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I think "we'll have Washington DC nuked because Trump doesn't like to appear weak" would be the bigger underestimate by far. Trump's ego is not worth that much. Sorry, there won't be WWIII over Taiwan.
Such as?
They're not. The Plan A is intimidation, sticks and carrots, and gradual reunification after KMT victory in 2028, read this again. The military buildup is just plan B + generic upgrading befitting a major power, executed very leisurely, with a negligible fraction of their industrial capacity (still enough to dwarf all "free world" efforts combined). Americans, in contrast, enormously underestimate China which is why they simply ignore the plan A (for Fukuyamist reasons, "no way they can pull off a bloodless takeover!") and fantasize about mowing down hordes of underfed commie bugs doing a meat wave invasion. You, as a vassal citizen, are simply brainwashed.
Sloganeering. Nuclear wars are not started over boomer sloganeering. Taiwan doesn't have security guarantees or recognition as a sovereign state from the US, and Trump repeatedly waffles on whether it'll be supported in any fashion; he easily freezes weapon shipments without warning, for example. Not to mention he simply loathes Taiwan because of his weird belief that trade is bad and Americans are getting ripped off when they buy 2nm chips.
You can't convince me that this conveniently lukewarm attitude will transform into a bitter existential commitment when The Time Comes, especially over Trump's ego, and neither can you convince Beijing. You… don't even overestimate the West, you just have some insane degree of entitlement and main character syndrome if you believe that this lazy bluster will be seriously entertained.
Where is the preparation for war commensurate with (again, very low-effort) Chinese buildup? Fallback to nuclear bluffs is very spiritually Russian, and Russians didn't nuke Ukraine either.
I predict that if Japan chooses suicide, Americans will sit that out, and this is being communicated.
We go from declaring China's industrial base the best in the world to failing to grok why Trump would want to move cutting-edge chip manufacturing from China's border to the Southwest. Pick a lane, Trump's motivations aren't that inscrutable, you can have your cake and eat it too and still call him a narcissist if you want.
Latest estimate from Fed of Atlanta is GDP growth of 5.1%, US defense spending topping $1 Trillion, announcement from Space Force of weapons systems in orbit, manufacturers reshoring to US, AI buildout, Starship. You don't have to believe it will work but it is being attempted, there are very smart people working on this exact problem and some of them are at the highest levels of government. It's not the Obama era anymore, America is building more than social media and carbon credits.
Do you deny that Trump explicitly claims that Taiwan is ripping Americans off? Because he does.
Moving chip industry off the Chinese coast is indeed rational and, if anything, reinforces my assertion that the US is not interested in a nuclear war (or, really, any war) over the island. If TSMC Arizona and such is scaled up, that's even less reason to intervene in the Strait.
Most of that has zero relation to Taiwan (but may be relevant on a longer time horizon for a generic competition with China). The US has just burned through maybe 50% of munitions that were supposed to be necessary for deterring PLAN in the Strait. Nobody is getting ready to stop the Chinese invasion.
You might be confused. I'm not arguing that the US stands no chance against the PRC in general, I'm saying very specifically, that there is no political will in the US to intervene over Taiwan, especially to the extent that might escalate to nuclear exchange. The idea is ludicrous, and the stuff about Neville Chamberlain is not going to make it less so.
The Chinese also know they're not Nazis and nobody seriously expects them to be Nazis. It's not credible.
Neat, you get to agree with Trump in one register and insult him in another, after putting enough rhetorical distance between Our Blessed Homelands and Their Barbarous Wastes.
The story about US burning through THAADs was basically fake news that relied on conflating old systems and some prototypes with munitions in general. Mostly, though, I don't believe these stories and estimates that rely on the commentariat somehow having precise knowledge of how large the American arsenal is. (What I mean is: this kind of estimate is so obviously bullshit that it reflects badly on your infodiet if you believe it.)
I get to be correct and still not be a bootlicker like you, indeed. Convenient, that.
What rhetorical distance? This and that are different issues. Trump lies. Lies all the time. Lies egregiously, spreads libels, has zero dignity, no regard for truth and honesty etc. In particular he lies about Taiwan stealing the chip industry from the United States.
You, Shakes, are a natural slave and brownshirt, a cardboard cutout of the authoritarian personality type from Adorno's book, so you idolize your strongman and excuse his lies as well as any other sign of his moral degeneracy. Perhaps you could defend this with the rationale that in the American culture it'd be difficult to rally the constituency for reindustrialization without making up an offense and spreading bitchy, whiny libel about your client state. That, of course, would point to an even deeper moral degeneracy of your culture. But you didn't even bother to do that, instead you try to invent some hypocrisy and double standard, and perhaps you even truly interpret my words as such, because you are in fact a barbarian who, like Trump, doesn't have any standard except the standard of safe opportunity for pillage and extraction. I'm not sure. It's hard for me to model the "mindset" of a true patriot.
This is a popular cope in some patriotic circles. However, these are not some black projects, the budget for standard munitions is reported to the Congress, the production rate of PrSM or ATACMS is not difficult to reconstruct.
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