> PS: no clue why anyone would downvote something like that :)
Because there’s no way of knowing whether these unamed exiles exist or, if they do, there’s any reason to think they would have any insight on the matter? This being the internet, it’s safer to assume you’re making the whole thing up (no offense intended ;) )
I think it is much more likely that China will succeed in its chip production self sufficiency efforts, generating oversupply, indirectly contributing to an economic crisis in Taiwan (whos economy is overdependent on semi), and changing the winds back towards peaceful reunification.
commentary from exiles is the least reliable source of information, Iraq should've taught us this. The PRC policy on Taiwan has been consistent since 1949 - one china principle, otherwise renewal of hostilities. Chips have very little to do with it
Well, after what Russia did anything is possible. But the interesting question here is "why would they do that?".
AFAIK Taiwan doesn't have any resources like Ukraine does. It has an amazing strategic presence militarily, but strengthening their military position in the Pacific doesn't immidiately help with an economic problem unless the US is trying to blockade them by sea.
> the interesting question here is "why would they do that?"
China is not Russia. But Xi is weak. There was no reason to rush on Hong Kong when it was going to, without controversy, revert to Chinese law in a few decades. By being impatient, Xi undermined Chinese interests there, in Taiwan and internationally in favour of his personal political interests. If China invades Taiwan, it will be in recapitulation of Galtieri’s junta in the Falklands.
Instead of letting democracy fester, potentially spreading the sentiment to the mainland, Xi has effectively neutralised the opposition in Hong Kong. Reading this as weakness is wishful thinking.
And militarily, as well as economically, an invasion of Taiwan is a lot less clear cut than it was before the war in Ukraine started. Plus, Taiwn would be an amphibious invasion, against a very well prepared and supported defender.
I 100% agree with the outlook of Dalio, but if that is the plan then why provoke the war now? If they wait 5-10 years the US might implode and not even be able to resist them in the Pacific. The US economy is pretty questionable.
It isn't lost on Chinese high command that the longer they wait, the easier it will be to fight the US. All their planners would be saying "lets not start the war with the US now, lets wait a few years".
Now maybe they go in Putin-style anyway, but Russia is being cornered. China isn't under that sort of external pressure. They can afford to drag this out, Russia has been losing vs. the US for more than 40 years.
>then why provoke the war now? If they wait 5-10 years the US might implode and not even be able to resist them in the Pacific. The US economy is pretty questionable.
Xi is getting old. He may want to be around for the invasion. Also, if the next leader isn't as aggressive, the moment may be missed.
China is imploding far ahead of schedule developmentally (probably mostly a one child policy thing), whereas the US population is doing the reverse. By 2030, the tail end cohort of the most aggressive era of population suppression will be nearing 40y.o.
Do you mean economy is better somewhere else?
There are now more jobs in US than before the pandemic.
Isn't that pretty good at least relatively speaking?
The US is deeply in debt and printing money has become part of the Plan A response to every crisis.
They can't afford to wage war in Asia against China. Afghanistan against goatherds had them gasping with the exertion, and this proxy war against Russia might easily prove too much if they get overexcited. It is just a matter of time until the US has to pull their head in for financial reasons. If China waits 10 years there is even a chance the US collapses on its own without help. They aren't going to recover from 130% debt:GDP without a political crisis of some sort.
If China waits 10 years, their population will already have gone down in absolute terms, and their population is aging significantly faster than the US'. This is worse than it seems when you factor in the very low retirement ages that China has saddled itself with.
Per the post above, China's population has been dropping since 4 years ago but the statistics have been doctored pretty aggressively to hide this fact. The linked tweet alleges a 120million person discrepancy between government reporting and the reality.
History suggests that countries go to war during economically challenging times. A dictator whose power is slipping also tends towards war. Sovereignty at sea is also a big attraction. Taiwan being a perennial thorn in the side of the Chinese regime is another.
China has been getting more aggressive lately— flying military jets deep into Taiwanese air space. I would not be surprised if China made a move in the next 18 months.
Sure. So why Taiwan? Why not head north into Russia and Mongolia? There are lots more resources up there, and Russia doesn't have the worlds most violent military looming behind them.
"one China" is a very serious thing to the PRC government, maybe comparable as a rallying cry to manifest destiny for US back in the 19th century.
No one in China is looking around trying to figure out which direction will be the most profitable direction for an invasion that they're gunning for. They're gunning for Taiwan specifically. As far as economic imperialism, China shows low willingness to attempt nation building and high enthusiasm for investing in projects in questionably stable states.
Perhaps not much resources over there and no excuse to start a war? tbh not sure if the US will really interfere with military action if a war is really started
Ok, just to get it right: You think it is possible that the US would go to war against China (in defense of Taiwan). And, that they would go so far to bomb mainland China with nukes?
If the war starts with Taiwan, everybody will bomb the fabs. The Taiwanese probably have units detailed to do that to prevent their intact capture, just as Switzerland have mined every bridge and tunnel in the country.
Everyday tsmc and intel are closer to opening fabs in Arizona. Also Samsung proved they have some chops at producing decently cutting edge silicon with Nvidia’s ampere chips, if China does invade taiwan before the plants in Arizona open.
This is what Putin just tried to do. Failed spectacularly. I'm honestly of better opinion of the CCP. Last time when they fucked up things that badly, was the Great Leap Forward and that was 65 years ago.
Look at the actual facts on the ground: land-bridge to Crimea, Luhansk 100% under Russian control, Donetsk most probably getting there, also some chunks of Kharkiv province, about 7 million Ukrainian refugees, Ukrainian's army potential drastically reduced (i.e. "demilitarisation" that seemed to have worked), how is all this "failing spectacularly"?
Original objective of a decapitation strike in Kyiv failed. All the forces committed to the north of the country have been destroyed or retreated.
Ukrainians have slowly been driven out of the south, but have generally held the Russians at the Siverskyi Donets river. Spectacular footage exists of the failed attempt to cross it with two BTGs which were entirely destroyed.
And the big failure is political: Sweden and Finland have been driven to immediately join NATO. Attacking Ukraine has moved NATO's border eastwards. Countries adjoining Russia and Ukraine and Belarus have decided they need to arm themselves rapidly. Russia has been cut off from replacement supplies of Western goods, and can no longer e.g. make cars.
The war will continue for the forseeable future, like the war in Syria, but with gradually reducing intensity and slow pushing back by the Ukranians.
From the same facts I have the completely opposite reading that you have. Despite the constant propaganda telling you otherwise in the USA, Ukraine has been a major defeat for NATO.
Economic sanctions on Russia were useless. China didn’t budge nor did India nor did most of Africa and South America highlighting the new irrelevance of the USA. Ukraine failed to properly negotiate after stopping the Kiev advance when it would have been advantageous to do so because the USA was a poor steward and is now sure to lose significant territories in the south. The war will not be allowed to keep going for long because it has a significant impact on Ukraine allies economies and these allies are already significantly pushing for new negotiations to take place. Sweden and Finland joined NATO at significant cost to them in their negotiations with Turkey. It’s not far from a complete debacle honestly.
The sanctions on Russia have caused them to be unable to wage war in a way that they could have previously, which was the point.
On top of the number of people living below the poverty line in Russia in the first quarter of 2022 rose by 69%. Probably not all the sanctions, but given the amount of jobs that just up and left its likely related.
> China didn’t budge nor did India nor did most of Africa and South America highlighting the new irrelevance of the USA
China, Russias 'closest' ally with a 'unlimited friendship' isn't doing anything outside of providing humanitarian aid to Russia. They clearly want no part of it.
> Ukraine failed to properly negotiate after stopping the Kiev advance when it would have been advantageous to do so because the USA was a poor steward and is now sure to lose significant territories in the south
Ukraine will now likely retake Crimea if things keep going how they have been the past two weeks, if Russia never invaded they would of ironically kept more land. I await the day that Russia loses their black sea fleet.
> The war will not be allowed to keep going for long because it has a significant impact on Ukraine allies economies and these allies are already significantly pushing for new negotiations to take place. Sweden and Finland joined NATO at significant cost to them in their negotiations with Turkey. It’s not far from a complete debacle honestly.
Ukraines allies have repeatedly said that any negotiations are up to Ukraine, I think that a lot of the allies (especially eastern European states that have felt the thumb of Russia before) know that this war is about a lot more than Ukraine and Russia.
To quickly reply to you (at that point a long answer would be a waste of my time), sanctions didn’t meaningfully impact Russia revenue which raised with gaz and oil prices. China is actually importing things from Russia. Ukraine has no chance of retaking Crimea - which doesn’t want to be retaken anyway - and is currently losing territories, infrastructures and seeing a very real erosion of its available manpower not winning them. Negotiations have to be made by Ukraine obviously but allies have a lot of sway there. Ukraine couldn’t wage this war without the support of NATO countries and these countries are first and foremost serving their own interests as usual.
The statistics of the number of people under the poverty line come from the Russian government so theirs no delusion there.
Ukraine will retake all of its territory in time.
If Russia is winning so much why are they rolling out units that are compromised of volunteers that are nearly geriatric?.
Why is Russia using weapons that where designed to take out America aircraft carriers against Ukrainian shopping malls? (kh-22).
Why is Russia using tanks that where made in the 1960's (T-62).
Ukraine already has weapons that far outstrip anything that Russia has deployed against them so far (HIMARS, m777's, CESARS, KRABS and Panzerhaubitze 2000) and they are getting more as time goes (NASAMS and M270's).
Multiple Russian ammo depots explode nearly every day from HIMARS, and Russia has no effective counter to them, because of the way that Russian logistics work this will be devastating if it's kept up.
Russia is and always has been a paper tiger, never forget they lost in Chechnya and they lost in Afghanistan.
In a war everybody loses. Blowing up buildings and killing people how could that not be a defeat for everybody. The question is who started it? Who is the aggressor?
I remain a Clausewitzian at heart. War is the continuation of politics. When the dust will settle, the situation between both side will have been altered in way which couldn’t be reached diplomatically and at this point I think the end result seems more favorable to Russia than the west.
Countries start wars all the time. The USA started four since I was born including one outside of the international framework which would have given it a thin veneer of legitimacy.
I dislike wars as much as anyone else. They are a waste of resources especially when they drag for no reason. But they are more or less a fact of life. What matter is understanding whose interests they serve and why they are waged so we can build the conditions of a stable peace. Ideals are not going to get you far in international politics but they certainly are an easy string to tug on for propaganda purpose.
> Ukrainian's army potential drastically reduced (i.e. "demilitarisation" that seemed to have worked)
Ukraine’s army is being modernised by backers that eclipse Russia’s industrial capacity many times over. This is a war of attrition Russia is spending decades-old back catalog on to fuel a domestic narrative.
It is very much a war of attrition, but I'm not sure it is necessarily a war that Russia is going to lose. So far Russia is slowly progressing on their primary objective. They have had significant losses but they have a huge amount of dumb rockets and artillery that they can throw at the problem. They have have failed in most blitz actions with highly mobile forces, but the slow grind seem to work for them, although obviously with high costs for both sides.
They lack manpower but, unfortunately for their victims, they seem to be managing by conscripting the occupied population.
The key will be on whether the West will lose interest in supporting Ukraine before Russia runs out of resources.
Well, thing is they might not care. As long as they can leave dealing with insurgency mostly to the new "independent" government and not have to report the losses at home, while still controlling the resources and enjoying the buffer zone they might be ok to returning to the previous lower intensity warfare of the last decade.
Obviously toppling the government proved to be well beyond Russia's means, but I wouldn't be surprised if they might try to take advantage of the post war hardships for a coup. It will be important for the West to help Ukraine with reconstruction to avoid this.
Except they’re not. And they won’t be able to. For the time being, light insurgency and the threat of shelling all but foreclose resource development in eastern Ukraine for years to come.
This is Russia’s Afghanistan. Except unlike the U.S. or USSR, Russia is not a superpower. (Its economy is eclipsed by California’s. And its military struggles even miles off its border.)
It is unlikely that a large ape will be able to go around Moscow without setting all kind of alerts, so it won't be effective.
Kidding aside, Ukraine has nothing to gain with attacking the Russian population with terror attacks as that might be the excuse Putin needs for forced conscription and further escalation (even nuclear).
Non conventional attacks on military assets in the occupied areas are to be expected though and are in fact already happening.
Which guerilla? Russia is mostly taking part of Ukraine with low support for the federal government. It’s not to the point of Crimea which had been trying to be independent since 1991 but they definitely have a good chance of actually annexing the parts they are occupying without to much resistance from the inside.
But the war is still ongoing. That’s the regular army using guerilla tactics. If what happened in 2014 happens again (big if as Crimea had a very poor relationship with Ukraine while the rest had a slightly better one), Russia should hold.
People leaving russia is not an indication that they are definitely losing the war in ukraine.
Russia may be in demographic decline - but there's still tonnes of time before that problem becomes insurmountable. The regime doesn't care about that anyway.
Originally there were many predictions about how Ukraine would fall in 2-3 weeks at most (Putin even said a few years ago he could take Kiev in 14 days). With respect to that goal it has been a miserable failure, but I think most people expect Russia to still 'win' at least in some sense even if not 100% of Ukraine.
They will definitely follow that path if China can depend on Russia for mineral resources, and at this point it seems like it can depend. You don't need to control the seaways to bring iron, coal, gas or oil from Siberia and the Russian Far East into China. Mongolia next door has some of the biggest copper mines in the world that has just opened. [1]
How self sufficient is Russia? I heard that they have plenty of natural resources, but not enough engineering to exploit them effectively without importing the necessary technology.
Eeeh. I think there’s a decent chance that TSM is destroyed early in any campaign, and that the West gives Xi a stern letter saying, “You better not attack Japan.”
This has been the headline the past week. Why are prices lagging? There's been a modest decrease, but far from a crash. More critically: availability and lead times are still historically awful. I can't make business strategies on vaporware.
The prices will fall and Jevon's paradox will kick in swiftly. If anything, world will see even more microcontrollers, memory, and CPUs used everywhere for decades to come.
With that in mind it might be a good idea to stack up some chip supplies.
PS: no clue why anyone would downvote something like that :)