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Trans Pacific Partnership & RIMPAC: Is The Pivot To Asia About Corporate Control?

Shawn Helton
21st Century Wire

The People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLA Navy) will participate in the U.S. led ‘Rim of the Pacific’ or (RIMPAC), a biennial naval exercise that the U.S. Navy is set to conduct in the South Pacific in the spring of 2014.

Not surprisingly, this has opened up a fire storm of controversy for the Obama administration and the Pentagon, raising important questions about security and the nature of shared military drills with other countries.

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In order to understand why the U.S. would advocate sharing sensitive naval strategies in RIMPAC, we’re reminded of the many growing global partnerships seeking to expand their financial influence.

The Trans Pacific Partnership or (TPP) is the Pacific regional trade partnership that seems to be at the center of countries involved in RIMPAC, specifically China, New Zealand and the U.S. The original TPP agreement emerged between Brunei, Chile, New Zealand and Singapore in June of 2005. Several other countries including Canada and Mexico are also active participants in this agreement.

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Some suggest that U.S. involvement in TPP exposes a motive to contain China’s meteoric rise by stalling growth through strict regulations. Conversely, there have also been claims that New Zealand and China, are looking to slow or even reduce U.S. trade. This may have credence, as the U.S. has suddenly reestablished a relationship with New Zealand through TPP and RIMPAC over the last few years. However, others see a much darker side to the TPP and its multilateral agreements which allows governments to appeal regulations overriding rule of law in the name of corporate interests. Could the U.S. be giving up military insight to stay relevant economically, or is there something bigger at work here regarding consolidation? China, the world’s largest economy, looking to find new avenues of growth, has been in the process of sealing up a significant trade plans with New Zealand under TPP. Both are pushing to eclipse U.S. exports as world trade grows.

Lori Wallach of watchdog group, Citizen.org had this to say about the TPP agreement:

This is an agreement that ultimately could have the whole world in it as a set of binding corporate guarantees with new rights and privileges enforced with cash sanctions and trade sanctions. It is not an exaggeration to say that the TPP, threatens to become a regime of binding global governance.”



Modern Trade Wars

Just as China has been making deep connections in trade partnerships in the Pacific, it has also been trying to ensure energy gains in the Middle East. The Chinese oil barons have a lot to lose when it comes to the deliberate destabilization of the Mid East at the hands of the West. This is of no small significance when you consider Mid East oil trade has given China additional access to a third of the Syrian Petroleum Company’s oil through its consortium China National Petroleum Company. Oil pipelines in Iran, Iraq and Syria, have all been embroiled in direct conflict or proxy conflict aided by the U.S. and its Western interventionist allies.

The proxy war in Syria is in large part consumed with interests in Mid East oil, just as the Iraq war was a decade ago. This card was revealed by the E.U. when they lifted the oil embargo against Syria as recently as last month, giving way, for rebels to seize control over oil trade in Syria and ultimately cementing a trade partnership with the Western nations and rebel terror networks.

How will the Mid East oil play impact Chinese – U.S. relations regarding the Trans Pacific Partnership?


In a recent article for Global Research
Nile Bowie provides deeper insight into what TPP has come to be:

“Six hundred US corporate advisors have negotiated and had input into the TPP, and the proposed draft text has not been made available to the public, the press or policymakers. The level of secrecy surrounding the agreements is unparalleled – paramilitary teams scatter outside the premise of each round of discussions while helicopters loom overhead – media outlets impose a near-total blackout of reportage on the subject and US Senator Ron Wyden, the Chair of the Congressional Committee with jurisdiction over TPP, was denied access to the negotiation texts.

The majority of Congress is being kept in the dark as to the substance of the TPP negotiations, while representatives of U.S. corporations — like Halliburton, Chevron, PhaRMA, Comcast and the Motion Picture Association of America — are being consulted and made privy to details of the agreement,” said Wyden, in a floor statement to Congress.”

The connection between conflict and world trade appears to be very real.

As we examine the role of trade partnerships like the Trans Atlantic Union and the Trans Pacific Partnership we see more than just trade talks developing. Could these trade partnerships hold the key to understanding why the U.S. is willing to share naval strategies with China?

The “Pivot to Asia” seems to be more global governance rhetoric, disguising intentions to consolidate sovereignty.

The world has become a prison of asymmetrical war, resource grabbing and corporate controllers.

READ MORE ON THE TPP AT: 21st Century Wire TPP File

 

 

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