Armed Polite Society
Main Forums => Politics => Topic started by: MillCreek on September 09, 2012, 11:27:29 AM
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I don't intend this to become a political partisanship discussion over which future President of any party has more intestinal fortitude over the opposing party and is more likely to start launching nukes. I have been doing some reading lately about past, current and future mainland China politics and how it impacts the future of Taiwan. Other than treaty obligations (if any, which I have not researched), does the US have pressing political, economic, military or strategic interests in keeping Taiwan independent, up to and including another SE Asian war?
I have been thinking about SE Asia a lot recently, especially with the posturing of various SE Asian nations over the ownership of various unoccupied islands between China, Japan, the Philippines and Vietnam, which are significant only insofar as they offer the possibility of oil and natural gas. If push comes to shove, China is really the only power there with sufficient naval and airpower assets to assert its interests.
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I always believed that we were committed by treaty to defend Taiwan against mainland China, and I have always believed (and continue to believe) that Taiwan is the legitimate government of China. Regardless of how one regards the legitimacy of the Communist government on the mainland (after all, I don't advocate that the descendents of Louis XIV are the rightful rulers of France), I don't recognize mainland China's claim to Taiwan any more than I recognize Argentina's claim to the Falkland Islands.
So I think that, morally and ethically, we should defend Taiwan. I am now not as certain as I once was that we have a written obligation to do so. And at this point in time/history, I seriously doubt that we have the resources to take on mainland China if they should decide to invade Taiwan.
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Morally, we should exert influence in defense of freedom wherever feasible. Politically, if Taiwan is subsumed by PRC, the entire region can presume the same fate. So, not defending Taiwan is a(nother) tacit admission that we're willing to let PRC become regional hegemon. Pretty sure we do have treaty obligations to support Taiwan.
Hawkmoon hit it, though. "Should" is a less critical issue than "can". If PRC strikes preemptively, do we have power projection sufficient to stop them before Taiwan is obliterated? I don't know.
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What is this assimilation?
Is that what you call waging war and conquering your neighbor?
The question should be worded "Should the USA go to war in defense of of an ally who has been attacked by China?"
If that happened it would probably be one of the few truly unambiguously legitimate uses of our war making ability in decades.
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What is this assimilation?
Is that what you call waging war and conquering your neighbor?
The question should be worded "Should the USA go to war in defense of of an ally who has been attacked by China?"
If that happened it would probably be one of the few truly unambiguously legitimate uses of our war making ability in decades.
This. Much like the defense of Kuwait it would be legitimate and proper.
If china executes a non military takeover of Taiwan, we'd better not do *expletive deleted*it.
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This is interesting.
Can the military buffs give a little insight on the PRC's current Naval, more importantly 'anti'Naval capabilities?
Also, what air power projection capabilities do they have over Taiwan? IIRC Argentina had a tough time keeping aircraft in the combat area due to lack of fuel resupply and a very distant airbase, that may have tipped the scales.
Are we ready and willing to take out strategic point targets inside mainland China? If so, how would the Chinese respond? How itchy is the Chinese nuclear trigger finger? How far would neocon types be willing to go if a couple of carrier fleets get beaten up?
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Another take on it: The Republic of China did help us out in WW2 with Japan to an extent, and then we left them swinging in the wind when the communists decided to finish their take over of the main land in 1948. That came back to haunt us in 1950 during the Korean war when the PRC intervened on behalf of the DPRK (NorK's). It'd be a pretty dick move if we left the Republic of China (Taiwan) to get bludgeoned by the communists a second time. =|
ETA:
This is interesting.
Can the military buffs give a little insight on the PRC's current Naval, more importantly 'anti'Naval capabilities?
Also, what air power projection capabilities do they have over Taiwan? IIRC Argentina had a tough time keeping aircraft in the combat area due to lack of fuel resupply and a very distant airbase, that may have tipped the scales.
Are we ready and willing to take out strategic point targets inside mainland China? If so, how would the Chinese respond? How itchy is the Chinese nuclear trigger finger? How far would neocon types be willing to go if a couple of carrier fleets get beaten up?
Their submarines are getting there, but they're not quite there yet. The nuke boats are relatively young in regards to technological maturity and most of their diesel sub fleet is, or is based on, Russian export material which I'd list as about a generation behind the current state of the art. Victor: U.S.
Surface combatants. Well, they've got plenty of em. Mostly smaller craft, destroyers/frigates/corvettes and a mess of coastal patrol craft. Lack of carriers is a non-issue for them since they're not operating away from their own turf and subsequent air bases. They managed to steal the entire collection electrical schematics for the Arleigh-Burke class destroyers a while back, so I'd consider the efficacy of the SPY-1 radars suspect in relation to jamming systems and the like. A massive barrage of anti-ship cruise missiles though, from say our four SSGN's, would still play merry hell with their surface fleet. Victor: Probably the U.S.
Their amphib capability is pretty bare and undeveloped (but again, they're working on it) compared to ours but could probably jump the straight if they weren't substantially opposed. A mess of infantry deployed ATGM's on the beaches could probably put a rather serious dent in any surface landings, friendly surface/air/sub combatants would stall it entirely. Victor: Taiwan/U.S.
Air assets are coming along at an accelerated pace courtesy stealing other peoples (ours mostly) tech. I'd give even odds on air superiority unless we committed our active F-22 squadrons to the issue. And then you have to ask: Where will we operate those from? Additionally they do have a few copies of the F-22 ripoff (J-20) up and flying and are planning to build more. They've also already successfully copied and produced large numbers of Russian Gen 4/5 jet fighters. The Para drops or helicopter insertion of troops is well within their capability. Victor: Eh, could go either way.
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Leaving the US interests/obligations, the PRC would get bloodied in a fight with Taiwan. They have the means and might to prevail. The PRC will do the political calculus, using their own national interest as the sole basis for any such decision. Let us hope they choose a peaceful course.
On the "should we/could we" intervene question... I don't know. We could operate several CVBG's in the area. We could make it ruinously expensive for the PRC, but could we stop it? Dunno. Does anyone think we could intervene at the cost of only a few planes and aircrew? I don't. I have no insight into the PRC's military capability, but my hunch is that they have formed and purposed the PLAN for this mission above any other, and that, if we trade punches with the PRC in the straits of Formosa, we will see ships stricken from the rolls of the USN. Is that cost worth it? Can anyone envision a post-war world in which the PRC and the US have fought such an engagement?
ETA: Damn, Blakenzy, great minds in parallel tracks, huh?
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^^^ I would be pretty darn concerned about watching the USS Nimitz and escorts sinking while on fire. I know that the PRC has been making strides on submarine and anti-ship missile warfare, and even with the Aegis destroyers, wonder how a carrier battle group would do with a saturation attack. There are only so many Standard and RAM missiles in the magazines.
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^^^ I would be pretty darn concerned about watching the USS Nimitz and escorts sinking while on fire. I know that the PRC has been making strides on submarine and anti-ship missile warfare, and even with the Aegis destroyers, wonder how a carrier battle group would do with a saturation attack. There are only so many Standard and RAM missiles in the magazines.
True. I wonder how well they'd fair if they bunched them together like back in WW2. Instead of lone carriers and their escorts roving about, you band 5-6 carriers together, and their associated escorts. Could probably also detail more small-boys than usual to each CVN.
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^^^ I would be pretty darn concerned about watching the USS Nimitz and escorts sinking while on fire. I know that the PRC has been making strides on submarine and anti-ship missile warfare, and even with the Aegis destroyers, wonder how a carrier battle group would do with a saturation attack. There are only so many Standard and RAM missiles in the magazines.
From what I know, the main defense of aircraft carriers is not so much literally shooting down the other guy's missiles, but things like electronic warfare, jamming, countermeasures, and so forth.
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From what I know, the main defense of aircraft carriers is not so much literally shooting down the other guy's missiles, but things like electronic warfare, jamming, countermeasures, and so forth.
Which is a big part of the duties of the support fleet.
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Which is a big part of the duties of the support fleet.
Yes, exactly this.
In the Cold War, Soviet naval bombers - and the tech gap between the US and the Soviets was not as large then - were entirely unable to get a weapons lock on US carriers due to the functioning of the American ECM.
The Soviet plan was, in event of actual WW3 erupting, to strike a US carrier battle-group with eight (8) 110-kiloton nuclear warheads. They hoped this would weaken the escorts' ECM capability enough so they could follow up with attacks on the carrier.
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From what I know, the main defense of aircraft carriers is not so much literally shooting down the other guy's missiles, but things like electronic warfare, jamming, countermeasures, and so forth.
And with contemporary anti-ship missiles in a saturation attack, I have not the faintest idea as to how effective ECM is. Certainly, our Navy has put a bunch of money into close-in ship defense, so they must be counting on some leakage.
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This. Much like the defense of Kuwait it would be legitimate and proper.
If china executes a non military takeover of Taiwan, we'd better not do *expletive deleted*.
If the PRC is smart, this is what they would do. Taiwan has a tremendous amount of economic and scientific resources, and it would be hard to exploit them if most of Taiwan is smoking rubble. If the PRC offered generous terms for Taiwan to become part of the PRC, but as a special economic and governance zone, akin to Hong Kong, I wonder what the reaction of the Taiwanese people would be. And let us not forget that there was an indigenous Formosa population before the Nationalists came and set up shop. The Nationalists don't have entirely clean hands either.
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And let us not forget that there was an indigenous Formosa population before the Nationalists came and set up shop. The Nationalists don't have entirely clean hands either.
The same could be said of us.
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Wow. I believe folk in Taiwan would go Alamo if the Chinese try it.
but its a real scary deal
The Chinese are very firm in their belief that Taiwan is a runaway province.
the hong Kong scenario offers advantages to both sides
The best thing Taiwan can hope for is internal dissent in mainland China keeping the focus off them for as long as possible
as soon as China thinks it can act it will but so far they chose not to rock the international boat.
that will change sooner or later
We need remember there are other players in the region as well
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How vulnerable is China to external embargo? If effective, we wouldn't have to get in real close.
I agree that we would take some losses which would hurt badly. I think that would be a given in any serious war we got into. I would also be curious how it would effect satellites, GPS, and ICBMs in general.
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I would also be curious how it would effect satellites, GPS, and ICBMs in general.
ICBM's typically use inertial guidance with optional star-tracker updating of it's location mid-flight, so the answer would be "not-a-whit."
GPS, eh, when it was the only thing of it's kind we could switch it off at will or insert errors into its transmissions that only we could decode. With the completion and activation of GLONASS (Globalnaya Navigatsionnaya Sputnikovaya Sistema) though, it really doesn't mean much. Hell, my Garmin can pick up either GPS or GLONASS signals to figure out where it is at.
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How vulnerable is China to external embargo? If effective, we wouldn't have to get in real close.
I agree that we would take some losses which would hurt badly. I think that would be a given in any serious war we got into. I would also be curious how it would effect satellites, GPS, and ICBMs in general.
Can you imagine Walmart shelves being empty ? ;/
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can you imagine them calling all that debt in? :facepalm:
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If the Chinese employed either measure, wouldn't that be pretty hard on them, too?
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can you imagine them calling all that debt in? :facepalm:
And I still wonder about cyber and economic warfare between China and the US having more of a negative economic impact on us than a localized shooting war.
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can you imagine them calling all that debt in? :facepalm:
Actually.... "If you invade Taiwan we will void any U.S. debt instruments you hold."
How's that for grabbing short-n-curlies?
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Actually.... "If you invade Taiwan we will void any U.S. debt instruments you hold."
How's that for grabbing short-n-curlies?
And then the full faith and credit of the US on the world financial markets disappears. And we cannot survive in isolation of the world markets.
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If the Chinese employed either measure, wouldn't that be pretty hard on them, too?
yes on the people
the leader? not so much
ask yourself how much they care about the people
http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/26/world/asia/china-killing/index.html
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=130158&page=1#.UE0fYa6k-aQ
western folk have a hard time thinking like asians do
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Strong economic ties has not stopped major wars in the past. When ideology, religion and nationalist causes are strong in the minds of the people, economics takes a back seat.
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Actually.... "If you invade Taiwan we will void any U.S. debt instruments you hold."
How's that for grabbing short-n-curlies?
Would that be our default position ???
=|
=D
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yes on the people
the leader? not so much
ask yourself how much they care about the people
http://www.cnn.com/2012/07/26/world/asia/china-killing/index.html
http://abcnews.go.com/WNT/story?id=130158&page=1#.UE0fYa6k-aQ
western folk have a hard time thinking like asians do
Yes, we do. But I was presuming the leaders want to keep making money.
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Tariffs, debt default. Drop the sabers.
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And then the full faith and credit of the US on the world financial markets disappears. And we cannot survive in isolation of the world markets.
Possibly to the first, and arguable to the second.
To the first, I say possibly, because it would be an overt act due to a declared cause, not just the US gov going tango uniform and defaulting on its debt, like say Greece.
Would that be our default position ???
=|
=D
*groan* :lol:
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And I still wonder about cyber and economic warfare between China and the US having more of a negative economic impact on us than a localized shooting war.
Not that I can tell too much... But that is already happening. PRC is our greatest intel threat, and we catch their agents on a regular basis. Israel being the second most active intel threat. Most of it is espionage. Lot of it specializing in aircraft and nuclear tech.
Ah... It is not one direction... And we have a lot better geeks. Draw your own conclusions.
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America and China have each other by the short-n-curlies in quite the death grip.
The price of letting go, or pulling harder... is too high for America to pay. Although China has much more to lose. America catches cold, China gets the flu etc.
Behind closed doors, both sides know the truth. And IMO, "status quo" for the foreseeable future is what I'd place my money on. With economic collapse, and the Chinese real-estate/banking bubble making the American one look like just a bad week, a close second.
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I don't see us going directly into war with China.....
.....but I could see a few supercargo ships full of high-tech weaponry being "abandoned" in Taiwan's main harbor.....at the same time that some non-gov't connected "contractors" who can train others happen to be vacationing there.... ;)
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With economic collapse, and the Chinese real-estate/banking bubble making the American one look like just a bad week, a close second.
This is something that cannot be overstated, they are in an incredibly dangerous position given what has happening at home, the rampant corruption that infects everything, the leftover politican fun of communism with its day-long murder "trials", the lack of any kind of force projection to protect these assets they are buying up around the globe, and the incentive that nearly everyone else in the world has to default.
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This is something that cannot be overstated, they are in an incredibly dangerous position given what has happening at home, the rampant corruption that infects everything, the leftover politican fun of communism with its day-long murder "trials", the lack of any kind of force projection to protect these assets they are buying up around the globe, and the incentive that nearly everyone else in the world has to default.
From what I've read, the PRC government does stick its fingers in many pies. But I honestly doubt they care about world domination.
http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/politics/mark-kitto-youll-never-be-chinese-leaving-china/
A xenophobic government might attack its neighbors and conquer them. But they tend not to Imperialistic World Super Power state like the Romans, Mongols, Byzantines, British, Ottomans, etc. You need to be pretty accepting of the local wogs. Sure, you also need to believe YOU are superior to everyone else in the world, but you need a pretty flexible system in order to accommodate the local cultures in all the random places your Empire takes. That's the mark of every successful Empire in the history of the world. Otherwise, they get smashed sooner rather than later. The exception is "kill everyone and everything, then repopulate with your own folks". Not likely to be successful these days with advances in weapons. Ask the USSR when folks with little more than rocks, spears and AKs decide not to accommodate foreign invaders.
I don't think the PRC government has the mindframe to become a political or military superpower. Too rigid, too xenophobic, too self-centered as a collective, etc. Economic superpower, perhaps. It will be interesting.
I have long suspected that the PRC is rigging their books. No one will know until long after it pops just how rigged their game is.
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Oh I agree that they probably dont want world domination, my point was that they have all these assets scattered across the world and no obvious means to protect them. Given how many nations - especially in the regions they have been putting money into - go in for seizures, "nationalizations" etc (and thats even when there arent civil wars) it is perhaps dangerous to have so much money out there.
As for cooking the books, I thought that the likes of QE, the "Euro rescue packages" and the rest meant that this was what everyone was doing nowadays?
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I don't intend this to become a political partisanship discussion over which future President of any party has more intestinal fortitude over the opposing party and is more likely to start launching nukes. I have been doing some reading lately about past, current and future mainland China politics and how it impacts the future of Taiwan. Other than treaty obligations (if any, which I have not researched), does the US have pressing political, economic, military or strategic interests in keeping Taiwan independent, up to and including another SE Asian war?
I have been thinking about SE Asia a lot recently, especially with the posturing of various SE Asian nations over the ownership of various unoccupied islands between China, Japan, the Philippines and Vietnam, which are significant only insofar as they offer the possibility of oil and natural gas. If push comes to shove, China is really the only power there with sufficient naval and airpower assets to assert its interests.
Gonna reply deliberately without reading any other responses this first go 'round...
Short answer:
0. There are no permanent allies, only permanent interests.
That said...
1. We should seek to help our allies and confound our enemies.
2. Making a habit of abandoning or mistreating allies means you'll have fewer allies.
3. Leaving Taiwan to the wolves is a good way to tell to other allies that the USA has not the stomach for serious conflict and will cost far more in the long run. Taiwan is not some benighted conclave of bestial queer religious fanatics without two cow chips to rub together in an area of litle political and economic significance.
Han Chinese nationalism or no, the fact that it is still considered a possibility in the PRC indicates we have not kept up appearances or the reality of might.
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Oh I agree that they probably dont want world domination, my point was that they have all these assets scattered across the world and no obvious means to protect them. Given how many nations - especially in the regions they have been putting money into - go in for seizures, "nationalizations" etc (and thats even when there arent civil wars) it is perhaps dangerous to have so much money out there.
As for cooking the books, I thought that the likes of QE, the "Euro rescue packages" and the rest meant that this was what everyone was doing nowadays?
Those two points are contradicting each other. If you have assets, you have assets to protect your assets. Rest is just proper management and the necessary amount of ruthlessness.
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What is this assimilation?
Is that what you call waging war and conquering your neighbor?
The question should be worded "Should the USA go to war in defense of of an ally who has been attacked by China?"
If that happened it would probably be one of the few truly unambiguously legitimate uses of our war making ability in decades.
This...instead of wasting our strength trying to civilize ignorant goatherds.
can you imagine them calling all that debt in? :facepalm:
Actually.... "If you invade Taiwan we will void any U.S. debt instruments you hold."
How's that for grabbing short-n-curlies?
And then the full faith and credit of the US on the world financial markets disappears. And we cannot survive in isolation of the world markets.
Abrogating such debt/commercial agreements is par for the course when nation states make war. It is a risk one takes when waging war. Want the debt instruments from country A honored? Don't go to war with country A.
IOW, the default/abrogation itself would not bring about a collapse of "the full faith and credit of the US." The Han SOBs just had better be willing to take the hit.
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Behind closed doors, both sides know the truth. And IMO, "status quo" for the foreseeable future is what I'd place my money on. With economic collapse, and the Chinese real-estate/banking bubble making the American one look like just a bad week, a close second.
Do not assume economic rationalism has a full seat at the Reasons To Go To War table. Other factors have, traditionally, been much greater.
On a tangent, this highlights the lack of reality in much marxist and libertarian thought. They both suggest folks are primarily motivated by economics, when reality shows this is not so. Fickle human critters are fickle.
Strong economic ties has not stopped major wars in the past. When ideology, religion and nationalist causes are strong in the minds of the people, economics takes a back seat.
Yep.
western folk have a hard time thinking like asians do
This, with bells on it. "Scratch a foreigner and you'll find an American yearning to be free." Not so much, it turns out.
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We are already at war with China. Of course a lot of Americans are and have been on the wrong side. For decades. "We" created the China problem, and some of us have made out very well thanks to it.
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http://news.yahoo.com/japan-buy-disputed-islands-angering-china-121834666.html (http://news.yahoo.com/japan-buy-disputed-islands-angering-china-121834666.html)
Coincidentally, from AP, a story about Japanese government acquisition of islands claimed by PRC. PRC statement warns of "serious consequences" for violations of "territorial sovereignty".
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If China launches an actual attack and attempts to invade Taiwan, I think we are in the right to defend them. Both morally and legally.
As the the question of can we, yes and no. Do we have the military ability to do so? Yes, yes I think we do. But I also think that comes with casualty levels and commitment the US public isn't likely to accept. With a direct attack on the US maybe, but not to protect an ally.
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I don't think the PRC government has the mindframe to become a political or military superpower. Too rigid, too xenophobic, too self-centered as a collective, etc. Economic superpower, perhaps. It will be interesting.
it matters less what we think. more it matters what they think.
therein lies the problem with westerners trying to understand asians
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If China launches an actual attack and attempts to invade Taiwan, I think we are in the right to defend them. Both morally and legally.
As the the question of can we, yes and no. Do we have the military ability to do so? Yes, yes I think we do. But I also think that comes with casualty levels and commitment the US public isn't likely to accept. With a direct attack on the US maybe, but not to protect an ally.
Whats interesting is we're in a shifting mode. We've built up a kick ass specops community to deal with the war on terror. A fistfight with China would require us to pivot 180 degrees and start thinking conventional warfare again.
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Oh I agree that they probably dont want world domination, my point was that they have all these assets scattered across the world and no obvious means to protect them. Given how many nations - especially in the regions they have been putting money into - go in for seizures, "nationalizations" etc (and thats even when there arent civil wars) it is perhaps dangerous to have so much money out there.
As for cooking the books, I thought that the likes of QE, the "Euro rescue packages" and the rest meant that this was what everyone was doing nowadays?
Oh God would I LOVE to see China get stuck in some quagmires in Africa, or have some other Red/Left leaning state, maybe Venezuela go full-retard on them and nationalize a bunch of their interests.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2012/mar/12/venezuelan-oil-a-risky-investment-for-china/?page=all
The ONE thing I do understand well enough about non-Westernized Asians is that they don't take well to loss of face, or insults to honor. Well, I guess their ability to engage in force projection in Venezuela is even less than it is on America's Western coast. However, some of those places in Africa where they're "on the ground" and have large amounts of Chinese workers living in dorms etc...
Whats interesting is we're in a shifting mode. We've built up a kick ass specops community to deal with the war on terror. A fistfight with China would require us to pivot 180 degrees and start thinking conventional warfare again.
Or perhaps the most pragmatic, get a POTUS in office and an Exec branch willing to PO the Mainland Chinese by selling Taiwan all the arms they're willing to buy. Get a level of MAD going, so we don't have to step in.
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Or perhaps the most pragmatic, get a POTUS in office and an Exec branch willing to PO the Mainland Chinese by selling Taiwan all the arms they're willing to buy. Get a level of MAD going, so we don't have to step in.
This. And toss in theater-level anti-missile defense for fun.
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Whats interesting is we're in a shifting mode. We've built up a kick ass specops community to deal with the war on terror. A fistfight with China would require us to pivot 180 degrees and start thinking conventional warfare again.
Indeed we would. And it would be another example that those who claim there wont be another large scale war, as soon as we finish one, are idiots.
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There is no way this would end well for either country or whatever allies each has.
If China wins, what they've done is swallow an area that will be very restless and is highly capitalistic. Those features are going to be absorbed into China's bloodstream and will simply accelerate the change that is already occurring. A change that likely will have no place for those currently at the top.
If we win, it will be at great cost perhaps to the point of so weakening the armed forces that it would be impossible to maintain the commitments they have now. Which would lead to a general collapse of those commitments. Sort of a "domino effect".
To win might require a war-time economy* and so add in more years of a lack of a real recovery. Not to mention that if it goes poorly, there will be calls to re-introduce the draft which will mean many productive people having their energies effectively wasted on un-economic goods if not killed outright. Also taxes will likely go up. So the economy will tank hard and long. And afterwords how long will it take to recover?
Add in the possible threat of nuclear response and no one wins.
*Of course Krugman and the Keynesian idiot brigades will be salivating (Spending! Full employment! Yea!) over such a thing because they have no idea how economies actually work. So you might find them in the forefront of any pro-war agitation.
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Can you imagine Walmart shelves being empty ? ;/
it's on my wish list.
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Really, so people are to be deprived of low-cost, mid-quality goods? Wal-Mart helps people get more out of a dollar. It makes the people that shop there better off, otherwise they wouldn't shop there.
Lowering folks' standard of living is not a good goal to have. Nor is economic nationalism in any way rational or desirable.
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thats not what the union sponsored websites saY and you know they only have the american peoples best interests at heart...... >:D :facepalm: [popcorn]
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I've looked at the military aspects of this in detail, as have others (there is a great RAND study on a US-PRC shooting war) and I'm sorry to say, the end result would be MASSIVE losses of ships and aircraft on both sides, (higher numbers on theirs, but comparable percentages I would say...20:1 combat ratio only seems good until the threat actually HAS 20x the assets), and unfortunately, a PRC held ROC.
Sorry. The only way to win is not to play, would you lie a nice game of chess?
Our non-nuclear capability in that conflict serves only as a deterrent...it would be catastrophically damaging to both militaries, so it's a matter of "is it worth it to the PRC" (w.r.t. Both the military and economic effects), not can we -actually- defend ROC.
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It's a form of MAD: they quit buying our bonds and we quit buying their cheap plastic carp :P
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It's a form of MAD: they quit buying our bonds and we quit buying their cheap plastic carp :P
Scary part is, they have already started the former, and we have not done the latter. Their US treasury purchases (and holdings, scarily) have been in steady decline. The largest ppsingle purchaser is the Fed, and with that suppressing interest rates (to keep the interest "affordable" through inflationary monetary policy), it makes them a bad deal for actual purchasers, especially foreign ones, at a cost of the most insidious of "taxes"...inflation, especially when the government, in a major conflict of interest, can continue to hide true inflation by effectively making up numbers. The only reason they can do so is other economic policies had restrained the velocity of money to historically anomalous lows, and thus the massive money supply increase has not been as visible as it woud normally be. However, this creates a horrifically dangerous situation...anything that would increase that velocity (ie an improving economy, a move away from the dollar as a reserve currency, etc) would create a catastrophic devaluation of the dollar (for example, based on current money supply and velocity figures, a return to historical norms in velocity would result in a dollar devaluation of nearly 50-75%!). So basically, we've recreated a situation where win or lose, we lose...as the fed can't possibly pull money back fast enough to make a difference, and even if they could, the resulting interest rate spike would crush the government AND the economy.
Dangerous times my friends, dangerous times.
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aND the chinese are aware even if most in the usa aren't
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Maybe we all ought to start learning to speak Chinese ;)
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aND the chinese are aware even if most in the usa aren't
Be careful not to build them up so much. They have made plenty of blunders they've yet to correct that will bite them in the tuckus if they don't react soon & decisively.
Sometimes inscrutability is less about genius-level machinations and more about incoherence.
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I've looked at the military aspects of this in detail, as have others (there is a great RAND study on a US-PRC shooting war) and I'm sorry to say, the end result would be MASSIVE losses of ships and aircraft on both sides, (higher numbers on theirs, but comparable percentages I would say...20:1 combat ratio only seems good until the threat actually HAS 20x the assets), and unfortunately, a PRC held ROC.
Sorry. The only way to win is not to play, would you lie a nice game of chess?
Our non-nuclear capability in that conflict serves only as a deterrent...it would be catastrophically damaging to both militaries, so it's a matter of "is it worth it to the PRC" (w.r.t. Both the military and economic effects), not can we -actually- defend ROC.
I dunno, I read Rand docs and sometimes I wonder...maybe I read too many Rand docs. :P
Granted:
1. Taiwan could be rubbled by PRC conventional ballistic missiles, no doubt. And I bet that is what the PRC would end up getting (rubble), not a first-rate industrial nation.
2. I make no claims it would be a cakewalk. We would expend beau coup munitions turning their shiny new planes, boats, and such into scrap.
It is going to take more than matériel to be competitive. Give them 20x or 50x the hardware they had when they fought Viet Nam (and lost), but retain the same culture and morale, and I doubt the hardware will do them much good against a first-rate military. Also, against whom have they been sharpening their armed forces the last 10+ years? Yeah, I can't think of any foe, either. OTOH, the USA has lots of veteran troops who have BTDT.
Ultimately, I think the PRC's decision to attack will come down to non-economic factors and an overly optimistic read of their chances of success. Not sure we ought to feed the latter.
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Be careful not to build them up so much. They have made plenty of blunders they've yet to correct that will bite them in the tuckus if they don't react soon & decisively.
Sometimes inscrutability is less about genius-level machinations and more about incoherence.
Lot of people figure their economy is getting ready to implode. They've sunk a vast amount of resources into what are basically Potemkin villages, entire cities where no one lives because there aren't enough people that can afford it and they need to create make-work to make their economy look better. If that ever catches up with them it'll make our housing bust look like a minor hickup.
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OTOH, the USA has lots of veteran troops who have BTDT.
[tinfoil] [tinfoil] [tinfoil]
What if the point of the "War on Terror" was actually to sharpen our troops for China?
[tinfoil] [tinfoil] [tinfoil]
Chris
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I dunno, I read Rand docs and sometimes I wonder...maybe I read too many Rand docs. :P
Granted:
1. Taiwan could be rubbled by PRC conventional ballistic missiles, no doubt. And I bet that is what the PRC would end up getting (rubble), not a first-rate industrial nation.
2. I make no claims it would be a cakewalk. We would expend beau coup munitions turning their shiny new planes, boats, and such into scrap.
It is going to take more than matériel to be competitive. Give them 20x or 50x the hardware they had when they fought Viet Nam (and lost), but retain the same culture and morale, and I doubt the hardware will do them much good against a first-rate military. Also, against whom have they been sharpening their armed forces the last 10+ years? Yeah, I can't think of any foe, either. OTOH, the USA has lots of veteran troops who have BTDT.
Ultimately, I think the PRC's decision to attack will come down to non-economic factors and an overly optimistic read of their chances of success. Not sure we ought to feed the latter.
Agree on the RAND docs, I've done my own analyses as well. I agree with your training assessment, but it's going to boil down to an air/sea war, not a land war, and our guys have had as much combat experience air to air and blue water engagements as they have. We haven't really fought a real war for air superiority or power projection at sea since Vietnam in the former, and WWII in the latter. While we train more realistically and more often, training only goes so far. The point of the rand air/sea report was even if training lowers the Phit by an enemy AAM by a factor of 4 or more, it's still a war of attrition on both sides. Yeah, an F-22 can probably get 4-6 kills with 4-6 amraams, but that just means it has to have a better than 50% chance of defeating the 20+ AAM's coming the other way to achieve the required exchange ratio. Same issues with ship defense, if you fire 200 cruise missiles as a CBG, it is highly likely you will get a bunch of hits. The Chinese strategy is one of quantity and overwhelming strikes..lust look at the number of SRBMs they point at Taiwan.
While I absolutely agree that we are far better equipped and trained, that can only improve the numbers game so much.
Also agree on what they would get after their strikeon Taiwan, but remember, unification is less about economically integrating Taiwan and more about national unification and creating their zone of influence unopposed. Even if they didn't request to rubble, it is likely they found have a serious insurgency (that is how it started after all), so it wouldn't be economically viable anyway--the point is to create their own exclusion zone and buffer zone, and "threats" inside that zone wouldn't be tolerated. Remove Taiwan, push the carriers back, and deter US from using Japan (including Okinawa), and our ability to do anything in the region becomes far more difficult just due to range.
Draw a 1500-2000km range ring around china, subtracting Japan, and look at the resources in that area, and who currently holds them. My bet is they will expand, avoid things that would really provoke the US (Taiwan, Japan) and use the possibility of massive attrition as a deterrent to prevent our intervention in things like the spratly islands.
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Be careful not to build them up so much. They have made plenty of blunders they've yet to correct that will bite them in the tuckus if they don't react soon & decisively.
Sometimes inscrutability is less about genius-level machinations and more about incoherence.
they don't care
if they decide that a move will kill 10 million of their own folks they saY OH WELL
hard to beat someone who doesn't care how many you kill
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they don't care
if they decide that a move will kill 10 million of their own folks they saY OH WELL
hard to beat someone who doesn't care how many you kill
Very true. An exceptional individual in China, say someone you'd claim was "One in a million"... there's still more than one thousand people just like them.
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they killed 20 million of their own people
the top guys killed off parts of their own families
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Lot of people figure their economy is getting ready to implode. They've sunk a vast amount of resources into what are basically Potemkin villages, entire cities where no one lives because there aren't enough people that can afford it and they need to create make-work to make their economy look better. If that ever catches up with them it'll make our housing bust look like a minor hickup.
Ah, the Community Redevelopment Act outreach program at work?
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western folk have a hard time thinking like asians do
Therein lies the problem.
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Therein lies the problem.
there are westerners who think asian. they are usually pariahs. think billy mitchel
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Really, so people are to be deprived of low-cost, mid-quality goods? Wal-Mart helps people get more out of a dollar. It makes the people that shop there better off, otherwise they wouldn't shop there.
Lowering folks' standard of living is not a good goal to have. Nor is economic nationalism in any way rational or desirable.
sorry for the hijack, but i don't agree that lower quality products made in a foreign nation with a large conglomerate siphoning the profit benefits most americans. period. i think the last 40 years of that thinking has gotten us where we are today (ie, still better off than much of the world, but slipping fast).
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http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-10-09/wal-mart-to-end-worker-profit-sharing-contributions-in-february.html
Wal-Mart’s profit-sharing plan was created in 1971 by company co-founder Sam Walton, according to his biography, “Made in America.”
During the year ended Jan. 31, 2008, Wal-Mart contributed $724.4 million to 838,955 hourly employees in profit-sharing and 401(k) contributions, according to a May 2008 company press release. Data for more recent years wasn’t immediately available.
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there are westerners who think asian. they are usually pariahs. think billy mitchel
Pariah indeed. Shame they didn't listen to him earlier.
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Sure, there are westerners who think like Asians. They are the one busy selling us out for personal gain. And, wait for it, not just Democrats. Go back to the General System of Preference and ask who benefits, who created that, why.