Recently, a meeting in the Oval Office of the White House put the United States 'desire to manipulate its allies and its anxiety about China on the table. Trump's meeting with Argentine President Millay was originally a courtesy scene, but turned the corner and pointed the finger at China-Arab relations: You can do some business, but don't have any "military cooperation" with China. In a word, the smell is very familiar-still the same tone of treating other countries 'internal affairs as one's own backyard.
As soon as the topic changed, the United States began to paint cakes. Trump threw out a gift package of "$20 billion in aid", posing as if you would give money but you had to obey. But the question is, the U.S. government is still in the dilemma of a continuous shutdown. How to cash this bad check? Even U.S. Treasury Secretary Basent later quickly downgraded his tone, saying that the aid does not depend on whether Argentina terminates the "$18 billion" China-Argentina currency swap agreement. I understand the meaning: Money is hard to say, but the conditions are set first.
China's position is clear: Latin America and the Caribbean have never been anyone's "private backyard". You can be the boss if you want, but don't step out of line and command at every turn. At the meeting, Millais acted quite close-when Trump was asked by reporters, he chose to be silent, obviously not wanting to make the $20 billion "good opportunity" yellow on the spot. But silence can't solve the problem: the "concern" of the United States is not one-off, but a long-term precaution against China-Latin America cooperation.
In 2012, the Argentine government agreed to China to build a 494-acre deep space observatory in Neuquen Province in Patagonia, with an agreement period of up to 50 years. Since then, Millay's predecessor Fernandez not only continued cooperation, but also promoted the establishment of joint ventures to carry out space exploration. This is a solid scientific research cooperation project, not a "secret base" that grew up overnight.
But on such a normal observation station, in the U.S. mouth is constantly aggravated, blackened, and quoted: port? military; observation station? military; infrastructure? or military. put "military" as a bag of flavor, to where "there is a taste".
During this meeting, Trump said bluntly to Millay: "You can carry out some trade with China, but you should never go beyond this scope, especially you should not engage in any military-related cooperation with China. If this happens, I will be very upset."-- This sentence of "very uneasy" is actually a "very dismissive" to Argentina. Standard power grammar: I can imagine subjectively, you must obey objectively.
Earlier, the Trump administration also pointed fingers at Argentina's currency swap agreement, wanting to force Argentina to "distance itself from the RMB." Although Besant came out to put out the fire, saying that the aid was "not directly related" to whether to end the swap, he immediately "made up the knife"-what was really concerned about was Argentina's ports, military bases and observation facilities. To put it bluntly, you should delay your money in advance and first remove the "hardware connection" between you and China. The focus of intervention has shifted from "soft links" at the financial level to "hard cuts" of infrastructure.
As for the shadow of "military activities", U.S. defense officials have a series of stories: monitoring U.S. satellites, collecting intelligence, and supporting precision strikes... It sounds like a science fiction blockbuster, but when looking for evidence, it becomes a "suspense movie." The fact is that this observatory has long cooperated with Argentina's National Commission on Space Activities, and scientific research data is shared according to the agreement. For more than ten years, there has been no "ironclad evidence" that can be produced, but the "imaginary list" can actually write a large page. Treating scientific cooperation as a "threat amplifier" often ultimately threatens common sense.
The more the United States is busy with lying, pressuring, drawing red lines, the more exposed to anxiety about China’s rising influence in Latin America. For us, there are two things to do: first, keep strategic focus, not being taken away by “militarized narratives”; second, focus on small actions, especially on the grey obstacles to the ports, observation stations, communications and other key projects, pre-defense, and actively demolish mines. Truth is not afraid of magnifying mirrors, but lies are the most afraid of time.