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Keeping the forms of Asian exquisite politeness, serious tension is winding up between China and Japan. China chastised the Japanese Embassador for the fifth time demanding the release of a Chinese captain. He was arrested in a disputed part of the sea and is accused of deliberately attacking a Japanese fishing boat. The Japanese Embassy warned Japanese nationals living in China as well as those travelling and doing business there that they should take care of their safety.
33 comments:
Wars have started over less. But I think this is just chest thumping and will get resolved peacefully. The Chinese and Japanese both have too much to lose from starting a shootin' war.
K
But I think this is just chest thumping
Penis measurement.
"Too much to lose" is not an argument that ever stopped a war.
The Chinese are intent on ritually abusing the Japanese, perhaps the Chicoms are ashamed to recall that when Nationalist soldiers were dying by the thousands at the hands of the Japanese, Mao and his Commies were content to wait it out in the mountains. Stalin must have told him to sit on his hands as the capitalists duked it out. But don't ever question the patriotism of the Communists.
The Okinawa base is safe henceforth, it all depends on whether the Americans want it.
Imagine what would the situation be if American battle groups were not patrolling the area. We had 65 years of world peace thanks to American hegemony.
Imagine what would the situation be if American battle groups were not patrolling the area. We had 65 years of world peace thanks to American hegemony.
I am concerned - we are growing old, we are growing feeble, we are growing poor, we are growing stupid and socialist. All the sins of post-war Britain are ours now. Who will pick up the white man's burden once we set it down?
The Chinese hold back but not out of any sense of morality or respect for the rule of law . Everything with them is a matter of economic calculation. If the economics shift, so will their actions.
K
"Who will pick up the white man's burden once we set it down?"
Nobody.
As Westerners we should just realize that there's the West and the rest. Let the rest sort themselves out, we've got plenty of work on our hands if we want the West to survive.
Doesn't our standard of living in part depend on the existence of a system of free trade. If pirates are not just in Somalia but on every coast, doesn't this take us back to the Middle Ages?
K
Doesn't our standard of living in part depend on the existence of a system of free trade.
I agree.
If by standard of living you mean having lots of material garbage that we don't need, then maybe. But I'd be glad to do without most of that stuff if it means saving the West.
If America pulls out, Japan will go nuclear in about 5 minutes; can we afford a stand-off like this in Asia?
The only sane answer is no.
Anon.
Japan, then South Korea, Taiwan, Singapur. Australia depends on America - it is very lonely down under.
When it's time to roll up the empire, certain distant outposts get left behind. The Roman citizens left in Roman Britain in the 5th century wrote to the Emperor and he replied that they should "look to their own defenses". By 407 AD there were no new Roman coins going into circulation in Britain, and by 430 AD it is likely that coinage as a medium of exchange had been abandoned (i.e. they were back to a barter economy). Gold coins would not be minted again in Britain for almost 900 years.
K
I think Australia will be able to take the lead and form a defensive alliance. Taiwan, the Koreas, Vietnam, Mongolia, etc. will fall under Chinese hegemony. Or Japanese.
Once we pop smoke and make it clear that we have nobody's back, Taiwan, South Korea, Vietnam, Thailand, etc., will develop nuclear weapons tout suite. Since most of China's population and industries are concentrated in a relatively narrow strip of land, downstream from giant reservoirs, they are very vulnerable to strikes from even small (relatively) nuclear-armed countries, and will probably not be willing to go to war with them.
My personal preference is for a US that either goes the whole nine yards and really brings back colonialism, or leaves everybody to their business a la George Washington's original foreign policy. This half-assed "we'll bribe you and imply threats and SORT OF tell you what to do, and occasionally invade some worthless hellhole" foreign policy combines the costs of both extremes while gaining us the advantages of neither.
Taiwan , S. K., Japan - yes. Vietnam, Thailand - no. Although nuclear weapons are 1940s technology, some places don't even have that. It's really not technology so much as ability to devote massive resources to thousands of centrifuges,etc.
Who would AU ally with?
K
If North Korea and Pakistan can do it, anybody can do it.
What do I care whom Australia would ally with? Let them defend themselves or work out a deal with their neighbors. I'm an American Jew, not an Australian.
Truth is that almost anybody can develope nuclear weapons today. The technical issue consists of how to accumulate enough uranium, refine it and compress it. It doesnt have to explode, to spread the radioactive material is enough to cause panic and abandonment of a city. Since no one can live in chaos, sooner or later open world government will have to be imposed. Something like the WTO in commerce.
Most probably this world government will be headed by the British, because all the peoples have confidence in their fairness and reliability. The British colonialism was basically benign, we can see it now. They also have the experience.
Once the Queen passes on, there will be no one in the UK who actually remembers what it was like to be a global power or administrator. It is sad but all things come to an end. The old UK was quite possibly the greatest nation in history all things considered.
The British have lost their faith in God and are hedonists, but that is reversible.
I can absolutely assure you that not everybody can develop nuclear weapons.
Anon.
The fact is everything great about the UK was connected in some way with Christianity, law, literature, science, the white man's burden; even her atheists, men such as Bertrand Russell and Charles Darwin had solid knowledge of the Bible. The Anglicans screwed up massively in compromising with the spirit of the times by allowing divorce and birth control.
God save us all from one world government and eternal mediocrity. Rather, I hope to see thousands of small independent nation-states, with the lot of each according to its population and ruler's abilities and behavior.
Not bloody likely. Obama has a special hatred for the British because of his father's experience in Kenya. The 1st thing he did was send the British back the bust of Churchill that sat in the Oval Office. The Britain that once ruled the world no longer even exists - now it is a "multicultural" (read Islamic) post Christian country.
A lot of ex-colonials (including Israelis) have less than totally favorable memories of British administration. While from an objective point of view the British mostly left their colonial possession in much better shape than when they started, there seems to be a human impulse for self-government, even if the self-government is worse than the colonial regime (which it almost always is). Would Israel accept a return to the Mandate?
K
"The British", it might be argued, no longer exist, especially in the mind of their own government.
Anon.
Obama did not even see his wastrel of a father, his white mother and grandparents brought him up, yet he nurses a greviance against the British. Talk about manufactured identity. A Zelig lives too much in his head. Fortunately for the Americans, he has turned out to be an empty suit and not a sinister genius.
There are still some Brits. They congregate on the streets of London's financial area, drinking beer.
These are not the people I grew up with, who, in my heated imagination, truly appeared to control the world.
Anon.
If you happen to be in London this autumn you may find hundreds of tall, pink skinned boys with big glasses of beer in hand, socializing in the street in front of pubs. To me, they seem British. They certainly control lots of money and I envy them.
I am reading the book written by Mark, Obama's half brother who lives in China ($1.50 on Amazon - I get free shipping so they lost $ on it). Obama's father married another white (Jewish!) woman after Obama's mother. He would come home drunk and beat her. A fine role model.
Under Halacha, Obama's brother is Jewish too. He is aware of his Jewish roots - he talks about how his Chinese wife was his "bashert" (destined one, in Yiddish).
K
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