Even major global powers won’t use hsr, China is failing



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No Cyber Terror

The threat of a cyber-attack is extremely low.


Scott Borg, January 21, 2012 “Threat of Future Cyber Attacks by Adversaries Remains Low” January 21, 2012. Scott Borg is the Director and Chief Economist of the United States Cyber Consequences Unit.

Will American adversaries respond to American improvement with serious cyber attacks? The short answer is, no. There could be some denial-of-service attacks on U.S. government Web sites, but these would probably be only a minor nuisance. And if they do happen, they might not be acknowledged or even noticed. Cyber conflicts between Hamas and Israel, beginning in 1999, and between Hezbollah and Israel, beginning in 2000, made virtually all political activists in the Middle East very aware of the potential of cyber attacks. Starting in 2001, senior al Qaeda leaders regularly said they would turn the Western superiority in information technology into a tool to bring down the West. In October 2001, an alleged al Qaeda operative, arrested in India, claimed that other members of the terrorist network had managed to get hired by Microsoft, so that they could build backdoors and bugs into the company’s new XP operating system. There is no evidence that al Qaeda operatives were actually able to do this. But after this news story was picked up by the international press, al Qaeda leaders and other ideological militants would certainly have been thinking about the possibilities. Beginning in early 2002, American intelligence officials repeatedly warned that computers belonging to al Qaeda associates had been used to access Web sites offering hacker tools and instructions. Imam Samudra, organizer of the 2002 Bali nightclub bombings, urged Muslim militants to start hacking into U.S. computers, both to steal money and to do damage.¶ Starting in 2002, however, government forces were very successful in hunting down potential al Qaeda cyber attack leaders. Imam Samudra was arrested in Indonesia in 2002 and eventually executed for his terrorist acts. Abu Anas al Liby was reported captured in Sudan in 2002, although American officials have since said that his whereabouts is still unknown. Khalid Shaikh Mohammed was captured in Pakistan in 2003 and is currently being held at Guantanamo Bay. Depriving al Qaeda of these leaders seems to have been a big setback to their cyber efforts. Cyber-attack threats are increasingly disappearing, strongly due to an increasing United States cyber-infrastructure. In March of 2005, Sir David Omand announced that British intelligence had surveillance reports indicating al Qaeda affiliates were preparing to use the internet and other electronic communication systems to cripple economic, medical, and transport networks. These attacks were either never launched or, more likely, were unsuccessful. Government forces had another round of successes in capturing al Qaeda cyber attack advocates in 2005. Younis Tsouli was arrested in the U.K. in 2005 and convicted of incitement to acts of terrorism in 2007. Mustafa Setmariam Nasar was captured in Pakistan in 2005. In 2006, many cyber attackers in the Arab world got caught up in a cyber campaign against Denmark, prompted by the Danish cartoon of Mohammed. This effort seems to have temporarily reduced other cyber attack activity originating from the Middle East. In December of 2006 and again in October of 2007, Web sites associated with al Qaeda announced the beginning of a "cyber Jihad," directed against Western banks and other important institutions. There were rumors and circumstantial signs of ambitious cyber attacks being mounted by al Qaeda during this period, but they don’t seem to have gotten very far. Since early 2008, there has been no sign of any sustained or sizeable effort on the part of al Qaeda to assemble a serious cyber-attack force. This suggests, at minimum, that they have not been recruiting cyber attackers very widely or aggressively. It is possible the al Qaeda has been developing cyber-attack teams from within its own ranks, but bringing them to a very high level of capabilities without interaction with the wider hacker world would be difficult. Altogether, given its history and the lack of outward signs, it seems unlikely that enemies has developed significant cyber attack capabilities.


No Bio Terror

Beyond current terrorist capabilities


Milton Leitenberg, 2010 (senior research scholar at the Center for International and Security Studies), Terrorizing Ourselves, Cato Institute, "Assessing the Threat of Bioterrorism", http://books.google.com/books?id=HIsLQgAACAAJ

For two decades, we have been told that bioterrorism would be perpetrated by terrorist groups with an international presence and international political objectives. As noted, however, these groups have little or no scientific competence, little or no knowledge of microbiology, and no known access to pathogen strains or laboratory facilities. The most recent U.S. National Intelligence Council terrorist assessment makes no reference to any of these capabilities. The report of the Commission on the Prevention of Weapons of Mass Destruction Proliferation and Terrorism, released in December 2008, states, "We accept the validity of intelligence estimates about the current rudimentary nature of terrorist capabilities in the area of biological weapons."




**Commodities F/L**

This may possibly be the worst advantage I have ever come into contact with:

Their Pittsburgh Post-Gazette evidence says that barges are key to “move gravel, sand and limestone…fuel oil, fertilizer and other goods.” Waterways alone are not key to commodities and this evidence isn’t specific.

On the Soybean Scneario, the USB evidence says that the American Soybean Association is already develop new dams and infrastructure for these kind of issues in the unhiglighted portion. And, it says we need a combination of locks, rail, and highways—the aff doesn’t do highways or rail.

China is far more reliant on South American soy bean commodities than US


Ferchen 2012 [Matthew, Matt Ferchen is a resident scholar at the Carnegie-Tsinghua Center for Global Policy, where he runs the China and the Developing World program. His research focuses on the governance of China's urban informal economy, debates about the “China Model” of development, and economic and political relations between China and Latin America., China’s Latin American Interests, Carnegie Endownment, 5/6, http://carnegieendowment.org/2012/04/06/china-s-latin-american-interests/a7av ]

China-Latin America relations, especially economic ties, have boomed in the last decade. Between 2000 and 2010 China-Latin America trade expanded over 1,500 percent, and between 2008 and 2010 alone China’s investment in the region expanded more than 180 percent. This boom in economic relations has been primarily driven by strong Chinese demand for South American mineral, agricultural, and energy resources like copper, iron ore, soybeans, and oil. At the same time, Latin America has become an important destination for increasing amounts of Chinese manufactured-good exports ranging from modems to motorcycles. While there are other dimensions to the Latin America-China relationship, including a history of Chinese immigration to countries like Cuba and Peru, the recent decade-long surge in relations has been primarily driven by trade and investment ties. Though those ties have also underpinned renewed and strengthened diplomatic relations between China and countries throughout the region, the main binding force remains economic rather than political or ideological. This has fueled a mixture of rising hopes and anxieties among government and business leaders in Latin America. The hopes ride on ever-expanding trade and investment links as well as the possibility that China might prove to be a positive alternative to long-standing American economic and political power in the region. Anxieties are rooted in concerns that the region’s ties to China repeat dysfunctional historical patterns of commodity dependence and a “hollowing out” of local industry in the face of Chinese manufacturing and export prowess.

The American Interest evidence talks about how soybeans are a key part of Chinese diet, but never says anything about how Soybean spikes would result in instability. Also, the card says there is already unrest and instability, meaning the impact should’ve occurred already.

No Chinese instability—economic leadership offsets import and export problems.


Deng Shasha, 7/21/12 “China Has No Sign of Economic Collapse: S. Africa Expert” http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/indepth/2012-07/21/c_131729166.htm

China's economy is slowing down amid global economic volatility, but there is no sign of a collapse, a South African expert has said.¶ China's National Bureau of Statistics announced days ago that the country's economic growth slowed to 7.6 percent in the second quarter this year from 8.1 percent in the first quarter, the first time below 8 percent over the past three years.¶ Some western analysts predicted that China is facing the risk of an economic collapse.¶ However, Dr. Alistair Ruiters, executive chairman of Ruukki South Africa at Ruukki Group, dismissed the view, saying "China's GDP below 8 percent is not a sign of a collapsing economy, 7 or even 6 percent growth is still good."¶ "Economic conditions in other parts of the world are forcing China to produce less and export less, resulted in slowing down in terms of its GDP growth," he told Xinhua in an interview Wednesday.¶ Ruiters, former director general of South Africa's Department of Trade and Industry, said "China's economy is not independent from the global economy. There has been a housing crisis in the United States, and presently there is a financial crisis in Europe."¶ Growing worries about the future makes consumers more cautious on spending, which surely has an impact on China because it is a large global exporter of consumer products, he said.¶ "The important thing is for China to realize that it is a consumer of global major commodities, especially mining products," he said.¶ "China should realize the importance of controlling the value chain of those products so that it can get them at the right price," the expert added.¶ Ruiters noted that China's economic adjustment will have an impact on many parts of the world, but its influence on South Africa would be limited.¶ "It does have an impact on South Africa at the moment, mainly on raw materials, because we continue to produce in factories. We would have an oversupply of material in the market because big buyers like China may be reducing their spending due to the slowdown in the GDP growth," he said.¶ China has become South Africa's biggest trading partner, with bilateral trade increasing by 77 percent from 2010 to 2011, the South African Broadcasting Corp. said Wednesday.¶ South Africa's GDP increased 2.7 percent in the first quarter of 2012, compared to 3.2 percent growth for the fourth quarter of last year, Statistics South Africa reported on May 29.¶ South Africa is the largest economy on the African continent while China has the world's second largest economy.

On the fertilizer scenario, the Pittsburg evidence says that coal accounts for the majority of transport on waterways, meaning fertilizer would always be offset. And, the evidence is talking about Pittsburgh waterways, not the entire waterway system.

The Bennett evidence says that stuff like natural gas consumption, nitrogen fixation, coal usage, and energy policy are the main reasons for growing food supply crisis, not specifically fertilizer.

The problem with food produce is misdistribution, not quantity available.


Barrett 2 (Christopher B., http://dyson.cornell.edu/special_programs /AFSNRM/Parima /Papers%20from %20Cbb2/Papers/BarrettFoodSecurityandFood%20AssistancePrograms.pdf, Dept. Agri. Res. Mgmt. @ Cornell, accessed 7/8/11) CJQ

The second broad pattern is that, despite indisputable progress, hunger and food insecurity remain distressingly widespread. The absolute number of people suffering food insecurity has not fallen appreciably, as widespread poverty and increasingly unequal asset and income distributions conspire to counteract increased per capita food availability and falling food prices [International Conference on Nutrition (1992), Bread for the World Institute (1995)]. A large plurality of the world’s hungry and food insecure reside in South Asia; despite a falling rate of prevalence, absolute numbers of malnourished people have risen there. The best available estimates suggest that 800– 1300 million people in the world – about the same number as are classified as “poor” – suffer chronic PEM [International Conference on Nutrition (1992), Bread for the World Institute (1995)]. Another 2 billion people are affected by micronutrient deficiencies related to insufficient intake of iodine, iron, or vitamin A [International Conference on Nutrition (1992)]. The distributional challenge is highlighted by the fact that a large proportion of these people – indeed, the great majority of food-insecure children – live in homes where others have enough to eat [United Nations Children’s Fund (1995)]. The distressing prevalence of macronutrient and micronutrient deficiency despite ample food availability highlights the now widely accepted fact that food availability is not the primary cause of food insecurity, the problem is in the distribution of available food.



Biofuels consume half of the world’s crop consumption—predicting yields won’t change that.


Evans ’11 (Alex, NYU Centre on Int'l Cooperation, http://www.guardian.co.uk/global-development/poverty-matters/2011/may/31/global-food-crisis-real-cost-biofuels, accessed 7/8/11) CJQ

Other factors have driven the breathtaking inflation and volatility in food markets over the last few years. These include a rising global population, millions more people shifting to western diets, declining crop yield growth, years of under-investment, extreme weather, high oil prices increasing the cost of inputs such as fertiliser, low stock levels, and kneejerk actions by governments such as food export bans and panic buying by importers. But it is biofuels that have been the real game changer. As the International Monetary Fund observed in 2008, biofuels accounted for 1.5% of global liquid fuels supply that year, but represented nearly half the increase in food crop consumption, mainly because of corn-based ethanol in the US. While they only accounted for a small fraction of liquid fuels, the fact that they represented 75% of the net increase in non-Opec liquid fuels in 2008 goes a long way towards explaining why oil importers have taken to them with such enthusiasm. That's scant comfort to the billion or so poor people who don't get enough to eat – they have seen food prices rise still further out of reach as a result of biofuel support policies. Is the tide finally turning against corn-based ethanol and other inefficient "first generation" biofuels? At first glance, it might look like wishful thinking. The US farm lobby, never shy in pushing for its interests, has taken to ethanol with a passion. With presidential elections looming, the Obama administration has been careful not to offend agribusiness: a speech on food security by the US secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, this month failed to mention the words "ethanol" or "biofuels" even once. The EU, too, looks in no mood to rethink its target of obtaining 10% of transport fuels from biofuel by 2020.



New tech means farmers will always produce more food


Zubrin 11 (Dr. Robert Zubrin, president of Pioneer Astronautics, Senior Fellow with the Center for Security Policy “WHY IT’S WRONG TO AGREE WITH THE MALTHUSIANS ABOUT ETHANOL” May 13, 2011http://www.ilcorn.org/daily-update/182-why-it-rsquo-s-wrong-to-agree-with-the-malthusians-about-ethanol/)//

In an op-ed article printed in the Denver Post May 8, editorial columnist Vince Carroll endorsed the view of population control advocate Lester Brown that the U.S. corn ethanol program is threatening the world’s poor with starvation. This endorsement is especially remarkable in view of the fact that, as the otherwise generally astute Mr. Carroll has correctly noted many times in the past, all of Lester Brown’s many previous limited-resources doomsday predictions have proven wildly incorrect. In fact, Lester Brown is wrong about the alleged famine-inducing potential of the ethanol program for exactly the same reason he has been repeatedly wrong about the alleged famine-inducing potential of population growth. There is not a fixed amount of grain in the world. Farmers produce in response to demand. The more customers, the more grain. Not only that, but the larger the potential market, the greater the motivation for investment in improved techniques. This is why, despite the fact that the world population has indeed doubled since Lester Brown, Paul Ehrlich, and the other population control zealots first published their manifestos during the 1960s, people worldwide are eating much better today than they were then. In the case of America’s corn growing industry, the beneficial effect of a growing market has been especially pronounced, with corn yields per acre in 2010 (165 bushels per acre) being 37 percent higher than they were in 2002 (120 bushels per acres) and more than four times as great as they were in 1960 (40 bushels per acre.) Not only that, but in part because of the impetus of the expanded ethanol program, another doubling of yield is now in sight, as the best farms have pushed yields above 300 bushels per acre. As a result, in 2010, the state of Iowa alone produced more corn than the entire United States did in 1947. Of our entire corn crop, only 2 percent is actually eaten by Americans as corn, or 12 percent if one includes products like corn chips and corn syrup. These advances in productivity do not only benefit the United States. America’s farmers are the vanguard for their counterparts worldwide. New seed strains and other techniques first demonstrated on our most advanced farms, subsequently spread to average farms, and then go global, thereby raising crop yields everywhere.




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