Author’s Comment on the Updated and Expanded Edition
Why go through all the trouble of writing an expanded and updated version of The World Is Flat only a year after the book was first published? I can offer a very brief answer: because I could and because I must.
—Tom Friedman
I offer this updated and expanded edition of The Coming China Wars because, like Tom Friedman, I can and I must. I can because, based on the initial success of the hardcover version of this book, my publisher thought it would be a great idea to offer a low-cost, paperback edition.
I must write Version 2.0 of The Coming China Wars for at least three reasons. The first relates to one of the lesser known, but more amusing quotations of John F. Kennedy. After a bruising campaign against Richard Nixon in the 1960 election, the new President would quip: “When we got into office, the thing that surprised me most was to find that things were just as bad as we’ve been saying they were.”
My own surprise is not that the world’s emerging “China Problem” is as bad as I said it was in the first edition. Rather, it is that many of the problems that I documented in that edition have become significantly worse—and have progressed much more rapidly than even I had projected. Indeed, since the initial publication of the book, not a day seems to go by without yet another chilling revelation about the dangers of a world economy increasingly “Made in China.”
These revelations span the spectrum from exploding cell phone batteries, shredded tires, and fake Lipitor to poisonous toothpaste and deadly toys. But they also include startling news about broader global issues such as China’s provocative blasting of a satellite out of the sky; its threats to “go nuclear” on American financial markets by dumping U.S. bonds and dollars; a rapid escalation in the harassment of foreign journalists; and China’s continued and frankly despicable role in tragedies and events such as the Burmese repression, the ongoing genocide in Darfur, and a rogue Iran’s destabilization of the Middle East.
The second reason why I must update and expand The Coming China Wars is that, based on a large mound of reader correspondence, I clearly missed coverage of a number of key issues. That’s why I have added several new chapters to this edition.
One chapter absolutely essential for consumers and businesses operating in China deals in much greater detail with what has become an epidemic of contaminated and defective products from China. Consumers need to know how to protect themselves from this epidemic. Business executives likewise must learn how to ensure quality control when offshoring to the People’s Republic—or risk costly recalls and debilitating lawsuits.
A second new chapter deals with China’s very rapid Red Army buildup. Since publication of the first edition of this book, it has come to light that China’s military budget is growing roughly twice as fast as its own red-hot economy. China’s rapid and highly provocative military buildup includes modernization of what is already the world’s largest standing army; construction of a deepwater navy to challenge the United States on the high seas; the addition of advanced nuclear submarines capable of striking U.S. cities with nuclear weapons; and a Chinese Air Force powered by the most advanced fighters and bombers available from the Russians. The political and strategic implications of China’s arms buildup are worth a very close look, particularly because this buildup is quite literally being funded by the dollars that you and I spend every day on cheap Chinese goods in places such as Wal-Mart and Target.
A third new chapter very closely related to China’s military adventures focuses on The Coming China Star Wars. While the U.S. space program continues its parabolic fade amidst budget cuts, embarrassing scandals, and interminable shuttle delays, China is aggressively moving forward with plans for a permanent Chinese space station, colonization of the moon, and travel to Mars. In conjunction with these bold plans, the Chinese are rapidly rolling out a massive space-related infrastructure that includes a powerful satellite network, a Global Positioning System (GPS) constellation known as Beidou, a fleet of deepwater space tracking ships, and ground stations established in Chinese client nations across the globe that will be capable of tracking U.S. military assets. The critical question examined in this chapter is whether China will be a friend or foe as it reaches for the stars; and you might find at least one possible answer to that question very disquieting.
A fourth new chapter squarely addresses China’s human rights abuses, its suppression of free speech, China’s brutal subjugation of Tibet, and what has become the world’s biggest prison. Many readers questioned why I failed to address these topics in the first edition. As an economist, I originally thought these topics were more properly in the domain of politics. What changed my mind on this point have been several incidents involving self-censorship to gain access to the Chinese economy by three of the world’s largest tech companies and Internet search engines: Google, Microsoft, and Yahoo! In the most despicable case, Yahoo! executives, hungry for business in China, played a key role in the jailing of a journalist who committed no other crime than forwarding an email message. Based on incidents such as these, it’s clear to me that most of China’s economic problems cannot be resolved without greater political transparency, and greater political transparency inevitably means the lifting of China’s totalitarian curtain.
The third and final reason why I believe I must offer this updated and expanded version of The Coming China Wars is that I want to provide a much better set of answers to the core question raised by this book: How can we together fight and win these coming wars in a way that will benefit both China and the rest of the world? It is in this area of inquiry where critics found the most fault with the first edition.
For example, in his thoughtful review in the Asia Times, Benjamin Shobert wrote that The Coming China Wars “serves as an important touchstone for any prudent discussion regarding the implications to China’s growth.” However, Shobert also noted that the book “would have been more complete with an expanded emphasis on solutions to the issues he introduces.” Echoing this theme, Publishers Weekly opined that “this informative book will teach readers to understand the dragon, just not how to vanquish it.”
To firmly address this criticism, I have not only substantially expanded my own set of recommendations for consumers, workers, business executives, and government officials. I also offer sets of solutions that have been proposed by some of the most sophisticated China watchers in the world.
I hope that you find this updated and expanded edition of The Coming China Wars to be a very useful tool to help you navigate through the increasingly rough seas of the twenty-first century. My primary goal in this book remains that of a “call to action.” My fervent hope is that by raising the level of awareness about the world’s growing China Problem, this awareness will translate into economic and political actions both within and outside of China that are long overdue.