Author: lukewarm source: official account: lukewarm studio has been authorized to reprint
Since July this year, Shinzo Abe, Mikhail Gorbachev, Kazuo Inamori, and Elizabeth II have all died suddenly. Almost four people who have a very important impact on history have died suddenly.
If you look back, these four people all represent the golden age of the West. Shinzo Abe is much younger. He is included because he is behind the once prosperous political family in Japan. Gorbachev is included because he promoted the golden age of the west after surrendering to the West.
As a person born in 1982, according to the information I saw and my personal experience, when China started its reform and opening up in 1978, China’s per capita GDP could be said to be the poorest country in the world at that time.
In the 1970s and 1980s, the whole western world began to enter the peak period.
For example, let’s take American truck drivers as an example. In the 1970s, American truck drivers reached their happiest period. At that time, their quality of life was the highest. At that time, their monthly income had reached seven or eight thousand dollars a month. At that time, the income of a Chinese working for 200 days was equivalent to the income of an American working for one day. The gap between them was so large that it made people despair, That is why in the 1970s and 1980s, it created a huge ideological imprint on many young people at that time. I always felt that Europe and the United States were the center of world civilization. Europe and the United States always represented wealth and advancement. This imprint can not be erased in this life, because the gap at that time was too big.
Even some key world nodes that do second-hand business with the European and American world, as long as they are attached to the European and American world and located in the transportation arteries of their production chain and supply chain, such as Hong Kong and Singapore, will benefit greatly from this.
In the 1990s, a large truck driver in Hong Kong was 25000 to 50000 Hong Kong dollars a month. At that time, Hong Kong dollars were more expensive than RMB. At that time, as an ordinary Chinese, his monthly income was only a few hundred yuan less. I remember very clearly. In 1997, my father told me that if I could get 600 to 700 yuan a month when I grew up, he would be very satisfied.
At that time, a large truck driver in Hong Kong was already 25000-50000 Hong Kong dollars a month. There was a huge gap between the two. The whole western world could be said to be living an extremely superior life. Their welfare and quality of life were far away from us. This comparison is a comparison between the whole West and the East.
Before the disintegration of the Soviet Union, there was only one buffer zone in the world, that is, only Europe and the United States plus the Soviet Union. There are a large number of extremely poor developing countries below. Today, in some West African countries, after the mines in their homes were dug up by the French, the French cars drove out of the mining areas and fell debris on the road. Those West Africans went to the ground to pick up the debris and ash and sift them clean, After that, they sold a small amount of pocket money. They are still living this kind of life. This is the huge difference between the whole European and American world and the developing world.
Europe and the United States ran too fast in the early stage of industrialization, so they have a lot of space to exploit and squeeze developing countries. Although they have done a lot of anti human things, as long as they are rich, there will be many simple people who admire the strong to wash their eyes and say that everything they do is right.
For example, in the British Empire, they made contributions to the world, but also brought great disasters. However, there are still many people in China. When the queen died, they really looked like their ancestors. You can’t understand the feelings of these people. In fact, they are strong minded. They will sympathize with the colonists. They don’t believe that their country and nation can stand up, I don’t believe that we can live a good life through the efforts of generations. In 1978, we were indeed the poorest country in the world at that time, but we could still come here a little bit. And there was a special reason for our poverty. It was because we were in a hostile state with the Soviet Union and the United States at the same time, so we were the poorest, but we kept our sovereignty, So we can quickly surpass other countries in the next few decades.
At the same time, India, which started with us, is superior to us in all aspects. The basic resources they had when they started, and their friendship with world powers, are much better than ours. However, after we retained our sovereignty, India has been left far behind in the short 40 years of reform and opening up. We have swallowed the deepest suffering. However, we believe that China can certainly stand on its own, which is why earth shaking changes have taken place in the short 40 years.
The whole world takes 2008 as the dividing line, which has changed the first golden years of western countries. From the 1970s to 2008, there were more than 30 years of golden cycles. The whole west is in an extremely rich state. At this time, they treat us with compassion, compassion and contempt. But after these 30 years, there are actually only two countries in the world growing after 2008. One is the United States and the other is China, The United States is the world’s financial hegemon, while China relies on the sudden advance in the industrial field to achieve crazy growth at one breath. Other countries have stagnated for a long time, and have not moved forward.
Many people have not noticed the GDP of Germany and Japan in 2008. By 2022, the data of Germany and Japan in 2008 have been hovering around. In other words, in the past 14 years, Europe and the United States have slowly stagnated, and then slowly declined.
Shinzo Abe, mikuo Gorbachev, Kazuo Inamori and Elizabeth II all came from the golden age of Europe and the United States. If you look carefully at the economic development history of Europe and the United States, the development of Europe and the United States has never been smooth. When the oil crisis occurred in the fourth China East War, the whole Europe and the United States also fell into a huge crisis. The United States also entered a period of high inflation from that time, It also took a long time for the high inflation in the United States to be gradually eliminated.
The United States came to cooperate with China because high inflation was very serious at that time and the United States was being attacked by the Soviet Union. We were not given handouts. Other people needed us. We could not solve the problem of the Soviet Union or the problem of high inflation within the United States, so we came to cooperate.
We must make this problem clear. Many people think that China’s reform and opening-up is a handout from the European and American world. No, during the oil crisis, London in Britain was in a depression. If you read the Memoirs of that year, the West has never been smooth sailing. But after the 1980s, a large number of problems accumulated by the Soviet Union broke out. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, a wave of his property was stolen by people within the Soviet Union, Turning state-owned property into private property, the other half was swallowed up by European and American countries, and the forces of countries with Britain and the United States as the mainstay, fattened the entire European and American countries. Only then can European and American countries reach a highly developed state, so we went to see the whole of Europe and America, Singapore, Hong Kong and Taiwan at that time. The gap was so big that we could not believe it, At that time, the Chinese nation was suffering from a huge sense of gap that was difficult to bridge.
In 2002, friends around me went to Hong Kong and felt that it was a very proud thing. After returning, everyone told us how Hong Kong’s roads were designed and how good Hong Kong’s business district was. But in fact, after it became a very common thing for us to shuttle between Hong Kong, we found that it was actually like that. The legendary Golden Bauhinia Square was actually so big, Walking from Mongkok to Victoria Harbour, it was so close. After the mystery of Hong Kong was broken, we stopped making a fuss and became very calm.
The decline of Hong Kong is essentially the decline of the western world. If Hong Kong wants to rise again, it can only rise with its back to the motherland.
When you go to other places to wander around, you will suddenly find that their countries are like this. Europe is full of thieves, and you can see a lot of garbage on the streets of Japan. It is not the extremely rich, prosperous, peaceful and friendly world we imagined.
This year’s wave of dead people, who are in their prime of life, are at their best and can look down on us, but this era is over.
The geomantic omens of the world take turns. China also stood at the highest peak in history during the Tang and Han Dynasties and the Ming Dynasty. At that time, did we ever think that there would be a tragedy like that in the late Qing Dynasty, but one day we will slowly decline and then stand up again.
Many people do not believe that the European and American world will decline, because the gap at that time was too large, and many people were desperate, but many people were not desperate.
I think there are still a group of great people in China who dare to set such a grand goal that we will become a moderately developed country in the middle of the 21st century when we are so poor. Who would dare to believe this at that time? I saw this when I read political books in the 1990s. I also don’t believe it. But now they are really steadily moving towards this stage step by step.
If we develop smoothly, this time point may be advanced.
Of course, before this time point comes, the world will certainly experience a huge turning point. We have eaten up many resources and high-quality industries in Europe and the United States, and their overall quality of life will decline a lot. So you can see that as soon as China’s industry rose, it joined the WTO in 2001, and the world financial crisis in 2008. At this time, the golden age of the whole west began to slowly stagnate, and then it is certain that, Taking the Russian Ukrainian war this year and 2022 as the boundary, it will be the second dividing line of the western world.
As French President macron said: the history of France (in fact, the whole of Western Europe) living without worries about food and clothing is about to pass.
In fact, the leaders of the whole Europe know very well that they are standing on the historical dividing line, but they have no way to change the pattern of history, because the whole Europe is deeply controlled by the United States in terms of economy, military and ideology, and none of them can reverse the change of history.
In the past, we could share the world together. When the western world and Japan were so different from the Asian world, they could share the fruits of victory together. But when a country in the East suddenly stood up and found that the cake was not enough, the United States asked Europe to cut it up and add it to its bowl. At this time, Europe could not resist.
The death of Elizabeth II represents not only the death of her generation, but also the complete end of the golden years of the whole west. If they get up next time, according to the laws of history, it will be between 150 and 200 years. After the whole western world has fallen, I believe that the future world will be a multipolar world. I believe that there is no country, It can reach the influence of the United States from the 1980s to the 2000s.
Because this influence of the United States is a very special historical phenomenon produced at a very special historical stage. It was after the world experienced World War I and World War II, and after the continuous accumulation of talents and funds, and then just after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the sudden collapse of a great empire that no one thought of. It developed the extreme wealth of the United States at that time, as well as the United States’ imperialist influence and control over the world.
In addition, Chinese Confucianism and Chinese people’s understanding of the world will not lead us to the hegemonism of the United States. I believe that the world in the future will be a multipolar world.
Now the United States and the western world are both in the process of decline, but who is weaker first and who will decline faster. Therefore, the rate of decline in Europe now takes precedence over that in the United States. But after Europe has eaten up, the United States can not find the next object to swallow. It is time for the United States.
I also believe in one thing, that is, the western world has declined, but it is not destroyed. We must not look at the world with a arrogant attitude. The western world is only declining, but not destroyed. Moreover, every western country will certainly retain a small number of people who eat their own meals, and some core industrial fields.
For example, the French say that they must keep their LNG technology and luxury goods. They will also firmly occupy some West African countries and cling to their colonies.
Moreover, a family, from extremely rich to rich, from middle class to well-off, is slowly declining, so I estimate that Europe and the United States should be from an extremely developed (1970-2008) to a developed (2008-2022), and then it will fall into a middle-class world. It will not fall into a well-off and poor world soon, or some industries will remain.
Therefore, we should not expect Europe and the United States to completely and completely decline. They should still have a transition period for the middle class, which can last for 30 to 50 years. We don’t know how to go in the future. We should look at it while we walk.
All we need to know is that the global pattern is being subverted and we are ushering in the future of a multipolar world. China cannot follow the path of American hegemony. With China’s current situation, it is difficult for us to achieve the influence of the United States on the world at its peak. What the world is facing is a multipolar world. The gap between the rich and the poor in all countries in the world will not be as large as before, but a relatively even A multipolar earth pattern.
The death of Elizabeth II took away not only the most golden and peak years of Britain, but also the most golden and peak years of Europe. I believe there will be another turning point in the United States in the future, and the United States will also fall from the most developed to the developed, and then slowly into the middle class.
As a post-80s generation, I have experienced the period when China was not rich before. China’s cities and rural areas used to be poor. Watching them develop a little over the past few decades has given me a great feeling. As a person, we must not look at the world with an old-fashioned perspective and think that the world is unchanged.
At the same time, it reminds us that in the process of our own development, we should also be alert to the process of our own country’s development. We should not enter the White left world of the west, nor flood with love when we are full. We should also remember the suffering we have experienced before. We should always remind us to stay alert. Only in this way can our nation go further and our country stay in the position of prosperity for a longer time.
The Russian Ukrainian war in 2022 has put an end to the golden years of the West. However, those who cry for the death of the British queen can neither believe nor face it.