During Donald Trump's election campaign, and especially since he became President of the United States, his plan to build (to complete) a wall along the Mexican border is one of the hottest debated issue in media all over the world. As Mr. Trump´s campaign motto was Make America Great again, I thought it could be interesting to make a brief comparison between the wall that he wants to build in the USA and the Great Wall of China, the wall par excellence which, nowadays, far from its defensive role to stop the Mongolian warriors in its origins, is currently one of the seven wonders of the world.
We will begin the comparison with an aerial photo of both borders. On the ground, the approximate length in straight line between the ends of the Chinese wall would be approximately twice as long as the American. The first would have about 6,259km long while the second would be 3.144km.
However, as we can see in the image below, in the Chinese Great Wall there are many overlaps of different layers relative to the multiple dynasties that ruled the country for centuries and, in addition, these walls have branches in different directions. The latest studies carried out by the National Authority of Chinese Cultural Heritage estimates 21,916 kilometers of wall built during its 2000 years of construction, instead of the 8,850km previously accounted.
While it is unlikely that the construction of the wall between the US and Mexico will take 2000 years, it is possible that its construction will not be as simple as drawing a line along the border between the two countries. A proof of the complexity of the layout of this wall is the fact that since the year 2000, approximately 1/3 of that border has been closed in an irregular and inefficient way.
Although the dimensions of both walls are relatively similar, comparing other data leads to ridiculous results, especially those relating to the construction timeline and the required workforce.
WORKERS:
-US: Estimated about 40,000 (probably Mexican construction workers)
-China: The number could be counted by millions (soldiers, peasants and prisoners)
TERM OF CONSTRUCTION
-US: As estimated, 21 years. 16 years from 2000 plus the 5 that suppose they need to complete it.
-China: 2,000 years approximately
COST
-US: It is estimated between 8-30 billion dollars
-CHINA: According to a study of the website Quore, building the Great Wall of China currently would cost between 13-65 billion dollars, but using the type of fence that is currently used for the American wall. On the other hand, it is estimated that during the construction of the Chinese wall about 1,000,000 people died, so the cost of lives should be taken into consideration.
MATERIALS AND DIMENSIONS
-US: concrete and steel. The current fence consists mainly of metal fence, razor wire, surveillance cameras and lights, but within the options to complete the new wall shuffles the possibility of prefabricated concrete panels. It is estimated a foundation of 1.5m approx and a height of about 6m, although Donald Trump has talked of even 16m high.
Below we can see an example of a boarder wall nowadays:
And this video of the CNN enumerates different possibilities for the construction of the wall USA-Mexico:
-CHINA: Sand, brick, stone and wood. The height of the wall varies between 5 and 8 meters although at the moment many of the sections that are still standing are less than 2 meters.
As a curious fact, the Great Wall of China receives about 4 million tourists a year, while according to a DHS (Department of Homeland Security) document of 2015, around 170,000 Mexicans plus 80,000 unaccompanied minors and families from other countries managed to cross the border illegally that year. A Mexican can get to pay a smuggler for crossing the fence illegally about 6,000 dollars, while the entrance to the Chinese wall is 6 dollars in the tourist sections.
Mr. Trump has referred to the US Wall with Mexico as a "Great Wall" because of the short time of its construction. Here I would like to talk about the idea of time. Time is relative, a wall is built in 2,000 years and another in 20, however, the result is not the same. Those two millennia have influenced each of the bricks and stones placed by hand on the Chinese wall, even some of these bricks retain the marks inscribed by those who placed them hundreds of years ago.
Starting from the principle that any type of wall only implies suffering. It is very unlikely that the US wall will become over time any wonder of the World interms of tourism. It will be a wall without personality, that the day that will fall, and it will surely do, will not fall with a lyricism like the one we saw in the photos of Berlin Wall´s Fall.
The poetics of time has been lost. The new Great Wall of China is called Great Firewall, it is an invisible wall, made of zeros and ones, waves, or whatever launguage the internet uses. It is a wall that reaches any corner of the planet where someone is connected to the internet and can be continuously updated.