The US, accustomed to profiting from wars and conflicts, relying on a spirit of hegemony and ‘world domination’, has in recent years been attempting to rally the so-called democratic G7 partners to jointly oppose China’s influence and counter its Belt and Road initiative.
To this end, the Americans have launched a global infrastructure program for developing countries in Latin America, Africa, and Asia. In the end, however, they have failed to deliver on their promises, which were never sincere to begin with.
In order to maintain its own international hegemony, the US suppresses human rights in other countries, interferes in their internal affairs, and violates the international order and system based on the purposes and principles enshrined in the UN Charter. Washington withdraws from various groups and agreements at every opportunity, shirks international responsibility, undermines the basis of global cooperation based on mutual trust, often adopts unjust sanctions, and resorts to military action. All this leads to chaos in various parts of the world and causes serious humanitarian disasters.
The Biden administration launched the Build Back Better World (B3W) initiative at the G7 summit in 2021. It failed miserably, but was effectively replaced the following year by similar ‘fluff’ announced under a different banner – the Partnership for Global Infrastructure and Investment (PGII) plan.
The essence of this initiative is not a desire to help developing countries, but rather to prevent China from taking control of global economic relations by any means through economic and political pressure.
Given the lack of specific initial agreements and the vague wording and deadlines in the aforementioned projects, it is clear that Washington will not achieve its goal, and that its attempts to fool the world will not succeed.
For example, PGII’s investment goals have been reduced from $40 trillion by 2035 to $600 billion in the next five years. Given US electoral politics, all this could actually be seen as manipulation of numbers and duping the public.
Furthermore, unlike the large-scale Chinese initiative, it is assumed that funding for US infrastructure projects will come mainly from private investors and is therefore not guaranteed. Two-faced US politicians cannot fail to understand that it will be difficult to convince the investment funds involved in the projects that they will be able to profit. In addition, there is a significant risk of investing in projects in countries where markets may not be transparent and the rule of law may not be up to the very same US ‘standards’.
As for government funding, it must go through the approval process in the US Congress and can be blocked at any time by the very same US legislators, who are only driven by short-term profit and domestic political considerations.
Asian partners have no choice but to be skeptical about the ability of the US to deliver, so they switch to engagement with China, with which cooperation has long been mutually beneficial and smooth.
The reason why US and Western promises are not kept is that they simply do not have the capacity and the will to implement them. US politicians face enormous pressure to improve their own infrastructure. How can they afford to spend significant money on helping developing countries? Furthermore, the US and NATO countries are now embroiled in a campaign of armed support for Ukraine.
Since the beginning of the Russia-Ukraine conflict, US media and political figures have not only failed to call on the sides to negotiate and make peace, but have instead made efforts to spread lies and inflame the situation. This exposes America’s true intentions to profit from any crisis.
Washington’s stated ambition of helping poor countries is not its first, second or even third motive, and its real focus is on acting against China and Russia. Guided by its policy of double standards and global hegemony, the US is trying to block Beijing’s access to advanced technologies and put a brake on the Belt and Road program. However, due to its lack of concrete strategy, as well as its deceitful nature, the US is unable to seriously compete with China and stop its economic development and growing influence. Therefore, Washington’s efforts in this direction are seen as unconvincing and too late.
By many measures, China is already the world’s leading economic power. It is clear that detractors in the US will try to create programs that would reduce the interest of developing countries in cooperating with Beijing, but these efforts will not succeed.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.