No doubt those evil devils in the west, USA and Australia telling lies
First of all you somehow manage to enter Eurovision. Now youāre trying to relocate into a different hemisphere.
Weāre already everywhere.
We are inevitable
It will be a horrible, bloody war, if China seeks to take Taiwan.
There is no good American play. If it gets involved militarily, it will likely lose. I know America has a couple of fleets over there, but itās on Chinaās doorstep, and they will arm and re arm, until America is defeated, with both sides suffering lots of casualties but eventually China winning.
This assumes a conventional war. I canāt imagine America would want to countenance nuclear war over Taiwan.
America can just use their bases in korea , taiwan , japan to effectively block China in. I suspect this is what they will do if Taiwan asks for help.
China is different from Russia in the sense that it relies a lot on trade to establish their strength. Cut off control of the south china sea and the pacific , china gets boxed in.
A lot of this depends on how decisively the russians are contained. As of now , if China starts a conflict over Taiwan , they wont win that. The russian army is engaged in ukraine and wont be able to pressurize.
Also China can kiss what remains of BRICS good bye if they do this.
Well , i suppose the chinese involvment in the srilankan debt trap doesnt paint a good picture.
Well China is doing a suitcase full of money tour of small island nations.
Solomon Islands, Fiji, Kiribati, Samoa, Tonga, Vanuatu, Papua New Guinea and East Timor.
The old saying needs updating. Beware Chinese bearing gifts !
The world has always been dependant on China, remember the āMade in Chinaā stamp marks over everything way back when?
Itās not so much a dependency on China, the west see them as a threat to the Western economy, things weāre growing so fast econimically for China a few years back, to the extent that they were projected to overtake the US to become the largest economy in the world. And of course the US canāt have that, hence everything from China is a national security and whilst their at it, stir up some trouble in places where China has an interest.
Hong Kong (where Iām from) and Taiwan have been SARās of China for years, why the sudden interest in them from the US? Hong Kong was fine, a thriving financial hub and quite democratic, stir the pot and of course China will assert their authority, where was the call out for democracy before? There wasnāt, everybody was happy, well most, but youāll get those lefties everywhere.
Have any of the national security concerns been identified, confirmed and examples shared? Thatās right, none.
Now, I donāt support China in anyway, they have some iffy rules and some of their folk (especially the new money ones) are very rude and uncivilised, but look at how the country managed their growth and their influence worldwide, you canāt be a threat to be able to do that, right? Influence and economics, thatās what the US,and the west, (including Australia) influenced by the US are concerned about.
This is not true. China has a rich history, of course, and has, at times been a preeminent nation in trade and innovation, but for most of the 20th century it was not vital to the world economy as it is now. In fact it was dormant. I never saw āMade in Chinaā stamps in my youth. In those days it was āMade in Japanā.
Of course, the US and its allies wish to preserve their economic influence, that is only natural, but that doesnāt mean that there arenāt legitimate concerns about the lack of democracy and freedom in China, or its growing political influence abroad. There would be less worry if it was a country with free speech and human rights, but it clearly isnāt.
Maybe youāre younger than me I associated made in Japan with electronics
The thing there is, why be concerned about how another country is run, what business is it of theirs? The US talk about human rights but what about renditions and Guantanamo? Bit extreme but you get the point donāt ya? What about human rights in Saudi Arabia, or does access to their oil make them blind to it?
To me, itās akin to bullying, theyāre going to be bigger than us so weāll gang up on them and tell some lies to de-stabilise them.
Whereās the evidence I ask, convince me with evidence, at the moment itās hearsay. Where are all these photos of the Uygurās being enslaved, or of the North Korean punishment camps, or whatever theyāre called? Itās always sources, North Korea is a secretive country so where do they get their information from? Remember they jailed some westerner for being drunk and taking some picture down from his hotel, would someone risk taking photos or leaking things to the press, what kind of punishment would that result in?
So itās all down to economics and political influence then.
Iām sure Iām older than you
Iām talking about the 1970s. China was economically irrelevant then.
You undermine your own argument by saying that thereās no evidence of repression in China or NK because people are too scared to document it.
Whataboutism is not helpful either. There is a US politics thread in which we discuss many shortcomings in US democracy, but this is about China and its spreading influence.
We are all citizens of the world, and what happens in other countries is also our concern. I would like to see all of humanity living in peace, security and freedom and this is more likely when powerful and influential nations promote those values.
That applies everywhere.
Yay, weāre both over 50!!
Haha yeah good catch, I was referring to the western folk, do you think itās western folk or the locals who are leaking the stuff, either way itās a high risk, thereās no freedom of speech/media as you well know.
Aye yeah, if we could wave a magic wand we could solve the world problems and make it a better place to live, amen. Nothing worse than seeing people being displaced and starving kids. Probably too late for that now, thereās too much corruption in all places and most countries will do whatever it takes to put themselves first in every respect.
So what then? Impose more sanctions on China and hope they go away? Too many fingers in too many pies and close ties with other countries for that to happen.
Plus thereās the debts that multiple countries owe China, for their infrastructure projects etc. Thereās a lot of talk about China bankrupting these countries e.g. Sri Lanka but surely this wouldnāt in their best interests as they wonāt get their money back, there must have been some maths done somewhere e.g. Sri Lanka
You gotta put your money on western countries doing that too.
What do you reckon, will it pass or will the west have another cold war against the commies?
Thereās plenty of photos, and investigative journalism work that has been and is being done around this. One canāt help if you prefer to bury your head in the sand. Just look at this for example:
Or Hacked files reveal Chinese āshoot-to-killā policy in Uighur detention camps - BBC News - YouTube (be warned, if youāre in HK best to access these through VPN).
Why wouldnāt it be in their best interests?
The deals were primarily established with the stipulation (and I am aware that theyāre not unique in this) that Chinese companies and Chinese workers were used, with very little participation from the local labour force. If the client country isnāt bankrupt, great for the Chinese economy.
If the client country is bankrupt, all the better as they can then start making moves on local economic resources. Ports, natural resources, you name it.
Sorry China , we aint falling for the bait. We have been bitten far too many times already.
The first thing they need to do is agree exactly where their national borders are.
Nah, down under so was able to watch. So. thereās a bunch of pictures and no one knows the authenticity of them, only the word of a western journalist, then loads of happy Uighurs, talks of extremism cos theyāre Muslims, then an apparent camp seen from Google maps followed by drawings of how people are treat inside. Unknown informant passing information to some chap, how was this done through the great firewall of China? Followed by someone who found his missus on a hacked file, she was jailed for co-ordinating some social gathering to disturb the social order. If you know itās against the law, why do it? Does everyone in the west go looting and thieving cos itās against the law? Or speed on the motorways, wait scrap that last oneā¦
It may be all true and people can believe what they like, how does that saying goā¦two sides to every story and all that