Chapter Six
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Japan 27 600 000 29 377 829 15 44
Argentina 40 800 000 29 2 780 400 15 44
Germany 81 800 000 15 357 022 15 30
Great Britain 63 200 000 14 242 900 15 29In this assessment of critical mass power, we can observe that China
appears in the fourth place. It means, in effect, that China has a great
population and territory. The Chinese population factor ranks in the first
place in the world but concerning the territorial one, China is similar to the
United States, being surpassed by Russia and Canada, so that it occupies
the third position in the territorial extension factor. Critical mass is
supposed to measure the inert capacity of a country, and China is not the
first in this ranking. The top three are the United States, the former USSR
and Brazil, with China granted the fourth isolated place. Professor Ray
Cline has some difficulty recognizing powers under 50 million inhabitants
and under 100 000 square meters. The combination of a small territory and
a low population is not considered an inclusive power base.
The economic capacity measures the level of development of the
nation. Vectors like foreign trade, GNP, the production and exploration of
the most important minerals, and the capacity to generate food to provide
the whole population with, are fundamental lines of analysis. China’s
position in GNP is sixth, but its performance, given the critical mass, is
very low when compared with England, France, Italy, and Japan. In terms
of critical minerals, the advantage goes to countries that have no power or
little capacity to act in international relations. China only appears as a
producer of coal, petroleum, iron ore, cement, and crude steel, revealing a
deficit in grains like wheat, coarse grains, and rice–with little participation
in foreign trade. With all these aspects being considered, China was
classified in the seventh position, mainly due to its GNP.
Concerning Military Capacity, China is ranked in the eighth position.
This rough power can be converted into deterrence, nuclear power, and/or
conventional power. Nuclear power is typically used to blackmail or to
exert some political pressure, because after Hiroshima and Nagasaki these
weapons were never again used in war. Nevertheless, nations of the
“nuclear club” have not altered their production. So it is a good lesson to
study the accumulated nuclear power, at the time of Cline’s writing, in the
five traditionally identified nuclear States.