Ever since they realise Obama's 'pivot to Asia', they proactively cemented those islands on their backyard. This isn't something new and America should know since they are great at bulling others since when they became the superpower no one could challenge, not even Russia. What happened to Globalisation push? It would appear they could swallow their ideological differences for the sake of the $ profits because corporate America outsourced labor for making cheap crap we all wanted. As long as our competitors remain sweat shops, nothing more than making stuff we don't really need to replace but could replace from wear and tear instead of fix, we are happy.
This time around Thucydides trap is a bit different from the previous one when the British Empire faded to be replaced by an equally ideological similar political structure and in fact with the same common language. Think what happens if that superpower was Germany or Japan from WW2 with equally expansionistic ambition?
So here we are as you obviously seem to embrace, the politics of vaccine, which highlights the decoupling nature we are now facing. It is us and America V them and Russia. Cold war is coming back and you can read it in the media weekly as think thank (ASPI) ram up the rhetoric to soften any resistance to conflict. As suggested we have lost our coal exports and Bloomberg suggest it will take years before we see that export coming back, so why not weaponise Iron Ore since we have first mover advantage with supply? Add Spudomene which is the next crude oil which we can choke off their attempt at trying to kick start the green EV revolution?
Like CCP have warned, if we make them our enemy, they will be our enemy. Trump tried to put a wedge between them and Russia but Biden is just playing into both Russia and China common interests. Everyone who went through the crash of Iron Ore in 2014-16 are aware that being complacent now do not study the history of cyclical commodities especially at a time when we were already complacent and congratulated ourselves of how good a job we were at crushing the virus infection until now.
