Results 41 to 50 of 51
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10-09-2021 #41
Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
"The Rise of Modern China" certainly looks like the prefect follow up to "China, a History" which I am now finishing and I found a very cheap used copy on Amazon.
https://www.amazon.com/Rise-Modern-C...s%2C219&sr=1-1
The Fenby book also looks fascinating.
Thanks
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10-09-2021 #42
Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
Wow, Wittfogel and Wolf are certainly a couple of interesting characters!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karl_A...ntal_Despotism
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_Wolf
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10-11-2021 #43
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Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
You may also be interested in these two books on geography and rivers. If you don’t already know them-
https://geographical.co.uk/reviews/b...th-book-review
https://www.amazon.co.uk/Prisoners-G.../dp/1783961414
I am currently interested in why some major countries have not created merchant shipping companies. The US enjoys access to two oceans, but has no merchant shipping with global reach to compare with Aristotle Onassis, Stavros Niarchos or the Scandinavians….why not?
Last edited by rodinuk; 10-11-2021 at 04:38 PM.
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10-13-2021 #44
Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
That's interesting ,thanks.
I remember a few or my favorite authors and poets from the 60's were members of what used to be called the 'merchant marine', including Jack Kerouac ,Alan Ginsberg and Gary Snyder. And I remember the 'Seaman's Hall' down in lower Manhattan where card carrying 'merchant seaman could go to sign up for work.
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11-02-2021 #45
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Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
If you look back through history, there has always been animosity between China and the United States. If anybody is interested, check out the Chinese foreign minister's speech to the United Nations in 1950 before China launched its offensive in the Korean War. A lot has changed since then, with each nation going through its own domestic and foreign issues, but also the fostering of relations with each other both politically and financially.
Having said that, underneath it all, it seems the tension was always still there. Especially with China's rise as a global superpower and some of their shenanigans. So I been figuring out the best way to answer this question, but have been having a hard time putting my thoughts together. I read the following article though and I agree with some of the points that the writer brings up:
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/11/us-china-war/620571/
So do I think war between China and the United States is inevitable, No. But I do think its possible. It just depends on what the United States is willing to go to war with them over. I don't think it will be over Taiwan though. Because that looks like the Korean War all over again and this time I don't think it would end in a cease fire.
Last edited by blackchubby38; 11-02-2021 at 02:14 AM.
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11-02-2021 #46
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Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
Thanks for the link to a fascinating article to stand alongside the article in Foreign Affairs linked some time ago.
A few thoughts-
1) China has flourished in an age of peace since 1989 which has both seen its own domestic wealth increase to levels unknown since the Opium Wars, and in return as part of Globalization provided us in the rest of the world with affordable products, from flat-screen tv's, computers and cameras to clothes. Even with a slow-down in its economy Chna is still doing better than the days when Mao was in charge. Convinced China had everything it needed, he was opposed to modernization in everything other than architecture, preferring the miserabilism of East Germany to the vernacular Chinese architecture so much of which was destoyed during the 'Great People's Cultural Revolution'
2) The difference now is that Xi sees himself as a new 'Mao' with ambitions that reach beyond Continental China and end the 'era of peace' to replace it with belligerent statemenst, and the physical occupation of islands in the South China Sea. One point not made in the Atlantic Article is that the occupation of the Spatly Islands that the Philippines successfully challenged in court, are not far from the major gas resources north of Palawan that Shell and the Phillipines have been developing for years now. But if the occupation of the Spraty Islands is illegal, so too would be the theft of its sub-surface gas resources.
3) Whether this increase in tension provokes Japan to repeal its military neutrality remains in doubt as I am not sure if public opinion wants this dimension to Japan's foreign policy to change.
4) The most likely flashpoint may not be Taiwan or even the South China Sea, but the border with India, with China at best annexing territory over which it fights with India. At the moment, Modi is more committed to a long-term plan to 'anonymize' the Muslim communities of India, an under-reported set of campaigns that a friend in India often sends me evidence of. Modi is as belligerent as Xi, and that is not good news for either India or China.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-53062484
5) The article linked below is from the RAND Corporation -for all the trillions it has spent and Xi's bellgerence, the lack of combat experience begs the question -how successful, if at all, would China's military be if it did engage another state? It points out for example, that even armies that have failed in one theatre can succeed in another if they have combat experience -thus, the US, which has combat experience but a string of military failures in recent years, may in fact see off any Chinese threat in, say, Taiwan, China becoming the victim of Xi's Hubris.
https://www.rand.org/blog/2018/11/ch...it-matter.html
Consider:
--Iraq had the world's fourth largest land army in 1990, but in the field an ineffective one -it failed to defeat Iran through conventional means -Iran swallowed the 'bitter cup of poison' in 1988 largely through war weariness on both sides, lack of funds, and Iraq's use of US-supplied -and illega- chemical weapons. Having a large army is no guarantee of military success.
--Saudi Arabia fought a war with Egypt for control of the Yemen from 1963-1970 and lost it as the new Government was Nationalist and Republican, where the Saudis had supported the 'Religious' party associated with the Imams overthrown in the 1962 revolution. Since 1970 Saudi Arabia has spent well over a trillion dollars on its military, but there it is in the Yemen again, incapable of winning a war with all the resources at its disposal. Spending trillions of dollars on the military is no guarantee of success.
Last edited by Stavros; 11-02-2021 at 05:26 PM.
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11-02-2021 #47
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Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
Stavros:
Regarding this point in your post:
3) Whether this increase in tension provokes Japan to repeal its military neutrality remains in doubt as I am not sure if public opinion wants this dimension to Japan's foreign policy to change.
I have often thought that a good way to keep in China in check would be for Japan to repeal its military neutrality and starting developing offensive weapons and forces. I also feel that the nation has done its time for its actions before and during WW II and I think they can be trusted to have a military again.
But I think if they did, it would be make China feel like they were really being encircled by allies of the United States (Japan and South Korea) and that may make provoke them into making a first strike against either one of those two countries or against other U.S. interests. So in the end, that might not be a good idea.
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11-03-2021 #48
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Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
You identify a genuine dilemma, and I agree that for Japan to end its military neutrality would alter the 'balance of power' in the Pacific Region, given that China might see such a move as an additional threat to add to the AUKUS agreement giving Australia a more toxic anti-Chinese position than it has had in recent years. I don't know if such a move would be popular in Japan, which does have a hard core of Nationalists, but where the ruling party doesn't seem keen to spend money on Defence that a change in strategy would entail.
It may not be a surprise that Americans have suggested Japan change to counter the Chinese 'threat'- the link below to a talk that was given at Chatham House in London earlier this year makes comparisons to Germany after 1945. Re-heating the claims that the USSR had a strategic plan to annexe the whole of Germany thus justifying the re-armament of Germany in 1950 the authors in my view are mistaken because of the quite different context from that Japan found itself in after 1945- Germany was a divided country on the European continent bordering the USSR.
Also, the two authors, (one of them [Eldrige Colby] is associated with the Marathon Initiative and the Center for a New American Security), make no mention of how Japan's 'soft power' through its economic and technological growth sine 1945 and its investments in China, South Korea and the Philippines, has been a more positive benefit than the Shinto Empire it imposed on the region in the first half of the 20th century. Why would Japan want to replace a successful strategy with one that might contrbute to a reversal of it and the region's gains?
At the moment, Xi is the focus of concern, because of his dominant influence in the Communist Party, his belligerent rhetoric and actions -he is perhaps testing the resolve of his perceived adversaries to find out how much he can get away with without actually sending in the troops. Hong Kong has been easy, Taiwan is anything but.
Incidentally, I raised this with my Indian friend yesterday, who regards Modi as weaker than Xi, that is, Modi doesn't have absoute power in India, and is more focused on internal politics, and the potential problems posed by the Taliban in Afghanistan, in itself, and in relation to potential meddling in Kashmir. I am not sure either India or China have a military with enough combat experience to give it a go in the Himalayas. We wait and see.
Chatham House article here-
https://www.chathamhouse.org/2021/06...ective-defence
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08-04-2022 #49
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Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
Given the tensions that exist with Russia and what is seen by many as a Proxy War in which NATO countries are in effect arming Ukraine, and given the shock Russia's failures has been to China, their long-established aim to 're-unite' Taiwan with the mainland did not need so provocative an act by Speaker Nancy Pelosi.
She has been 'defiant', saying China cannot tell her what countries in Asia she can visit, but she never needed to visit at all. If she wanted to talk to President Tsai, she could do so by Zoom. I don't see how anyone familiar with the current modus operandi in China can expect anything other than the response we have seen. It could be a provocation for President Xi in the sense that members of his own party think he is too reckless for the country and China needs to draw back from its imperial ambitions in the Pacific Region to focus more on domestic and international trade, or it could give Xi the impetus to go further.
Not so sure, because the failure of Russia to annexe Ukraine has been a warning, that annexing Taiwan might not be as easy as he thinks it is. Or, China could push the boundaries to see how far the US is in fact willing to go to 'save Taiwan'. Moreover, while NATO might think opening a new front in Eastern Europe would stretch Russia's military to breaking point (eg, Belarus), Russia and China together could open a new front for the US which it is incapable of dealing with.
So the last thing we need is a loud-mouth from Congress saying things we already know in a manner that is likely to cause more harm than we want. The best thing to hear from Pelosi is her retiring from politics, the sooner the better.
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08-06-2022 #50
Re: Is war between China and the US inevitable? The Thucydides Trap.
If you're a Western business owner and outsourcing to China or doing business with China, then you're part of the problem.
That being said, you can cure your problem by outsourcing and doing business to/with Africa, Mexico, Central America, South America, and a few other places as well.
"I am, a SIGMA Male...
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