It’s rather intriguing to observe that economist Nouriel Roubini, the man who most famously predicted the financial crisis of 2008 – as did Steve Keen and I – is now also in agreement with me that WWIII has already begun and that the global economy is going to bifurcate:
Last week, the New York University professor was interviewed by Der Spiegel and listed some of the world’s most acute problems.
Recalling a recent event hosted by the International Monetary Fund, he referred to historian Niall Ferguson who “said in a speech there that we would be lucky if we got an economic crisis like in the 1970s — and not a war like in the 1940s.”
When speaking about major global threats, Roubini mentioned the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine, adding that Iran and Israel are “on a collision course” as well.
“I read that the Biden administration expects China to attack Taiwan sooner rather than later,” the economist said, summarizing that “World War III has already effectively begun.”
The rivalry between Washington and Beijing is driving tension to a large degree, Roubini noted, adding that the US has banned the export of certain semiconductors to China and is pressuring European nations into cutting trade ties with the country on national security grounds. He believes that a breakup of the globalized world is looming.
“Trade, finance, technology, internet: Everything will split in two,” he predicted.
It was not clear if non-allied nations would pick the US side in the confrontation, he said. “I asked the president of an African country why he gets 5G technology from China and not from the West. He told me, we are a small country, so someone will spy on us anyway. Then, I might as well take the Chinese technology, it’s cheaper,” the economist revealed to Der Spiegel.
There simply isn’t any reason for any self-interested third party to choose the side of what Vladimir Putin describes as the Second West. Unlike the USA, which has been attacking countries, undermining their currencies, and murdering their leaders for decades, the Chinese are mostly content to simply do business with other countries. And while that may change, and the massive Chinese diaspora is not exactly popular in countries such as Indonesia, Australia, and Canada, the fact is that the Chinese track record concerning foreign relations is considerably better than that of the USA or of its representative in Asia, Japan.