It's fine for someone to take sides, but there's no room for discussion if one twists all the facts and pretends to know more than someone who actually lives there.
Cold War against China?
- Thread starter VorZakone
- Start date
Yup. Like I said, China is facing plenty of internal crisis themselves (e.g. COVID, Henan bank protests, "rotten-tail buildings", etc.). They urgently need some substances to unite their people, and talking tough (as they always do) helps to promote patriotism.
So you're ok with everything the chinese are doing right now, including genocide?
Dunno why it has to be a country where you family or close relations. Their invasion and annexation of Tibet was as brutal as it gets. And they are still treating Tibetans in the most horrible ways. You could argue it's a long time ago now, but they are still essentially trying to wipe out Tibetan culture and their language to some degree. But as regards to Taiwan, it can be hard to argue why it's up to the US to secure their sovereignity.
Especially as the USA does not recognise them as a sovereign nation
Yeah totally.
I find it weird how the Chinese and Russians get a free pass in some quarters for naked imperialism and, to some extent, genocide. Maybe continental empires look less obviously wrong than maritime empires or occupations of non-contiguous territories.
And that guy claims to be an ambassador representing China in a major country (France)? He's more like the first guy that Henry VIII would kick out of the court when the king's in a bad mood.
Mainly cos emperor Xi wants to go down in history as the man who ‘unified’ China.
He’s not getting younger.
When did I suggest you should side with the US? It’s the fact you side with an authoritarian regime that oppresses its own people and commits genocide that I have an issue with.
The world is much more dangerous than 10 years ago mainly due to emperor Xi.
Feels like a lot of the world is on a knife edge at the moment, much more so than a long time. With global recession, possible food crisis because of the war in Ukraine, China flexing it's muscles etc I do fear the worst at times.
Yes. Plus he might well be feeling vulnerable right now after covid. Particularly given his age.
I sort of wonder. Certain historical dictators bathed incessantly - far right people tend to have high levels of "disgust sensitivity".
Coming off the back of a pandemic HAS to have some serious psychological repercussions for these narcissistic control freaks. Disease is a problem posed by "outsiders" to our homes after all. So this requirement to pull the borders together, cleanse the "others" and go full on tribal ... The timing can't be coincidental. Putin and Xi will see it all as cleansing. It's terrifying, because how far can you go with that line of thinking ? Are we all go get purified by fire? That's what Putin is doing and Xi is threatening.
Well, China are still running their ridiculous COViD
Policy mainly because he think he has a much more obedient population than western countries.
Putin is trying to reform the USSR and Xi wants to invade Taiwan, I’m not a fan of the US in general but they seems to be humanity’s greatest hope.
China has its own way of doing things and will keep on doing them that way. Not only in its own terms, but in world terms, in lifting 100 million of its people out of abject poverty, it has been very successful and hence is hardly likely to change... 'if it ain't broke, don't fix it'
The problems come (as they have already started to) when its success and the need to expand its horizons means it has to 'brush up' against others with differing 'ways of doing things', as presented mainly by western democracies. The problems arising in Hong Kong are now making the rest of the world and in particular in places like Taiwan, very nervous.
The way Russia has responded to having to 'brush' up against a one time very close neighbour in Ukraine, is getting everybody nervous and China may in some sense get caught in the 'down draft'. China doesn't fear Taiwan, but for many in China the presence of Taiwan represents the remnants of its own civil war, something that was 'not sorted' and it remains almost as an 'insult'... which is probably why speaker Pelosi's visit would be seen in China as 'poking the tiger'.
If China is to become a true superpower, and takes it place in the world as such, then unless it plans to rule the whole planet by force, it will need to change some aspects of its behaviour... but of course without losing 'face'. Its a big Ask!
The problems come (as they have already started to) when its success and the need to expand its horizons means it has to 'brush up' against others with differing 'ways of doing things', as presented mainly by western democracies. The problems arising in Hong Kong are now making the rest of the world and in particular in places like Taiwan, very nervous.
The way Russia has responded to having to 'brush' up against a one time very close neighbour in Ukraine, is getting everybody nervous and China may in some sense get caught in the 'down draft'. China doesn't fear Taiwan, but for many in China the presence of Taiwan represents the remnants of its own civil war, something that was 'not sorted' and it remains almost as an 'insult'... which is probably why speaker Pelosi's visit would be seen in China as 'poking the tiger'.
If China is to become a true superpower, and takes it place in the world as such, then unless it plans to rule the whole planet by force, it will need to change some aspects of its behaviour... but of course without losing 'face'. Its a big Ask!
Economically as well, every country is in so much debt and the old excuses and kicking the can down the line isn't an option anymore.
Too many issues in the world and now it seems like we are entering a new global power struggle. Going to be our modern day age of empires being played out and us as pawns. Yay.
Only that COVID, along with many other diseases, actually started in China themselves. Given their poor culture and hygeine, we always expect new virus strains emerge from China every few years.
Pretty racist tbf...mods?
Last edited:
I'm curious what Taiwan's nuclear breakout period is. They obviously have the technology and resources to develop some form of nuclear weapon, but would China be deterred by them? Or is Xi willing to accept the casualties?
The problem is that China is rapidly going backwards ever since emperor Xi came into power, Hong Kong is the best example of this. Do you think 200,000+ HKers went to the UK in the last couple of years for no apparent reason?
Many people dig too deep, the only reason these dictatorships end up needing to show the force is to distract from the internal issues and the fact that they’re in fact dictatorships. We would see none of it if the people could actually elect and change their governments - that’s the single largest reason.
Last edited:
i'm not sure that's true or supported by historical fact. consider the us and the british empire as it was then. the war of 1812. each was a democracy, internally at least, but that didn't prevent them from having a series of standoffs over all kinds of issues. the missiles china fired into the sea off taiwan is likely a signal to the us after pelosi's visit. it might have internal benefit for the most nationalistic but it also has other functions beyond just distracting from internal problems. i think at the level of russia, china, and the us what you see is action and reaction on a continuous basis and much of it will be done behind closed doors. they're always making adjustments to each other and that's true of smaller states in less publicized competitions too. i don't think the us invaded iraq to distract from internal issues and the us is not a dictatorship. i don't think russia backed assad to distract from internal issues and russia is an autocratic dictatorship. the game plays out on more than one level. russia and the us in competition in syria and now ukraine. china and the us in competition in asia.
it might have internal propaganda benefits but these aren't the sole reason states do what they do.
Chinese people have a culture of eating wild animals that you have never thought of. They also keep various kinds of animals in wet markets for retail, which become excellent media for virus recombination. Visit one of those markets and you'll know why new viruses emerge every few years.
Have a look at the Palestine Israel thread and see who gets a free pass? It is simply being hypocritical to say that Russia and China get a free pass. Russian invasion is as criminal as it gets and the Chinese occupation of Tibet is nowhere near as brutal as the Israeli invasion and occupation of Palestine. China has been occupying Tibet for a long time and they should have the freedom to be an independent country too. So does Palestine and many others. Let the US and the G7 talk about freedom to places that are under occupation and penalise the American and British illegal invasion of Iraq and the illegal bombing of Libya and the Americans out of their illegal occupation of Syria and the Israeli illegal occupation of Syria and then the majority of the World would penalise The Russians and Chinese for their illegal acts.
You must be joking? from what most of the mods post here why do you think they care?
I thought blatant racism was still bad....mmmmkay
Do please elaborate on what you think the benefits are other than keeping the little pinks happy?
Unless you think China is actively seeking to help Japan amend Article 9 of their constitution, what benefit does shooting missiles into the Japan EEZ zone serve?
what?
i told you in the op why these things might happen aside from internal consumption. go read for yourself.
The thing is, Foxbatt, that you're so eager to rant, rave and rail against the iniquities of the west, but show absolutely no desire to cast that same critical eye further east. It takes several prompts to even make you note it in passing. This makes you the hypocrite Foxbatt. You.
what's weird about it? All of the imperialist nations have their apologists.
Or do you mean more specifically those in the west that will strongly criticise their own governments, but struggle at times to do the same for their main geopolitical rivals? Thus making a hypocrite of their supposed beliefs? That's not weird either, you can easily find the mirror of the western leftist/tankie that struggles not to attribute everything negative to American plots, in the likes of the former communist country, staunch freedom loving right-winger/modern american style libertarian. Those are the guys you want to look for if you're interested in seeing rigorous criticism of Russia/USSR and Chinese historical crimes, while America/Britain/France etc get a pass. Having lived in both regions, it's depressingly nothing unusual.
“Baidu Maps show that there are 38 Shandong dumpling restaurants and 67 Shanxi noodle restaurants in Taipei,” Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokeswoman Hua Chunying posted on Twitter late on Sunday.
“Palates don’t cheat. #Taiwan has always been a part of China. The long lost child will eventually return home,” she added.
“Palates don’t cheat. #Taiwan has always been a part of China. The long lost child will eventually return home,” she added.
Man, talk about how low in the pit of delusion the CCP can fall into.
In comparison, there are 398 McDonald's restaurants in all of Taiwan according to the latest count from late May.Solid reasoning.
I wasn’t referring to Russians or Chinese - “my country right or wrong” is depressingly widespread. More third country citizens (including Westerners) who are alert to every bad thing ever done by Western nations but have a very noticeable blind spot towards other imperial powers.
which other imperial powers? i'm thinking of korea, vietnam, and afghanistan as major conflicts involving the soviets and chinese. all of those were border conflicts. they were also proxy wars involving western actors excluding the later chinese vietnamese war which was more to do with the soviets than anything else. still imperialism obviously but what else is there? the legacy of the west around the world has been unrivaled in terms of brutality in the 20th century. that has everything to do with empire, colonialism, and then attempts to maintain control in the post-colonial era. you can add ukraine and syria to the russian side. maybe nepal to the chinese? the list might have ten or twenty entries on it if we exclude the west over the past 100 years.
then you have south and central america, most of asia, the middle east, and all of africa on the european and american ledger.
Last edited:
There are hypocrisies on both sides but both sides need to be called out. i’m just calling for the same set of standards to be applied by commentators. For example, I think you’d struggle to find anyone on here defending the invasion of Iraq but you will find various apologists for naked Russian Imperialism In Ukraine.
i don't think i've seen you call the israeli situation or the iraqi situation or any situation that doesn't revolve around russia "criminal". i'm not convinced you yourself apply the same standards you want others to apply, even though i agree people should be consistent.
This thread is about China and the other current thread is about Ukraine. Iraq, while I was disgusted by the invasion, was 19 years ago and so I don’t mention it much. As forI Israel, fair enough, I don’t post in that thread. I just find it too depressing as I see no obvious solution given the US provides unqualified support and no one is likely to counter-balance that factor. For Ukraine and Taiwan (if not Tibet), there are realistic, better alternatives to discuss.
As regards your earlier post (and apologies for singling out Russia - it’s just because I know its history a lot better than China’s), from the 20th century why didn’t you bring up the Soviet Bloc (Prague 68, East Germany shootings, Budapest 56), Katyn and the Polish and Baltic clearances of 1940, the winter war (i.e. invasion of Finland), the Holodymr, the attempted invasion of Poland just after the Russian revolution, the repressions in the Caucuses after they attempted to set up independent republics in 1918/1919) to name but a few. Border wars maybe, but border wars due to centuries of expansion so other countries and territories previously independent or belonging to someone else get swallowed up become your neighbours. That was my original point - not that Russia or China is uniquely bad, more that land empires (including the US) seem to get judged with a lighter touch than Britain and France (one an island and the other bordered by European powers) sailing off to invade overseas as they had no hinterland to overrun and dominate.
fair enough but the iraqi situation and many others come up all the time because we're still living with the consequences. and i don't see the taiwanese case being any more or less difficult than the palestinian. if china decides to invade, no one is realistically stopping them. that wouldn't make it right.
with the exception of finland, all of those are examples of internal repression, if you take into account the transition from "western" russian empire to soviet union during that 1917-1922ish period, and i don't think many argue that the ussr wasn't internally repressive. or that china isn't. that has always been the argument. that the ussr was repressive internally but that the us and europeans were much more repressive externally. i think that's generally true even though you can find examples where the soviets or chinese have acted repressively in border conflicts.