Sunday Cutdown XXXIII (14 July 2024)
Clearing my inbox of stories I want to document
1) India will starve or become a food superpower: pick one.
NIKKEI ASIA: India’s Climate Crisis
ECONOMIST: The world’s next food superpower
India attracts great hype today and great pessimism, marking it as the country of note right now.
India’s demographic dividend of 500m souls is the biggest one yet, far larger than SE Asia’s or even China’s preceding it. The world economy needs its growth trajectory to continue and expand, particularly as the Subcontinent serves to springboard what comes later this century: an even bigger demographic dividend across Africa. Frankly, the world will need a strong and vigorous China AND India to pull that one off.
This is why I argue against viewing India as a useful cudgel against “peaking China.” India’s rise is too important to be wasted or even diverted to the counter-productive task of containing China. America cannot become the force set on holding back the progress of others; it will kill our national brand’s appeal by making us seem like an aged power totally obsessed with defending its wealth (never a good look).
Therein lies the threat of Trump’s economic nationalism — an aged power obsessed with defending his wealth.
While we as a nation need to shift from our long-held market-making bias (caring as much or more about the world system than our own needs) to one more appropriately self-interested (a legit market-playing role), the danger of going overboard in this correction is plainly manifested by some of the truly nutty and self-destructive plans of Trump’s Project 2025. Wreaking chaos and destruction on the so-called administrative state while layering on tariffs throughout the economy will only kneecap our capacity to compete with other superpowers in the years and decades ahead. We’ll signal a full retreat while other superpowers look to organize and win the Global South in all manner of ways (investment, trade, networks, 5G, IoT, AIoT, etc.)
Ah, but I get a bit wound up here (how Bidean) and lose my train of thought: the core dynamic that must unfold in India’s rise is the successful transformation of its labor-heavy agricultural sector (still a whopping 45% of workers) into something far more productive amidst what is clearly going to be climate change’s extreme stressing of much of the nation’s farmland.
Nikkei Asia looks mostly at the downside here: climate change-driven mega-droughts sap hydropower capacity, forcing India to rely more on coal to keep its population cool during these stunning heat waves. Naturally, burning coal only extends the negative dynamic.
Meanwhile, the Economist, bullish as usual, seeks to cast India’s great Achilles heel (ag sector) as its logical breakthrough point. Makes sense to those given to taking on problem-sets aggressively.
Expect to see these dueling interpretations in the years ahead: the fight over the most accurate narrative on India will be fierce. Those committed entho-nationalists will harp on the negatives, while the progressives and free-traders will focus on the positives.
Like James T. Kirk, I don’t believe in the no-win scenario — not part of my job description, so you know where I stand.
2) China is building the RE Economy
E360: China Building Twice as Much Wind and Solar as Rest of World Combined
Honestly, I say congrats whenever I see this stuff:
China is erecting twice as much wind and solar capacity as every other country put together, according to a new analysis of large renewable energy projects. Increasingly, wind and solar are edging coal off the power grid.
This is China embracing the inevitable (gotta move down the carbon chain on energy production) while running with the seemingly inconceivable (so why not aspire to drive a global revolution in the process?).
That is taking a problem and making it a strength.
Here’s a slide I’m working on as part of my second MOOC (Massive Open Online Course) at U Maryland for edX and ultimately Coursera. It is eye-catching:
What I see here: somebody (China, EU) has an industrial policy looking to dominate a Green Revolution as it spreads around the planet. America’s in the mix alright, but one spots far greater geopolitical ambition among the competition, yes?
Meanwhile, we’ve got governors censoring the words climate change in government publications.
Who do you think is going to win and rule this century based on these indicators?
3) We can do or we can teach. What’s your pleasure?
GLOBAL TIMES: Central Asia transformed from landlocked region to Eurasia transport hub under BRI, SCO framework
China is running with the Belt and Road initiative (somewhere well north of 150 participating countries) and the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) — both committed to connecting Central Asia to the wider world.
Useful? Of course it is.
Trade integration (intra-regional trade) across the Former Soviet Union/ Commonwealth of Independent States is minuscule at 15%. It is stunningly worse (5%) across South Asia.
These are hugely unorganized economic landscapes — globalization’s highly active frontiers.
China has some HUGE answers to this problem set; America and Europe have some sanctions. India itself … can feel its ambitions skyrocketing.
This is not a question of who wins, as the West most certainly will not. We lecture and scold and demand while China builds with an eye to meeting local demand.
China is making the effort, so China deserves to win — to whatever extent allowed by India’s growing counter-responses balanced by New Delhi’s willingness to go along (the biding-time strategy) in the near term.
We can feel bad about that, because it’s no longer America being the lead integrator like we were with Asia (Japan, then Tigers, then China, now being eclipsed across SE Asia), or we can recognize the economic logic (the last integrated becomes the next integrator of note, meaning we are now several steps away from that role).
Our leadership is no longer so “indispensable.” Or better put, our leadership is both necessary and insufficient.
Accepting that reality would allow us to re-focus on doing the same where it most makes sense for us going forward — namely, integrating Latin America into a larger US-led W. Hemispheric hub of trade, investment, integration, and strength.
Trump wants to go home, I want to go big — much bigger than playing Cold War games with China, Russia, and India (way too much of Biden).
Thus it is high time we moved past Boomer political leadership by any means possible.
And yes, that means I want Joe to go.
4) Everything old is new again
WHYY: Three Mile Island considers nuclear restart as Pa. lawmakers look to new tech to meet demand
The curious dynamic of all this push toward the IoT, AI and the AIoT: tremendous requirements for power and cooling of vast hardware IT complexes (often identified as server farms). Requirements so vast that true inconceivables are being contemplated, like reopening the infamous Three Mile Island nuclear power plant.
The distinction here is fine: Unit 2 is the one that suffered the meltdown back in 1979. Unit 1 apparently didn’t fully shut down until 2019, and that’s the one being reconsidered for possible reactivation as it previously had regulatory permission to operate through 2034.
Live long enough and just about anything comes back round again.
5) Too hot for them birds
WAPO: As extreme heat bakes the West, emergency helicopters struggle to fly
It makes perfect sense when you think about it: when it gets super-hot, it gets super-hard to fly helicopters.
I mean, biologists have already noted how climate change is transforming actual birds for all of the same reasons: getting smaller to reduce load requirement & improve cooling dynamics while growing wings longer to achieve more lift capacity.
Tell me this isn’t the same problem set driving the rapid evolution of birds:
When it is hot out, the air is thin, meaning choppers’ blades have less air to grab onto. That affects their ability to lift off and navigate. The systems onboard can overheat and stop working. Pilots have to make adjustments to weight, equipment and route planning — or they may have to decline to go altogether.
We live in a natural world that demands more and more of our attention and respect over how much we have altered it.
That is the great inevitability of this century, dwarfing, and thus subordinating all others to, the inconceivables it will force on both humanity and the rest of the world’s species.
6) Both Biden and Ukraine-NATO on irreversible courses
NYT: For Ukraine, an ‘Irreversible’ Path to NATO Clouded by Uncertainty
The picture says a lot: out with the really old and in with the far younger.
Okay, that’s just being cruel.
But the irreversibility vibe is real on both counts:
The only way this conflict concludes in a fashion acceptable to NATO (partial win at best) is for Ukraine to be granted expedited admission in compensation for its inevitable territorial losses. Nothing less is acceptable. Blathered threats of WWIII (complete nonsense) aside, that is as good as it will get so long as Putin walks the earth.
The balance here is clear enough: NATO isn’t going to escalate to all-in war to stop Putin’s various annexations, but Russia isn’t going to escalate to an all-in war to stop Ukraine’s admission. Both sides can claim they “won” and the conflict will freeze and be superseded by Putin’s next inevitable gambit.
Of course, all of this goes by the wayside with a Trump win. His Retribution Tour must certainly include Ukraine and Zelensky. This is why NATO made these brave noises now in an effort to Trump-proof the solidarity of NATO Europe.
Sad and embarrassing to witness as a US national security professional?
Troubling in the extreme.
But NATO’s European leadership can spot the irreversibility of Biden’s fall, and they need to look out for themselves. Things can only get worse.
7) Spymobiles
FORTUNE: Chinese self-driving cars have quietly traveled 1.8 million miles on U.S. roads, collecting detailed data with cameras and lasers
Who needs spy balloons when your experimental self-driving cars can map out an entire nation from the street view up?
Frankly, in this environment, I’d purposefully put a balloon up there to capture your interest while the real work is going on.
China is applying this sort of ambition across the world.
Meanwhile, America is mostly focused on trying to contain China’s ambitions instead of countering them with grand strategies of its own.
Our growing tendency to accept the narrative of peaking-and-declining China works against us. It tends to provide strategic top cover to those arguing for a regressive cultural revolution within America (Project 2025, White Christian Nationalism, our Catholic-sharia SCOTUS), when such a self-destructive turn will ruin us just like Mao’s 1960s variant did to China.
Such Great Leaps Backward invariably self-destruct, and maybe America is doomed to undergo just such a lesson so as to trigger the much-needed Progressive Era to come.
But, man, consider the vast opportunity costs that will be incurred.
By the time we emerge all damaged from Trump II, others will have organized our world far beyond our capacity to contest it.
8) AI smash!
NYT: A.I. Helped to Find a Vast Source of the Copper That A.I. Needs to Thrive
AI hangry!
AI prospect!
AI find!
AI dig!
AI eat!
AI stronger!
AI hangrier!
9) Progress amidst backsliding on energy sources
VISUAL CAPITALIST: What Powered the World in 2023?
It’s all good, right?
Understand, total world energy power in 2000 was about 400 EJ (exajoule), meaning a rough 50% increase overall since then.
For example, when you consider our absolute use of oil over this timeframe, today’s share of 23 percent equates to about 140 EJ, whereas our higher share back in 2000 (36-37%) basically shakes out at the same level (about 140 EJ).
Still, that’s real progress when you consider the explosion in auto use since 2000 (rough doubling of global car fleet). We’ve basically reached Peak Oil with zero economic freakout.
Good work, world!
As for coal, our 2000 share of 23-24% has actually risen to 32%, reflecting the great rise in energy demand in emerging markets where coal is the go-to on cost and existing infrastructure. Thus, with the overall increase of 50% since 2000, the world is using a lot more coal today (a rough doubling).
Natural gas has likewise exploded in use, rising from 21-22% in 2000 to 26% now, or another rough doubling in total EJ.
Thus, so far, gasoline holding steady while coal and NG doubling — a mixed bag when you’re trying to limit CO2 emissions.
Renewable energy (RE) stands at 18% now, versus only about … 18% back in 2000 (nukes down, hydro up, others up), which means collectively they’ve absolutely increased by 50%. That is significant growth while simultaneously holding one’s percentage shares roughly in place.
Sigh, right?
As much as no environmentally-minded person welcomes the whole “all of the above” approach on energy, that is an enduring reality when overall use is going up so fast and the vast majority of that growth in in emerging/rising economies.
But that’s also what makes China’s push to dominate REs so smart and — frankly — laudable, particularly if Trump II sends us back to deep fossil fuel reliance.
I know, I know. It’s hard to imagine a leader on more wrong sides of history than Trump. He exploits all the correct fears but answers with all the wrong solutions.
10) Too many soldiers or not enough?
FOREIGN POLICY: The Return of the Military Draft
AXIOS: One-third of U.S. military could be robotic, Milley predicts
Foreign Policy doesn’t typically swim that hard against the tide, but this piece is a doozy. Ukraine and Gaza “proving” the need for more boots on the ground?
Right as Ukraine is redefining the battlespace from human to unmanned & robotic, FP goes with a call for the return of the draft?
That’s about as brain-dead as arguing that women should be included in the draft.
What world are these people living in? Hell, let’s include dogs in the draft.
Oh crap! They thought of that too.
Time to break out your VCR tape of Robocop. Gotta stay abreast of all these tech revolutions!
And yes, with that last aside, I am indicating that I think unmanned systems similarly crowd out carbon-based lifeforms in the domestic policing world of tomorrow.
11) Welcome to the world of tomorrow!
NBC NEWS: Panama is using barbed wire to try to block a major route for U.S.-bound migrants
How much you wanna bet we put them up to it?
In a bid to block U.S.-bound migrants, Panama has installed barbed-wire fencing along the Darien Gap, sparking panic among migrants trying to cross the jungle that links South and Central America — but not necessarily stopping them.
Videos of the barbed-wire barriers appeared as early as June 27 in WhatsApp groups for people planning to migrate to the U.S., causing users to ask who was behind the move and if they could still get across the jungle. Since then, the Ministry of Public Security of the Republic of Panama has claimed responsibility for the new installations.
Barbed-wire doesn’t stop anybody.
This is the state of America’s response to growing migration increasingly fueled by climate change. I can definitely see it working in the Wooooooooorld of Tomorrow!
Insert finger here:
Meanwhile, pay no attention to the rising tide of water, people, whatever.
12) Oh, Canada!
REUTERS: Canada takes step to acquire up to 12 submarines to guard Arctic
I get the focus on icebreakers, and I get the focus on subs.
But I can’t help thinking that unmanned vehicles will inevitably prevail, right?
We’re talking the world’s longest coastline — even longer than Russia’s. That sounds like a problem best solved by the many, the indifferent, the robots!
You seem particularly concerned this morning about our nation's current path. Understandable. An election choosing between a decrepit on one side and christian infused nationalism abetting really poor policy choices on the other seems sub-optimal. Meanwhile the world moves on.