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I just don't see what China stands to gain from invading Taiwan. Seems foolhardy, if the real objective is to quell dissent at home.
 
kebabking said:
Personally, I am not as sanguine about the idea that war isn't about to happen until there a 500,000 strong invasion force on its way - living memory is rammed with examples of wars being launched long before the conditions required for a successful outcome have been met.
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For China, starting a war without having an invasion force ready to roll would be a disaster. What they want is a fait accompli and the war to be over before a reaction can be decided upon, and minimal disruption to business. If they start bombing Taiwan before they are ready to invade then Taiwan is fully capable of bombing their ports in response which would result in their economic isolation. It would also give ample time for a geopolitical response to be organised.

This is kind of what the Silk Road concept is about, to create alternative trade routes through Central Asia that are less sensitive to military disruption.
 
Flavour said:
I just don't see what China stands to gain from invading Taiwan. Seems foolhardy, if the real objective is to quell dissent at home.
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It's a necessary condition for them to drive the US out of the Pacific and to achieve naval hegemony in Asia and over the world's busiest shipping routes.

Their ambition is to be the dominant global power and you can't be that if you can't bring your back yard to heel.
 
The main spilt in Taiwan politics isn’t left/right, it’s wether to reunite with the ‘mainland’ or not. It’s quite bizarre, it’s a bit like Northern Ireland ( but also nothing like Norn…)

Chiang Kai-Shek’s old party the KMT is bizzarly the reunification party ( although it’s split between people who want closer ties with China on a one country two systems model, to people who nostalgically yearn for the mainland being reunited with Taiwan under Taiwanese government (!)) The DPP looks like a European center left party till you scratch the surface and see the spectrum of independence to nationalism it covers.

But then this is a country that has a Memorial Day to the people killed by the KMT whilst the KMT is still one of the two main active parties.

I’d still rather live in Taiwan than China though.
 
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Rimbaud said:
It's a necessary condition for them to drive the US out of the Pacific and to achieve naval hegemony in Asia and over the world's busiest shipping routes.

Their ambition is to be the dominant global power and you can't be that if you can't bring your back yard to heel.
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I’m not sure China does want to be the dominant global power in the same way that Britain was and America is. Their (national myth) history is one of continuous civilisation that occasionally has suffered invasion from outside but never launched a war of aggression ( of course, both are bollocks, like all national myths). The CCP is riven with divisions (a big part of the idiocy in Hong Kong was about Xi’s faction removing the power base of a challenging party faction, as well as taking all HK’s cash reserves to shore up belt and road obvs). But, I’d also think those people in China who are looking to the next 50 years are more concerned about India than the US or Europe.

But who knows?

The Taiwanese will keep building their missiles, any chinese invasion might or might not work ( and I’m sure Ukraine is causing a massive doctrine review) but would result in huge damage to the developed parts of the mainland.
 
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kebabking said:
Strong. However, it's nuanced.

Distance is a huge problem for the US and its allies - they are all sufficiently distant from each other that mutual support is difficult, while each is close enough to China that China can concentrate a huge quantity of force onto each.

On the other hand, neither the Chinese military, nor the Chinese government, have fought a war in living memory. War, as Ukraine shows, isn't simply about numbers, it's much more complicated than that - so there's probably a great of scope for fuck ups on the Chinese side caused by a) unrealistic military exercises that are simply about firepower demonstrations with none of the friction that real world operations are full of, and thats even before a very motivated, skilled enemy starts shooting at you, b) unrealistic political leadership /management who think that a big parade/firepower demonstration is the same as a war, and c) a political/military culture where telling uncomfortable truths about deficiencies in equipment/training/planning is a good way to end your career/end up in a camp for crimes against the revolution.

Personally, I am not as sanguine about the idea that war isn't about to happen until there a 500,000 strong invasion force on its way - living memory is rammed with examples of wars being launched long before the conditions required for a successful outcome have been met.

China has announced a no-fly zone north of Taiwan, and has - in the last week - talked about stopping and searching vessels, including other Navies, sailing in the Straights of Taiwan.

I wouldn't fall off my chair if, when the history books are written, it's decided that the war has already started.
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Nuanced is the word. Ship building they have been and from a numbers point of you they have been but they are way behind in terms of projectable air sea power. Within South China sea though quite formidable.

Subs they are coming up quite fast on. (Fuck you Macron on being pissed about not get that Aussie contract when there was a 20 year lead time on it). Congrats to RN carrier group on the recent win at hide and seek....that said its Chinese interest in what Saphir did a few years back that makes me nervous
 
Rimbaud said:
This is kind of what the Silk Road concept is about, to create alternative trade routes through Central Asia that are less sensitive to military disruption.
Click to expand...
The trouble with the road part of belt and road, as Xi has realised, is that because it's actually really a rail link, any regional power (or insurgency) along the whole route can turn the whole thing off overnight.
 
A380 said:
Chiang Kai-Shek’s old party the KMT is bizzarly the reunification party ( although it’s split between people who want closer ties with China on a one country two systems model, to people who nostalgically yearn for the mainland being reunited with Taiwan under Taiwanese government (!)) The DPP looks like a European center left party till you scratch the surface and see the spectrum of independence to nationalism it covers.
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Not that bizarre when you remember that the KMT is a Chinese nationalist party, and that Taiwanese nationalism emerged as a reaction against the KMT's heavy handed approach to occupying Taiwan.
 
It's interesting to note that early CCP texts and statements refer to the Taiwanese in the same bracket as Koreans and Mongolians, with sense they would be helped to self determination, this inviolable part of national territory stuff is also post civil war.
ETA Here's the reference, happened to be reading it the other day as am doing something related to this period: https://sci-hub.ru/10.2307/2757657 Looks like I remembered the watershed wrong, they say it comes after the Cairo Conference in 1943
 
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JimW said:
It's interesting to note that early CCP texts and statements refer to the Taiwanese in the same bracket as Koreans and Mongolians, with sense they would be helped to self determination, this inviolable part of national territory stuff is also post civil war.
ETA Here's the reference, happened to be reading it the other day as am doing something related to this period: https://sci-hub.ru/10.2307/2757657 Looks like I remembered the watershed wrong, they say it comes after the Cairo Conference in 1943
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What I found interesting about Taiwan is despite it's location and modern history it didn't have that much to do with China. The Chinese only started building forts there after the Dutch East India Company did the same. Han Chinese people only started moving there in numbers (illegally) in the 18th Century. The Japanese, who had also tried to annexe it in the 1500s, made it more like a French DOM than the rest of their colonies post kicking 'us*' out in 1880s, they didn't behave with quite as much barbarity as in Korea or China (lots of older Taiwanese speak Japanese as their first language). It was only when the KMT bugged out to the Island did the whole 'one China' thing come about (on both sides TBF).

And the Nationalists tried to hold Hainan as well, which the West often forgets, but being much closer the the mainland they got kicked out of there in 1950.

(WARNING Massive over simplification)


*See the Camphor War for another great example of Victorian Colonial fuckery.
 
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A380 said:
What I found interesting about Taiwan is despite it's location and modern history it didn't have that much to do with China. The Chinese only started building forts there after the Dutch East India Company did the same. Han Chinese people only started moving there in numbers (illegally) in the 18th Century. The Japanese, who had also tried to annexe it in the 1500s, made it more like a French DOM than the rest of their colonies post kicking 'us*' out in 1880s, they didn't behave with quite as much barbarity as in Korea or China (lots of older Taiwanese speak Japanese as their first language). It was only when the KMT bugged out to the Island did the whole 'one China' thing come about (on both sides TBF).

And the Nationalists tried to hold Hainan as well, which the West often forgets, but being much closer the the mainland they got kicked out of there in 1950.

(WARNING Massive over simplification)


*See the Camphor War for another great example of Victorian Colonial fuckery.
Click to expand...
Of course to the Han settlers, the Qing was as much an alien regime as the Japanese. The nationalist revolution did also spark Chinese nationalist sentiment and was certainly a big spur to resistance movements on the island, but alongside nativist stuff too as I mentioned above.
 
JimW said:
Of course to the Han settlers, the Qing was as much an alien regime as the Japanese. The nationalist revolution did also spark Chinese nationalist sentiment and was certainly a big spur to resistance movements on the island, but alongside nativist stuff too as I mentioned above.
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It was interesting that there is a theory that most of the pacific peoples (of which the Taiwanese indigenous people are one) actually originated on Formosa and not what is now Vietnam/Cambodia/Loas. Not sure if that theory has much traction outside Taiwan...
 
A380 said:
It was interesting that there is a theory that most of the pacific peoples (of which the Taiwanese indigenous people are one) actually originated on Formosa and not what is now Vietnam/Cambodia/Loas. Not sure if that theory has much traction outside Taiwan...
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Think that's widely accepted, not looked at mainland discussions but given it's indigenous issue probably OK
 
Rimbaud said:
For China, starting a war without having an invasion force ready to roll would be a disaster. What they want is a fait accompli and the war to be over before a reaction can be decided upon, and minimal disruption to business. If they start bombing Taiwan before they are ready to invade then Taiwan is fully capable of bombing their ports in response which would result in their economic isolation. It would also give ample time for a geopolitical response to be organised.

This is kind of what the Silk Road concept is about, to create alternative trade routes through Central Asia that are less sensitive to military disruption.
Click to expand...

Can they survive de-linking economically from the US? Near as I can tell, the US is already migrating away from China and moving toward Mexico and other low wage countries as a source of production. Some of it is even coming back to the US after the supply chain issues during the pandemic.
 
Dogsauce said:
The numbers of Taiwanese in favour of reunification with China has declined massively over the last couple of decades. I wonder if part of this is down to seeing how things turned out for Hong Kong?
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Think it will be generational too as mainlanders and their children maybe had more hankerings but grandchildren less so, though don't doubt evidence of 'one country, two systems' being a con hasn't helped the peaceful reunification cause.
 
Yuwipi Woman said:
Can they survive de-linking economically from the US? Near as I can tell, the US is already migrating away from China and moving toward Mexico and other low wage countries as a source of production. Some of it is even coming back to the US after the supply chain issues during the pandemic.
Click to expand...
They can probably survive, but of course their economy will be much weaker. I think the likely trend for China is not necessarily a severe economic decline but Japanese style stagnation and decline relative to India, SE Asia, parts of Africa etc which will start to catch up to China.
 
Rimbaud said:
They can probably survive, but of course their economy will be much weaker. I think the likely trend for China is not necessarily a severe economic decline but Japanese style stagnation and decline relative to India, SE Asia, parts of Africa etc which will start to catch up to China.
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I've seen it argued that globalization is coming to an end or at least seeing a major contraction. Do you think this is happening? ... or will happen?
 
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Yuwipi Woman said:
I've seen it argued that globalization is coming to an end or at least seeing a major contraction. Do you think this is happening? ... or will happen?
Click to expand...

It depends what you mean by globalisation.

I think the Thomas Friedman era of unbridled optimism about neoliberal globalisation is over, and there is indeed some return to the nation state. But there can hardly be a return to 20th Century level of non-globalisation because of how transportation and communications have developed, so I don't think it can come to an end exactly, only go through a period of contraction.
 
Yuwipi Woman said:
I've seen it argued that globalization is coming to an end or at least seeing a major contraction. Do you think this is happening? ... or will happen?
Click to expand...
There's lots of talk of onshoring, nearshoring, friendshoring.

The pandemic, war, climate change have shown the vulnerablity in supply chains. WIth the failing relations between USA and China exacerbating that.

Supply chains: companies shift from ‘just in time’ to ‘just in case’
Businesses exposed by pandemic shortages and shipping bottlenecks are being forced to rethink their operations
FT December 20 2021

Some businesses are increasing the inventory they keep on hand and entering into longer term contracts with key suppliers. Others are diversifying their manufacturing to create regional hubs with local suppliers and investing in technology to give them greater advance warning of potential bottlenecks. Some companies are also investigating ways of working with their rivals to share information to develop emergency back up facilities without falling foul of competition regulators.
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Rimbaud said:
It depends what you mean by globalisation.

I think the Thomas Friedman era of unbridled optimism about neoliberal globalisation is over, and there is indeed some return to the nation state. But there can hardly be a return to 20th Century level of non-globalisation because of how transportation and communications have developed, so I don't think it can come to an end exactly, only go through a period of contraction.
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Rather than a return of the nation state we're seeing the reinforcement of regional blocs.

With Saudi Arabia joining the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, and Finland NATO.
 
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