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ZorbaTHut  1yr ago (text post)   31256 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of October 17, 2022

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Meanwhile this all looks like nothing but roses for China.

I've been unable to decide how China is supposed to feel about Russia's humiliation here, given their presumably similar concern over Taiwan. On one hand, I can imagine "I'm glad they fell into the trap assuming that Western nations are too weak to oppose hostile imperialist takeovers rather than us", but also "Why did Russia have to go and ruin the surprise that it's time for a little imperialism? Now they'll be prepared for us." I'm not really sure which is more credible: perhaps even both to some extent.

If China has designs on Taiwan, then it can't be feeling too good. It's tough to remember now, but back in February everyone was expecting the Russians to roll right over Ukraine and take over the government within weeks, if not days. It was assumed that the Russian army was better trained and better equipped than the ragtag Ukrainian forces which couldn't even retake the breakaway territories in the Donbas. It also wasn't clear whether pro-Russian sentiment in the East would stymie Ukraine's defenses with indifference; it's easy to lay down if you don't really care which side wins and just want to prevent your home from being destroyed. Nine months later, the Russians are completely exposed. Most commentators agree that Russia has little chance of winning this war the way things stand and talk is about desperation tactics like full mobilization or use of nuclear weapons. Even Putin's downfall, which most serious commentators brushed off at the beginning of the war as a pipe dream, is now being discussed earnestly. Taking over Taiwan would involve an amphibious assault in a short weather window and is thus a much riskier proposition. Given that a military that was assumed to be incompetent has been giving fits to one that was supposed to beat them handily, Chinese leaders may be exhibiting a greater unwillingness to put themselves in a similar situation.

It’s probably something important to point out here, that the style of regime both Russia and China exhibit(personal dictatorships) generally have relatively inflexible military structures that perform comparably worse against forces from democratic governments that can give their troops a longer leash in the field.

The problems within autocracies are that there is always incentives to suppress the free and open flow of information. The sort-of classic text in this genre is Why Arabs Lose Wars, but the problems extend to all closed societies

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