Underground Empire: How America Weaponized the World Economy

Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman in Conversation with Paul Krugman

This event was recorded live on May 22, 2024.

Underground Empire, a real-life techno-thriller by Henry Farrell and Abraham Newman, reveals how the U.S. controls a global web of surveillance, in the form of networks of fiber optic cables and banking systems, giving it enormous economic power. Farrell and Newman show how these channels, weaponized after 9/11 but now used as a matter of course, have become realms of spying and coercion over foreign businesses and countries, allowing for U.S domination. Paul Krugman — Nobel laureate in economics, columnist for The New York Times, and distinguished professor at the CUNY Graduate Center — speaks with the authors about their investigation and the geopolitical implications of the power they uncover. Farrell is a professor at Johns Hopkins University and editor-in-chief of The Monkey Cage blog at The Washington Post; Newman is a professor at Georgetown University and also co-author of the book Of Privacy and Power: The Transatlantic Struggle Over Freedom and Security.

Presented with the Stone Center on Socio-Economic Inequality.

[PhiloSurfer]

Who is the biggest rogue state in the world?
Which regime is not a signatory to the Rome Statue?
Which regime threatened to sanction the ICC despite not signing the Rome Statue?
Which regime is using UNCLOS to claim freedom of navigation despite not ratifying UNCLOS?
Which regime shredded the multi-lateral JCPOA on Iran?
Which regime walked away from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty?
Which regime walked away from the WHO (and then walked back)?
Which regime did not sign up for the Kyoto Protocol and the Paris Agreement?
Which regime has the most cases with the WTO, and when found guilty decided to hobble the WTO by blocking the appointment of judges to the WTO's Appellate Body?
Which regime passed the "Invasion of The Hague" Act so that it can invade The Netherlands should the ICC decide to prosecute its politicians and soldiers for war crimes?
The list goes

Which is why this regime and its chihuahua vassals are always shouting "rules-based order". This is just the regime's way of not conforming to international laws as embodied in the UN Charter and other multi-lateral institutions as it is the biggest breaker of international laws. Instead the rules base order allows it to cook up some rules (which has never been published) and order the rest of the world to obey. If this regime breaks its own rules, it just ignore the rules and move on.

[Questioneverything]

Too late, the world has moved on. Baffling how late they are to geopolitical dynamics. Brics are already discussing programs that are outside western influence

[ShahryarSaigol]

Russia and China seem to have no problem going around these sanctions. They have done currency swaps with their trade partners and they are engineering their way around technological barriers. Eventually they will become totally independent of US controlled networks

[unreliablenarrator]

Holy crap, Krugman is such a fossil, 20 years out of date. No wonder the NYT loves him.

[MurrayLake]

The world is evolving at breakneck speed. Last fall Huawei announced it was building 7nm chips for their smart phones. Western experts said it would take China five to ten years to catch up to Nvidia. What happened? Only six months later Huawei started mass producing the 5nm Accent 910B AI chip using SAQP manufacturing technology (working with Sicarrier and Naura) . Now remarkably only two months after that announcement Huawei has filed patents for a revolutionary new 3nm chip manufactured using the quadruple patterning technology. The Chinese love a challenge. Its highly doubtful semiconductors are going to be a serious obstacle to Chinese industrial progress.

[alagna]

im blown away that krugman is clueless that the us moves against wuawei didnt not constitute war by economic moves- stunning he was so out of touch what the heck was he observing for the last decade!!

[jaxx]

Why do you believe that the USA adheres to any rule of law? We are neither blind nor foolish. The numerous instances of U.S. interference in international infrastructure demonstrate that the USA doesn't honor the rule of law. The Huawei ban, in particular, USA held the world back by five years to compensate for their technological shortcomings. The USA’s behavior resembles that of lawless feudal robber barons. China deeply cares about laws. Look at the Palestine issue. The rest of the world is trying to find a solution within the rules of law and it's the USA and West who are committing genocide breaking all rules of law.

[aliezhasa]

Professor Paul Krugman didn't know about what was going on.😳
Now i am less surprised about how less the American public knows about the world.

[tnidub]

Nordstream sabotage not mentioned? Very odd

[anonymousanonymous]

Absolutely not worth watching unless you’ve lived under a rock the past 20 years.

[renstein]

I’m astounded. Absolutely astounded. They are giving the introduction with an assumption that the audience does not link together economics, geopolitics, and conflict. I sure hope their audience is smarter than that.

[unreliablenarrator]

Now they are quoting Yellen, who is a miserable failure. [headslap]

[sirrobinofloxley]

And the octopus tentacle known as AIPAC?

[KC-lcdx]

Krugman? Isn’t he a mouthpiece for empire?

[unreliablenarrator]

Guys, Huawei is shipping millions of Mate 60 phones with indigenous chips. Working at scale. Case closed.

[chriswong]

39:00 HOW OLD is this "conversation" ??? Huawei has surpass 5G technology and now offer Worldwide, now in Middle East, ASEAN, Global South, Africa, even South America.... Huawei 6G technology is working in-house with China's space station. Huawei is the number one supplier of Communication Worldwide, even Germany is getting more Huawei. There is no secret in China manufacturing, is just Sales, Sales, Sales... In meantime USA is still operating at 3G/4G.

[rmnair]

Somebody should tell the moderator that he is exhibiting great disrespect towards the audience by presenting the sole of his shoe to them. And then he wiggles his foot as if to signal the pleasure he is deriving.
Disgusting.
Imagine if he were to put his feet up on the table in front.

This moderator should be restricted to podcasts.

[renstein]

The real issue with the sanctions that these two are not pointing out is that these sanctions are giving incentive for the rest of the world to reduce their dependence on these US controlled networks. Other countries have seen what these two are talking about for years.

[antonyfrancis]

What happened to the QUESTION PERIOD? Afraid to face your weaknesses? The 'PETRO-DOLLAR' is history. Your free LUNCH is over.

[TimTim]

The US has too many of these people without any Tech and engineering background to make policy. For any Tech people, there is always a tech solution to these so-called economic weapons. These weapons only work in small states that lack technology depth.
China loves sanctions, which means previous dominant players have given the market share to me. I fixed the problem, I have the market.