Comment by mschuster91
14 days ago
> Russia is playing a very stupid game here.
They are not, if you take the larger context into account - and that is China and their saber rattling not just against Taiwan but also against everyone else in what China thinks is "their" influence sphere such as the Philippines.
Russia's warmongering (not just in Ukraine, but also via Syria, Iran and Yemen!) is breaking apart both the US and EU internally - recent elections have shown that both populations are pretty much fed up with the wars and their consequences, and once enough countries either fall to Putin's 5th column outright or their governments pull a Chamberlain, China can be relatively certain no one will intervene too much when they decide that now is the best time to annex other countries.
I wonder if anyone thinks this seems likely:
American Secretary of Defense: "Mr. President, the Chinese just destroyed our Naval base in the Philippines, killing hundreds of US servicemen. As part of a plan to annex the country or something."
American president: "Let's not intervene too much."
I don't think the Chinese will attack US infrastructure or vessels directly, they are not that stupid - but they did attack Philippine ships in what is widely recognized Philippine territory [1] or fish illegally in Philippine territory [2].
The only response the entire West was able to give in years of Chinese transgressions were strong words, about as effective as "thoughts and prayers". China is a bully that escalates continuously (similar to Russia's behavior in Syria with the countless "red lines" that were crossed, eventually including chemical weapons) and needs to be brought to its knees before they one day trigger WW3 by accident.
[1] https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/chinese-coast-gua...
[2] https://maritime-executive.com/article/philippine-official-a...
it's why instead of an appropriate, equal and measured response for acts of bullying, any sort of aggression should be faced with overwhelming relatiation.
This is what one would do to a school yard bully. They push you, and you immediately do a full face punch and knee to the nose. Fight to the death from the first push/shove, and let it escalate. One fight, and the bullying is over, or you both get injured sufficiently to go to the hospital. There should be no middle grounds.
Putin and Xi's big advantage over the US is that American presidents get elected every 4 years. If they gradually encroach on their neighbors and make intervention unpopular in the US via propaganda they don't need to attack a US base.
The other big issue is US adventurism in Iraq (and to a lesser extent Afghanistan) has made US citizens wary of any international actions, no matter the details. It's especially galling how many of the same people who were cheering on the direct military conquering of Iraq are now against supporting Ukraine at an arms length. "Can't get fooled again", indeed.
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Well the result of China's 5d chess has been to install a leader in the US that is likely to escalate a trade war with china when with an impending demographic crisis they most need someone to stop the trade war. Sheer genius!
The problem with dictators of all kinds is that their personal concerns (say, appearing before the local populace as "the one who re-unified China") can and will trump over what makes sense for the country long-term.
Of course that can and does also happen in democracies, but at least most reasonable democracies have some sort of "checks and balances" that at least prevents open war from breaking out.
The world will be looking to China as a stable partner while the US voluntarily dismantles its economy and very possibly its political system.
So yeah, the US absolutely got outplayed here.
The us is currently one of the most stable economies, so there's a long way to go.
I think it's unlikely that the world will pick an economic partner that:
- builds 90% of the new coal fired plants while the rest of the world (including the US) is decarbonizing
- has 280+% debt to GDP ratio
- has capital controls on its currency (the real exchange rate could change suddenly at the drop of a hat)
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Ah yes, Trump famously hates china,
How well did that trade war go last time he was in office? Trick question, farmers got fucked, and rational minds agree that the US lost.
>Initiating steel and aluminium tariff actions in March 2018, Trump said "trade wars are good, and easy to win,"[54] but as the conflict continued to escalate through August 2019, Trump stated, "I never said China was going to be easy."
It doesn't matter what you claim to want to do or who you claim to "hate" if your sheer incompetence prevents you from accomplishing your desire.
Maybe putting a serial business failure in charge of a trade war isn't very effective?
Biden didn't get rid of them, because it's basically impossible to unwind a trade war, and then put some more limitations on solar panels. I don't think there is a clear answer yet on Biden's addition to the trade war. Probably will be "meh".
A trade war between the US and China is almost always going to be extremely negative sum. Both of our countries rely on each other for prosperity and nice shit.
Sure, but I am commenting from a non-military, non-geopolitics, non-strategy related background: It's a stupid game. Stupid in the sense of: I don't like it, I don't want to play it, thus it's stupid.