Should China Sanction NATO for Supporting Ukraine?

There has been a lot of noise recently regarding threats made by NATO figures about China. They are threatening China that if it provides military hardware to Russia, NATO and its allies will impose sanctions on China.

This is particularly hypocritical given the billions in military and other aid given or sold to Ukraine over the last decade, starting from the $5 billion Victoria Nuland spent to overthrow the elected Ukrainian government in 2014. Without the massive transfers of weapons and money to Ukraine, let alone NATO expeditionary forces (AKA mercenaries), the Ukraine War would have been over long ago and maybe never even taken place.

Moreover, America, as well as other NATO members, have transferred weapons around the world, and have been involved in numerous conflicts.

As I have discussed in the past, the so-called Rules-Based Order is just the American empire. America has sought to force compliance from other nations through threats and bribes, while pretending to be about international law, international peace, and collective security. Nations that accept status as American vassals receive certain benefits and privileges, while other nations that refuse such as not just adversaries, but evil. State sovereignty is the enemy of American hegemony.

While the American empire claims to stand for “liberal democracy”, that means accepting the values and rules as imposed by the leadership of the American empire, not favoring liberal economics nor democratic elections. Only when election outcomes align with imperial values does the empire accept the country as being a liberal democracy. For decades, it didn’t matter if a ruler was a dictator, as long as he was our dictator and allowed American companies access to exploit his country.

China has become one of the world’s largest economies, in large part due to America transferring so much of its manufacturing and technology to China. China has also built upon the transfers and is developing leading edge technology in certain areas. China has its own issues and the CCP has more in line with the practice of Italian fascism than with communism, but that is its own issue.

My local newspaper recently featured an opinion piece by a formerly prominent “conservative” writer calling for regime change in China, and claiming the only bad thing about China today is its leadership. This is related to normal Neocon thinking that America has the right to determine the leaders of other countries and the duty to force the change by any means necessary.

America has been doing this for a long time. When Woodrow Wilson sent US troops under General Pershing into Mexico, with a young Patton, prior to World War I, he said, “I am going to teach them to elect good men.” This is especially ironic given the US tendency to put in bad leaders around the world that are willing to do the bidding of America.

Getting back to China, at some point China and the rest of the BRICS and their allies, will need to push back on the sanctions regime. It is one thing for so many nations in the Global South to assist Russia in evading sanctions. This has been a huge step, especially for countries that did not previously help other countries avoid US sanctions. However, it would be another entirely for China and other nations to respond in kind and sanction Western countries for providing weapons to one side in a military conflict.

Right now, China has become the major trading partner for many countries around the world, pushing aside European countries, America, and Japan. Many of the countries of the Global South are import sources of important natural resources needed for the great Green dream. But these same countries have a long history of looking with caution towards NATO. After all, the European countries are their former colonial masters. And America has acted with great hostility against many of these countries, often using allegedly international tools such as the IMF and World Bank to disrupt their economies and inflict harm mandated policies. America did help fight colonialism in the past, but America lost the anti-colonialism point when it decided to treat former colonies as vassal states of the American empire.

What if these countries joined together and started sanctioning NATO countries for their involvement in Ukraine? They can even use the same justifications as NATO for doing so, alleging that NATO has engaged disrupted Ukraine with its money, weapons, and interventions and led to the Ukraine War.

These counties hate US imposed sanctions. And every dictator around the world is afraid that his looted wealth will be seized, given the precedent of anti-Russian sanctions and seize of assets. Now they have a military champion in Russia and an economic champion in China. Russia was already supplanting France and others in Africa. They have long viewed US sanctions on Cuba as immoral and illegal.

Once upon a time, supplying weapons to combatants was seen as a violation of neutrality. Jefferson got his Embargo Act to keep America out of European conflicts. It was also seen as prolonging conflicts, that might be over quickly without outside support. China, if it decides that it will not supply Russia, could take the high ground and call for all nations to remove themselves from the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, and declare it will start sanctioning countries that support Ukraine.

Washington does not even think something like this is possible, but times are changing, and, at some point, Washington will need to let go of its dictates to the world. It is one thing for the US to say that US goods can’t be sold somewhere else. It is another thing all together for the US to impose its will on the world and force other countries to act in the ways it wants.

Washington acts towards the rest of the world in much the same manner it acts towards the states domestically. There is limited reason and compromise. There is mostly just Amercian orders and mandates, that serve the goals of the American empire and the oligarchs who rule it.

China has not been afraid to retaliate against US actions. If China decides to send supplies to Russia, it will be doing so knowing that NATO will issue sanctions against China. China should push back with sanctions of its own. Even if it does not, Western anti-Russia sanctions have hurt the West more than Russia and anti-China sanctions will likely hurt the West more than China.

Until the West can move most of its manufacturing back home, the West will likely be hurt more than China in a sanctions battle. And the West is unlikely to move the manufacturing home because it would decrease profits and empower workers. The oligarchy ruling the West hates its own fellow citizens as much as it hates the rest of the world. The oligarchy fears its own fellow citizens as well, fears that the citizens will resist their control and pull down the oligarchy. Even in the profits were the same producing products in Vietnam and South Carolina, they will pick Vietnam every time, no matter the increase in transportation costs.

For 30 years, America has attempted to maintain its sole superpower status. Instead of accepting the end of the Cold War and a returning to multipolarity, it has sought to keep everyone else down, includes its so-called allies. America is falling apart at home in its efforts to maintain its primacy. In terms the Chinese use, America has lost the Mandate of Heaven. Disaster and turmoil will continue to mount until real change takes place at home and the empire is no more.