China, Perceived Power
91The Newest Changes in China
We cannot stay frozen in 1990-2000, where Cline left us in his last book.
We will try to comprehend the distribution of economic power in the great
powers of the world and try to understand the share of defense in their
National Product.
It is interesting to underline that the transaction balance shows a
positive result for only a small number of countries. Others are limited by
heavy deficits, which oblige each of these countries to hope for a good
conjuncture in the market, in order to finance their debts.
Figure 6-9: Military Defense^16
Countries GNP Military defense International
Commerce
in million $US in % of GNP in thousands $US
China 6 643 1.6 a 2 243 549 +
Russia 1 522 4.3 198 180 +
USA 15 148 4.6 735 206 -
Japan 5 739 1.0 20 584 -
Brazil 2 108 1.7 29 807 +
Germany 3 608 1.4 214 545 +
Switzerland 604 0.8 3 113 +
U. Kingdom 2 370 2.7 160 302 -We can see that the huge position of the United States in National
Product is dwarfed by its dependence on the negative external trade, and
the country cannot manage its structural deficit. Japan is choosing the
same path and all countries in Europe are spending more than their exports
allow. The result is the great debt of the United States of America and of
the allied countries in Europe and Far East Asia.
Brazil, Russia, Germany, and China are, on the contrary, countries that
have a positive and even strong advantage in commercial terms. This
means that their economies are productive and well linked to markets.
Thus, these may increase and probably will have flexibility regarding the
possibility to enforce the military capacity.
(^16) Atlas Larousse, 2014.