The subject of the Feb. 1st edition of CGTN’s “The Hub With Wang Guan” was U.S.-China relations. There was 4.5 minutes of footage of the 1970s “ping pong diplomacy” and a short interview with one of the U.S. women who had been involved in that important event. Wang also interviewed students from the University of Virginia, who were just in China, again playing ping-pong in commemoration of that event decades ago. Wang then conducted a 15-minute interview with former EIR White House correspondent Bill Jones on the issue of U.S.-China relations. Jones talked of the importance of the Nov. 15, 2023 San Francisco meeting between Xi Jinping and Joe Biden on the sidelines of the APEC summit, noting that the establishment of these ties between the various government departments and at the summit level could do a lot to avoid conflicts, as these would inevitably arise, given the very different perspectives of the two governments.
Wang asked whether China would become an issue in the presidential debates if the contest were between Trump and Biden. Jones said that was probably inevitable, given that all the “hot button” issues between the two candidates would be front and center and the campaign rhetoric would probably be quite bitter. He said, however, that one should not place too much emphasis on what is said in the campaign, as it was only after the dust had settled that one could judge what the policy would be. Jones would make no estimate about the election, when asked who he thought would win, but indicated that it could be a tight election.
Wang asked about the fentanyl situation and the accusations about Chinese involvement. Jones said that thinking that China would be importing drugs was ridiculous, given China’s experience with the matter since the Opium Wars. He noted that it was a big problem in the U.S. and felt that China had realized the importance of the question for the Biden Administration and was working hard to deal with their concerns, which had more to do with so-called “precursor drugs” allegedly coming from China rather than the fentanyl itself. Discussions, in fact, were ongoing that day between the two parties in Beijing on the very matter.
On the “de-risking,” Jones said that it would be continuing, but that it would also have deleterious effects for the U.S. economy, referring to comments by Janet Yellen on the subject. And while the U.S. is pressuring its “allies” to follow suit, given the conditions in Europe as a result of this unfortunate policy, there are clear limits to how long they would follow the U.S. lead at the cost of their own economic well-being.
Wang then completed the program interviewing Steve Orlins, the head of the National Committee on U.S.-China Relations, who honed in on the extension of the so-called “national security concerns” which are now becoming so broad that they are affecting the very functioning of the economy.
The day before, Dialogue with Yang Rui interviewed the Schiller Institute’s Helga Zepp-LaRouche, as part of a panel discussion “Strikes, Protests, and Economic Pressures: Challenges Facing Germany in 2024.” Unfortunate technical issues cut her remarks to only 5 minutes, but Yang asked her, “Helga, we see the rise of AfD, the right-wing party. Chancellor Scholz expressed a concern about that. How big a challenge is that? And how big a threat, let’s say, the people are feeling from the rise of this right-wing ideology?”
Mrs. Zepp-LaRouche replied: “Well, it’s mixed, because obviously within the AfD, there are some very problematic people in it, who are even fascist; you can call them fascist by a court decision. But the majority of the people voting for the AfD do that because of a general dissatisfaction with the government policy, that the exit from nuclear energy left Germany without secure energy supplies, that money is given for weapons to Ukraine and now to Israel, which is lacking for infrastructure, schools, health systems, so there are a variety of reasons why people are voting for the AfD.
“But I would like to point out one thing which I think is extremely important, especially for people abroad to recognize: that the real protest against the government policy is what the farmers have demonstrated in the last weeks, these 100,000 tractors all over Germany, blocking highways, expressing their moral dissatisfaction, that they just want the money which allows them to produce food for the entire population. They’re not trying to make richest, like speculators. They’re just providing nourishment for the entire population. So it’s a very legitimate demand.
“Now, this is mixed, and this is very difficult for people abroad to understand: But there was this so-called ‘secret meeting’ in Potsdam, where supposedly some AfD and other right-wing people were planning what was called by the media, ‘deportation of migrants.’ This was completely—I think this is a very ominous operation, because the journalists received that apparently from the internal secret service of Germany, and then kept it quiet for six weeks! And only after the farmers had this huge demonstration with 100,000 tractors on Monday [Jan. 22] and then the whole week, and then culminating in a big demonstration in Berlin one week later, and it’s still going on. Only two days later, that story about the so-called right-wing plot was published by the mainstream media, and the mainstream media are now publishing in great detail the place of these so-called anti-right demonstrations. So everybody, there are now more and more people suspecting that this is an effort by the government to distract from the rightful protests of the farmers. And even the farmers are now saying that, themselves.
And I think that, rather than changing the policy, which is, also one has to be aware of the fact that this is not even the prices made by the government or the EU Commission, these are prices made by the international cartels.”
