China and the USA's Pivot to the East

'China's economy was 87% the size of the US economy..This would have many important consequences beyond the most obvious – that the US, the symbol of post-second world war democracy and western capitalist beliefs, is no longer the world's biggest economy'.

China's economic power is one thing; its potential military weight, however, is being offset in advance by the US through Obama's 'pivot to Asia' strategy which, since 2011, has sought to counter an increase in China's economic and political power in the Far East.

There is no evidence the US intends giving up its global dominance. In particular Washington has made plain it intends to back its south east Asian allies in their disputes with China over access to the oil of the South China Sea. There is also a dispute between Japan and China, in the East China Sea, over the Senkaku /Diaoyu islands

As Michael Klare points out, the US has created an 'anti-Chinese coalition on China’s periphery' by providing military support to India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam, a strategy responded to by China bolstering is naval fleet.

The US promotion of free trade ties to Asian states is already under threat from China's model of development in which states supply them with raw material and in return benefit from investments in infrastructure, partnership with Chinese businesses and arms sales.

With the shale oil and gas 'revolution', the US has become less interested in the Middle East as it was under George Bush. Instead, the aim is to contain China as this nascent economic superpower made inroads into both Eurasia and the Pacific regions in the 2000s when the US was bogged down in the Iraq War

China is set to become more dependent upon oil from the unstable Middle East than the US. By securing naval dominance of the South China sea and other vital sea lanes through which oil and LNG flows, the US can thereby put itself in a power political position so as to hold China in check.

In Egypt, the Obama administration was prepared to tacitly acknowledge the military coup of 2013 as it wants to preserve its influence over the Suez Canal, the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden ( one reason for US concern for Yemen and also Somalia where oil is present ).

In Afghanistan, the continued presence of US forces and mercenaries is concerned with containing Chinese inroads there as regards its competition for lithium and other minerals. The TAPI pipeline would also bind Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India closer as a bulwark against Chinese influence.

China's influence in Iran was a major reason for the growing importance of the TAPI pipeline, a  main geopolitical ambition of the Afghanistan war ( though unmentionable to the US and European publics ). which would block off Iran's rival IP pipeline and work towards isolating it.

The rise of the Chinese super-economy and rivalry with the US for control over energy supplies and resources is part of a global New Great Game. An arms race and ferocious competition to court oil and gas producing states is as important as China's clout in global economic institutions.

A pathological race for resources stretching from the Greater Middle East to the Eurasian landmass through to the Pacific is on and could herald a new epoch of proxy conflicts ( e.g Syria ), terrorist blowback from destabilised regions, resource wars and the rise of authoritarian security states.

In that sense, China, far from being an anomaly with its authoritarian political structure and turbocapitalist economy, may be a model that other states across the globe would start to converge towards, including the democratic states of Europe and the US ( as predicted in Huxley's Brave New World revisited )

Egypt: The New Great Game and Global Arms Race

'The EU's top diplomat...Lady Ashton ( a Labour Peer ) is in Cairo to try to negotiate an unlikely settlement between Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood and the army, but demands and recent behaviour from both sides mean reconciliation is far from likely.'

So reports the Guardian's Patrick Kingsley. Lady Ashton has reported from an undisclosed location after having been escorted there by the Egyptian army that ex-president Morsi is doing 'well', knows what is going on in the world and that she would not comment on her visit as "I was not going to represent his views".

It is hard to see what bargaining power Ashton actually has and whether this is mere 'public diplomacy' to make it appear as though the EU is in the business of 'democracy promotion' as opposed to promoting its business interests over democracy in the name of 'stability'.

The two, business interests and democracy, are not necessarily incompatible. Yet the military takeover is not very likely to promote democracy as the old Mubarak era elites in the 'deep state' are only prepared to tolerate a measure of it provided they can stave off any threats to their hegemony in Egypt.

The only thing Ashton seems to have offered is vacuous platitudes about the need for a "fully inclusive transition process, taking in all political groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood". That will impress neither the Muslim Brotherhood not the Egyptian army which is backed directly by Washington.

The reason the US will not remove its $1.3bn funding is that an authoritarian regime is favoured by strategic partners and major suppliers of oil to the US such as Saudi Arabia. The kingdom fears the spread of Muslim Brotherhood ideas in the region and a weak regime in which terrorists can thrive.

Indeed, after Mubarak fell in 2011 and the US switched to supporting a democratic transition in Egypt, Saudi Arabia indicated that it could draw closer to new emerging energy hungry industrial powers such as India and China. This is poses a threat to US hegemony over the Gulf region.

Moreover, Egyptian generals have long indicated that the $1.3 billion US military aid, which has not changed since 1978, is not substantial enough. There has been resistance to the army downscaling its military capacity to act only as a rapid deployment force to defend Western oil interest in the Gulf.

Given Egypt's global geostrategic significance occupying the land bridge between North Africa and the Middle East, and with the Suez Canal and the SUMED pipeline, the Egyptian military and the 'deep state' have every interest in playing off rival suitors vying for influence in the region.

Ultimately, Washington will not want to sacrifice influence both in Egypt and Saudi Arabia against China's and Russia's attempt to make strategical inroads into the Middle East. There is an arms race now on with both Great Powers which are eager to gain a foothold and diplomatic leverage.

A Congressional Service Report in late 2011 revealed that Egypt purchased $800 million in Chinese weapons since 2003 and $600 million from Russia. That led to the US increasing its sales of weapons to Egypt from $4.5 billion between 2003 and 2007 to $7.8 billion from 2007 to 2011.

Compared to these broader trends and the feared decline of the US as a world empire, the delay in delivering four F-16 fighter jets to Egypt is a mere diplomatic token gesture no less than Lady Ashton's show of concern about the democratic transition being placed back on track through being 'inclusive'.

Egypt is the site of a brutal power struggle in which the army can ramp up the the stakes by executing a military coup in the name of preserving 'stability' . Then, as General Sisi has indicated, the consequent rise of terrorist threats as all the more reason why those interested in regional stability should support it.

These are the realities of the West being far too dependent upon oil and gas to fuel their high octane economies. The EU state's representatives will warble on about human rights and democracy but are always prepared to do that while leaving the real business of energy geopolitics to the US and NATO.

Both in the Middle East and in Central Asia a New Great Game is on between the major powers for control over oil supplies and the pipeline routes that ensure hegemony. Egypt is squarely in the middle of that global contest as is Syria, Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan, the latter being another pipeline transit state.

Why the US Cannot Call a Coup a Coup .

"We have had a long relationship with Egypt and the Egyptian people and it would not be wise to abruptly change our assistance programme.. ..The smart policy is to review this matter...There is not a simple or easy answer here"- Jay Carney, US spokesman.

The US is clearly hamstrung on the military takeover ( i.e coup ) because it cannot be seen to be be backing the army against the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood when it is backing the Sunni insurgents in their struggle against President Assad's Alawi Shia regime in Syria.

In Syria the Muslim Brotherhood has been a major component of the armed opposition to Assad backed by Turkey, a NATO nation, and the removal of Morsi has deprived them of one of its most significant backers and ideological support from its original homeland.

It would be absurd for the US to openly back the army takeover as its erstwhile enemy Assad has claimed "What is happening in Egypt is the fall of what is known as political Islam..whoever uses religion for political aims, or to benefit some and not others, will fall".

Despite the predictable claims that the CIA just must have been behind the coup ( without any evidence ) there was absolutely no interest the US could have had in either backing one or even being seen to back on. It has taken the US by surprise and it has no idea how to react.

In fact, only Tony Blair has openly criticised the Muslim Brotherhood and advocated working with the new government, something that clearly has more to do with his obsession with the idea that 'inactivity' is a policy choice with consequences too ( mostly due to his role in the invasion of Iraq ).

The US is probably hoping that the killing of 51 Muslim Brotherhood supporters cannot lead to a reaction strong enough to pose serious resistance to the military's position in Egypt which it secures through its funding. If some radicals resort to terrorism, then the US can justify that subsidy.

If, however, if the calls by the Muslim Brotherhood leaders to 'rise up' go beyond street protest, leading to further provocations and heavy handed military responses, the potential for serious civil conflict will grow and this is bound to call into question the wisdom of giving arms to the Syrian insurgents.