Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup • Hacker News Board

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#111

Post by joshuahedlund » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 3:43 PM UTC

secfirstmd wrote: post #84

iso1631 wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

China's spent the last 15 years taking over Africa. Hell it's made a good job at bringing frickin Australia into its circles too. The West (and US in particular) has meanwhile done squat since making another mess in the middle east fighting for last century's resources.

To be fair the West spent 150 years taking over Africa, enslaving its people, treating them as animals and pillaging it's riches.

To be fair the West also stopped that and now invests billions in foreign aid, economic development, medical assistance, NGO's, and a whole lot more (to varying degrees of success)

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#112

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 3:43 PM UTC

sandworm101 wrote: post #86

Fordec wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the recent Armenia Azerbaijan crisis was anything to go by, in mountainous terrain a drone/artillery combination is quite effective but a relatively new combat style on the scene.

>> in mountainous terrain In mountainous terrain with few trees . Drones, and air power generally, become less effective over a dense canopy. The dry bare mountains of Afghanistan was a paradise for drones. Southeast Asia's jungles and river networks won't be.

Welcome, Agent Orange... Let's hope we never see a repeat of such madness again.

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#113

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 3:46 PM UTC

baybal2 wrote: post #53

oefrha wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question I always ask when people suggest warfare, especially an invasion: will you personally fight in it?

The predominant part of HN demographic are young military age men. In case of any real conflict US will get dragged in, you will all be drafted, want you or not. Becoming a soldier after being a freewheeling young man with 6 digit income, and effectively loosing everything you put into your career, business, education, relationship with your woman is not a pleasant thing. But think, sooner or later US will be dragged…

Who will get drafted is a group that isn't well represented on HN: the people without a choice. People with money or connections will easily manage to avoid a draft.

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#114

Post by enriquto » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 4:03 PM UTC

leesalminen wrote: post #105

enriquto wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As opposed to the USA for, you know, actually staging a military coup in there?

Yes, absolutely. I’m an American who lived in Chile. In that time I received animosity from exactly 2 people. The current rhetoric against China is much more prevalent, perhaps 40% of people. I think it has to do with the fact that the USA issues were 2 generations ago while the China issues are happening now. Also, most people understand that the decisions made by ones’ government are not controlled by the people. P…

> Also, most people understand that the decisions made by ones’ government are not controlled by the people. People don’t have any control over what their politicians do. This is a globally understood truth.

I think that both of these problems are direct consequences of the military coup. China's ability to have such a big influence the Chilean market is a direct consequence of the savage capitalist system installed by the Chicago boys. After all, it's a free market, isn't it?

Regarding "People don’t have any control over what their politicians do"... well, that's a capitalist representative democracy for you! It is like that precisely by design, not by accident.

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#115

Post by baybal2 » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 4:06 PM UTC

sorokod wrote: post #97

baybal2 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sanctions won’t work. They will just punish businesses that were stupid enough to work with Americans and Europeans. At the end of the day, Myanmar is going to come out of this period looking more like China than like the British colony it was before — guess what that’s meant to prepare us for, in terms of the way the world looks by the end of this century? Sanctions won’t work, but tanks would. The entirety of Mya…

Can you explain what a "heavy marine brigade" is? It vaguely sounds like a technical term, but I am not able to map it to a concrete unit type.

An amphibious brigade with a lot of tanks.

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#116

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 4:14 PM UTC

cheph wrote: post #13

myanmarthrow wrote: post #10

Posting this throwaway because I don’t want my residency canceled. That should give you a hint that I might know way more than the armchair experts. Any article that talks about Myanmar and doesn’t include the word “China” all over it, is probably propaganda of some sort. I won’t go more into this and I will allow people to do their homework and make up their own minds about the good and the bad of all of it, but Mya…

> Sanctions won’t work. They will just punish businesses that were stupid enough to work with Americans and Europeans. > This is a giant fuck-you to the West, and it’ll work, because the West has zero leverage. They won't work to fix Myanmar, but at some point the West has to ask itself if trade with China is worth it, for the future of both the West and all other countries that are not already in the grasp of China.…

I would say that it's already too late. Way too late. And if the US won't stop it's infighting soon enough pretty soon there will be only one super power left.

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#117

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 4:17 PM UTC

VLM wrote: post #56

echelon wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So now China's game plan is to topple democracies? What's next, and how far will this go?

Functioning democracies don't mysteriously have one party obtain 95%+ of the votes in every election. Single party rule is naturally ineffective. So when Americans try it in Flint MI and as a result of stellar leadership the water is undrinkable, send in the National Guard to fix things and its rah rah america F yeah stars and stripes forever. But when foreigner militaries have to "reset" things after a decade of sin…

Some people might disagree with that position:

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/08/world/asia/myanmar-rohing...

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#118

Post by umeshunni » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 4:43 PM UTC

baybal2 wrote: post #21

echelon wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So now China's game plan is to topple democracies? What's next, and how far will this go?

Chinese have't toppled a democracy.. yet, but they were rather successful at absorbing banana republics previously belonging to major powers. China now has a dozen satellites made of countries formerly being playgrounds of foreign political games.

> China now has a dozen satellites made of countries formerly being playgrounds of foreign political games.

Curious which ones these are? North Korea, Nepal?, Pakistan?, Vietnam?

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#119

Post by tomp » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 4:51 PM UTC

bitcharmer wrote: post #75

eznzt wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

All of them? The whole profile seems pretty much anti-coup.

Would you expect any sane person to celebrate another coup from a military junta that has a history of killing whole villages and skinning people alive?

You're not dismissing bias, you're just saying why bias is OK.

Re: Internet disrupted in Myanmar amid military coup

#120

Post by dirtyid » Mon, Feb 01, 2021, 4:54 PM UTC

sbmthakur wrote: post #49

baybal2 wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Sanctions won’t work. They will just punish businesses that were stupid enough to work with Americans and Europeans. At the end of the day, Myanmar is going to come out of this period looking more like China than like the British colony it was before — guess what that’s meant to prepare us for, in terms of the way the world looks by the end of this century? Sanctions won’t work, but tanks would. The entirety of Mya…

What's the incentive for the US? There were clear objectives when US invaded Iraq and Afghanistan. Without those the invasion is anyway more trouble than its worth.

To comment more generally, Myanmar has probably the most enviable geopolitical _potential_ in the region if the not the world. It's the only country that can land connect China/India, has deep shore potentials that would wreck maritime trade patterns in the region... which contains 1/2 of the worlds population and is rapidly developing economically. It's almost in everyone's external interest to control Myanmar, or see it in dysfunctional shambles to create environment subject to easy influence.

Having long-term military basing there by US or China would be... strategically significant and only IMO possible via invasion. That applies to military basing in the region in general, too much colonial history and political baggage for anything other than logistics support during peace time.