This article analyzes Premier Li Keqiang’s remarks on Sino-Japanese economic “complementarity” and reveals China’s hidden agenda rooted in its historical “steel-as-wealth” mentality. It exposes how excess steel production, technology acquisition from Japan, and the AIIB are directly tied to China’s military ambitions and tributary-state worldview.

February 24, 2017
What follows is a continuation of the previous chapter.
“There is extremely large complementarity in the Sino-Japanese economic relationship. Japan is advanced in many fields, especially in technology, and possesses advanced management systems. China seeks these,” said Premier Li Keqiang.
After stating that “economic relations have complementarity,” Premier Li immediately revealed his true intentions by adding that “China seeks advanced technology.”
Here, a grave issue on the part of the Chinese Communist Party comes clearly into view.
More than 600 million tons of “steel” are produced each year, and this steel has accumulated and overflowed throughout the territory under CCP rule.
From ancient times, the Han Chinese have accumulated “steel” as wealth.
That tradition still lives on today, and even local governments routinely engage not in saving money, but in “storing steel.”
“I believe that if Japan’s technology and China’s market are firmly linked, an extremely large energy can be drawn out,” Premier Li said, again displaying his fixation on Japanese technology.
In this case, the foremost of such technologies would be the technology to improve the quality of “steel.”
This is directly linked to the enhancement of military technology.
With the “steel” produced under the current CCP regime, many weapons simply cannot be manufactured.
Premier Li then went on to explain the AIIB (Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank), saying, “Since the outbreak of the international financial crisis, flaws have emerged in the existing international financial system.
China, together with the G20 and other nations, intends to work to reform the existing international financial system, improve it further, and develop it in a fair, reasonable, and balanced direction.”
In a certain sense, Premier Li’s explanation is honest.
The view has already spread that the AIIB was established in order to distribute the surplus steel (crude steel) produced under CCP rule, under the pretext of supporting infrastructure development.
Crude steel production under the CCP regime exceeds 700 million tons and ranks first in the world (2013), reaching seven times that of second-place Japan and nine times that of third-place United States.
Historically, what the Han Chinese call “money” refers to “steel.”
The phrase “balanced direction” means nothing more than, “We will provide this steel, so pay the price.”
And the “money” paid as that price will be the “money” of advanced capitalist nations—dollars and euros.
Dollars and euros come with technology attached.
Premier Li Keqiang’s words and actions are thoroughly based on value judgments that place the Han Chinese CCP regime at the center, and they embody the historical tributary-system worldview itself.