Current Global Economic State/Outlook

[J Livermore]

About time the world's leaders stopped wasting money on weapons and spent it on cleaning up the planet etc.

If you think militaries are expensive you ought to try being occupied by a hostile army.

 

[Nowler]

If you think militaries are expensive you ought to try being occupied by a hostile army.

At first I was gonna say "that's such an American thing to say..."
But then I thought about it... it's true!

 

[J Livermore]

At first I was gonna say "that's such an American thing to say..."
But then I thought about it... it's true!

Hi Nowler,

The scary part of preparing to defend your nation is you never can truly know how much military is not enough or how much is overkill until it’s too late.

There is no way to read the minds of potential adversaries to know what amount of defence spending will deter them from aggression.

Before the outbreak of World War II France thought they were prepared for what was coming their way. I feel sorry for their citizens that lived through occupation and the other nations who were also victims of Blitzkrieg.

 

[Pat494]

Just a bit of trivia but the authors of THE book in the 1920s that expounded the tactics of Blitzkrieg were not German, But they did read the book and thought it was just what they needed.

 

[tomorton]

Hi Nowler,

The scary part of preparing to defend your nation is you never can truly know how much military is not enough or how much is overkill until it’s too late.

There is no way to read the minds of potential adversaries to know what amount of defence spending will deter them from aggression.

Before the outbreak of World War II France thought they were prepared for what was coming their way. I feel sorry for their citizens that lived through occupation and the other nations who were also victims of Blitzkrieg.

Military spending is (or could be with the right government leadership) worth far more than home defence. A strong military of course deters attacks on our homeland, but it also gives us options to protect the homelands of other people who don't have such a strong military. Or the homelands of people who are marginalised within their own countries.

A strong conventional military in Europe reduces the likelihood that nuclear weapons would need to be used tactically on the continent against a conventional aggressor, with the risk of potential escalation into nuclear attacks on homeland cities.

 

[Nowler]

Hi Nowler,

The scary part of preparing to defend your nation is you never can truly know how much military is not enough or how much is overkill until it’s too late.

There is no way to read the minds of potential adversaries to know what amount of defence spending will deter them from aggression.

Before the outbreak of World War II France thought they were prepared for what was coming their way. I feel sorry for their citizens that lived through occupation and the other nations who were also victims of Blitzkrieg.

I agree to a point.
While building a formidable military is a good way to defend yourself and make people think twice about invading you... going around forcing yourself on people is what paints a target on your back. At least a significant reason anyway.

Power corrupts!
Absolute power corrupts absolutely!

 

[Pat494]

It isn't just nasty dictators that use the false threat of being attacked to stay in power.
Lies more lies and damned lies imho
Trump is wasting more shedloads of money on the latest weapons even though the US is technically bankrupt.

 

[J Livermore]

It isn't just nasty dictators that use the false threat of being attacked to stay in power.
Lies more lies and damned lies imho
Trump is wasting more shedloads of money on the latest weapons even though the US is technically bankrupt.

Having a superior military in no way guarantees you against attack. Especially a surprise attack. Britain had a military more powerful than Argentina. This did not scare them. They invaded and captured the Falklands anyway. Only to pay a price after Britain responded.

 

[Nowler]

 

[Pat494]

The US versus China is more likely to be an escalation of the trade war.
If Trump gets re-elected then neither side will likely back down and it may well become a hot war with salvoes of nuclear missiles. I haven't heard Biden's attitude. Is it conciliatory or what ?
The US is trying to row back some of the distant losses suffered by US industry. Letting China devastate US industries is a costly mistake. They have new chip tech in the pipeline which is 100 times faster . I expect someone , if bribed enough will give China all the details though.
China has over played it's domineering position and the US may be able to squeeze them back into second place for a while.
Interesting times ahead. Europe and the rest will have to decide which side they are on for the coming fight.

 

[Nowler]

The US versus China is more likely to be an escalation of the trade war.
If Trump gets re-elected then neither side will likely back down and it may well become a hot war with salvoes of nuclear missiles. I haven't heard Biden's attitude. Is it conciliatory or what ?
The US is trying to row back some of the distant losses suffered by US industry. Letting China devastate US industries is a costly mistake. They have new chip tech in the pipeline which is 100 times faster . I expect someone , if bribed enough will give China all the details though.
China has over played it's domineering position and the US may be able to squeeze them back into second place for a while.
Interesting times ahead. Europe and the rest will have to decide which side they are on for the coming fight.

Biden is bound to be softer on China than Trump is.
Trump has got sand AND ant in his pants
Blaming China for the U.S willingly handing over their manufacturing, lol
Obviously China was going to take it... who wouldn't!?

I wonder what Kamala Harris will be like in this China/US spat...
There is a very good chance that she step up to POTUS as Biden is old as fk!
If the reaper don't come knocking, it'll be ill health!
8 years..? Nah! He'd be doing well to stay fit after 4 years.

Obama strutted in, and limped out
He aged about 22 years in 8

 

[Nowler]

China has over played it's domineering position and the US may be able to squeeze them back into second place for a while.
Interesting times ahead. Europe and the rest will have to decide which side they are on for the coming fight.

Overplayed?
How so?

I really admire China's long-game approach!
They have been selling US bonds too... Reducing their risk to a weaponised USD (along with other countries! with the Euro becoming prefered)

If their actions in certain situations (human rights, Hong Kong, Lining up to take Taiwan back etc) weren't so abrasive to the Western world, then more countries would be more willing to support them.

 

[Rufus_Leakey]

I haven't heard Biden's attitude. Is it conciliatory or what ?

It's "I'll say anything on my teleprompter to get votes, but do whatever it takes to make my family rich."

Hunter Biden teamed with Chinese military supplier to acquire dual-use Michigan auto parts maker

Biden’s investment fund BHR co-purchased Henniges Automotive with Chinese military contractor AVIC, which has been identified as front for China's military and was sanctioned before the Obama administration approved Biden-connected sale.

justthenews.com

As he was sewing up the Democrat nomination this spring, Joe Biden surprised many in foreign policy circles by publishing an essay arguing it was time to "get tough with China" and to stop its "robbing the United States and American companies of their technology and intellectual property."

For Biden, a four-decade advocate of trade and friendly relations with Beijing, it was a stunning turnabout that signaled the Democrat was concerned President Trump was winning the election-year battle over U.S.-China policy as tensions in the South China Sea, a trade war, and growing espionage cases created a Cold War-like atmosphere with China.

But for U.S. security experts, it was remarkable for another reason: An investment fund named Bohai Harvest RST (BHR) partly owned and directed by Biden's son, Hunter, and Secretary of State John Kerry's stepson, Chris Heinz, had just a few years earlier played a vital role in facilitating the sale of the Michigan-based auto parts maker Henniges Automotive to one of China's main military aircraft makers, Aviation Industry Corporation of China or AVIC.

That 2015 transaction approved by the Obama administration and its Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) came just 15 months after the United States publicly added one of AVIC's subsidiaries to a Commerce Department blacklist (known as the "Entity List") and just months before the Obama administration resumed patrols in the South China Sea because of increased Beijing military aggression in the region, where AVIC-built military jets partake in China's activities.

The timing has left many, including Senate Finance Committee chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa), questioning whether the CFIUS decision whitewashed security concerns because the vice president's son was involved in the transaction. Those concerns were heightened this June when the Pentagon listed the entire AVIC conglomerate on a list of companies subject to future sanctions because of its ties to the People's Liberation Army.

File
DODEntitiesLostJune2020.pdf
Grassley demanded a briefing from Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin last year, saying he was concerned because the Obama administration allowed the transaction to proceed even though Henniges possessed "anti-vibration technologies with military applications" and AVIC had a history of ties to China's military aggression dating to at least 2007. Officials said what Grassley learned in a classified briefing only heightened his concerns.

File
2019-08-14 CEG to Treasury (AVIC CFIUS).pdf
"The direct involvement of Mr. Hunter Biden and Mr. Heinz in the acquisition of Henniges by the Chinese government creates a potential conflict of interest," the senator wrote in an Aug. 14, 2019 letter. "Both are directly related to high-ranking Obama administration officials. The Department of State, then under Mr. Kerry's leadership, is also a CFIUS member and played a direct role in the decision to approve the Henniges transaction. The appearance of potential conflicts in this case is particularly troubling given Mr. Biden's and Mr. Heinz's history of investing in and collaborating with Chinese companies, including at least one posing significant national security concerns."

Hunter Biden's efforts to make money in China while his father oversaw U.S.-China policy have caused concern since the author Peter Schweizer highlighted the issue earlier this year in his new book "Profiles in Corruption." (Schweizer first exposed the Biden connection to the AVIC-Henniges deal in his New York Times #1 best seller "Secret Empires.")

In addition to his role in the Henniges transaction, Hunter Biden also flew aboard Air Force Two in December 2013 with his father to Beijing, where the son engaged in a private business discussion to do private business with Chinese officials that included talk of a $1 billion investment fund.

Hunter Biden's BHR fund also made an investment in 2014 in the China General Nuclear Power Corp., China's largest nuclear power company. In 2016, the company was charged along with a nuclear engineer named Szuhsiung "Allen" Ho for conspiring to help China illegally obtain "sensitive and controlled" nuclear technology from within the United States. Ho, a naturalized American citizen, pleaded guilty and was sentenced to two years in prison.

Michael Pillsbury, a China adviser to both the Obama administration and President Trump, said Joe Biden's long record of downplaying China's threat and his son's efforts to cash in on Beijing while his father was vice president "give reason for journalists to question the sincerity of Joe Biden's recent conversion to China hawk."

"The jet fighter and the aircraft carriers that China deploys to threaten the South China Seas can be traced back to financial transactions involving Hunter Biden's companies," Pillsbury said.

Roger Robinson, a former senior director for international economic affairs on President Ronald Reagan's National Security Council, told Just the News the U.S. government has known for years that AVIC has been helping China's military and aiding U.S. enemies and as such was sanctioned in the past. That record makes the Obama administration's transaction approval for Henniges all the more curious, he said.

"This is anything but a benign Chinese enterprise," Robinson said.

Indeed, AVIC was sanctioned on five separate occasions since 1993 for activities ranging from violating the Arms Export Control Act and proliferating missile technology in Pakistan to multiple violations related to trafficking missile and other military technology to Iran. In 2014, one AVIC subsidiary was added to the Obama-Biden Commerce Department "Entity List" indicating that AVIC was on the short list for potential sanctions months before the 2015 CFIUS decision now under scrutiny by Senator Grassley.

File
DoCAVICSubsidiarySanction.pdf
Grassley's letter identified one such security concern dating to eight years before the Henniges transaction was approved. "CFIUS approved the transaction despite reports that in 2007, years before BHR teamed up with AVIC's subsidiary, AVIC was reportedly involved in stealing sensitive data regarding the Joint Strike Fighter program. AVIC later reportedly incorporated the stolen data into China's J-20 and J‑31 aircraft," the senator wrote.

More recently, the Pentagon in June identified AVIC as one of several Chinese state-owned firms assisting the People's Liberation Army in building Beijing's military supremacy.

File
DODEntitiesLostJune2020.pdf
The tale of China's acquisition of Henniges has many tentacles and is raising questions about where an American-based firm's jobs are going.

During the Obama years, Hunter Biden held an ownership stake in and a board seat on BHR. On Sept. 15, 2015, the hedge firm announced the completion of the acquisition of Henniges Automotive, which gave AVIC 51% control and BHR 49%. The $600 million acquisition was one of the largest Chinese takeovers of an American automotive company in history, topping AVIC's 2010 takeover of Michigan-based Nexteer Automotive for $440 million. The purchase also revealed a pattern of Chinese state-backed takeovers of sensitive American companies which included China's controversial purchase of A123 Systems for $256.6 million in 2013 after the Obama-Biden CFIUS approved the deal.

While Hunter Biden pursued the business deals, the Obama-Biden administration was acquiescing to China's wishes to expand its influence, trade and exchanges in the United States and to lessen the potential for military confrontation. For instance, a Pentagon official disclosed in fall 2015 that the Obama administration had essentially imposed a moratorium since 2013 on U.S. patrols in the South China Sea even as Beijing was increasing its influence there, including building man-made islands viewed as hostile to the West and its Asian allies.

The administration also reached a deal for Chinese companies to participate in the U.S. stock market without having to fully comply with the Sarbanes-Oxley accounting rules imposed on Americans companies. And Joe Biden himself was cheering on China's economic expansion despite warning signs it was coming at U.S. expense in the form of economic espionage. "It's overwhelmingly in our interest that China grows," Biden declared in a July 19, 2013 speech.

As late as spring 2019, Biden was still sounding that note. "They're not bad folks, folks. But guess what, they're not, they're not competition for us," Biden said at a May 2019 Democratic campaign event that drew criticism.

Far from the political fray in Washington, Henniges was trying to rebound in Michigan from the 2008-09 financial crisis when the AVIC deal emerged.

Henniges' partnership with China dated back to at least December 1995 when Henniges formed a joint venture with Beijing Energine (a subsidiary of a China state-owned aerospace conglomerate). Since then, Henniges has operated at least six facilities in China with at least two new facilities opened after the AVIC deal.

Approximately one month before the Henniges deal was completed with AVIC, Henniges announced its intention to open multiple factories, not in its home state of Michigan but rather in China and Mexico. On Aug. 14, 2015, Henniges announced it had begun building its fourth plant in Mexico. Four days later, Henniges announced it would be opening new facilities in Beijing and Munich. By December 2017, Henniges had announced another "exciting expansion" of its global footprint. At the ribbon-cutting ceremony, Henniges executives and Chinese government officials celebrated the grand opening of a new 79,500 square foot factory in Suzhou, China. Such global expansion has raised questions about whether jobs that would have gone to Americans have been outsourced.

Officials for Henniges did not respond to repeated requests from Just the News for total numbers of employees in the United States and overseas since 2005.

But an analysis performed by conservative website The National Pulse found that "while Henniges had begun outsourcing before Hunter Biden got involved, AVIC accelerated the practice, operating on a considerably larger scale." Henniges only added two new factories outside the U.S. in the ten years before the AVIC takeover, but "it took less than three years following the 2015 deal for AVIC to surpass this number."

In April 2020, Hunter Biden's lawyer issued a letter stating that Hunter Biden had stepped down in October 2019 from the BHR firm that helped AVIC purchase Henniges. The letter made no mention of what happened to Hunter Biden's 10% ownership stake in BHR, and it appears that Hunter Biden may still be profiting from BHR's ownership stakes in companies like Henniges.

 

[Pat494]

Having a superior military in no way guarantees you against attack. Especially a surprise attack. Britain had a military more powerful than Argentina. This did not scare them. They invaded and captured the Falklands anyway. Only to pay a price after Britain responded.

Britain should have demanded reparations of costs or blasted Argie cities. There was not even an apology !!
WW2 was fought as a continuation of WW1 because the Allies didn't finish the job in 1918.

 

[FXX]

 

[Nowler]

What!!
Haha!

The cheek of em
Sort them out with a few things and send them to the UK 🤪

 

[Nowler]

What's everyone's opinion on the current global economic outlook and how it pertains to your investing portfolio?

I am currently considering banking my profits and moving into a split of cash and AAA long-term bonds until the arse falls out of this bubble.

Currently battling with FOMO
Maybe if I reduce all my positions to 50%... best of both worlds
Probably better that I reduce them by 50% rather than letting the economy do it...

 

[CharlieSheen99]

What's everyone's opinion on the current global economic outlook and how it pertains to your investing portfolio?

I am currently considering banking my profits and moving into a split of cash and AAA long-term bonds until the arse falls out of this bubble.

Currently battling with FOMO
Maybe if I reduce all my positions to 50%... best of both worlds
Probably better that I reduce them by 50% rather than letting the economy do it...

It will be the major economic catastrophe since 1945 in the occidental world.
FED and BCE are printing like there are no tomorrow.
SP500 the major index in the world at maximum prices with a virus that kill everyday more people in the US that kill the 11S or Pearl Harbour.

 

[Nowler]

 

[Nowler]

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Erm..
Sure thing Champ.

I assume this is another bot?