Real Economy.

I spent years trying to convey a simple thought of Western "economics" being nothing more than a creative bookkeeping having nothing to do with the real state of the affairs. In fact, this economic delusion is in the foundation of many other West's delusions be it military, technological or social. In military parlance this is known as the loss of situational awareness.

Now, Vladimir Putin during his press-conference in China yesterday started to speak only within the framework of Purchase Power Parity when dealing with real GDPs of SCO nations. It is, of course, understandable that the whole notion of developed manufacturing (especially hi-tech machine building sector) being the foundation of national power is completely alien to most US economic "scholars" but that is how world goes about. In fact, even PPP is not precise, granted it is much better metric than preposterous "nominal" GDPs based on US Dollar alone--a number no serious analyst will pay attention to. 

But PPP or even adjusters derived from the "Big Mac" index do not reflect a complex reality of modern economics because, as I stated non-stop for many years, to even grasp what the real depth and size of economy are one has to look at actual industrial output of tangibles. Moreover, looking at weapons--their complexity, quality, quantity and effectiveness--is even better adjuster than anything else. It is a truism--only extremely developed economies can produce state-of-the-art nuclear power submarines, complex fighter planes and very complex C4ISR "infrastructure". No amount of financial data-twisting can obfuscate a simple fact--to make and run something like GLONASS or deploy weapons the likes of Kinzhal or Avanguard, requires way more that just "sophisticated" economy, it requires a massive one. In fact, this is very intuitive--something so complex (in fact they are most complex man-made things) as Virginia-class or Yasen-class nuclear submarines require and incredible network of industries, from metallurgy to electronics, to name a few, which, unlike fake papers produced by the Wall Street, do constitute a great index of national power. So, yes, it is very gratifying to hear President Putin setting an appropriate, much more realistic, framework for economic discussions than some convoluted pseudo-economic BS produced by Western "analysts". In the end, it is their "economic analysis" which is in the foundation of Russophrenia--a condition where the sufferer believes Russia is both about to collapse, and take over the world. Since 2013, instances of this ailment have reached epidemic-like proportions in certain parts of Washington, London and Brussels. 

 

But then again, try to explain to some Ivy League-trained "investment" bankster (most of whom never worked on a real job in their life) what is the difference between selling some financial "product" (aka snake oil) and manufacturing, say, something like blades of jet engine. The experience could be fascinating. So, Mr. Putin--good to hear from you on this issue. Moreover, even in the foundation of a recent G-7 snafu is actual economy, things produced and needed to be sold--from cars to aircraft--not some BS "capitalization" of markets.