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Comment by AsyncAwait | Hacker News Reader

> This seems reasonable

Does it? The U.S went to wars, killing hundreds of thousands of civilians to force open markets to its products, it has been preaching the free market mantra for decades. Regardless of everything else about China, they're now starting to make some actually compelling products so the U.S is acting out.

I know the argument is that Chinese companies are just an extension of the state, but you could say the same in reverse about the U.S.

I just assumed it's going to be more subtle than this, as an EU citizen, this sends a clear signal to me that the EU is only an 'ally' as long as it keeps buying American products.

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> I know the argument is that Chinese companies are just an extension of the state, but you could say the same in reverse about the U.S

What

The US state being an extension of US companies, thanks to all the lobbying, collusion and some underhanded moves.

I think a good argument can be made that Lockheed Martin and Boeing are extensions of the USG.

The US and citizens, even without direct stock, are beneficial owners of US companies because they contribute to the economy and livelihood of the local economy... that and National Security Letters.

Also US started wars , military actions or changed the governments around the world,spied(maybe assassinations - I would apreciate someone if knows of a good example of this) , pushed international law for the interest of the big companies(aka for money) ex the banana wars https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Wars

Also the government will intervene on the internal market too with money,subsidies, regulations,exceptions to help the big companies,

in t he end the state and big companies are in a long relationship and there is no way you can deny this just ways you can try to find arguments that is fair and honest.

Since the US gained global dominance post WW2 with the Marshall plan I don't think the US has ever really been that subtle about maintaining capitalist free market dominance.

As you say, now that China is producing compelling products the US is flexing a bit more because it sees a serious non ally threat to US interests. The biggest shame of it is that it is so unfortunate that China isn't more politically and legally upstanding and morally respectable like Europe is.

I think you have cause and effect mixed up. The U.S. became a postwar economic superpower not because of the Marshall Plan, but because its chief competitors in Europe and the Pacific had utterly ruined one another’s economies after years of total war. Meanwhile, the United States’ manufacturing capacity had continued to expand.

The Marshall Plan certainly exposed Europeans to more American products, especially Hollywood and pop culture. However, the majority of Marshall Plan funds were given as grants, not loans - ultimately, even to Germany. American capital did not come to own and exploit Western Europe. On the contrary, one of the Marshall Plan’s main effects was to reduce intra-Europe trade barriers, setting the stage for the E.E.C. and later, the European Union.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marshall_Plan

I misworded my comment, I meant that the Marshall Plan was the first obvious act in their own corporate self interest. You can't sell anything to people with no money.

How much do you think the Marshall plan accelerated the repair and growth of Europe?

>How much do you think the Marshall plan accelerated the repair and growth of Europe?

I’m not sure what you expect me to say. I think the academic consensus is, “by a lot.” I think the immediate European reaction was also, “it’s great that we’ve rebuilt our own means of production with generous outside assistance, while retaining ownership and without accruing huge debts.”

I’m a little confused. What was the nefarious aspect of the Marshall Plan? Why was it bad to help Germans rebuild Volkswagen factories, in order that they might trade things Americans want for things that Germans want?

I'm not denying the mutual benefit of the Marshall Plan. Of course it was a great help to Europe in the post war rebuild.

But had Europe not been an opportunity market for US industry then I suspect the Marshall Plan would have never happened or maybe I'm just cynical.

> I don't think the US has ever really been that subtle about maintaining capitalist free market dominance.

Excuse me for my ignorance, but what makes US' economy a free market capitalism?

Definition of free market: "in economics, a free market is a system in which the prices for goods and services are determined by the open market and by consumers. In a free market, the laws and forces of supply and demand are free from any intervention by a government or other authority and from all forms of economic privilege, monopolies and artificial scarcities."

Correct me if I am wrong, but this most definitely does not seem to be the case. There are regulations, price controls, subsidies, tariffs and other government interferences with freedom of exchange that distort the market.

The issue isn't about how the US regulates free market activities. It is about how the US uses it's power and influence to undermine the sovereign decisions of other nations that might be detrimental to US trade.

Things like protectionism, how a country may choose to do trade (e.g the currency they trade in E.g petrodollar), the rights to a countries natural resources (E.g nationalisation). These tools are effective for underdeveloped countries that don't have the market and production efficiencies to compete on a global stage or the money to subsidise nationally important yet expensive businesses like farming.

Adam Smith effectively said that trade is good because it frees up the utility of your worker to do work of a greater economic benefit and that it made greater sense to buy from a supplier nation that can produce the same product more efficiently.

Those countries with inefficient and unproductive economies don't have the high skill economically more valuable jobs so for them trade isn't an opportunity for growth because it just undermines their local economy by taking away local jobs.

>The U.S went to wars, killing hundreds of thousands of civilians to force open markets to its products

This is a standard Marxist explanation for U.S. overseas military intervention [0]. It is also largely wrong.

Let’s look at the data. After 16 years of obscenely expensive American intervention in Iraq, that country exports more to China than the U.S., and imports more from China and Turkey together than from all other trade partners combined [1]. Likewise, Afghanistan today imports almost nothing from the U.S., but relies heavily on exports from China and Iran - two major U.S. competitors [2]. This is, of course, geographical common sense. If anything, recent U.S. wars have opened new markets for China, their number one geopolitical competitor.

Looking further back, Germany, Japan, and South Korea have all developed into financially independent trading partners. Far from U.S. capital dominating Japan, Americans were afraid for quite some time that Japanese cars, electronics, and industrial equipment would completely displace their American equivalents.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxist_explanations_of_warfar... [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Iraq [2] http://stat.wto.org/CountryProfile/WSDBCountryPFView.aspx?La...

> After 16 years of obscenely expensive American intervention in Iraq, that country exports more to China than the U.S. and imports more from China and Turkey together than from all other trade partners combined [0]. Likewise, Afghanistan today imports almost nothing from the U.S. but relies heavily on exports from China and Iran

U.S military contractors got handsomely rich off both Afghanistan and Iraq and both nations are almost exclusively importing American military equipment. As for civilian items, the average income of an Afghan/Iraqi civilian is not enough to afford American products, but just because not every U.S economic sector benefited does not mean it wasn't worth it for the likes of Raytheon.

As for Iran being very close to Iraq now, that certainly wasn't the plan, is just that there are other players in the world making moves and reacting to U.S. ones and sometimes they come out on top, particularly if they happen to understand the local political dynamic better, because they're actually from the area.

>As for civilian items, the average income of an Afghan/Iraqi civilian is not enough to afford American product

OK, so that completely breaks the first part of traditional Marxist arguments. I will grudgingly admit, however, that the U.S. tried for many years and at great expense to improve the economic situation of average Iraqis to a point where they could afford American-made goods.

>U.S military contractors got handsomely rich off both Afghanistan and Iraq and both nations are almost exclusively importing American military equipment.

I’d 100% agree with you there. However, the military-industrial complex is a very different beast than Lenin’s theory of imperial monopoly capitalism. The M.I.C. is to me a far simpler and more boring explanation, and one which bears up better under scrutiny, than the Marxist theory of warfare which your OP postulated.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marxist_explanations_of_warfar...

The explanation is not wrong.

They are running rival concentration camps, I can't imagine the competition is welcome.

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