American Strategic Deception Bureau

　Public security continues to deteriorate, prices are soaring, workers are on strike one after another, and supermarkets are often out of stock...

　Of course, what bothered Nixon the most was the ever-increasing prices.

　"Those economists have proposed one new fiscal policy after another. The Federal Reserve has raised interest rates to 23%, and the White House has tried every possible way to cut government spending. But many expenses simply can't be cut, and inflation is out of control! The dollar is almost as bad as the yen!"

　But during the Cold War, the United States was the most developed country in the world and had already stood at the top of the global industrial chain and scientific and technological research and development. After those relatively low-value-added industries were transferred from the United States, there were no higher-value-added industries that the United States could introduce from the outside world.

　However, the next wave of technological revolution, namely computers and the Internet, had not yet made a breakthrough in the 1960s and 1970s.

　As a result, after manufacturing was transferred out of the United States, it became a one-sided bleeding, rather than a replacement of the old with the new in and out.

　Originally, this "de-industrialization" should have been a relatively slow process. American manufacturing workers also gradually lost their jobs over a dozen or even dozens of years. There was a relatively long buffer period for them to transform and find jobs in other industries.

　However, last year's civil war and the collapse of national order caused the modern American manufacturing industry, which is highly dependent on logistics, public security, communications and bank credit, to collapse and shut down on a sudden and large scale. National industrial production fell by 23% within a year.

　Large numbers of factories and companies closed down directly. The bosses either went bankrupt on the spot and became a flying trapeze artist and fell into a pulp; or they took their technical backbones to Japan, South Korea and West Germany, where the security was relatively better and they were intimidated by the presence of US troops, to find local partners and start a second business in a foreign country.

　As the deindustrialization and manufacturing transfer in the United States accelerated sharply, the domestic unemployment rate naturally soared.

　Even more devastating was the fact that factories in the United States had shut down or collapsed one after another. However, new production lines overseas were still under construction and commissioning, and production of various products had not yet fully ramped up. There was no time to fill the production gap in a short period of time, resulting in a sudden and drastic drop in the supply of goods.

　Besides, industrial products can be mass-produced simply by turning on the assembly line, but if we want to increase agricultural production in large quantities, we have to wait at least a year or two, right?

　——There has never been such a good thing that bananas and pineapples will pop up in the plantation immediately as long as the merchant places an order!

　In this way, in a short period of time, there are fewer goods on the market, but more money. Wouldn't prices definitely skyrocket?

　Roughly speaking, it is equivalent to the gap between the old and the new in agricultural production.

　It just so happens that while prices are soaring and inflation is high in the United States, it is also experiencing large-scale unemployment... If this had happened in ancient China's agricultural society, it would probably be equivalent to natural disasters and wars coupled with the enclosure movement - it would be strange if the whole country was not in chaos!

　Therefore, no matter how Washington adjusts its economic and monetary policies, the country's situation will not improve immediately. It will take at least one or two years - even Roosevelt's New Deal, which saved the United States from the Great Depression, did not produce immediate results!

　“Mr. President, the situation in the country is indeed frustrating, but I ask that you be patient.

　A broken country cannot be revived overnight, just as a seriously ill patient cannot be cured in one day."

　After listening to President Nixon's complaints, Dr. Kissinger responded, "

　Domestic industrial transformation will require a period of pain. Japan's manufacturing industry continues to soar and expand. Once Brazil and Argentina's agricultural production increases significantly, and Japan's production of cheap consumer goods also increases, domestic inflation will surely gradually decline, and public security will gradually improve..."

　After hearing Dr. Kissinger's words, President Nixon frowned. "So, you think that even though we know that Germany and Japan will rise and pose a threat to the United States in twenty years, we still have to transfer industries to them?"

　In response, Dr. Kissinger spread his hands and said, "I'm sorry, Mr. President, this manufacturing industry has to be transferred!"

　The United States' transfer of technology and manufacturing to Japan and Germany during the Cold War was the result of a complex interweaving of strategic objectives. It served both the geopolitical need to contain Soviet expansion and the need to integrate the capitalist world economic system.

　First, both Japan and West Germany were frontier positions in containing the Red Bloc. Japan served as Asia's "breakwater," while Germany served as Europe's bridgehead against the Soviet Union. The United States needed to strengthen their stability through economic and technological support to prevent these two countries from becoming communists.

　In the 1940s and 1950s, the reason why the United States unilaterally opened its market to Japan and tolerated its trade surplus was to stabilize Japan.

　Secondly, the United States needs to integrate Japan and Germany into the global industrial chain dominated by it through technology transfer and industrial transfer.

　In fact, while Japan and West Germany achieved economic take-off after the war, they were also forced to become deeply tied to the US economy.

　Third, relocating labor-intensive industries to Japan and Germany would not only reduce production costs for American companies but also alleviate labor-capital conflicts caused by the concentration of manufacturing. At the same time, the United States could shed its burdens and focus on high-value-added industries such as finance and technology, achieving industrial upgrading.

　Finally, if the two major camps of the Cold War are viewed as two entities, then the United States' promotion of its allies' industrial capabilities through technology transfer is enhancing the overall competitiveness of the Western camp, giving it an even greater overwhelming absolute advantage when facing the Soviet and Eastern European camps.

　——This is actually similar to China’s “Belt and Road Initiative” in the future.

　By supporting Japan and Germany, the United States not only built a solid alliance system against the Soviet Union, but also promoted the expansion of the global capitalist market.

　Zhang.

　Of course, the United States’ generous technology transfer policy is essentially a “double-edged sword.”

　While this helped the United States consolidate its Cold War advantage in the short term, it also sowed hidden dangers. Although the strength of the entire capitalist camp was enhanced, the United States' advantage and control within the camp declined, effectively creating a new economic rival for itself.

　For example, by the end of the Cold War, Japan began to threaten American industries in areas like automobiles and semiconductors. Germany's industrial independence, on the other hand, gradually enabled it to become a political and economic leader within the European Community and later the European Union, competing with the United States. In one timeline, due to American missteps, Japan and Germany, after being fattened up, even turned against the United States, riding on its heels.

　But there's no way around it. Every hegemonic nation must make a difficult trade-off between technological diffusion and balancing interests, between its own national interests and those of its own faction. Whether it's generous or self-serving, it could lead to mistakes and cause enormous disasters.

　In fact, similar to the way the US transferred industries to Japan and Germany, the Soviet Union also did so. During the Soviet era, Moscow transferred countless advanced industries to the various republics! In the five Central Asian countries, in particular, they practically built a Central Asian industrial zone from scratch! As for Ukraine, even more so, almost half of the Soviet Union's core industries, from the most advanced shipyards to the steel industry, were located there.

　——As a result, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the advanced industries that were built as aid to these industrialized member states actually became a threat to Russia.

　In terms of nature, it is actually almost the same as the United States' excessive support for Japan and Germany, which led to the growth of these two Axis powers and almost caused them to become a threat.

　After all, to be honest, Washington's control over Japan and West Germany may not be much worse than Moscow's control over some of the Soviet republics.

　Even for other friendly countries, the scale of industrial aid provided by the Soviet Union was not small - not to mention the aid projects to China in the 1950s, there were also the Bhilai Steel Plant in India, the Helwan Steel Plant and the Aswan Dam in Egypt, etc.

　——Relying on exporting heavy industrial projects in exchange for political support was a common tactic used by the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

　However, unlike the United States, which focused on technology exports for economic gain, the Soviet Union essentially treated foreign aid as a bargaining chip for political transactions, with most of its aid projects being "turnkey projects." These projects not only lacked the necessary technological support, but also struggled to generate positive returns for the Soviet economy.

　Just like India and Egypt, even if the Soviet Union provided them with more industrial aid, how much of India and Egypt's products could the Soviet people use?

　On the contrary, American families have been listening to Japanese radios and eating Japanese instant noodles since the 1950s and 1960s.

　--During the Sino-Soviet honeymoon period in the 1950s, the Soviet Union's Economic Planning Committee hoped to utilize China's human resources to provide cheap, low-end candies, cakes, sodas and other light industrial products to the Soviet market, which had long suffered from a shortage of daily necessities.

　And indeed, for a few years, cheap Chinese goods appeared in large quantities on the shelves of Moscow department stores to repay loans.

　But the problem is that this rough economic complementary relationship soon came to an end due to the deterioration of relations between the two countries.

　After settling the accounts, both China and the Soviet Union felt that they had lost out.

　Later on, the Soviet Union's foreign aid was basically completely focused on politics and neglected economy, and it was completely a matter of spending money to gain reputation.

　Therefore, during the Cold War, the US's advantage stemmed largely from its ability to effectively utilize the industrial population and resources of its allies. The Soviet Union's rigid planned economy, however, was unable to effectively utilize the industrial population within its own sphere of influence (though it wasn't entirely incapable; the CMEA occasionally managed to develop a few industries to some degree). Instead, it suffered from intense internal friction and failed to form an efficient and smooth unified market economy.

　As a result, the Cold War became a confrontation between the Soviet Union and a group of laggards, against the United States and a group of old capitalist countries.

　In the late Cold War, even if we do not consider the difference in integration efficiency between the two economic systems of the East and the West (CMEA and the WTO), just considering the population, it is still a confrontation between 4 million people under the leadership of Moscow and 20 billion people under the leadership of Washington - in the long run, how could the Soviet Union not be defeated?

　But if the United States, fearing the rise of Japan and Germany and their future backlash, now stopped transferring advanced technology and manufacturing, stopped trying to exploit the human resources of Japan and Germany, stopped exporting capital and technology abroad, and kept all modern industrial production capacity at home—in other words, downgrading the US-Soviet hegemony from a confrontation between two camps to a confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union…

　But if this is the case, wouldn’t it be equivalent to asking the United States to give up its greatest advantage of “a strong camp” and use its own weaknesses to attack the enemy’s weaknesses?

　You know, until its collapse, the Soviet Union had a larger population than the United States!

　Then, in terms of the efficiency of fully utilizing human resources, the United States is actually not as good as the Soviet Union...

　Of course, at this point, whether in Moscow or Washington, except for a few rigid-minded old fogies, most politicians have lost interest in the Cold War. After being misled by the "future message" in the world of Cyberpunk 2077, everyone believes that the Cold War will end with both the US and the Soviet Union suffering losses, with Germany and Japan rising up and counterattacking the US and threatening the Soviet Union...

　In this case, anyone with a bit of common sense and responsibility

　American politicians no longer want to continue the Cold War and only think about "America first."

　In any case, it now appears that the Soviet Union's capabilities are limited. Without the lash of the iron father Stalin, the Kremlin is struggling to maintain its own rule. Even if the Cold War ended, the Soviet government, already bureaucratized, would not have the power to sweep the world and turn it into a communist country.

　So why did the United States waste its own resources, allow the "real enemy" to grow stronger, and continue to play meaningless games with the Soviet Union?

　So, even though there were still many Cold War fanatics in Congress, the government, and the public who only cared about the Soviet Union, President Nixon, who had already been accused of being "pro-communist," had a very negative attitude towards the Cold War, even believing that competing with the Soviet Union was meaningless.

　In this case, is it still necessary to support Japan and Germany without considering the outcome of the Cold War and only considering the interests of the United States?

　"Even without considering defeating the Soviet Union in peaceful competition, transferring technology and manufacturing to West Germany and Japan, at least to Japan, is an essential development strategy. Otherwise, how can the US economy grow? Where can the US dollar buy things?"

　After hearing President Nixon's doubts, Dr. Kissinger replied firmly, "Without German and Japanese factories producing low-end consumer goods for our supermarkets, how can we keep domestic prices down? We can't rely on other countries. Italy's industry is a mess, Britain has long since deindustrialized, and the French are not only incompetent in industry, but are even more dishonest than Germany and Japan."

　——When the capitalist economy develops to a certain stage, if it does not want to stagnate, it will inevitably "depart from the real economy and move towards the virtual economy."

　Since the establishment of the global dollar system after World War II, the United States has been able to easily reap global wealth through the tidal law of raising and lowering interest rates.

　If that's the case, why should the US itself bother producing anything? It should just focus on developing the tertiary industry, which is both relaxing and respectable! Football, basketball, Broadway, Disney, Hollywood, museums, rap, rock music... they can all be exciting!

　More importantly, for American capitalists, these workers in the tertiary industry are much easier to deal with than the proletarian workers who stick together in factories. Not only do they lack bargaining power in labor disputes, but they are also less likely to overthrow the current capitalist system.

　However, this can only be done on the premise that the productivity of the entire capitalist world economy has recovered and even reached a surplus.

　If the whole world were devastated and full of ruins like it was at the end of World War II, Americans would have nowhere to buy things with their dollars overseas!

　If the United States wants to stop producing goods and keep the merchandise on supermarket shelves fresh, it must move factories abroad and restore their productivity!

　Therefore, in order for Americans to use their dollars to buy the cheap goods they like, transferring manufacturing to places with lower production costs has become an inevitable move for the next development of the US economy, and it cannot be reversed by a single government decree.

　Of course, this inevitable shift of the national economy from the real economy to the virtual economy is not a smooth transition. During the period when the United States relocated manufacturing overseas, problems such as high unemployment, price fluctuations, and uncontrolled commodity supply were all inevitable "pains of transition." These inevitable pains were greatly amplified by last year's domestic political crisis.

　However, if we want to give the US economy, which is in severe spasm and pain, a dose of painkiller, we have to wait until Japan, Germany or Latin American countries produce the massive amount of cheap consumer goods needed by the US market, so that the US market can achieve great material abundance.

　In other words, it allows Americans to turn the funds pouring into the market into needed goods after stimulating production.

　Only then can the United States confidently and boldly develop the tertiary industry, distribute the wealth flowing into the United States, and live an easy and comfortable life.

　The government will, of course, need to regulate the economy during this period to curb the polarization between the rich and the poor, lest the rich reap all the benefits while the poor, left without food and clothing, resort to desperate measures. However, until the problems on the production side are resolved, no matter how the government adjusts its distribution methods, it will not be able to improve the national economy as a whole.

　——After Dr. Kissinger explained this difficulty to President Nixon in the simplest and most understandable language possible, President Nixon finally gave up, or rather, lost hope: It seemed that the domestic economic situation would not improve in the short term!

　As for public security? It was already a blessing from God that there was a glimmer of hope for improvement before the end of his presidency.

　What to do? Just make do!

　No matter how chaotic the domestic security is, it is much better than last year when the two armies confronted each other in the capital Washington, shelling the White House and burning Capitol Hill!

　He sighed deeply, changed the subject, and asked Dr. Kissinger, "Tell me about what you've seen and heard abroad? Are there any new developments with our European allies?"

　—Listen to the bad news from European countries to offset your own bad mood and make him feel that the situation in the United States is not that bad...

　The ceiling of a cinema collapsed while Captain America 4 was showing, destroying most of the seats, but miraculously no one was injured - because the film was so bad, only two people bought tickets to see it.

　Chapter 618: Isn’t it fun to see your allies suffer?

　"The situation in the Old World across the Atlantic is as bad as ever, even worse than in the New World, Mr. President."

　Since the harried President Nixon wanted to hear bad news from abroad to alleviate his anxiety over the deteriorating situation in the United States, Dr. Kissinger, as a trusted aide, naturally wanted to share his concerns and tried to pick out the words that Nixon wanted to hear.

　The UK is currently experiencing its worst national social crisis in two decades, with a raging pandemic, economic recession, soaring prices, and record-high crime rates. Although the peak of the super flu pandemic has passed, as the epidemic eases, public anger continues to ferment, from remote villages in the Scottish Highlands to the streets of the City of London. Large-scale demonstrations have broken out across the UK, and public security is on the verge of collapse.

　British gangs openly robbed markets in cities and kidnapped hostages for ransom, while large numbers of robbers drove trucks to rob cattle and sheep in the countryside.

　London's city government declared bankruptcy last month, halting operations in the city's health care sector, and even the police and fire department went on strike due to unpaid wages. The charity soup kitchen in Whitechapel distributes 2000 meals daily, but only feeds 10% of those waiting in line.

　Last week, when I met the Queen, thousands of unemployed workers stormed Buckingham Palace and fought with the Royal Guards.

　The situation in Scotland to the north is even worse, with unemployment rates exceeding 30% in Edinburgh and Glasgow. This has even led to a Scottish independence movement—the first such movement since the Victorian era. One woman leading the Scottish independence movement even managed to find a private meeting at my hotel, hoping to gain support, or at least tacit approval, from the White House. She said Great Britain is a bankrupt dream.

　Kissinger described in vivid detail what he had seen and heard in Britain, and showed President Nixon the photos he had taken with his Polaroid camera of street clashes, strike marches, and unemployed people queuing up for relief in front of churches.

　"In my opinion, the situation in France is probably even worse than in Britain. With France forced to completely withdraw its troops from Africa and lose control of the CFA franc zone, coupled with domestic fiscal collapse and intensified political conflict, this once European power is embroiled in the worst systemic crisis since World War II. The flames of protest that ignited the Arc de Triomphe in Paris have spread to the slums of Marseille and the wineries of Burgundy, and social order is on the verge of collapse.

　Ever since the light of freedom from the New World shone on the dark land of West Africa, France has lost tens of billions of francs in annual mining monopoly and central bank "foreign exchange reserve custody" income, which is equivalent to cutting off the right arm of France's finances.

　The prevention of the super flu and the resettlement of overseas troops who returned home have increased France's expenses.

　The Paris Stock Exchange index has plummeted by 40%, while the share prices of French companies that rely on African business have plummeted by 50% to 70%. The national unemployment rate has soared to 25%, and the Bank of France has announced that it can no longer pay the interest on the national debt, forcing it to declare a default.

　But in this situation, the French government still has to build a large number of sturdy underground shelters that can withstand nuclear explosions, and the construction costs are quite huge.

　After suppressing the paratrooper rebellion and riots by far-right groups, the Pompidou government passed a "Fiscal Emergency Law" that froze pensions until 1980 and cut housing subsidies by 70%. This immediately led to strikes and demonstrations throughout Paris.

　Because retirees found that their pensions were suddenly reduced by 30%, while the price of milk in the supermarket increased fourfold.

　When I arrived in Paris, retired teachers and young students were storming the city hall. Crowds sang "The Internationale," and the streets were filled with overturned police cars and officers firing tear gas. The Élysée Palace had been under a week-long "indefinite popular siege" organized by French trade unions. Trapped inside, President Pompidou could only speak with me remotely by phone.

　But Paris is not the most chaotic. In Marseille, French far-right militias demanding "pure blood priority" broke out in street fighting with North African immigrants that lasted for three days. The thugs attacked each other with Molotov cocktails and shotguns, resulting in nearly a thousand casualties. The authorities were forced to send out tanks to block Avenue Cannabière.

　In Brittany, French farmers set up roadblocks to collect a "local subsistence tax," while Corsican separatists seized control of the customs office at the port of Ajaccio. While the French army continues to suppress the unrest, the generals appear to have other plans. If nothing unexpected happens, a new military coup is imminent. The Fifth Republic of France risks becoming the Sixth.

　"It sounds like things are better in the US than they were last year. At least no one's bombarding the Elysee Palace with cannons yet," President Nixon muttered. "How are things in Germany and other countries? And how is the United Nations doing in Switzerland? When are they planning to move back to New York?"

　"Germany... was also in a complete mess. After West Germany was hit by two atomic bombs, international hot money fled from the Federal Republic of Germany, industrial giants went bankrupt one after another, and inflation soared.

　Break double digits.

　Unfortunately, Germany's super-flu epidemic is still at its peak, with people falling ill across the country. The resulting panic has further undermined industrial production. Now, the Ruhr industrial region in the Federal Republic of Germany, like our Detroit and Chicago, is experiencing a major economic collapse.

　Starting in March, the austerity law forced through the Federal Republic of Germany also froze pensions and housing subsidies and cut unemployment benefits by 30%. However, food prices have tripled, leading to hundreds to thousands of people lining up every morning outside every government-run supermarket to grab limited quantities of cooking oil and flour. During my visit to Bonn, I witnessed thugs using a bulldozer to smash through shop windows and steal frozen steaks and sausages. When the police arrived, all that was left was broken glass and a spray-painted slogan: "Being well fed is more important than obeying the law."

　The rebellion launched by the Nazi remnants in Hamburg, though limited in scale and duration, and the insurgents' fighting capacity was a joke, looked more like a performance art. However, the chaos it caused is still spreading, and far-right forces, including the Nazis, continue to rise in Germany.

　In the first half of this year, anti-immigrant riots broke out in Cologne, Stuttgart, and Munich, where neo-Nazis armed with machetes and Molotov cocktails attacked Turkish communities, chanting "Germans first." Turkish communities, in turn, formed militia patrols and erected barricades at mosques.

　Some time ago, German extremists prepared a suicide truck and attempted to attack a US military base in Germany. However, they were intercepted by German police before they could even begin. Despite this, I warned the German government in Bonn and ordered them to suppress all anti-American speech.

　"It's understandable that the Germans are a little resentful. After all, they didn't do anything, but they were hit by two nuclear bombs for no reason."

　President Nixon said this in a pretentiously magnanimous manner. But then he paused for a moment and suddenly changed the subject, "No, the Germans haven't done anything wrong. They took advantage of last year's American Civil War to plunder the outflow of American funds, which is already a heinous crime!"

　Moreover, as a defeated nation in World War II, Germany was inherently guilty of original sin, and any punishment it received was justified..."

　Hearing Nixon belittling his own country, Dr. Kissinger, who was born in Germany and considered himself a German Jew, felt a little embarrassed, but he couldn't refute anything at this time, so he could only cough dryly and continue talking about the situation in Spain and Italy.

　Spain had just completed its restoration and democratic reforms (from military dictatorship to constitutional monarchy) when it was hit by a pandemic of superflu and economic turmoil that spread throughout Europe. The new government had vowed to build Spain into "Europe's sunny paradise," but instead faced an unemployment rate as high as 20%. In Madrid, many people walked 5 kilometers every day to employment agencies, but could not find a job that could support their families, and the waiting list was ten times longer than the openings. Parking lots and abandoned construction sites were filled with homeless people and the bodies of the violently deceased.

　Many Spanish children have been forced to drop out of school due to family bankruptcy, and they may have to spend their adolescence on the streets rather than in the classroom.