10 Days to the G20 Great Power Summits; Focus on the New Paradigm Opportunities

There are 10 days to go to the Group of 20 Buenos Aires summit, the occasion for meetings between President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping, and between Trump and President Vladimir Putin, and other bilaterals, which can provide critical momentum towards the New Paradigm initiative of a new world credit system favoring development—a ‘New Bretton Woods.’ Present among the G20 will be leaders of the Four Great Power nations—U.S., China, Russia, India, who represent—as referenced by statesman Lyndon LaRouche—the authority to make urgent shifts in world affairs.

At the same time, the challenge is to rout the attacks against this development potential, coming from the perpetrators of a `New Thucydides Trap.’ These political powers and figures assert that China and the Belt and Road Initiative are threats to the Old Order of London/Wall Street, and they back geopolitical strategies of confrontation, to the point of war.

Look at the attacks against China and the BRI in Europe. The EU is pushing for establishing a new review body to inspect—and deter—economic investment from China into Europe. On the military front, French President Emmanuel Macron has delusions of creating a new European army, to defend against China and Russia. He and German Chancellor Angela Merkel again spoke of this at a World War I commemoration in Berlin today.

In the Pacific, U.S. Vice President Mike Pence led a nearly non-stop denunciation of China and the BRI, while unfortunately representing the U.S. at the ASEAN (Nov. 14-15), and APEC (Nov. 15-18) meetings in Singapore and Papua New Guinea. Speaking to conference sessions and reporters, Pence said that “authoritarian” China is luring nations into inferior projects, and debt traps. He ridiculed the BRI as “a constricted belt and a one-way road.” Pence counterposed the geopolitical bloc called, the Quad—Quadrilateral of the U.S., Australia, Japan and India—to lead the way in the “Indo-Pacific.”

No wonder, for the first time in 29 years, the APEC summit could not issue a joint communiqué. The wording fell victim to the divide Pence opened with China. In fact, during the APEC conference, Pence announced that a new trilateral infrastructure fund set up by the U.S., Australia, and Japan—aimed at countering China in the South Pacific, was now operational. He also announced that the U.S. would partner with Australia in its development of a military base on Manus Island, owned by Papua New Guinea, This would add to a U.S. chain of bases, from Manus, to Guam, to Japan, to Hawaii.

Likewise, Pence was provocative to President Putin. Pence’s opening remarks to him, in an informal exchange on the sidelines of an ASEAN session Nov. 14, were, `Why does Russia keep meddling in U.S. elections?’ Kremlin spokesman Dmitri Peskov said of this Sunday, “The Americans are constantly repeating election interference as a mantra.”

Yesterday Trump himself slammed the idea that there was collusion between Russia and his campaign to interfere in the elections: “There was no collusion. It’s a scam.” He denounced these attacks on him, in a long interview Nov. 18 with Fox News commentator Chris Wallace. Trump defended his “ability to fight back” against such attacks. He wants “victory for the United States.”

The advance work for the G20 side summit meetings for Trump are underway, despite Pence’s gross misconduct. In Moscow today, Peskov said that serious preparations are taking place for the Trump-Putin meeting. Peskov reported that what Putin replied to Pence’s rude question, was that the topics he looks forward to discussing with Trump include the INF, Syria, Iran, and Ukraine.

For the Xi-Trump talks, reports are out that working groups for each side, headed by Liu He and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, will confer onsite in Buenos Aires, not in Washington, D.C., as originally planned. This way, they can have more effective input into the meeting of the two leaders.

Looking towards the new year and new era, Xi Jinping said at the APEC talks, that “mankind is at a crossroads.” There is a “development trend” underway, which we must take. He announced the importance of the April 2019 “Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation.”