In this last week, there’s been a narrowing of the options for those who seek to bring about war with China. Trump has threatened to impose heavy semiconductor tariffs on Taiwan, a provocation that’s angered Taiwanese officials. By doing this, Trump is treating Taiwan not as an anti-Chinese “ally” that’s separate from the PRC, but as another part of China; which is exactly what it is. And this makes the island’s leaders less likely to appease the United States, because they’re faced with the prospect of a trade war with Washington. Either they’ll capitulate to Trump in all areas, making a Taiwan proxy war more doable, or they’ll further defy Trump and the war plan will be disrupted.
Which path Taiwan will take depends on the outcome of the ideological battle that’s happening within the island. The ruling party, the Democratic Progressive Party, desires more dependence on the USA, while the opposition party the Kuomintang seeks closer relations with the mainland. The obstinately pro-U.S. liberals are being challenged by the recent events, as it’s hard to argue that Washington is the best partner when Washington is targeting Taiwan with mobster tactics. And in the world of 2025, it simply makes less practical sense to stay loyal to the USA.
Indonesia has joined with BRICS, adding one of the most populated and industrially important countries to the China-aligned trade sphere. The U.S. is unable to prevail in Ukraine, as demonstrated by Trump’s failure at pressuring Russia into a compromise; which proves how counterproductive it would be for Taiwan to join Washington in a proxy war against China. In the game of innovation, the U.S. keeps losing to China, seeing its war on TikTok backfire and having its AI companies be outcompeted by Chinese tech. From the perspective of self-interest alone, the “don’t hitch yourself to Washington” side has the more persuasive argument.
If the DPP defines Taiwan’s next direction, it will probably involve a repeat of the process that we’ve seen with President Yoon, wherein a U.S. puppet regime discards the rules of liberal “democracy” to advance Washington’s war plans. December’s declaration of martial law within U.S.-occupied Korea was about trying to create the conditions for a new confrontation on the Korean peninsula, and the empire will try this maneuver again if it can. The problem Trump has created for the east Asian war project is that the DPP is now under pressure to start thinking more like the KMT. Yet Trump has taken such an aggressive action because given how much BRICS is winning, a tariff confrontation feels like the only way to go. Or at least that’s how it feels for the wing of the ruling class that Trump aligns with.
This exposes the divisions within our ruling class. The dominant wing of monopoly capital doesn’t even view the Trump faction as an ideal leadership source. The liberal ultra-monopolists don’t care about bringing manufacturing back to the United States, and in fact prefer for the U.S. to keep being degrown. The Trump faction has been allowed to define the empire’s trajectory because at this point, the system’s best hope for survival is to implement radical reforms. The technocrats are desperately looking for solutions to this collapse, so they’re allowing the political order to be disrupted.
Certain factions of the intelligence establishment have tried to get rid of Trump by any means necessary, but if the CIA had an internal consensus in wanting Trump dead, it could easily carry out a successful assassination attempt. So the deep state is letting Trump alienate Washington’s allies, with the expectation being that he’ll fulfill the projects which matter to the empire most. These projects being the operation to put maximum pressure onto Russia, and the effort to militarily confront China.
Something crucial to know about the China war plan is that it’s dependent on how much Washington can make Russia compromise. For as much as the imperialists want a confrontation with China, they know there first needs to be a sufficient destabilization of the wider BRICS sphere, wherein the PRC is made to lose crucial partners. A major aspect of this plan is to draw Russia into a deal with Turkey and the United States, making Moscow too dependent on these countries to want to assist China during the decisive moment.
Both the retreat from Gaza, and the cutoff of funding for USAID, are about trying to bring about that outcome. Washington has had its Zionist proxy temporarily reduce involvement in Gaza so that it can solidify its presence within Syria, thereby putting more stress onto Russia. And Washington has abandoned its NGO network so it can invest more into covert operations, allowing more resources for regime change efforts within countries like Georgia, Indonesia, and Russia itself.
A major tactic that we can expect the imperial beast to employ is terrorist attacks. Since the hegemon began its hybrid war against BRICS, terrorism has been the method that’s worked the best for it; when the October 2024 BRICS summit was happening, and Turkey was trying to join the formation, shooters from the Kurdistan Workers Party attacked the headquarters of Turkish Aerospace Industries in Ankara. At the same time, India acted to block Turkey from gaining membership within BRICS. The plans of the neocons for targeting the geopolitical “swing states” had been put into practice, and Turkey was the first one they’d hit.
It’s not surprising that these maneuvers were effective at solidifying Turkey as a loyal imperial proxy, since Erdogan’s government had already shown it wasn’t willing to stop doing business with the Zionist entity. But will these kinds of strong-arming attempts work on the other “swing states,” such as Indonesia and South Africa? Will they succeed at getting Russia to comply?
This depends on where the balance of forces are at. And the way we can shift that balance is by building a mass movement for proletarian power, while disrupting the U.S. war machine. In so many ways, we are at an advantage. Our enemy is struggling to overcome numerous obstacles towards its scheme for reversing China’s gains. And the eyes of the world, including many of the U.S. masses, are on Palestine right now; as the enemy continues its extermination campaign against the Palestinians, we need to make this backfire on it. We’ll be fighting alongside the Palestinian people, the working class of Turkey, and all other global elements which have been participating in this revolt against the hegemon. Together, we will prevail against the great terrorist entity.
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