Transcription
Hello, can you hear me? Okay.
Uh, my first question is to Victor Gao. Uh, so basically, there is an extreme amount of polarization in the United States of America. Uh, where we see a lot of different, uh, there's a debate, constant debate going on between the left and the right. Uh, as a young student from National University of Science and Technology, I see these things. I see the young generation. I want to know how China has done this amazing thing where the entire nation is going in a very singular direction of development, whereas the US is going on a downhill trope of polarization and not caring about development in that sense. So, how has China achieved that, and how is it better than the approach of the West in the current regime?
Who, who are you addressing the question to?
Uh, Victor G.
Thank you very much for your question. Before I answer your question, please allow me to express my condolence and, uh, mourning to the loss of life in that terrorist attack in India. But I want to urge everyone, don't jump to the gun, jump the gun and accuse any other government for being behind, behind the terrorist attack. I condemn terrorist attacks of all colors, shapes, and forms. And whenever there is a terrorist attack, I hope investigation will be exhausted before you produce real evidence as to who was behind it. But let's really mourn the loss of life. That's number one.
Number two is that, you know, I was educated at Yale, uh, law school. I went to the same law school as Vice President JD Vance did. I was 20 classes ahead of Vice President JD Vance. Let me tell you, when I look at the United States, comparing China and the United States, if we think China is a vehicle, the United States is a vehicle. China's vehicle has four wheels. It's always synchronized, moving together, forefront, forward, or backwards, or turning right or turning left. When you think about the United States as a vehicle, whether it has four wheels or not, I do not know, maybe sometimes only three. And the wheels are lined completely in opposing directions. One moves forward, the other moves backward, the other moves leftwise or rightwise. Now, I learned it was the original design. The American forefathers did not want to, founding fathers did not want to have a very strong government. They want to have enough checks and balances. So understanding the checks and balances in the US system is crucial.
Now, allow me to mention one thing. I'm actually very much concerned about the economic situation in the United States. The federal government remains shut down today. Can you believe it? The largest economy in the world, the very strong military power remains shut down. Not because of China, not because of Europe, not because of India versus Pakistan, but because of the internal problems inside the United States. I also have a concern that maybe 2025 or 2026, there will be a major crisis breaking out in the United States. And if that does, and knock on the wood, I hope it will never happen. But if it does, let me tell you, there is only one country in this world which can save the United States, and that is China. China did that in 2008 during the international financial crisis. If you do not believe me, listen to what Hank Paulson said. Ridiculous. He kept calling China in 2008 asking for China to bail out the United States. And if there is any really wobbling in Wall Street in the United States, no other country can bail out the United States other than China. That means I hope Mr. Randi and all the American friends whom I highly respect will know how to deal with China. Don't alienate China too much that eventually, when that disaster does happen, God forbid, China will stand still and watch across the ocean. That will be a bad thing for the United States as well as for China.
Now, the other thing is that I want to show you this one, and I'll wrap up. Now, this is a phone. It's a Huawei phone. It's all chips, all made in China, but it has one function that the Americans never will have. It has a satellite communication function which will enable me to communicate to a high altitude satellite 35,000 kilometers above our head. 35,000 kilometers. It's not like the SpaceX which communicates with low orbit satellite 300 or 350 kilometers. What does that mean? And this is a civilian used phone. You do not see any extruded antenna in it. It's just a normal phone. This is for civilian use. The Americans will never have this technology because China has the proprietary technology of communicating 3,000, 35,000 kilometers above your warhead. What does it mean? China wants to embrace peace. But in case of war, the lower orbit satellites will be destroyed, and the high altitude satellites may have greater opportunity or likelihood of remaining intact. That means in times of real war or a world war, you can communicate with this phone with anyone else in the world after everything is destroyed, after low orbit satellites will be destroyed. That's why I always say the inevitability of peace between China and the United States. China has developed enough proprietary technologies to be way ahead of the United States. And the fact that the newly launched aircraft carrier FU, which has the electromagnetic counter-ult system, is amazing. President Trump said the American version of the electromagnetic system does not work. He wants to go back to the steam catapult system. Now, let me tell you, the electromagnetic catapult system for the aircraft launcher is the only real viable solution. Steam catapult system does not work. Especially when you are facing off each other and you need to launch your aircrafts, for example, quicker, faster, in greater abundance than the other side. A simple split of a second will matter. I say this to say China is very focused. China is not only a manufacturing power alone. China is the top brain power in the world. And in this regard, we've learned a lot from Britain, for example, for many years. We've learned a lot from the United States. And we treat both Britain and, [clears throat] the United States and many others, and also Russia, for example, as equal partners. We do not want to seek global dominance. But we will never allow any country or any group of countries to dominate above China. These are very simple examples. But each time when you see me use this phone, you will know this has the real cutting-edge technology in the world. Not heard of in Britain, not heard of in the United States, not heard of in Russia, but in China. This, this just looks like a cheese or bread and butter on the table. Everyone can buy and use this very sophisticated functions not available anywhere else in the world.
Thank you.
Thank you. You should tell us, tell us how much it costs.
This costs cheaper than the Apple phone. Can you believe it? Everything made in China is lower cost.
Can you believe it? Let me show you this one. No, I do not advertise this phone, but this is real, something of a masterpiece.
Okay. Yes, please.
Well, I'm, I'm, I want to thank Mr. Gal for recog. I, I think it's very important that we should condemn terrorism and all of its.
Yeah. Uh, very quickly, thank you very much for mentioning Africa. Africa should not be the forgotten continent in the Mala conference. Uh, the reality was that, uh, for quite a few decades, Africa was the forgotten continent as far as, unfortunately, the Europeans are concerned because they have a lot of skeletons in their closet. As far as Africa is concerned, I do not want to go into details. And also by the United States because of its slavery history, etc. We do not want to go into details of that. China has no skeleton in its closet as far as Africa is concerned. China actually, uh, sacrificed a lot in supporting the African, uh, national liberation drive, mainly because at that time, the Chinese leader was Mao, the predecessor of Deng Xiaoping, for whom I interpreted with. And Mao had this fancy of supporting people everywhere in the world in achieving their independence from colonialism and imperialism, for example. So that's the beginning of China's engagement with Africa. And for many years, China's cooperation with Africa was one-directional. China supported Africa, providing arms, providing financial support, providing ideological support. Later, around 2000, it changed. It became two-way traffic. China imported a lot, increasing amount from Africa, and exported a lot to Africa, to such an extent that there was an awakening in Europe and in the United States for Africa. And again, let me put this on the record. China has no problem with American engagement with Africa, or European engagement, or with, uh, Japanese engagement with Africa. The more the better, because Africa needs help and assistance from all countries in the world which they can. And talking about connectivity, which Africa direly needs. The more roads you build, the better. The Chinese build roads, the Japanese or the Americans, etc. But for the moment, only China is really spending a lot in building up connectivity of all kinds, building up power generation in the African continent, and helping them to train talents of all kinds. So I hope there will be a real awakening of interest in Africa. In terms of the size of the population, Chinese population, African population are more or less on par with each other. Now, in terms of the land mass, the African continent is about three times as big as China. So, each African country on average is less than a province in China. So, China does have the expertise, the knowledge base in helping the African countries how to manage their situation and how to upgrade themselves, uh, lifting their population out of poverty, building up connectivity, and really focus on manufacturing and, uh, industrial output. So, let's all work together for the benefit of the African people. Thank you.
Thank you. Just I would, I just say that there's a 400 million middle class in Africa. In the next 15 years, there'll be more citizens of Africa than the citizens of India and China combined. There's going to be more people in Africa in some very short period of time than there are in India and China combined. So, it's an enormous continent. Uh, I've been to 10 African countries. I helped shape in the first Trump administration, uh, its policy towards Africa called Prosper Africa. And, um, I'm on the board of a, of a business, uh, advisory group, uh, called Busousar Global Advisors, that are specifically focused on US and American, uh, business ties, uh, between, uh, Africa and the United States. I think the United States has been a very good partner to Africa in many different ways, whether it's in trade or security or development. So I think we're, I think the West needs to do a better job of of seeing Africa as an opportunity as opposed to a charity case.
Hello. Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Meen Khan, and I'm a public policy analyst. Um, my question is directed to the representative of what I believe to be not just the upcoming, but the ultimate global superpower. The only power that doesn't, and the only speaker that did not issue any disclaimers, who spoke for his country on behalf of his country and expressed himself openly, and that is Dr. G, the speaker that acknowledged the massive genocide in Gaza. And we condemn terrorist acts across the board. We also condemn genocides. We call them out and we condemn them. Thank you for acknowledging that Pakistan is a sovereign state and thank you for allowing us the liberty of making friendships with our neighbors.
And choosing our friends.
Well, we had a neighbor called Iran. We still have one. And we wanted to build a pipeline with them. And no prizes to the students at the back for guessing which country blocked that.
So my question to Dr. G. In 1998, I was a student at Harvard University, in fact, when Dean Nye was in charge. He was the initiator behind soft power. And I was studying a course called Foreign Policy. And in that course, there was a huge chunk devoted to the rising bear of China. And being a British Pakistani, I had no idea. China was never on my radar in the late 90s because there was no fear-mongering in the British press about China. And going to America for the first time and studying there and living there for two years, I was just amazed at why the Americans were so afraid of China. That was 27 years ago. And clearly, they were seeing the amazing changes that were happening in China economically, strategically, technologically. And they knew China was the threat to American bullying and American supremacy, which has come true. Dr. Gao, I would like to ask you, the reason I think China is so successful is because you don't impose your culture, your language, and your values on any country you do business with, unlike our colonial friends, who tell us, "Do you want more of us like a cheap date?" Otherwise, we have options. So, Dr. Gao, how do you think China is going to deal with this great role that it is embracing of being a global superpower, of outstripping its rivals? They see you as a rival. That's why I'm using that term because I think China is a civilization. It's not just a power. It's been a great civilization throughout history. One of the greatest. And it's regaining its greatness after colonial intervention and deliberate suppression of, [clears throat] China. So I would like to ask you this, how do you see your role in countering Western hegemony and influence? And in particular, although you condemn the genocide, what we in, uh, many areas of the world felt that China did not assert itself in stopping the genocide. So can you please clarify what the thinking was behind your somewhat muted role in the Gaza genocide? Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you very much. Uh, first of all, uh, convey, uh, you mentioned, uh, Professor Joseph Nye. He's well known in China. Uh, I have high respect for you for being educated at Harvard. And, uh, China does not want to be a superpower because superpower, as a term, is a negative term, a derogatory term in the Chinese language. We want to be a super population. And I coined that term, super population, for a country with more than 1 billion people. In the world of today, only two countries qualify: China and India. But we want to be super populations, but not superpowers. A superpower, for example, uh, uh, is very abrasive, very sharp elbows, for example, pushes you around, and sometimes holds a gun at your head. This is something China will never do.
Now, the other thing is that if you compare China versus the United States, I've been said in the darkest hour of the tariff war that China, we don't care. We don't care. We don't care. I said that three times on public television. Uh, why? Because, you know, China has been here for 5,000 years, if not even longer. And, uh, for most of the time, there is no United States, really. You know, I don't think Mr. Randi would disagree with me. Uh, next year, the United States will celebrate the 250 years of the founding of the United States of America. But over the thousands of years, we've met with all kinds of disasters, calamities, rivals, enemies, you name it. I will not go into details. We met with the Hans, at the Han, you know, went west, etc., after being defeated by the Chinese. We met with the Turks, for example. They left and went west, for example. I do not want to go into details. We dealt with the Mongols. We dealt with the Mughals. You name it. But one thing is very unique for the Chinese nation. The Chinese civilization has never been destroyed. Has never been interrupted. That means when we look at the United States, we have a historical perspective. I can stretch time, boom, into 5,000 years, and then I can stretch time into the future for another 5,000 years. And I'm pretty sure by the end of the coming 5,000 years, the Chinese civilization will still stand on the global stage. Whether the United States will be there 5,000 years later, I hope they will. But, you know, you really need to do a lot of history to see how deeper your roots are to be able to project, you know, the length of your survivability. That's number one.
Number two is that in China, we have a saying: "Do not do unto others what you do not want others do unto you." Now, let me be very quick. In the heat of the air battle, immediately after the Indian loss, Prime Minister Modi threatened to deny water to Pakistan. And I said publicly on Indian television, I said, "To deny water to the people in the downstream in times of peace will be a crime against humanity. In times of war, it will be a war crime." So I urged the Indian government not to do that. And I said, "Don't do unto others what you don't want others do unto you." The host, wonderful lady, said, "Are you threatening India?" And I said, "No, this is not a threat. This is a 2,500-year-old philosophical truth that we keep practicing in China. Don't do unto others what you don't want others do onto us." The same way, I would tell the Americans and President Trump and his team, "Don't do onto China what you don't want China do onto you." If you want to chokehold China in terms of the semiconductor, China will choke you in terms of the rare earth. And Trump and the Pakistan are talking about rare earth. But Trump himself doesn't know. But Secretary of State Rubio knows having rare earth is just one step in the right direction. Whether you will be able to extract them, to process them, to refine it to what we say 6N's, meaning 9.99999 degree, that is the trick. And only China has that. So China has never had any problem exporting rare earth to the United States before. But if you want to chokehold, China will choke you back. And that really makes the United States, in terms of defense industry, very much losing its insanity because it being, it's being choked. I mentioned this again. If calm descends between China and the United States, why should the United States try to chokehold China in terms of the semiconductor?
Let me tell you, in a matter of, this is my judgment, 3 to 5 years, China will no longer need to import any single dollar of chips made abroad, including from China's Taiwan province. That means China will achieve complete self-reliance in semiconductor chips. And once China achieves that, there will be a revolution in terms of chips pricing. Price will drop like a rocket, like many other things that China will achieve self-independence. That means again, China will never fire the first shot at anyone, but China will never allow you to fire the second shot at China. That is the resilience of China. That is the wisdom of China. And also the historical depth, and by which you can really project what will be the future. So I keep thinking about the world in terms of the coming 5,000 years. I keep thinking about the United States in 7025. Where is the United States by 7025? I hope Mr. Randi and his people will think about that. I keep thinking about China in 7025. Let me tell you my real truth. I believe China will be standing there by 7025. And I hope China-Pakistan friendship will also survive to 20, sorry, 7025 and beyond. Thank you.
When, when, uh, Dr. G was referring to falling prices, for a second, I thought you were going to say falling like the Indian Rafales, but you didn't say that. So I, I can't take the liberty and say that. Uh, yes. Yes.
Hi.
We, sorry, we have the last 10 minutes, so we'll have to go very quickly.
Okay. And my name is Zanera. I'm a journalist and a policy analyst. Can you hear me now?
Okay. Yeah. So my question is to Mr. Randi, who said that this is the moment for Pakistan to go big on minerals, one, and two, engage on TAPI. Uh, it's interesting the way you put it because it seems like a very US-centric approach towards Pakistan. It's different that Pakistan would always welcome it, given our economic problems. But how is this different from every time when the US comes back to Pakistan with its own interests and putting it in front of us as if it is in our interests? That is number one. Number two, um, I'm a student of federalism, and I have read all the 85 essays, Federalist Papers. I'm talking about, and the American dream that we, uh, saw while we were growing up and heard of. Uh, it is, it is painful to see what is happening on your campuses, to your citizens, to students who don't agree to you. So isn't it better for us to focus on the domestic front a little? Thank you.
Okay. Thank you. Um, so I guess what I would say about, we've historically had a very oversecuritized. The only people in Washington that know anything about Pakistan are spies and generals. We have an overly militarized relationship. I'm a Republican. I like spies and I like generals. Okay. But we have too much of that. So I think the question for the United States and Pakistan is, do we want to diversify and broaden the aperture of our partnership? You know, we have a relationship. It's, you know, I think we have, you know, we owe a lot to Pakistan for opening the relationship with China. We have a, we have a history. There's some distrust and there's been some, uh, you know, we've had a number of conflicts. We're, as I said, I think we're at the high point of our relationship in the last 15 years, and it's the first time in 60 years we're looking at Pakistan as Pakistan. So my thought is, what can we do in the economic sphere? I think President Trump and his team are right to be focused on this. Uh, like I said, I'll take a little bit of credit because like when I came here a year ago and I started talking about minerals, people looked at me like, what are you talking about? Uh, to be frank. And so, uh, I think there are, if we want to broaden the aperture of the relationship, in my view, these are two obvious areas. There's others, it's LG, some of its, it's, it's its technology. But I think, as I said earlier, we need to think about how Pakistan handles its energy and its electricity issues if we're going to actually make the promise of AI a thing. Um, and then I guess on the campuses, my view is, we have 1 million foreign students. That's a good thing. Uh, at the same time, it's a privilege. You're a guest in the United States. So if you say things or you people act in a certain, one thing is speech. Sometimes there's really obnoxious speech. But sometimes it's people not following the rules. So it's a privilege. It's not a right to come and study in the US. People can study in the UK. People can study in China. People can study elsewhere. So, if we don't have a, a million students and we end up having 700,000 students, I'm okay with that. If we don't have a million students, we have 300,000 foreign students, I'm okay with that, too. So, uh, it's a privilege to come to the United States. Many of you have studied there. I'm, I think it's a, it's one part of our soft power, but it's not a right. And so, it means you have to abide by certain rules. And so, I, I'm assuming part of what you're referring to is some of the stuff around October 7th. If you participate in demonstrations and the university says you need to break up the protest and you won't do it, my view is we should have consequences for that. There's consequences. There's rules here in Pakistan. People follow rules. We have rules in the United States. We're a free country. But at the same time, we've got rules. If you're a guest in a country, you should respect being a guest in the country.
G, at the back.
G.
Thank you. Uh, because we are running out of time, I will go asking if Pakistan becomes part of the US broader initiative to reduce China's control over critical minerals. How is China likely to reposition itself in response to such a development? And my question directly goes to Dr. Gao. Thank you.
I, I thought the question was about the minerals and China's role in that. First of all, I think the United States is talking with multiple countries in the world about rare earth. Uh, Myanmar included. Can you believe it? Pakistan included, you, Ukraine, and China's northern neighbor, Mongolia, many others. Uh, it's not a problem. I, I think, uh, the fact of the matter is that sometimes whenever you have the rare earth minerals, you actually send it to China to be processed and to be refined. Rare earth in itself is not rare by any stretch of the imagination. The problem is that rare earth coexists with other minerals. So you need to extract the rare earth part of the mineral from the other minerals, and then you need to, uh, uh, process huge amounts of other minerals in order to really extract a very tiny amount of rare earth. Then the difficulty really kicks in. You need to refine it into the highest level of fineness before it can really be used on, uh, advanced semiconductors, etc. Now, the trick is that if you use rare earth materials to build phantom planes, etc., and it is not of the highest quality, your planes, your missiles can be detected by the other side. And don't quote me when I say this because I'm not an expert on this, but the noise I picked up is that when the B2 bombers took off in the United States, flying west across the Pacific and eventually dropped the bomb on Iran, the takeoff, the flight, and whatever it did in the air was picked up by very sophisticated radar. Even the cockpit dialogue between the pilots was picked up. Can you believe it? Now, this means some country, I do not want to name the name, you know what I'm talking about, has the very sophisticated technology. And if you really want to choke China in terms of the semiconductor chips, China will be self-reliant eventually, 3 to 5 years. But then it will take minimum 10 years before the United States can really come up with a real practical road map to manufacture and process and refine rare earth to the finest quality. And in the matter of today, 5 years will make or break anything in this world. So that leaves me again back to, uh, my conclusion, inevitability of peace. I want to be in eternal peace with people like Mr. Randi, everyone in the United States, with all my classmates at Yale Law School, including my alumni, Vice President JD Vance. And I do hope he will win the presidential election in 2028 and be the next president in 2029. Therefore, between China and the United States, forget about all these rivalry, etc. China is not a rising power. Uh, allow me to mention, China has been in the top is law for thousands of years, and China will never allow any country after the Opium War to rule above China and to bully China. So from the US perspective, don't call China as a rising power. We have risen again and again. And look at the comparison between China today and Britain today. I told the British friends, China is not a competitor for Britain. Where do China compete with Britain except for the men's football team? Other than that, where is the competition? No, there is no competition. Britain will be ill-advised to think China as a competitor or a rival or an enemy. No way. China is not competing with Britain. China is thinking about landing persons on the moon ahead of anyone else. And China is really very broad-minded. And China wants to embrace everyone in the world as an equal rather than to dominate above you. That is the China, and that is the resilience of China. When you think about China, think about China marching over, over 5,000 years to today. And I can tell you, I am a typical descendant of the Chinese civilization. And I want to keep marching forward into the future for another 5,000 years. By then, where is Great Britain? I do not know. You know, the British Prime Minister was an Indian-born distinguished Prime Minister, and the Mayor of New York is an Muslim American born somewhere in Africa. Is that right? So I would say when we look at today, don't be seized up with today. Always think about the historical depth. And when we look at today, never only think about today. Forecast into the future. And in the Chinese term, we look back minimum 5,000 years and we look forward another 5,000 years. I will dare to say there are no other nations in the world which can bring onto the table that historical perspective in terms of time and that historical projection into the future. Therefore, deal with China as an equal. That's the minimum thing you can do. Don't rule above China. Don't try to bully China. Don't try to push China around. And China will never do this to you. China just wants to be your equal. That's the minimum bottom line. Thank you.
We had, thank you very much. We had, we have more questions. I know there is one gentleman I've, I've given the mic to, but we are out of time. We are out of time. I'll have to apologize to you because it is 2:30 and, uh, the next session has to come around. So you can ask the question privately once we finish. So I'd like to, I'd like to thank all the speakers today. Um, and I think I just, one thing that I would like to mention is that, you know, the, the quality of the panel today was that you got four different versions of, uh, of important issues that are of so much importance to us. And, uh, in Pakistan, unfortunately, we are not used to hearing such a variety of views. So it's a, it's a wonderful opportunity. Uh, General Majid, credit to you and your team for having a, a, a panel which can actually, which can actually allow us to think beyond our own prejudices and biases. We all learn from it, and we ultimately, it will benefit discourse in Pakistan. Thank you very much for being with us today.
Thank you very much, worthy speakers and the moderator. This concludes a very interesting discourse on great power politics and the future of international security. I would request President Epri to please come on the stage and present mementos to our worthy speakers and the moderator. Mr. Daniel Randi, Dr. Victor Gao, Dr. Anisa Sia Meligina, Mr. Despine Bwin, and finally our moderator for the session, Mr. Fahad Hussein. I request the speakers and the moderator to assemble for a group photo, please.