What are the implications of this? More precisely, where will these fault lines emerge? China is likely to experience an increasing dichotomy between its poorer rural inland and (increasingly capitalistic) wealthy coastal regions. These coastal regions are growing accustomed to their prosperity and are going to become increasingly defiant towards any attempts to ’sacrifice for the common good’ (inner-China). As the coastal provinces continue to integrate their economies with the surrounding region (South Korea, Japan… Taiwan), we could very well see an exchange of political ideology following the same vertices.

The Taiwanese government, the ROC, doesn’t need to split from China. It needs to infect China, by further integrating itself with coastal China; like Hong Kong. The PRC’s Communists and ROC’s Nationalists could conceivably compete politically as does America’s Democrats and Republicans.

The PRC and the US are already enjoying a considerably stable partnership, even with its areas of tension and mistrust. If the ROC, a close ally of the US already, were to become a very real political force within China, and Taiwan the de facto capital of the Chinese littoral, then I believe China could come to more closely resemble America’s protege.

With that said, I don’t believe that the US is close to handing off the baton quite yet. Still, the foundation is being set.

Of course, the CCP would rather follow the Singapore route than that of S. Korea and Taiwan. However, what works for a city-state of 4 million may not work for a regional-sized country of 45 million people, let alone a continental nation-state of 1.5 billion people.

It is well-known from more knowledgeable sources that Mousavi and his opposition are even more “pro-nuke” than Ahmadinejade and his crowd. Indeed, the biggest complaint that Mousavi has had with Ahmadinejade is the latter’s attracting attention to the nuclear program by shooting off his mouth every 5 minutes. They want Admadinejade to shut his mouth so as not to attract attention to their nuclear program (both energy and weapons).

The Mousavi opposition is certainly not “pro-western”. Rather, they are Persian nationalists and want Persia to be a “great” nation, with the implication that “great” nations are nuclear armed.

Also, consider that the Shah had both a commercial nuclear power program as well as a nuclear weapons program underway when he was overthrown.

I really don’t recommend this book.

As a Grandson of Konrad Peddersen, I applaud your example concerning Human Nature.

JRH