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Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

economist.com

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Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#31

Post by mannykannot »

ahtu123 wrote: post #11

I have a feeling 10 years from now Trump will be funny blip on the radar of how crazy the '10s were while Asia will be quite meaningfully transformed. I wish this was getting as much attention as BREAKING NEWS: Trump/staffer did something dumb. The (soon plausibly) richest and most populous country in the world will soon have a dictator. That's a bit scary.

While fussing over every misstep of the administration is a distraction, this is an unfortunate time to have a US President who seems uninterested in global politics.

Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#32

Post by Slansitartop »

arialeks wrote: post #25
anthonyleecook wrote: post #4

Some other disturbing signs from China: increasing military budget https://www.hongkongfp.com/2018/03/06/china-splash-us175-bil... , kidnapping relatives of the reporters in other countries that exposed the uigher concentration camps http://m.dw.com/en/chinese-authorities-detain-relatives-of-r... , China literally banned words and letter n in social media https://mashable.com/2018/02/28/china-bans-n-xi-jinping-term..…

Is it disturbing from a US POV, or generally speaking? Because if I recall correctly, the US military spending has gone up significantly as well, also it's projected to rise even further in the future. On a related note, could someone explain to me how Russia manages to stay a threat with a military budget that's about 6% of the US budget? Or does it only seem to be that smaller because their soldiers are payed less?

> On a related note, could someone explain to me how Russia manages to stay a threat with a military budget that's about 6% of the US budget?

Total speculation: the US may spend more on R&D to develop unproven ideas into functional systems (with a lot of failure and trial and error). Then Russia can follows those now-proven development paths without needing to spend nearly as much on dead ends or original research.

Kinda like this link that another user posted here: https://io9.gizmodo.com/this-experiment-proved-that-anyone-c...

AFAIK, there has always been a lot of Russian copying/mimicry of US technology, from the Tu-4 to the Buran, but little in the other direction.

Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#33

Post by bgee »

anthonyleecook wrote: post #4

Some other disturbing signs from China: increasing military budget https://www.hongkongfp.com/2018/03/06/china-splash-us175-bil... , kidnapping relatives of the reporters in other countries that exposed the uigher concentration camps http://m.dw.com/en/chinese-authorities-detain-relatives-of-r... , China literally banned words and letter n in social media https://mashable.com/2018/02/28/china-bans-n-xi-jinping-term..…

Can you elaborate more on why China's increasing military budget is a disturbing sign to you?

China spends a mere 1.9% of its GDP in 2016 and that number is smaller than from Vietnam, Korea, India even Singapore [0]. To me China is only trying catching up its neighbors.

BTW Japan's PM has just submitted his 2018 Military Budget and if approved would be the 6th "straight annual increase" [1].

[0]: https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/MS.MIL.XPND.GD.ZS?end=2...

[1]: https://thediplomat.com/2017/08/whats-in-japans-record-2018-...

Disclaimer: I'm Chinese.

Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#34

Post by dragonwriter »

arialeks wrote: post #25
anthonyleecook wrote: post #4

Some other disturbing signs from China: increasing military budget https://www.hongkongfp.com/2018/03/06/china-splash-us175-bil... , kidnapping relatives of the reporters in other countries that exposed the uigher concentration camps http://m.dw.com/en/chinese-authorities-detain-relatives-of-r... , China literally banned words and letter n in social media https://mashable.com/2018/02/28/china-bans-n-xi-jinping-term..…

Is it disturbing from a US POV, or generally speaking? Because if I recall correctly, the US military spending has gone up significantly as well, also it's projected to rise even further in the future. On a related note, could someone explain to me how Russia manages to stay a threat with a military budget that's about 6% of the US budget? Or does it only seem to be that smaller because their soldiers are payed less?

> On a related note, could someone explain to me how Russia manages to stay a threat with a military budget that's about 6% of the US budget?

Because Russia: (1) has ICBMs, which makes it a strategic global threat, even though they can't directly control territory that way, (2) because Russia has a large and capable conventional military than makes it a strong regional power threatening US interests and allies (it can't challenge the US on global force projection, which is the real driver of US military cost.)

> Or does it only seem to be that smaller because their soldiers are payed less?

Soldier and suppliers being paid less is a factor, too, but the big factor in the fundamental asymmetry between what is necessary to be a regional power and what is necessary to be able to respond to threats by regional powers everywhere in the world.

Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#35

Post by bllguo »

arialeks wrote: post #25
anthonyleecook wrote: post #4

Some other disturbing signs from China: increasing military budget https://www.hongkongfp.com/2018/03/06/china-splash-us175-bil... , kidnapping relatives of the reporters in other countries that exposed the uigher concentration camps http://m.dw.com/en/chinese-authorities-detain-relatives-of-r... , China literally banned words and letter n in social media https://mashable.com/2018/02/28/china-bans-n-xi-jinping-term..…

Is it disturbing from a US POV, or generally speaking? Because if I recall correctly, the US military spending has gone up significantly as well, also it's projected to rise even further in the future. On a related note, could someone explain to me how Russia manages to stay a threat with a military budget that's about 6% of the US budget? Or does it only seem to be that smaller because their soldiers are payed less?

some hypotheses:

80/20 rule - 20% of the budget gets you 80% of the capability. ofc these are not accurate percentages

not to say this doesn't happen in Russia, but everyone talks about how much excessive waste there is in the US military

like you say, cost for soldiers will be much less there

Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#36

Post by adventured »

dragonwriter wrote: post #20
adventured wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody is going to start a global nuclear war over Taiwan. The country is far too close to mainland China for the US to perpetually stand-off China from taking the island in the case of war. It's futile almost no matter the strength gap between the US and China. China could have successfully taken Taiwan 15 years ago for the same reason, despite there being a huge military gap back then. There's no scenario where Chi…

> When it happens (during Xi's lifetime), it's going to set a particularly terrible precedent that will encourage Russia to do more of the same in eastern Europe. It may provide a distraction for further Russian expansion, but Russia clearly doesn't need any new foreign precedent to justify invading it's neighbors. > If China then decides Mongolia too is part of greater China, who can really stop that? Nobody. China…

> but Mongolia is much more likely to (with Russia as the opposing major power.)

Russia gets expansion in Europe. China gets expansion in Asia. They agree to try to stay out of each others way. It certainly wouldn't be unusual, historically speaking, for very powerful authoritarian regimes to reach agreement on annexations of territory.

Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#37

Post by Isamu »

Slansitartop wrote: post #27
jerf wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the strategies is to keep Taiwan itself armed. Civilians like us can't know this, but it has been hypothesized that one of the levers being used on China with regard to North Korea's development of nuclear weapons is explaining to them that if North Korea goes nuclear, they can expect Japan, Taiwan, South Korea, and who knows who else to go nuclear, either via local development of the weaponry or via assisted…

> After all, one imagines that if they really put their mind to it, Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea could all go nuclear in a period measured in small single-digit months https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Japanese_nuclear_weapon_progra... : > While there are currently no known plans in Japan to produce nuclear weapons, it has been argued Japan has the technology, raw materials, and the capital to produce nuclear weapons w…

I would definitely expect Japan to have completely developed plans for a nuclear weapons program, with contingencies for getting it online in the shortest amount of time possible.

I would not expect them to have actually created a device, unless they are keeping deep under the stadium somewhere below the Akira project.

Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#38

Post by vondur »

bgee wrote: post #33
anthonyleecook wrote: post #4

Some other disturbing signs from China: increasing military budget https://www.hongkongfp.com/2018/03/06/china-splash-us175-bil... , kidnapping relatives of the reporters in other countries that exposed the uigher concentration camps http://m.dw.com/en/chinese-authorities-detain-relatives-of-r... , China literally banned words and letter n in social media https://mashable.com/2018/02/28/china-bans-n-xi-jinping-term..…

Can you elaborate more on why China's increasing military budget is a disturbing sign to you? China spends a mere 1.9% of its GDP in 2016 and that number is smaller than from Vietnam, Korea, India even Singapore [0]. To me China is only trying catching up its neighbors. BTW Japan's PM has just submitted his 2018 Military Budget and if approved would be the 6th "straight annual increase" [1]. [0]: https://data.worldba…

I've also read that China spends more on internal security than on it's own military.

Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#39

Post by mistermann »

simonh wrote: post #24
mistermann wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also think in light of recent events I think we'd benefit from people educating themselves on the actual state of free trade with respect to China, China is far more protectionist than the US, but if we try to do something about it, it's considered to be starting a trade war.

When it comes to trade what matters is whether or not you meet your treaty obligations. It's a rules based process, where you agree the rules and have some arbitration process, e.g. through the WTO. On that basis, what matters is whether China is following the rules it, and everyone else, agreed to. If you think some one is cheating you arbitrate. We made a deal. Trump is intent on blatantly breaking the rules the US…

I strongly disagree. I believe what matters is, or should be, whether the current arrangement that has been "agreed to", is objectively fair or not.

What is in the best interests of wealthy influential people and corporations may not be in the best interests of overall society. Maximizing GDP is not necessarily in the best interests of overall society.

I think this article makes some good points on whether "what we've agreed to" is actually "fair", and there are numerous other articles like it, but if an alien from another planet was to come here and listen to public discourse on the topic, they'd be left with the impression that there is no debate to be had.

https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2017/business/trade-chin...

It may be difficult to determine what is "objectively fair" in a complex globalized world, but it seems to me like there is a coordinated effort to avoid a conversation on the topic getting any kind of traction.

Re: Xi Jinping decides to abolish presidential term limits

#40

Post by mr_spothawk »

z2 wrote: post #26
moreorless wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You have a very interesting post and comment history.

As did this user in the past, before being banned for using HN primarily for political battle: https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=sharetea

both of these users have better content in their comments than I have in mine.

and sharetea was on to something in 2016... even if the account got banned.

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