Bill Totten — Trade is War

On June 3rd at De Balie in Amsterdam, ‘angry old man’ Yash Tandon presented his new book Trade is War: The West’s War Against the World (2015) – a new perspective in the debate on the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), the controversial trade agreement which the EU is currently negotiating with the US. In Europe, opponents of TTIP are mainly concerned about transparency, ever-increasing corporate power and the impact on the environment. But what does the treaty imply for North-South relations and what are the geopolitical dynamics behind it?

The debate on Trade is War – organised by TNI, SOMO and Both ENDS – places TTIP in a broader perspective. Tandon passes a devastating judgement on free trade. “Since colonial times, global trade has been aimed at Western world domination”.…

The nascent US realized that the British system of "free trade" was for the benefit of the British Empire and not the countries it was supposed to benefit. Hence, the American system of tariffs and protection of infant industries under which the US prospered was developed, based on Alexander Hamilton's American School of Economics and the National School of Friedrich List and Henry Carey.

Now that the British empire has morphed into the American empire, the US is pushing the British system to maintain and extend Western dominance.
 
Bill Totten's Weblog

Trade is War
Bill Totten