- Most of the developed world save notable exceptions like the USA (in USA the Boomers are retiring but the Millenials will take over) is aging at an accelerated pace as a result of the decrease on the birth rates. In Europe, Germany which is currently like the 3rd or 4th economy worldwide, will cease to be so powerful because of their demographics alone. In addition to that, much Germany's industry was based on cheap gas from Russia which is no longer an option, and raw materials from Russia and China which also will no longer be an option.
- China's demographics are even worse, as a result of their one child policy, and their population is aging at a much faster pace. Average birthrate are like 0.8 and theres many more men than women which means that in 10 years there will no be China as we know it anymore. Add to that the results of Zero Covid policy which destroyed their economy, and now since they don't have herd immunity a full blown covid meltdown, the Evergrande meltdown (which I didn't hear him mention, that's my own addition) and some other factors and things don't look good for China.
- 90% of rare earth materials come from China and Russia, mostly China, and most of the manufacturing comes from China and Germany, so that would mean the age of abundance where we have everything, is gone (or will be soon).
- Russia's population is also aging dramatically, and since Russia is basically and basically impossible to defend, that's the main reason why Putin invaded Ukraine, but then he would have to invade Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Georgia, Azerbajan, Uzbekhistan, and a long list of other countries to feel secure. And they had to do it now because in a few years they won't have the amount of 20 year olds to wage a war.
- Russia is the main exporter of fertilizer and potash worlwide, so this year and into next year there will be famine in many parts of the world because there will not be enough fertilizer for everyone.The USA will be fine because it produces most of the inputs to grow food. China will not be fine because it imports most of the imports to grow food.
- 80% of neon production is gone since the first phase is done in Russia and the second phase is done in Ukraine. Neon is used for lasers in semiconductor industry. The other 20% comes from China...
I'm sure I'm missing lots of points to connect, but I think there's enough for now. What do you think of all of this? Do you have any other insights about the world to make?
- Russia's ships can't get insurance, so they can't transport oil and other exports. Russia kind of provides state insurance and so ships with oil go to Portugal where then China moves them to some rented supertankers and go the long route bordering the continent to China, but those supertankers are very vulnerable to pirates or any rogue state just taking them by force. Also there's not storage capacity so if the ships start queing it blocks the flow. Production cannot be stopped, specially since in cold weather if it stops moving oil converts into a gel and breaks all the machinery which took 30 years to reproduce last time that happened. So if we take 4 million barrels a day out, we can get to 180 dollars a barrel.
I think Peter projects unwarranted — prophet level — certainty on both his predictions and his rationalisations about why things in the past happened as they did. For those subjects interesting to me, it was easy to find more qualified sources which disagree with Peter.
Zeihan uses geography and demographics to make some solid observations, but then proceeds to project far into the future. The world and human behavior is too complex to say anything that definitive based on just geography. I think Zeihan is best used as someone who has a paradigm worth adding to your tool belt but maybe not listening to his predictions verbatim.
To use an example you mentioned, rare earth mining. There are other nations with rare earth lodes and China has passed its peak of the market share of rare earth production.
One trick when evaluating a claim is to consider how markets will respond and whether that incentive can be picked up by another nation.
Another reality is that random extreme effects change the course of history all the time and many can’t really be predicted by geography. One of Zeihan’s big predictions is that the US will return to isolationism and European unity will weaken. The Russian invasion of Ukraine has seemingly shocked both trends backwards. Is that a temporary shock or part of a bigger trend? I would be hard pressed to predict either way.
I've read his first 2 books and if you listen to him now it's the same general idea, just more detailed and in-depth because it's book length, of course. He does predict that Russia will attack Ukraine in there (I think that book came out in 2012 or so?). He also makes a lot of other more vague predictions that I don't think have a chance of coming true, e.g. various inter-European wars and annexations in a struggle for resources and local control. But none of those are as specific as "Russia will attack Ukraine within the next 10 years."
He has predicted some pretty out there stuff, like China collapsing within 10 years, Germany's economy collapsing within 2 years.
Guess we'll see. He's entertaining for sure :)
With climate and weather, the mechanisms are well understood, with human history, the mechanisms are subject to change and are changing all the time.
(Edit: So as far as mechanisms are cited, e.g. Neon for lasers, I personally don't give much credence to it, the more specific the mechanism is)
He connects a lot of pieces that otherwise don't make sense to a mapper like me. I know he's not right about everything, but he seems to have a reasonably good handle on things. A far better handle that I've seen before.
Of course he's got blind spots, and doesn't know all the details, so reality is bound to deviate from his predictions, as it likes to do for us all.
China: just as government introduced one child policy it may introduce 2 or 3 children policy, saying e.g. that with 2 children you will get an apartment for free or that childless ppl have to pay 50% tax rate... So far China is not a consumption society, so decrease in population will not translate to a huge decrease in consumer spending. Instead they still rely on exports as engine of the economic growth. Introducing sanction against China by EU & US may be a greater hit than demographics.
Probably we will have to find ways to produce e.g. batteries without rare earth metals. New deposits where recently also found in Sweden.
No government will risk famine in their own country to support "rich countries sanctions". Certainly neither India nor China will. Poor countries will buy regardless if the wheat comes from Russia or Ukraine, not buying means starving a lot of people and social unrest.
Time to build neon producing facility in the west...
I think the current situation will be remembered as a small local conflict, just as Vietnam war, first gulf war and hundreds of other conflicts. Despite propaganda both sides (NATO, Russia) do not want to go to the full scale conflict (see NATO and Russia behavior after a missile have fallen on Polish border). Some EU politics still want to talk with Putin (Macron), some countries (Hungary) want Russia to actually win. My country (Poland) went "full panic mode", mostly because populistic government tries to use this conflict to boost their chances of winning an election coming in September.
As for Taiwan there was already a serious conflict about that island: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Third_Taiwan_Strait_Crisis Looks like we have a replay of that today. Just as south korea wants to avoid war at all costs (because the war will be on their territory), Taiwan want to also avoid war at all costs. China wants to unite with Taiwan on peaceful terms, otherwise we would see missiles flying over the island a long time ago.
Overall I believe Chinese government is kind of "brute gentlemens" or maybe even merchants, while Russian gov are just brutes. Nevertheless as long as Russia and China do not pull from stuff like fight with global warming, WHO (US shame on you) there will be no WWIII. Do let media panic and propaganda get to your heart.