Attacking another nation as in the current Russian invasion of Ukraine is not part of that agenda when a nation violates the territorial integrity of another.
Peacedog wrote:First, a disclaimer: I never worked China desk. So, I have no direct insight into intel governing that region.
I am now convinced that Taiwan has nuclear weapons, specifically high yield neutron bombs. These weapons would decimate any PRC invasion and wipe out cities on the mainland wholesale.
A careful reading of opensource reporting highly suggests this. Somewhere in the area of 20 devices that are probably deliverable using their highspeed, indigenously developed I might add, ballistic missile system.
This is why the PRC has never invaded and, probably, never will.
Invading Taiwan was always a political issue, not a security or economic one. The PRC could probably have pulled off a conventional maritime invasion, at a very high cost/casualty rate, previously, but they never did. And I strongly suspect Taiwanese nuclear weapons were the reason why. And if anyone knew for sure that Taiwan has these weapons...it would be PRC leadership.
IMO, Taiwan wiping an invasion fleet with one, or two, of these weapons would be a fatal event for PRC leadership. Let alone zapping a mainland city, or two, in retaliation.
A variety of reasons exist for why this isn't spoken about openly, but my suspicion is that the other nuclear powers don't want to encourage more countries to join the club.
The Ukraine invasion effectively pulled the band aid off the wound so to speak on this issue. Now anyone with a clear, and present danger, from a larger neighbor is going to want them. And Taiwan coming into the open about this would just create a rush to get them everywhere else.
IMO, Taiwan wiping an invasion fleet with one, or two, of these weapons would be a fatal event for PRC leadership. Let alone zapping a mainland city, or two, in retaliation.
The Ukraine invasion effectively pulled the band aid off the wound so to speak on this issue.
Now anyone with a clear, and present danger, from a larger neighbor is going to want them.
And Taiwan coming into the open about this would just create a rush to get them everywhere else.
The war in Ukraine has proven that the age of industrial warfare is still here. The massive consumption of equipment, vehicles and ammunition requires a large-scale industrial base for resupply – quantity still has a quality of its own. The mass scale combat has pitted 250,000 Ukrainian soldiers, together with 450,000 recently mobilised citizen soldiers against about 200,000 Russian and separatist troops. The effort to arm, feed and supply these armies is a monumental task. Ammunition resupply is particularly onerous. For Ukraine, compounding this task are Russian deep fires capabilities, which target Ukrainian military industry and transportation networks throughout the depth of the country. The Russian army has also suffered from Ukrainian cross-border attacks and acts of sabotage, but at a smaller scale.
The rate of ammunition and equipment consumption in Ukraine can only be sustained by a large-scale industrial base.
This reality should be a concrete warning to Western countries, who have scaled down military industrial capacity and sacrificed scale and effectiveness for efficiency.
This strategy relies on flawed assumptions about the future of war, and has been influenced by both the bureaucratic culture in Western governments and the legacy of low-intensity conflicts.
The core difference between lean and JIT is that lean focuses on the customer while JIT focuses on the business side of the manufacturing process.
So, to make it simple and memorable:
Lean manufacturing is a customer-centric philosophy.
JIT manufacturing is a business-centric philosophy.
China’s near monopoly on rare earth materials is an obvious challenge here.
Stinger missile production will not be completed until 2026, in part due to component shortages.
US reports on the defence industrial base have made it clear that ramping up production in war-time may be challenging, if not impossible, due to supply chain issues and a lack of trained personnel due to the degradation of the US manufacturing base.
windwalker wrote:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bmaakY-PIAc&t=2s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IQ-MlCAfKTQ
"to abandon Taiwan would be to abandon democracy and freedom"
who's democracy, who's freedom ?
"my promise to the Taiwanese people. We are going to start making China, pay a greater price"
Says, the king.....US
seems like a reoccurring pattern...
All nations have the rights of territorial integrity but as in nature small nations have rarely the arsenal to retaliate in kind to the oppressor. Ukraine does have it but it is no match for Russia and its proxies!
yeniseri wrote:I see clearly why China invaded Tibet..so that the claim of positioning could not be questioned and that appears to solidify its position despite the many misgivings of some political entities!
"Washington, January 9, 1964"
SUBJECT
Review of Tibetan Operations
1. Summary—The CIA Tibetan Activity consists of political action, propaganda, and paramilitary activity. The purpose of the program at this stage is to keep the political concept of an autonomous Tibet alive within Tibet and among foreign nations,
Previous operations had gone to support isolated Tibetan resistance groups within Tibet and to the creation of a paramilitary force on the Nepal/Tibet border of approximately 2,000 men, 800 of whom were armed...
The cost of the Tibetan Program for FY 1964 can be summarized in approximate figures as follows:
a. Support of 2100 Tibetan guerrillas based in Nepal—$ 500,000
b. Subsidy to the Dalai Lama—$ 180,000
c.[1 line of source text not declassified] (equipment, transportation, installation, and operator training costs)—$ 225,000
d. Expenses of covert training site in Colorado—$ 400,000
e. Tibet Houses in New York, Geneva, and [less than 1 line of source text not declassified] ( 1/2 year )—$ 75,000
f. Black air transportation of Tibetan trainees from Colorado to India—$ 185,000
g. Miscellaneous (operating expenses of [less than 1 line of source text not declassified] equipment and supplies to reconnaissance teams, caching program, air resupply—not overflights, preparation stages for agent network in Tibet, agent salaries, etc.)—$ 125,000
h. Educational program for 20 selected junior Tibetan officers— $ 45,000
Total—$ 1,735,000
]All nations have the rights of territorial integrity but as in nature small nations have rarely the arsenal to retaliate in kind to the oppressor. Ukraine does have it but it is no match for Russia and its proxies!
The United States appears to have entered a new cold war with both China and Russia. And US leaders’ portrayal of the confrontation as one between democracy and authoritarianism fails the smell test, especially at a time when the same leaders are actively courting a systematic human-rights abuser like Saudi Arabia. Such hypocrisy suggests that it is at least partly global hegemony, not values, that is really at stake.
For two decades after the fall of the Iron Curtain, the US was clearly number one. But then came disastrously misguided wars in the Middle East, the 2008 financial crash, rising inequality, the opioid epidemic, and other crises that seemed to cast doubt on the superiority of America’s economic model. Moreover, between Donald Trump’s election, the attempted coup at the US Capitol, numerous mass shootings, a Republican Party bent on voter suppression, and the rise of conspiracy cults like QAnon, there is more than enough evidence to suggest that some aspects of American political and social life have become deeply pathological.
Of course, America does not want to be dethroned. But it is simply inevitable that China will outstrip the US economically, regardless of what official indicator one uses. ...'
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