On Jun 15, 12:41*pm, "Michael Shirley" wrote:
On Wed, 04 Jun 2008 10:53:26 -0700, PaPaPeng wrote:

This long thread is evidence that the Chinese are already messing up
your minds from across the Pacific and in your own front yard (1.2%.)
Do the South Asians (Indians), Russians, Europeans, Arabs, anyone else
out there?, pose the same amount of concern about your place in the
global scene? *Nope. *China has displaced the USSR as your enemy #1.

* * * * It doesn't help that China has decided that we're their primary enemy *
too, and I can recall one speech by Chi Haotian that makes me rather *
nervous when I think of it. If you look at Chinese foreign policy for the *
last twenty five years or so, it strongly resembles a Weiqi game on a *
board designed by Halford MacKinder and Karl Hausehoffer.

* * * * I've got to give them a great deal of credit though. We build weapons and *
hope that we can come up with the logistics to deploy and support them. *
The Chinese built the logistical structure first and deferred weapons *
acquisition until they could support it. We could learn something from *
that,...

* * * * It's one of the big reasons that I hope that we don't attack Iran, *
(another SCO member) and that we get out of the Middle East. If you ask *
que bono, the only winner regardless of what we do or how well, will be *
Beijing.

* * * * In the end, I hope we stay out of a direct armed conflict in any case. *
We're a post industrial technological power with a rapidly declining *
industrial base while China is a rising industrial power and the *
preeminent industrial power on the planet-- what we were in WW-II. Given *
our lack of convertable industrial base and our tendency to buy boutique *
weapons systems that are too precious to hazard and impossible to replace *
in wartime, all China has to do in order to win is simply not lose.

* * * * I'd just as soon avoid two things. First a modern equivalent of the *
Russo-Japanese War with us playing the Czar's part, and a situation where *
we both work to exhaust each other like the Persians and the Byzantines, *
since in the end, your Islamic proxies would come to devour us both. *
(Which may be their intention. They study history too.)
--
"Implications leading to ramifications leading to shenanigans"-- Admiral *
Elmo Zumwalt, USN.

I highly doubt China will do anything to stop US from attacking Iran
if the US were really determined to do so. And I don't think the
biggest problem for US in a hypothetical war with Iran would be China
or Chinese arm sale to Iran. Just like Iraq, US would waste trillions
of dollars and thousands, even tens of thousands of casualties and a
further trash-down of American reputation and credibility in an
attempt to pacify Iran, however the military performs, the result
would still be a Iran deeply suspicious of America with more than
enough political entities waiting to take-over after a withdrawal. The
mindset of certain group of Americans often seen on this group is just
like typical American consumer who put "what I want" way ahead of
"what I can afford", they will talk about security, Bin Laden,
"mushroom cloud" incessantly while completely disregard whether or not
America can actually afford fighting another or even multiple Iraq
style war. One historical lesson seems to have totally lost on them:
when a great power overextend itself for too long, it will collapse.
The collapse of Soviet Union didn't teach them anything, on the
contrary, they seem to hold even more tightly to the naive belief
America will not overspend itself into collapse simply because America
is a democracy and has a free market system. They bear a eerie
resemblance to the bunch of army officers who dragged Imperial Japan
into WWII: one Japanese officer once told the minister of finance that
"we are soldiers, we don't know nothing about budget and fiance,all we
know is that for the security of our empire, we need this, if you
can't deliver, we will find somebody else who can". Afghanistan did
pose a threat to Soviet security, so with the same mindset, Soviet
leadership decided to invade, guess what, Soviet Union collapsed
partially because of the astronomical cost, security, geopolitical
intricacy, military posture, blah blah blah all become moot if you
can't keep a healthy domestic economy and keep your spending under
control.