FROM EIR DAILY ALERT
Victoria Nuland-Run Think Tank Insists Washington Fight against China’s Belt and Road
Sept. 20, 2018 (EIRNS)—The Center for a New American Security, a Washington Beltway think-tank headed by the notorious Victoria Nuland, who helped orchestrate the 2014 coup d’état by neo-Nazis in Ukraine, has just issued a belligerent and incompetent new report: “Power Play: Addressing China’s Belt and Road Strategy.” CNAS is heavy with Obama appointees and crackpot “counterinsurgency” specialists like John Nagl, and David Petraeus, who speaks at their events.
The CNAS press release, echoing the report’s executive summary, says:
“The United States and China are in a competition to shape the course of the 21st century. At stake is whether Beijing’s emerging vision—a world defined by great power spheres of influence, rigged economic interactions, and ascendant authoritarianism—will become the global reality.
“Central to Beijing’s ambition is its Belt and Road strategy, which seeks to bind together Asia, the Middle East, Europe, and Africa, through a web of Chinese-funded physical and digital infrastructure.
“The Center for a New American Security (CNAS) is pleased to announce the release of a landmark new report, ‘Power Play: Addressing China’s Belt and Road Strategy,’ by CNAS experts Dr. Daniel Kliman and Abigail Grace. Drawing upon the authors’ experience serving in the Obama and Trump Administrations and extensive field research, the report concludes that the Belt and Road:
- “Cements China’s status as a global power;
- “Places the world economy at risk while strengthening China’s ability to compete;
- “Imperils democracy in some countries and promotes low-quality development.
Kliman and Grace advance a number of bold and innovative recommendations for how the United States can compete with the Belt and Road, and offer positive alternatives in concert with America’s allies and partners. Key recommendations include:
- “Expand U.S. digital outreach, including establishing a digital development fund under the auspices of the OECD;
- “Develop and execute a counter-narrative to China’s Belt and Road strategy and prepare to capitalize on countries’ moments of disillusionment with Chinese investment;
- “Play defense and offense on military posture in the Indian Ocean;
- “Align strategic infrastructure investments by the United States, Japan, Australia, India, France, and the U.K.;
- “Promote regional connectivity plans, for example, by launching a new infrastructure initiative for the Middle East;
- “Foster political resiliency in countries that China targets for Belt and Road investment.
Kliman and Grace conclude that, with a Belt and Road backlash already evident in some countries, the United States has a window of strategic opportunity....”
