Last weekend an event happened, both expected and significant.
The 15 countries of the Asia-Pacific region have finally now officially formalized a large trading bloc without the coordinating participation of the United States that was previously necessary in any such kind of association.
But this deal, of course, was concluded with the so-called full and comprehensive support of the People's Republic of China.
And it could not be otherwise, because, as the classic of French literature sadly stated at one time, “otherwise the girls will run away from this house”.
And in general, in the end, both under American capitalism and under the Chinese socialism replacing it, the main thing is still accounting and control by the "coordinating center".
For it is possible to speak for democracy indefinitely, but after all, someone should bear responsibility for all this, if anything.
Therefore, on the one hand, what is happening, let's speak frankly, is a completely logical story, natural and therefore even a bit everyday.
And the bored observer is a little confused only by the scale of the deal: 2.2 billion potential consumers and $ 28 trillion of current annual GDP.
Moreover.
According to some forecasts (not everyone agrees with their correctness - the world is now too turbulent to operate with such distant planning horizons), by 2050 the total GDP of the countries participating in the new free trade zone may even reach $ 100 trillion.
But even if they do not agree with him, with this forecast, the current $ 28 trillion is also, you know, quite.
So, a purely economic decision is quite normal and justified for the current difficult times.
In the same way, let us allow ourselves some digression, as in the mouth of Frau Merkel "Nord Stream 2" is a purely commercial project.
Therefore, there is absolutely nothing to be surprised at.
Nevertheless, the signing of RCEP is definitely a landmark event.
And for the modern global economy, one might even say to some extent a turning point - and it is somehow rather stupid not to admit it.
However, let's go in order.
Without any special pathos and undue attracting completely unnecessary attention, as they say, on the sidelines of the ongoing annual series of ASEAN summits (this time it was generally held in video format), China and ten other countries of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), and also Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand signed the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP).
To make it absolutely clear, this is the very association that previously competed in absentia with the so-called Trans-Pacific Partnership - the very regional entity, almost the first decree canceled by Trump, in which the United States previously participated.
And now, instead of - and in many respects in place - this product of globalists from the then loser, after Barack Obama, but now winning the US Democratic Party, the RCEP project was born.
And, as the Prime Minister of the host country of the Hanoi Conference of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam, Comrade Nguyen Xuan Phuc, "RCEP will soon be ratified by the signatory countries and will enter into force, which will contribute to economic recovery after the COVID pandemic."
The pandemic contributed a lot to the early signing of this fateful document, we must give it its due: first of all, as a sobering factor for many American-centric economies of the Asia-Pacific region.
They took American standards as an example to follow.
Because the Asian way of countering the pandemic, demonstrated, by the way, not only in the PRC, but also in South Korea, as well as in some other states of the region, was so impressively different from what is still happening in the United States that there is no doubt : This set of differences hastened the decision to join RCEP by some of the now hesitant national governments of the Asia-Pacific region.
At the same time, of course, least of all it is worth believing the reports that this is now a zone "outside American influence."
You have to be an extremely naive person to believe that from the moment of entry into the new agreement, the same Japan, South Korea, Australia and New Zealand have ceased to be junior partners (and this is very putting it mildly) of the United States of America.
It's just that their degrees of economic freedom have slightly increased, which is already, in principle, good.
Now, perhaps, about the main thing: how to treat this emergence of a new systemic education for us, the state of the Russian Federation.
Well firstly, definitely welcome.
Which, by the way, has already been done in some way: let us recall that during the Hanoi summit, Vladimir Putin spoke to its participants via video link (by the way, he actually said a lot of interesting things, it's just a topic for a separate article).
And in general, it is logical to rejoice in the emergence of a new common market not far from our borders, coordinated according to laws that are more or less acceptable to us.
And to some extent protected from the more and more voluntaristic methods of the United States, which directly declare "sanctions as an instrument of competition policy," and from the Western world that has joined them in the wake of the entire conditional Western world.
Secondly, it is certainly necessary to interact with these markets and master them as closely as possible: which, in general, is already more or less on the way.
And thirdly, it is necessary to immediately give an answer, including to many Russian analysts, to the question of why we ourselves are still not there and why we are still not working on this agenda yet.
After all, it would seem that these are potentially friendly platforms, which, moreover, have come out of the very intrusive US control.
And here everything is simple: just look at the structure of our exports in the region.
For, yes, we are insanely interested in the rapidly developing before the pandemic, and even now, are far from dead premium markets of Southeast Asia and the Asia-Pacific region.
The question is in which sectors.
And these are primarily energy raw materials, military-industrial complex products, individual projects of Rosatom, fertilizers and not the largest volumes of agricultural products.
But is it really necessary to unite the markets to promote these commodity items?
Of course not.
Moreover, it is even contraindicated.
We even sometimes have to defend our domestic markets from overly aggressive buyers: in the trade in oil products - this is not even a single thing, but quite often.
Thanks to the tax reversal and the severance tax, of course, but we will not swear at them again, we just state them as a historically confirmed fact.
Well, then why should we, with them, with the APR countries, unite domestic markets at all?
Have we decided to compete with the Chinese and other Asians in the mass market ?!
So this is a useless business, they will make us there in one gate.
Ask the same Trump how he, after his predecessors, tried to deal with the trade deficit with China.
And what came of it.
Well, why then should we ourselves, of our own free will, stick our head there?
Unless for the sake of investment, and even then it is unlikely: with our reserves dug in different places and other egg-pods, as well as with the financial sector shamelessly fattening in the face of even the global crisis, we do not need investments.
Here, in the domestic investment sector, as in that still Soviet cartoon: "We have the funds, we do not have enough intelligence."
And about such "brain investments" in someone else's property and in other people's national interests, the modern world has definitely never heard of.
So we will not wait for investments here either, we will have to do, as always, on our own: and, for our taste, it’s even so good, no matter how you look at it.
And in general, one should not forget that we are still a great country, a global superpower, albeit not an economic one, but only a military-political one.
But we have our own - not American, but not Chinese either, namely that we have our own interests on this large gaming Eurasian and Pacific table.
And, by the way, pay attention: India for some reason did not join RCEP either.
But this can, of course, be explained by some tension in the Indian-Chinese relations.
But we were not even invited to go there, this did not even occur to anyone - and this is just a sign of respect.
First of all, on the part of China, by the way: in contrast to the Europeans, the Chinese comrades have already understood that these new “current Russians” are no longer suitable for use as a tool for pursuing policies in foreign national interests.
Well, they will not, although the Europeans still hope for this, neither in the West nor in the East to drag hot chestnuts out of the fire for someone.
And in no other capacity (with China alive), neither we, nor any of the strong players there, in this new free trade zone, is needed: or for someone such a big secret that it is Chinese project?
Therefore, we can only welcome this project.
As a curious market and an interesting trading partner in the future.
Especially in view of the decisive turn to the east announced by our country several years ago.
But also about the fact that we are a great country and we have our own - yes, insanely difficult and far from always joyful, but unique - a path of development that we initially could not squeeze in and integrate anywhere - this is also absolutely certain you should not forget under any circumstances.
Yes, we are not so many in terms of population, unfortunately - only (compared to the same RCEP) "miserable" 150 million. But it just so happened that both the newly-minted RCEP, and, by the way, the already quite old EU too small for us.
The author's point of view may not coincide with the position of the editorial board.