[martin14]

llama66 llama66:

Its scary. Brinksmanship.

An 'academic' issues some total nonsense that he has no influence over.
A fart in the wind would be more powerful.

If he was authorized by the Party to say such stupid crap, they are just looking
to see the reaction, if any, across boards and social media.

If not, we'll he'll be dead in a few days.

[Thanos]

Seems coincidental that this kind of talk and activity from the Chinese began about the same time a certain someone went out of his way to piss them off as much as he could with a completely un-necessary trade war. These aren't the sort of people one should play games with just to look like a tough guy to the rubes at home. Mess with China and you unleash the beast, just like with the Russians. Hell, has the US forgotten already just how badly the same kind of run-up based on bullshit led to a total debacle in Vietnam? Try the same crap with China and see what happens.

Think the Chinese will have to go it alone? Well, so will the US, thanks entirely to President Thunder C**t pissing off every American ally in the Pacific rim over the last two years. Any Canadian PM that follows the US lead and commits Canadian forces while Trump is president should be strung up from a fucking lamp-post and you can bet your bottom dollar that a majority the folks in Japan, South Korea, and Australia feel exactly the same. Donald Trump killed American moral authority in foreign affairs and it's not going to return any time soon, if ever.

[BartSimpson]

Thanos Thanos:

Seems coincidental that this kind of talk and activity from the Chinese began about the same time a certain someone went out of his way to piss them off as much as he could with a completely un-necessary trade war. These aren't the sort of people one should play games with just to look like a tough guy to the rubes at home. Mess with China and you unleash the beast, just like with the Russians. Hell, has the US forgotten already just how badly the same kind of run-up based on bullshit led to a total debacle in Vietnam? Try the same crap with China and see what happens.

Think the Chinese will have to go it alone? Well, so will the US, thanks entirely to President Thunder C**t pissing off every American ally in the Pacific rim over the last two years. Any Canadian PM that follows the US lead and commits Canadian forces while Trump is president should be strung up from a fucking lamp-post and you can bet your bottom dollar that a majority the folks in Japan, South Korea, and Australia feel exactly the same. Donald Trump killed American moral authority in foreign affairs and it's not going to return any time soon, if ever.

The trade war existed long before Trump came along. He's just the first to do anything about it.

https://www.google.com/search?source=hp ... JQsoNq1UOQ

[Thanos]

You mean the first to turn it from a nuisance, or from a convenient prop for politicians to get elected, into something that could turn into a shooting war with millions of people potentially being killed? Including in Japan and South Korea if they get dragged into the mess? Yeah, what an accomplishment.

[BartSimpson]

Thanos Thanos:

You mean the first to turn it from a nuisance, or from a convenient prop for politicians to get elected, into something that could turn into a shooting war with millions of people potentially being killed? Including in Japan and South Korea if they get dragged into the mess? Yeah, what an accomplishment.

It's not just a 'nuisance' when the trade imbalance between the US and China is around $1,000,000,000,000 per year.

[Thanos]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

It's not just a 'nuisance' when the trade imbalance between the US and China is around $1,000,000,000,000 per year.

Well, not really. It's about a third of that.

https://www.thebalance.com/u-s-china-tr ... ns-3306277

The greater meta should be that the American wealthy elite didn't have to send all those jobs to China in the first place. They did it to make money and they didn't give a damn about American workers or any sort of patriotism at all. It's a direct result of the anarcho-capitalism that the US has been toying with for far too long, a decades-long policy (endorsed whole-heartedly by both the GOP and the Dems) of "screw it as long as we make money off if it". Seriously, is China really to blame when the US adopted reverse-mercantilism as a national value? Like they were supposed to make a moral stand, "no, we won't let you send your jobs here because it's the wrong thing to do!", to stop you from blowing apart every working-class industry ranging from steel to electronics to textiles?

The US, and Canada & Europe too, has to look in the mirror on this for the true source of the blame. We let ourselves down in order to buy cheap crap made by slave labour with the added "benefit" of destroying the labour movement in our countries. And, for the most part, with our remaining manufacturing we really aren't making anything the Chinese are interested in importing because they're more than capable of making low-cost versions of our stuff right in their own home.

Ditto with Japan and South Korea. It's not their fault that they built brand new and massively efficient industries from out of the wreckage of World War Two while North America stagnated, especially in automotive. If capitalism is all about the best competitor winning then we can hardly blame other countries for kicking our asses because we got complacent or because our wealthy folks in the 1970's and 80's decided that having abundant working- and middle-class jobs for our own people was no longer in their own selfish personal interests anymore.

[PublicAnimalNo9]

bootlegga bootlegga:

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

China attacking two US carriers means total war with the United States.

I don't understand the Asian mind that repeatedly makes the mistake of thinking that non-Asians will be intimidated by this kind of aggression. It just pisses us off, unifies us against the foe, and commits us to the utter and complete annihilation of the enemy.

And setting a US Navy port of call visit to Taiwan as a trip wire is daring Trump to send a task force to Taiwan...which he will absolutely do.

On a bit of military trivia here do pay particular attention to Asian members of the US and allied militaries. If/when they start talking about Joe Chink you'll know that shit's getting serious.

Been my experience that when someone calls out Joe Chink they're referring to a Chinese target that's about to be engaged.

The thing is that China will likely have the upper hand militarily in a couple decades anyways,

Not necessarily. The Chinese are very concerned about one thing. While they have the numbers in manpower, they're concerned that their systems haven't been tested in battle yet whereas the US has had decades to perfect their systems and methods in combat.
Close air support is a prime example. You can make all the practice runs you want, nothing compares to the real thing. Having a FAC on the ground in training runs just doesn't quite test the systems and personnel like doing it in combat does.

What China really wants is to "scare" the US away from the South China Sea. That stretch of water sees more commercial shipping than anywhere else in the world and the Chinese want to control that. Hence the military bases on the artificial islands they built.

[Prof_Chomsky]

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

The Chinese suffer from Middle Kingdom syndrome in which they truly believe that China has a god-given right to rule the world and that all of the world should bow down and pay them tribute.

They really believe that if they make this kind of demonstration then the USA will be impressed and intimidated and that we'll back down and surrender the Pacific to China.

It's a flaw in their culture to believe they have some sort of superiority that gives them a right to rule and their cultural bias in this regard is so pervasive that it renders them (collectively) unable to recognize the mistakes of every other bunch of fools who thought they had such rights.

I hate to say but I am starting to wonder if war with China is inevitable. They seem to have committed to war with the USA as a natural step to global dominance.

You literally just described "American Exceptionalism".

[llama66]

The Strait of Malacca is technically the busiest stretch of water on earth, but I get your point. I think its also a resource grab on the part of the Chinese. Giant economy like theirs, they'll need resources that they can control. Wouldn't surprise me if they "discover" a major source of oil in the South China Sea in the next few years...

[BartSimpson]

Prof_Chomsky Prof_Chomsky:

BartSimpson BartSimpson:

The Chinese suffer from Middle Kingdom syndrome in which they truly believe that China has a god-given right to rule the world and that all of the world should bow down and pay them tribute.

They really believe that if they make this kind of demonstration then the USA will be impressed and intimidated and that we'll back down and surrender the Pacific to China.

It's a flaw in their culture to believe they have some sort of superiority that gives them a right to rule and their cultural bias in this regard is so pervasive that it renders them (collectively) unable to recognize the mistakes of every other bunch of fools who thought they had such rights.

I hate to say but I am starting to wonder if war with China is inevitable. They seem to have committed to war with the USA as a natural step to global dominance.

You literally just described "American Exceptionalism".

To some degree I agree with you and have said as much here on CKA and elsewhere.

[GreenTiger]

This kind of political BS has the be stopped immediately or a war may very well come to pass, it is strange to that the should try that with this President. Unlike Mr Obama Mr Trump would definitely respond in kind.

[raydan]

GreenTiger GreenTiger:

This kind of political BS has the be stopped immediately or a war may very well come to pass, it is strange to that the should try that with this President. Unlike Mr Obama Mr Trump would definitely respond in kind.

Maybe that's what they want.

[bootlegga]

PublicAnimalNo9 PublicAnimalNo9:

bootlegga bootlegga:

The thing is that China will likely have the upper hand militarily in a couple decades anyways,

Not necessarily. The Chinese are very concerned about one thing. While they have the numbers in manpower, they're concerned that their systems haven't been tested in battle yet whereas the US has had decades to perfect their systems and methods in combat.
Close air support is a prime example. You can make all the practice runs you want, nothing compares to the real thing. Having a FAC on the ground in training runs just doesn't quite test the systems and personnel like doing it in combat does.

What China really wants is to "scare" the US away from the South China Sea. That stretch of water sees more commercial shipping than anywhere else in the world and the Chinese want to control that. Hence the military bases on the artificial islands they built.

No, it's not guaranteed, but if the Chinese economy keeps growing, someday it will surpass the US economy (China is ranked at #2 with $12 Trillion GDP):

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_c ... P_(nominal)

Generally, the strongest economy on the planet has the strongest military forces. The USSR tried having the strongest military with the number 3 or 4 economy and it bankrupted them.

Unless the US can find some way for 350 million Americans to continue generate more wealth than 1.4 billion Chinese, it's just a matter of time. Honestly, it wouldn't surprise me to see the US economy ranked 3rd or even 4th globally by 2050.

Once it surpasses the US (likely by 2030 if current trends persist), it will eventually be able to afford a stronger military than the US can, especially if the US gets involved in another war somewhere that bleeds a trillion or two from its economy.

Then the USA will begin a gradual decline, just the the UK before them, the French before that, the Dutch before that, and so on.

We can hope that the USA, a relatively benign superpower, stays on top globally, but based on their current trajectory, it's just a matter of time unfortunately.