Awakening the Asian Giant

In the study of Debenzer The Manor on June 29, 1979, Henry was skimming through the newspapers Bart had prepared for his morning briefing when his jaw dropped.

Every major paper in New York and Washington, even the influential voices in Chicago and Los Angeles, had opened fire in perfect unison as though they’d coordinated the assault.

Our family staffers are too good at their jobs. It’s like they all received some wide-area buff and detonated this across the country on the same damn day.

Of course Henry had been fanning the flames from the shadows, but the seeds of the China threat ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠theory he’d planted had taken root in far richer soil than he’d anticipated. He had assumed that since China had just been beaten black and blue by Vietnam and was still begging for scraps, Americans would simply scoff. He’d thought the average citizen would dismiss the entire nation as just another Third World backwater. That was why he’d decided he would have to enlighten them himself. The reality, however, was that quite a few experts were already suffering from neurosis over Asia’s explosive growth.

After all, hadn’t their “tutor” Japan already carved up America’s auto and semiconductor industries, leaving a trail of unemployed workers in its wake? The only reason China had received any grace was the cold strategic logic that it could serve as a shield against the Soviet Union. When news of normalization first broke, most citizens had viewed ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠China as nothing more than a poor country that could safely be ignored. Conservative intellectuals had protested, but they were brushed aside. The press had gushed rosy predictions day after day. The public had been briefly hypnotized by the seductive promise that selling a single can of cola to each of a billion Chinese would open a market of a billion customers.

But the moment those same intellectuals read Henry’s document, the one packed with concrete data warning that these people would ignore patents and use the technology to slaughter American industry, the atmosphere flipped. The authority of the ivory tower had elevated the prediction to truth. Cold calculators began spinning inside citizens’ heads. They had been excited about selling a billion Cokes, but what if those billion cheap laborers ended up seizing America’s technology instead? Would their own jobs even exist tomorrow? Vague dreams of export profits had been replaced by the concrete terror of survival.

The leaked data was brutally detailed. The warning that “your children will work in a factory in Beijing” no longer sounded like conspiracy theory. The latent fear that their children’s futures might be mortgaged to an alien communist state in the East began to boil like magma in the hearts of ordinary citizens.

Even in the original timeline, Carter had been cursed for this decision for the rest of his life and beyond. The man had plenty of other reasons to be hated, of course, but the diplomatic recognition of China had been no small sin. In this era, Southeast Asia was thriving, Korea was sprinting forward in its “Miracle on the Han,” and Japan had gone completely insane. Every country in East Asia except China was bulking up, and the momentum was ferocious. People everywhere nodded along to the phrase “Europe, then America, then Asia.”

As for America itself? Modern people could scarcely imagine it, but 1979 America was not a thriving nation. Inflation had hit 11.3 percent that year, smashing through the ceiling, while bank lending rates exceeded 15 percent. The monster called stagflation was chewing the American dream to pieces. National pride had been shredded by defeat in Vietnam, and soon the Iran hostage crisis would broadcast America’s impotence as a paper tiger to the entire world. The industrial scene was even more brutal. Detroit’s auto plants were falling like dominoes under the Japanese onslaught; “Made in USA” had become a bitter joke. After the oil shocks, Americans stood in lines stretching for miles just to buy gasoline. They had begun to believe they were sinking their own ship, and their pride had hit rock bottom.

This was America’s true dark age, a time of crushing defeatism where the economy, national defense, and self-respect all collapsed like dominoes. The real original of the “Lost Decade” that Japan would later suffer was none other than the United States of this period.

In such an environment, Henry’s words were a lit match tossed into a powder keg. A single directive issued late in the afternoon on June 23 had, in just six days, blanketed every newspaper in America. And in three more days, the weekly Time magazine scheduled for Monday would drop an even more devastating bomb. The unfinished draft Henry had already reviewed was chilling. Experts had fleshed out his manuscript with statistics and analysis until the final product was so prescient that even Henry, the original author, wondered if another regressor was hiding somewhere.

The section on rare earths was especially sharp. What had begun as Henry’s casual note—“China will make a fuss about rare earths later, right?”—had evolved into a full scenario about the leakage of rare-earth refining and processing technology. The scenario warned that the moment America’s unrivaled expertise combined with China’s cheap labor, the world would change forever. The main propaganda line was simple: the instant America abandoned processing due to environmental regulations and costs and let China build the plants, the critical components for America’s most advanced F-15 fighters and ballistic missiles would require Beijing’s approval before they could even be manufactured.

The detailed analysis explained how a technology America had let die for environmental and profitability reasons would become a weapon in Chinese hands, letting them control at least sixty percent of the global supply chain. Without Chinese raw materials, which enjoyed overwhelming cost advantages, America’s defense contractors would simply stop. Some exaggeration had been added for propaganda purposes, but the report also contained the naked reality of China that Henry had witnessed to exhaustion in his previous life.

The rest looks like it came from my draft, but where did this part come from?

Henry pulled out one sheet that stood out among the pile. It was the front page of the LA Chronicle, its paper crisp and heavy. He took a sip of his bitter coffee and slowly read the headline.

Ah, so the experts added their own spice to my draft. “Sea of Red Nukes”… definitely provocative. Their fear marketing is top-tier.

Henry gave a wry smile and opened the other papers one by one. The weekly Time—the main dish—hadn’t even hit the stands yet, but the encirclement of public opinion was already airtight.

The Wall Street Journal used the chilling phrase “White House ignorance” to warn coldly that the treaty, stripped of intellectual property protections, would lead American companies to the slaughterhouse. The Daily News fanned the rage of blue-collar workers by claiming the “workers’ rice bowl” had become Carter’s political poker chip. The Chicago Tribune’s front page was downright heartbreaking, invoking the collapse of the Rust Belt to shake the entire Midwest. Even the New York Times, the pride of New York, intellectually scolded Carter’s diplomatic gamble under the headline “Gestating a Second Japan?” The New York Post, which Henry hadn’t expected much from, was delivering unexpectedly excellent aggro.

Henry gathered the papers and dropped them onto the table with a slap. From eastern elites to western middle class to midwestern laborers, Carter’s trade deal was about to be branded across America not as a “bridge of hope” but as “national suicide express.”

This is just the first day’s firepower. Starting tomorrow the papers will go even crazier trying to grab readers’ attention.

“I’m curious how Carter will respond. At this level, shouldn’t he be calling an emergency press conference?”

Henry turned on the television in the study with genuine anticipation, flipping through channels. But the scenes on screen were utterly peaceful.

“The newspapers are burning their pages tightening the noose around Carter’s neck, but this idiot box is just showing housewives cheering because they won a washing machine on Lucky Wheel. No wonder the public has no idea the US-China trade deal is creating a second Japan. Sigh, how frustrating. Still… this is America, I suppose.”

And this was precisely when the gap between American elitism and the general public began to widen, when the masses started getting dumber. Paradoxically, America’s later overwhelming global dominance was made possible by the bitter lessons learned while scraping the very bottom during this period. A cornered empire chose an unprecedentedly harsh remedy for survival. The mad decision by Fed Chairman Paul Volcker to raise interest rates all the way to 20 percent was only the beginning. After a bloodbath in which companies fell like autumn leaves and the unemployed flooded the streets, he finally succeeded in executing the cancer of inflation.

Yes, he succeeded. That was why future Fed Chairman Powell took Volcker as his role model, benchmarking his methods and slamming through Big Steps and Giant Steps, jacking rates up relentlessly. Reagan, who succeeded Carter, poured fuel on the restructured American economy. “Reaganomics,” built on bold tax cuts and deregulation, restored the wild spirit of enterprise and led to the legendary long boom of the 1980s. He didn’t stop there. Under the banner of a strong America he branded the Soviet Union the “Evil Empire” and drove an unlimited arms race. The Soviet Union, unable to endure the war of attrition, collapsed under the weight of its own economic bankruptcy.

The insane amounts poured into defense spending would later shock the world during the Gulf War, when everyone witnessed America’s overwhelming technological gap and felt as if they were facing aliens. America’s military power had been hammered into the consciousness of the entire planet.

In the end, America is a country where a single genius elite feeds the ignorant masses…

As with all things in this world, turning a sinking supertanker around could not be done without cost. Starting in 1980 the American middle class was silently annihilated, and the polarization of wealth spiraled out of control. The rich became astronomically richer, elites received education that placed them in a different dimension and evolved into a new species of humanity, while the vast numerical majority of the public grew increasingly ignorant and stupid. Flaunting wealth became infinitely tolerated, and personal success, regardless of the process, became an object of worship. This was the era when vicious materialism, which would continue into the future, openly raised its head. It was around this time that young, capable “yuppies” obsessed solely with success and consumption began pouring into the streets.

While Henry was clicking his tongue at the absence of the China story on network news, President Carter in the White House Oval Office let out a groan as he stared at the daily papers spread across his desk.

“How is this possible? These articles pinpoint the tariff cuts and technology cooperation ranges we only casually floated during working-level talks with terrifying accuracy. Has there been a leak?”

FBI Director William Webster, standing beside him, flipped through a file folder with a troubled expression.

“Mr. President, our investigation found no evidence that any documents were leaked from inside. The truth is that the tariff reductions and scope of technology cooperation were matters experts could have guessed to some degree. But there is something even more bizarre and frightening.”

“Bizarre? What exactly?”

Webster pulled out a sweat-stained document envelope and placed it on Carter’s desk.

“This is the ‘root document’ of the incident that our agents obtained. As you can see, it is not an official classified paper. It is closer to a ‘warning report on China’s rise’ that adds macro-level future projections to the items our government is currently reviewing. Yet its tone is excessively sophisticated and dagger-sharp. And it is viciously negative toward China. Every toxic clause and ‘sea of red nukes’ scenario the papers are screaming about was excerpted from this very report.”

Carter frowned as he turned ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠the first page. “Where did this first appear?”

“Our investigation shows the document was first secretly delivered to Time editor-in-chief William E. Borelli. Borelli recognized it as the scoop of a lifetime and sought verification from prominent Ivy League professors and economists. That was the spark. The old scholars were stunned by the report’s insight and began circulating copies among themselves for debate. The information spread like wildfire through the vast net of the intellectual class.”

Webster swallowed dryly and continued.

“It has now flowed into rival newspapers as well, each reprocessing it according to their own slant. The FBI has been deployed, but with hundreds of professors and journalists already sharing the content, identifying the original distributor is impossible. Our internal assessment is that… the mastermind behind this board may never be uncovered. We do, however, have a few guesses about which countries might be involved.”

Carter tapped the corner of the report with his finger and murmured, “You can’t identify the mastermind? You can only guess?”

“Mr. President, the initial delivery to Borelli appears to have been planned to leave no trail. There is truly not a single trace. Whether the original deliverer or the accomplices who spread it, we cannot find the suspects, or perhaps there are simply too many. Even if we treat every academic as a suspect, many have already shared it voluntarily. A single, meticulously crafted report has seized control of the entire American brain.”

“Hoo… So who does your guess say is behind this monstrous document?”

Webster hesitated for a moment before answering.

“Internal assessment suggests it will be difficult to identify any specific individual or organization. However, it is crystal clear who stands to gain the most if this report becomes reality. First, South Korea. Park Chung-hee is currently obsessed with nuclear development. The ‘Asian nuclear domino’ logic sown by this report gives him the perfect justification for arming himself. The argument is that since America cannot protect us, we must arm ourselves. Japan is the same. They will use this threat as a pretext to shed the constraints of their peace constitution and march toward becoming a military power. Taiwan needs no explanation.”

Webster stared directly at Carter and delivered his conclusion.

“In the end, the highest probability is that Asian intelligence agencies have colluded with American conservatives to set up this board. It is a high-level psychological operation aimed at collapsing your Mr. President’s US-China trade negotiations to prevent technology leakage and to secure their own military autonomy. This is not a simple information leak. It is a massive state-level lobbying effort wearing the skin of the media and pressing a blade to our throats.”

Carter’s grip tightened on the report. The sound of paper crumpling helplessly tore through the silence of the Oval Office.

“So the FBI is going to surrender to a single bundle of paper? You’re telling ‍‍‌‌⁠​​⁠‌​​‍​​‍​‌​⁠‍‌‍⁠⁠‌⁠‌‍‌‍‌‌‌‍⁠​‌​‌​‌‍‌‌‌⁠‍​​‌‍⁠‌‌⁠⁠me we really can’t uncover the mastermind?”

“Mr. President, we will do everything in our power to find the original deliverer, but the operation was designed so meticulously that the odds of coming up empty are high. The bomb has already exploded across the entire intellectual class, far beyond the realm of ordinary crime. Thousands of intellectuals have become addicted to this logic. As long as the First Amendment lives, we cannot arrest them all, can we?”

And on July 2, Time magazine carrying the “1979 China Threat Theory” was published.