy are diverging.

Semiconductors are critical. But as noted above, a financial crisis could also act as a tipping point for a defensive move to restore stability by the CCP. Likewise, pre-emptively switching to the digital renminbi next year could also act as a tipping point for a disruptive move by Washington.

@chris.daniel I am not sure the best way to illustrate opposing forces of inertia on the same Wardley map (see map above). So, I have mapped the US perspective instead:

Pelosi Visits Taiwan and China Responds: Welcome to the New Normal

Reports of large multinationals planning to move assets and people out of Taiwan have started to circulate. We have heard of a number of such cases. In the wake of Russia’s Ukraine invasion, concerns over a future Taiwan invasion are starting to be taken seriously. Were Taiwan to step up certain defense preparations—something many observers deem necessary—these concerns would be reinforced.

Some data related to the Chinese CBDC: