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America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

economist.com

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Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#91

Post by NicoJuicy »

avgcorrection wrote: post #30
NicoJuicy wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Art of war Pushing Russia to start a war ( friends with no limits was even publicly announced), see how the west reacts, but don't interfere enough ( so you won't get involved and have more time to identify weak points + weaken the enemy support - eg. Availability of artillery supplies). Base yourself on that. Or do you think it's a confidence the invasion started just after the Beijng Olympics ( ~ propaganda)? In th…

> Or do you think it's a confidence the invasion started just after the Beijng Olympics? Not a “confidence” no, since there were rumors already a year ago that Xi asked Putin to delay the invasion based on that. But it’s a leap from that to claiming that China indirectly master-minded the invasion of Ukraine.

Coincidence...

I'm not saying masterminded, but it embolded Russia.

Poo-tin was already eager to show "who's boss" after he didn't get enough "attention" in ~ 2000 for his ego.

Little guys...

Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#92

Post by mikewarot »

no_wizard wrote: post #40

Is anyone really equipped to go to war with the USA? Unrestrained war with the US war machine would be....catastrophic, to say the least. I mean for both parties, but the US out spends everyone by a wide margin[0] and the US military is very advanced and well resourced, and well trained. Even if the fighting was just constrained to Taiwan, it would be pretty bad for everyone, but I think it would be especially bad fo…

All we would have to do is park a few air craft carriers off the straits of Hormuz and stop any oil shipments to China, and their economy would implode within 6 months.

Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#93

Post by avgcorrection »

NicoJuicy wrote: post #91
avgcorrection wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Or do you think it's a confidence the invasion started just after the Beijng Olympics? Not a “confidence” no, since there were rumors already a year ago that Xi asked Putin to delay the invasion based on that. But it’s a leap from that to claiming that China indirectly master-minded the invasion of Ukraine.

Coincidence... I'm not saying masterminded, but it embolded Russia. Poo-tin was already eager to show "who's boss" after he didn't get enough "attention" in ~ 2000 for his ego. Little guys...

I can see that you are very serious about geopolitics.

Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#94

Post by meowfly »

I've been pretty skeptical of an invasion scenario. It's never made sense to me, because Taiwan is so close to the Mainland. If Taiwan wanted to, they could do an immense amount of damage to valuable infrastructure. When this is posited online to a Chinese audience, it seems people believe that they would never do that because China would annihilate the country.

My take is that China just plans to harass Taiwan. Last week it's believed China cut internet cables. We might continue to see China escalate until they start creating real economic damage (i.e an embargo).

This military build up is to make the US more hesitant to get involved in behaviors that don't quite warrant a war, but are severe enough to start pressuring Taiwan for concessions.

This whole situation is honestly pretty scary still, because it relies on no miscalculations. My own take is I blame Xi. Past presidents, like Obama, are often blamed for their weak stance against China, but many don't realize Hu Jin Tao was an entirely different leader. All the NYTimes articles about China joining the global order seemed far more reasonable, because Hu was very pro-globalization and no where close to as nationalistic. The KMT (Taiwan's pro-China party), was much stronger when China was run by Hu.

Recently Xi has broken convention and is in his third term. He has through anti-corruption campaigns and politicking filled the politburo with his people. There was a brief belief that post-covid, the country would pivot, however that now looks unlikely. China and America are going to have a tumultuous half-decade at-least.

Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#95

Post by MikusR »

rnk wrote: post #54
baal80spam wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OK, whole/most of the _civilized_ world did.

China, India, Syria, NK, a few other countries. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/russia-gets-shrugs-in-i...

As they said civilized countries have.

Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#96

Post by [deleted] »

ianburrell wrote: post #65
ergonaught wrote: post #29

I’ve always found it strange that military planning and training is considered newsworthy and informational. I’d be a whole lot more upset and surprised if USA and China were not preparing for a war over Taiwan. It is one of the top 3 most likely sparks for war between them. Which is not to say that it is “likely”.

How they are preparing is important. For example, China has built a modern navy in the last decade. Invasion is actually possible. Enough that people have been making predictions on it happening in next five years based on when China will be ready. The US has been focused on Iraq and Afghanistan and sort of neglected Navy and Air Force. The article is partly about the Marines completely changing strategy to fight Chi…

[deleted]

Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#97

Post by red-iron-pine »

magicalhippo wrote: post #46
swamp40 wrote: post #14

It would be a proxy war, not direct US troop involvement. But China says any response from Taiwan will be taken as a direct response from the US. So, that could go south in a hurry. I think Ukraine showed China exactly what the world response would be to such an invasion - i.e. shunning, so I doubt this would happen except as a way to goad the US into a war. And China certainly isn't ready for that yet. From the US P…

> I think Ukraine showed China exactly what the world response would be to such an invasion - i.e. shunning EU shunned everything except the stuff they relied on: gas. That they kept buying in quantity. Given how much manufacturing the EU and US has outsourced to China, how effective would such shunning be?

Much of that manufacturing has started heading to Vietnam, Indonesia, even Mexico.

China is the #1 manufacturer, but Germany is #2 and the US is #3, and the latter two will make reasonable attempts to respect your IP.

Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#98

Post by cafard »

SapporoChris wrote: post #41
twblalock wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seriously. We should even be training for war with Canada -- just in case. Getting ready for a war does not provoke war. Both sides are doing it, we know each other are doing it, we do war games all the time all over the world and it's fine. Freaking the public out about how the game is played is the real danger. That happened with the balloon incident too -- oh gee China spies on us? Yeah, and we spy on them too, an…

"War of 1812, when troops from Canada — then a British colony — marched to Washington, D.C., finished James and Dolly Madison’s unfinished dinner and burned down the White House. " https://www.politico.eu/article/us-war-with-canada-cross-bor...

Wow, all the way from Montreal?

The troops were landed on the Patuxent River, and marched a considerably shorter distance to Washington. I would also mention that the British called the burning retaliation for the burning of York (now Toronto).

But supposedly the War Department had plans in its files for an invasion of Canada as late as the 1930s.

Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#99

Post by [deleted] »

ihateyouall123 wrote: post #64
yalogin wrote: post #27

This has a very ominous inevitable tone to it. I question how wise it is to even publish an article with this tone given how grave the consequences of such a war would be. Just reading the title sent a chill for me. Any war like that will push the whole world into protracted recession and it will be hell for every country.

Seeing a lot of anti-free speech comments like this. This isn't even about supporting an asshole who claims "free speech." This is information with a certain tone, so are you anti-information with someone that has a certain tone?

[deleted]

Re: America and China are preparing for a war over Taiwan

#100

Post by calyth2018 »

yalogin wrote: post #27

This has a very ominous inevitable tone to it. I question how wise it is to even publish an article with this tone given how grave the consequences of such a war would be. Just reading the title sent a chill for me. Any war like that will push the whole world into protracted recession and it will be hell for every country.

Like others pointed out, it's just manufacturing consent.

The stated aim on the mainland side is reunification. Anyone with two brain cells would know that bombing a place to shit and then try to run it is going to be hell. See Iraq.

Taiwan knows that if they go for de jure independence, then that will leave the mainland with no choice but military action.

US knows that this is the juiciest way to do a Bait and Bleed (using Mearsheimer's terms), and will do whatever it takes to drum up the possibility while not directly engaging in an armed conflict with China.

This is just standard operating procedures when you have more than hegemons in the world.

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