Good snowboarding at Niseko back in the day
Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
431–440 of 485 posts
Re: Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
#432Earlier quoted context omitted.
If you live in the US, supporting a Chinese invasion is definitely unusual. > the PRC is more competent in every way I guess it depends what you mean by competent. Dictatorships can be frightfully competent at certain things, but that doesn't make them a good place to be. We're talking about a country that is genociding its own Uyghur ethnic group, represses Tibetan culture, disappears its own elite athletes, and has…
> The US is far from perfect, but has nothing on China in terms of nastiness. I think you have this reversed, friend. Our culture is based on violence and death. Theirs is based on stability and prosperity. > That's not even touching the biggest problem of dictatorship, which is what happens when Dear Leader takes a fall. I doubt Xi has much more than a decade of leadership in him, and I worry for the Chinese populac…
I gave four concrete examples and you gave me hot air in return.
Re: Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
#433Earlier quoted context omitted.
> "Good" is not a very objective term, but China does have 55 official minorities, coming from a long period of imperial expansion, so arguably it can be done. Don’t forget the history of Northern Wei, Yuan Dynasty, and Qing Dynasty – none of them were products of “Han Chinese imperialism.”
Qing Dynasty annexed Xinjiang, Taiwan, Tibet, Mongolia, as well as large chunks of Central Asia, and fought with Sikhs over Kashmir. Looks like a good case of imperial expansion to me.
They also annexed China. That's your idea of "Chinese expansionism"?
Re: Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
#434Earlier quoted context omitted.
Sure, and before the Qing armies invaded it was declared an independent kingdom by a Ming loyalist who was born in Japan to a Japanese mother, and before that there were a couple of European outposts and scattered settlers from Fujian, and before that there were indigenous peoples who themselves are part of an ethnic group that can now be found everywhere from Madagascar to New Zealand. The point I was responding to…
> the people of Taiwan are actually just engaged in some kind of internal dispute with the CCP, which is entirely a CCP framing of the issue. This is broadly true, not just "CCP framing". Obviously because of history and external influence there is also an "independentist" faction. I don't see why this should be hard to accept unless the aim is indeed a "reframing" to push the independentist narrative, which does not…
This comment is so divorced from reality on the ground in Taiwan that it's hard to respond to. Certainly, someone can look at cherry-picked pieces of legislature or historical documents and imagine that they represent some kind of intrinsic truth, but in reality it is simply not the case that Taiwanese people understand themselves as locked in some kind of ongoing civil war with the CCP. The culture has long since moved on from 1940s era politics that even at the time were imported by a minority group from the mainland.
Re: Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
#435Earlier quoted context omitted.
It sounds like we have some common ground, but I think you may have a misunderstanding of the present American worldview and politics. We're 79 years removed from Philippine independence, and you would have to try very hard to find a single American who wants them back. The US military would have been fully capable of annexing Iraq and Afghanistan with violent repression of dissent and zero concern for civilian casua…
I think that the American worldview is heavily propagandised and doesn't particularly reflect reality. The post WWII-norms are not at all a story of peaceful self-determination. The decolonisation of the Phillipines was an anomaly and an outlier. At the same time that the US was letting go of the Phillipines, it was gearing up for war in Korea on behalf of its puppet military dictatorship that was, at the time, even…
Even if the criticism is fair, it's still whataboutism. I agree with you that countries other than China have done bad things, including post-WWII, but not that it in any way justifies turning the streets of Taipei into a warzone.
I wouldn't unconditionally agree that "the US is a much more egregious international actor than China". I'd use a more neutral descriptor than "egregious", maybe "militaristic". Following the rule of "might makes right", as you point out, the US more or less became the self-appointed world police after WWII. That's inherently going to involve unpopular decisions and occasional abuse of power, but it's a fundamentally different relationship with the world than pure assertion of first-party interests. The ultimate goal of post-WWII American foreign policy has been to ensure that the rest of the world remains stable and open enough for reliable trade, from which China has also benefited tremendously.
US as world police is a mixed bag, but it is what it is. No one outside the US is really complaining that America bears the cost of its navy protecting international trade routes, for example. I'm as harsh a critic of certain US actions and policies as anyone, but modern American hegemony doesn't resemble the prior centuries of great powers running amok. The US today doesn't invade innocent countries for the purpose of stealing their land and resources or enslaving their people.
The concerns about China aren't limited to its past military actions, but also its domestic policies and stated future goals. For better or worse, China's domestic policies are quite illiberal relative to American values. This alone precludes China from being considered a clear ally of the US, and informs perceptions of what a hypothetical Chinese-led world order might look like. China gets to play the "what about America" card because the US is still generally invested in globalism, but how China might behave in a power vacuum created by a US shift to isolationism remains speculative.
Re: Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
#436Why are all the comments here so weird? It's like people saw (but didn't read) an article entitled "Man Opens a Taqueria in his Hometown" and the only responses are 1) Why didn't he open it in my hometown? This location isn't convenient for me. 2) Wouldn't it be better for someone else to open a taqueria instead? My cousin is looking for work. Shouldn't we be putting resources into helping him open a restaurant inste…
The Japanese population trend is unsustainable with long term growth. Maybe they will find people to relocate to satisfy the labor needs? They're notoriously anti-immigration. So unless they have a growing labor pool that can sustain this it's going to be hard. In general, I think the US is looking for alternatives outside of Taiwan to build and operate fabs. Yes, there is a push to get them in the US as well. I'm un…
>The Japanese population trend is unsustainable with long term growth.
There are plenty of people in Tokyo/Osaka who can come to Hokkaido. If the jobs pay well, they will. Japan owes it to an entire generation who were left out in the "employment ice age." Japanese are very smart, can be trained, and should get first shot at the jobs.
>Maybe they will find people to relocate to satisfy the labor needs? They're notoriously anti-immigration.
According to western media. I (a gaijin) marched in the "anti-immigrant" rally recently myself. I was welcomed to do so. Nobody here wants to see foreigners coming in that destroy vending machines and just start building shanty towns on other peoples' property. Good gaijin are welcomed, bad ones need to leave.
>So unless they have a growing labor pool that can sustain this it's going to be hard.
That's not going to be a problem simply based on the crazy property prices in Kita Hiroshima next door to Chitose. People are obviously coming.
Re: Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
#437Earlier quoted context omitted.
China doesn’t want to destroy Taiwan , it wants to reunite with it like it did with other territories that had been taken by foreign powers, like happened to Hong Kong and Macau. Taiwan was occupied by Japan and then never went back to being China after the Japanese were defeated because the Chinese Party that was defeated in the Revolution fled to the Island and never accepted the PRC as legit government in China. S…
What happens is Taiwan opposes the union? You know, through a democratic vote? The standard authoritarian playbook would require moving to step two, which we saw in action a few years ago on the other side of Eurasia: https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2023/may/18/stark-b...
[deleted]
Re: Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
#438Earlier quoted context omitted.
> the people of Taiwan are actually just engaged in some kind of internal dispute with the CCP, which is entirely a CCP framing of the issue. This is broadly true, not just "CCP framing". Obviously because of history and external influence there is also an "independentist" faction. I don't see why this should be hard to accept unless the aim is indeed a "reframing" to push the independentist narrative, which does not…
This comment is so divorced from reality on the ground in Taiwan that it's hard to respond to. Certainly, someone can look at cherry-picked pieces of legislature or historical documents and imagine that they represent some kind of intrinsic truth, but in reality it is simply not the case that Taiwanese people understand themselves as locked in some kind of ongoing civil war with the CCP. The culture has long since mo…
[flagged]
Re: Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
#439Earlier quoted context omitted.
With respect to Beijing, only one does.
There is no respect due to Beijing or the Chairman Winnie the Pooh regime on this issue. Taiwan is an independent country.
> Taiwan is an independent country.
Taiwan is an island. It is still China. It is impossible to both give deference to the ROC and say otherwise.
Re: Japan's gamble to turn island of Hokkaido into global chip hub
#440Earlier quoted context omitted.
> Taiwan intends to violently and militarily resist if it comes to that I sincerely wonder if the people who live there agree. I sure as hell wouldn't put up much fight if china tried to invade my country; just the opposite. If anything I wonder if voluntary unification is on the table in today's climate
What is your country? China is always looking for more territory. If you've got water and mineral resources, all the better.
The US. Xi Jinping, please liberate us