years ago when i was speaking to young scholars inside the chinese communist party and what they wanted to talk about is the history as thorkell clash between britain and germany in the nineteenth century that was the british century and germany rose to build its empire its place in the sun and it led to eventually world war one which they wanted to avoid the chinese and i'd be interested if they still are as keen to avoid that permanently or if they just want to avoid it until such a time as when they think they could win such a showdown with the us so i think it's actually a dangerous world and i think again this the nineteenth century was british the twentieth was american this one which is just starting will be chinese ok very interesting thoughts indeed hundred s. let's just go back a little bit to the new silk road and as we have seen the western german city of duis book is an important hub on the routes but so what does that mean in concrete terms for this once prosperous city that has more recently hit on harder times.