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President Xi has more reasons to invade Taiwan now than usual. He is getting older, and Taiwan reunification has been on his wish-list for a long time, recently

President Xi has more reasons to invade Taiwan now than usual. He is getting older, and Taiwan reunification has been on his wish-list for a long time, recently reaffirmed and suggesting force is on the table[1]. The U.S. is currently managing a situation in Ukraine and economic problems, and China is currently in an acute COVID crisis which sparked mass protests, and a less acute economic crisis (reduced GDP growth). A war would be a great distraction for the local population. The inevitable sanctions and disruption of chip production would excuse poor GDP growth. To top it off, a "glorious victory" (Pyrrhic victory) is pretty likely. The U.S. has global reach, but it's still not as logistically feasible for the U.S. to fight from staged forces in Japan and the Philippines as it is for China to fight from their home territory. [1] https://www.newsweek.com/xi-jinping-speech-suggests-china-invade-taiwan-promise-force-1752215 https://www.newsweek.com/xi-jinping-speech-suggests-china-in...

bamboozled 4y ago
It's a big call though, to risk starting a war and pissing off the population if they're already not to happy about Covid19's handling. In contrast, Hitler made Germans feel like they were heading for a better place so he garnered support, Xi though, doesn't seem as charismatic and popular. So it's going to be a much harder sell to start an all out hot war over something that means basically nothing to 99% of the population. Also invading a country is one thing, hanging onto it is another, Syria, Afganistan, Vietnam etc for example. China isn't exactly going to make friends taking the country by force.
- throwaway290 4y ago
  Population's attitude has been prepared by the party well in advance. Lots of people are pissed off because Taiwan is not invaded yet, not the other way around.
  - another_story 4y ago
    Are they really? A small but vocal (and sometimes state supported) group of people are actually mad. Another group will mindlessly mouth such sentiment, but the majority seem not to care and just want to get on with their lives.
    - honkler 4y ago
      tyranny of the minority, as taleb would say.
  - bamboozled 4y ago
    You would have very little chance of knowing what Chinese people are thinking by the fact that thinking the wrong thing, let alone vocalizing it could maybe ruin you or your families life.
    - throwaway290 4y ago
      If literally all people whose opinion matters to you say and provide sound arguments that Taiwan needs to be annexed then if you are normal human (not a psycho) you'd eventually believe the same. And then who cares what those people really thought, because their expressed opinion is the only one that mattered. Sad, yes. The big issue with totalitarian regimes I guess.
- 8note 4y ago
  Xi has sold that Taiwan is part of china, and that it's weird that Chinese people can't visit without a passport China is continuing to hold tibet as an invader of course, same with Xinjiang. America and western powers doesn't guarantee failure. Eg. Afghanistan has never been held by westerners, but has been by the persians many times
  - QuarterReptile 4y ago
    I asked some Chinese college students about this about 10 years ago. "What is Taiwan?" "Province of China." "But don't you need a visa to visit?" "It's a special province."
    - bamboozled 4y ago
      Chinese college students are very likely to tell you one thing and believe another, it's a symptom of growing up in a place where having the wrong thing can get you in a lot of trouble. People aren't that dumb, even if they are brainwashed.
      - throwaway290 4y ago
        How can you assume a person believes something other than what they say when there is no way for you to measure what they think except through their actions and their words?
        bamboozled 4y ago
        Because I believe most people deep down don't want war, or invasion and aggression. Most people given the choice would rather live peacefully with others. The outlier here is there is 1 billion+ Chinese furious and ready to invade China. Not the other way around.
        throwaway290 4y ago
        That's your philosophical position then, are humans innately good or not. I wish it was true but in the entire history of humanity tribes fought for resources, did they change...
- eyelidlessness 4y ago
  [flagged]
- komali2 4y ago
  Xi is incredibly popular across the PRC, and the textbooks are changing to enforce a new cult of personality. I wouldn't risk speculating on his popularity as a measure of whether or not an imperialist invasion would happen.
  - ssnistfajen 4y ago
    The whitepaper protests clearly shows he doesn't enjoy incredible popularity, so are the massive censorship term lists that consist solely of nicknames of Xi. Why would so many of these terms exist if everybody liked him? Leaked censorship list of 564 terms containing references to Xi Jinping from Xiaohongshu, a popular social media app, circa 2020: https://chinadigitaltimes.net/space/%E5%B0%8F%E7%BA%A2%E4%B9%A6%E5%AE%A1%E6%9F%A5%E7%99%BE%E7%A7%91%EF%BC%9A%E4%B9%A0%E8%BF%91%E5%B9%B3%E6%95%8F%E6%84%9F%E8%AF%8D%E5%BA%93 https://chinadigitaltimes.net/space/%E5%B0%8F%E7%BA%A2%E4%B9... Leaked censorship list of 35467 terms containing references to Xi Jinping from LeTV, a once-popular video streaming service, issued directly from the State Council Information Office, circa 2016: https://chinadigitaltimes.net/space/%E5%9B%BD%E6%96%B0%E5%8A%9E%E4%B9%A0%E8%BF%91%E5%B9%B3%E6%95%8F%E6%84%9F%E8%AF%8D%E5%BA%93 https://chinadigitaltimes.net/space/%E5%9B%BD%E6%96%B0%E5%8A... The bottom line is an invasion of Taiwan carries a high risk of ruin for the ruling clique in the CCP. There were multiple times when the ROC was in much more vulnerable positions both militarily and diplomatically (pre-Korean War and post-US-PRC approachment) and invasions didn't happen then. The PRC is much more export-dependent than Russia despite all the nationalist hysteria, and ruining all that with sanctions is going to do far more damage to themselves compared to simply keeping the propaganda machine running with inciteful editorials without organizing an actual military campaign.
- lesuorac 4y ago
  > In contrast, Hitler made Germans feel like they were heading for a better place so he garnered support I mean, the Nazi's cap'd out at 37% [1] when they initially became the largest party and that dropped to 33% by the next vote. The average German never felt that he would lead them to a better place (otherwise it'd be 50+% not 37%) and more Germans felt Nazis were doing a poor job once they started governing. Also, this is a First-Past-The-Poll situation so parties's popularity will be inflated in the voting results. i.e. more than 10x people voted for Nazi Party than were registered members; presumably the vast majority of Germans thought a different party would do better but between the Nazis or the Communists they picked the Nazis. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler%27s_rise_to_power#Seizure_of_control_(1931%E2%80%931933) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler%27s_rise_to_power...
philliphaydon 4y ago
> reunification Unification You can’t reunify something that wasn’t unified before.
- inawarminister 4y ago
  Hmm? The Qing Empire, which both the PRC and ROC claims to be successors of, held both China and Taiwan for 250 years (until Japanese conquest of Taiwan)
  - MangoCoffee 4y ago
    China and Taiwan is technically still at war like North and South Korea.
  - philliphaydon 4y ago
    Taiwan has never been under control of the Qing dynasty. The Ming dynasty pushed out the Dutch. 200 years of Qing rule did nothing with Taiwan. At the end of the Qing dynasty they decided to call Taiwan a province to deter Japan from invading. When japan invaded they threw their hands in the air and handed Taiwan over. Japan was not even convinced Taiwan belonged to China. The Qing dynasty had to convince Japan by claiming there are other parts of the world where tribes live even tho the country is ruled. Before 1943 the CCP called Taiwan an independent nation and nationality. They advocated for Taiwan independence. Mao said they would help Korea and Taiwan seek independence. It wasn’t until the allied forces asked KMT to adminster Taiwan until a later date that the CCP decided Taiwan belonged to them. Taiwans claims to China are due to KMT writing the constitution. The reality is people in Taiwan don’t consider China part of Taiwan. Taiwan is its own country and they don’t care about China. They want to continue to live their life in peace.
    - ssnistfajen 4y ago
      >Taiwan has never been under control of the Qing dynasty 131 citations and 86 sources say you were wrong: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_under_Qing_rule https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_under_Qing_rule Yes most of the eastern parts were unclaimed because the concept of nation sovereignty had yet to reach East Asia, but the era of Qing rule is very much integral to the history of Taiwan because majority ethno-cultural group directly descended from those who lived under Qing rule. >Mao said they would help Korea and Taiwan seek independence. Mao also said his home province of Hunan should also seek independence: https://www.jstor.org/stable/652585 https://www.jstor.org/stable/652585. Sun Yat-sen wanted to drive out all Manchus in his original revolutionary manifesto yet happily accepted the new multi-ethnic ROC that completely inherited most of the land that were not historically inhabited by ethnic Han. People change their views all the time, especially politicians who have much to gain from having flexible views. And yes "reunification" is a direct translation of PRC political jargon that carries the (false) connotation of Taiwan being a breakaway province when in reality it was the CCP who broke away from the ROC in a rebellion to create their own country. Revisionist history is bad history no matter which side it comes from.
etempleton 4y ago
If an invasion is to happen it probably has to happen the next decade. Xi is getting older and China's population has now officially started to decline. I can't see an invasion happening without massive loss of life on both sides and destroying Taiwan's value. Perhaps their plan is to conduct a massive long-term blockade. This would be more in-line China's typical actions of being aggressive in diplomacy and in stretching the boundaries of international law. If they outnumber the US in the Pacific what can the US do but watch? The US almost certainly would be unwilling to fire the first shot.
- lambo4bkfast 4y ago
  Given that their population is on decline, why would sacrificing many of their young population be to their benefit?
  - etempleton 4y ago
    That is why I think they might be more inclined to conduct a blockade.
  - bioemerl 4y ago
    You take what you can while you're powerful, it's easier to defend what you have when you're weak. Russia is in the exact same boat, they were running out of time and young people as well
  - int_19h 4y ago
    It probably wouldn't be to the benefit of China as a country. But that might not matter given how much Xi has consolidated power - the question is whether it benefits him. And if he wants to end up in the history books as "great leader who completed reunification of the country" or some such, he might have to rush even if that significantly increases the costs. (There are good reasons to believe that something similar wrt Putin is the primary motivation behind the war in Ukraine, BTW.)
  - esturk 4y ago
    That's more true of Taiwan's population. Taiwan's fertility rate is set to be the world's lowest.[1] So it doesn't seem like the population is Taiwan's advantage. [1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/04/21/asia-pacific/social-issues-asia-pacific/taiwan-birthrate-children/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/04/21/asia-pacific/so...
ssnistfajen 4y ago
A war would be a great distraction for the local population until the quick victories stop happening. They would only do it when they have nothing to lose. And based on the amount of children of CCP officials in Ivy League schools (including Xi's own daughter) and Wall Street firms, they do have everything to lose for the foreseeable future. I firmly believe in the odds of a hot war being extremely low until the children of high ranking CCP officials start a mass exodus from their comfy white collar lives in the Western world, much like Putin recalling his yachts on the eve of the war in Ukraine.

bamboozled 4y ago

It's a big call though, to risk starting a war and pissing off the population if they're already not to happy about Covid19's handling. In contrast, Hitler made Germans feel like they were heading for a better place so he garnered support, Xi though, doesn't seem as charismatic and popular. So it's going to be a much harder sell to start an all out hot war over something that means basically nothing to 99% of the population. Also invading a country is one thing, hanging onto it is another, Syria, Afganistan, Vietnam etc for example. China isn't exactly going to make friends taking the country by force.

throwaway290 4y ago
Population's attitude has been prepared by the party well in advance. Lots of people are pissed off because Taiwan is not invaded yet, not the other way around.
- another_story 4y ago
  Are they really? A small but vocal (and sometimes state supported) group of people are actually mad. Another group will mindlessly mouth such sentiment, but the majority seem not to care and just want to get on with their lives.
  - honkler 4y ago
    tyranny of the minority, as taleb would say.
- bamboozled 4y ago
  You would have very little chance of knowing what Chinese people are thinking by the fact that thinking the wrong thing, let alone vocalizing it could maybe ruin you or your families life.
  - throwaway290 4y ago
    If literally all people whose opinion matters to you say and provide sound arguments that Taiwan needs to be annexed then if you are normal human (not a psycho) you'd eventually believe the same. And then who cares what those people really thought, because their expressed opinion is the only one that mattered. Sad, yes. The big issue with totalitarian regimes I guess.
8note 4y ago
Xi has sold that Taiwan is part of china, and that it's weird that Chinese people can't visit without a passport China is continuing to hold tibet as an invader of course, same with Xinjiang. America and western powers doesn't guarantee failure. Eg. Afghanistan has never been held by westerners, but has been by the persians many times
- QuarterReptile 4y ago
  I asked some Chinese college students about this about 10 years ago. "What is Taiwan?" "Province of China." "But don't you need a visa to visit?" "It's a special province."
  - bamboozled 4y ago
    Chinese college students are very likely to tell you one thing and believe another, it's a symptom of growing up in a place where having the wrong thing can get you in a lot of trouble. People aren't that dumb, even if they are brainwashed.
    - throwaway290 4y ago
      How can you assume a person believes something other than what they say when there is no way for you to measure what they think except through their actions and their words?
      - bamboozled 4y ago
        Because I believe most people deep down don't want war, or invasion and aggression. Most people given the choice would rather live peacefully with others. The outlier here is there is 1 billion+ Chinese furious and ready to invade China. Not the other way around.
        throwaway290 4y ago
        That's your philosophical position then, are humans innately good or not. I wish it was true but in the entire history of humanity tribes fought for resources, did they change...
eyelidlessness 4y ago
[flagged]
komali2 4y ago
Xi is incredibly popular across the PRC, and the textbooks are changing to enforce a new cult of personality. I wouldn't risk speculating on his popularity as a measure of whether or not an imperialist invasion would happen.
- ssnistfajen 4y ago
  The whitepaper protests clearly shows he doesn't enjoy incredible popularity, so are the massive censorship term lists that consist solely of nicknames of Xi. Why would so many of these terms exist if everybody liked him? Leaked censorship list of 564 terms containing references to Xi Jinping from Xiaohongshu, a popular social media app, circa 2020: https://chinadigitaltimes.net/space/%E5%B0%8F%E7%BA%A2%E4%B9%A6%E5%AE%A1%E6%9F%A5%E7%99%BE%E7%A7%91%EF%BC%9A%E4%B9%A0%E8%BF%91%E5%B9%B3%E6%95%8F%E6%84%9F%E8%AF%8D%E5%BA%93 https://chinadigitaltimes.net/space/%E5%B0%8F%E7%BA%A2%E4%B9... Leaked censorship list of 35467 terms containing references to Xi Jinping from LeTV, a once-popular video streaming service, issued directly from the State Council Information Office, circa 2016: https://chinadigitaltimes.net/space/%E5%9B%BD%E6%96%B0%E5%8A%9E%E4%B9%A0%E8%BF%91%E5%B9%B3%E6%95%8F%E6%84%9F%E8%AF%8D%E5%BA%93 https://chinadigitaltimes.net/space/%E5%9B%BD%E6%96%B0%E5%8A... The bottom line is an invasion of Taiwan carries a high risk of ruin for the ruling clique in the CCP. There were multiple times when the ROC was in much more vulnerable positions both militarily and diplomatically (pre-Korean War and post-US-PRC approachment) and invasions didn't happen then. The PRC is much more export-dependent than Russia despite all the nationalist hysteria, and ruining all that with sanctions is going to do far more damage to themselves compared to simply keeping the propaganda machine running with inciteful editorials without organizing an actual military campaign.
lesuorac 4y ago
> In contrast, Hitler made Germans feel like they were heading for a better place so he garnered support I mean, the Nazi's cap'd out at 37% [1] when they initially became the largest party and that dropped to 33% by the next vote. The average German never felt that he would lead them to a better place (otherwise it'd be 50+% not 37%) and more Germans felt Nazis were doing a poor job once they started governing. Also, this is a First-Past-The-Poll situation so parties's popularity will be inflated in the voting results. i.e. more than 10x people voted for Nazi Party than were registered members; presumably the vast majority of Germans thought a different party would do better but between the Nazis or the Communists they picked the Nazis. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler%27s_rise_to_power#Seizure_of_control_(1931%E2%80%931933) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adolf_Hitler%27s_rise_to_power...

philliphaydon 4y ago

> reunification Unification You can’t reunify something that wasn’t unified before.

inawarminister 4y ago
Hmm? The Qing Empire, which both the PRC and ROC claims to be successors of, held both China and Taiwan for 250 years (until Japanese conquest of Taiwan)
- MangoCoffee 4y ago
  China and Taiwan is technically still at war like North and South Korea.
- philliphaydon 4y ago
  Taiwan has never been under control of the Qing dynasty. The Ming dynasty pushed out the Dutch. 200 years of Qing rule did nothing with Taiwan. At the end of the Qing dynasty they decided to call Taiwan a province to deter Japan from invading. When japan invaded they threw their hands in the air and handed Taiwan over. Japan was not even convinced Taiwan belonged to China. The Qing dynasty had to convince Japan by claiming there are other parts of the world where tribes live even tho the country is ruled. Before 1943 the CCP called Taiwan an independent nation and nationality. They advocated for Taiwan independence. Mao said they would help Korea and Taiwan seek independence. It wasn’t until the allied forces asked KMT to adminster Taiwan until a later date that the CCP decided Taiwan belonged to them. Taiwans claims to China are due to KMT writing the constitution. The reality is people in Taiwan don’t consider China part of Taiwan. Taiwan is its own country and they don’t care about China. They want to continue to live their life in peace.
  - ssnistfajen 4y ago
    >Taiwan has never been under control of the Qing dynasty 131 citations and 86 sources say you were wrong: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_under_Qing_rule https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_under_Qing_rule Yes most of the eastern parts were unclaimed because the concept of nation sovereignty had yet to reach East Asia, but the era of Qing rule is very much integral to the history of Taiwan because majority ethno-cultural group directly descended from those who lived under Qing rule. >Mao said they would help Korea and Taiwan seek independence. Mao also said his home province of Hunan should also seek independence: https://www.jstor.org/stable/652585 https://www.jstor.org/stable/652585. Sun Yat-sen wanted to drive out all Manchus in his original revolutionary manifesto yet happily accepted the new multi-ethnic ROC that completely inherited most of the land that were not historically inhabited by ethnic Han. People change their views all the time, especially politicians who have much to gain from having flexible views. And yes "reunification" is a direct translation of PRC political jargon that carries the (false) connotation of Taiwan being a breakaway province when in reality it was the CCP who broke away from the ROC in a rebellion to create their own country. Revisionist history is bad history no matter which side it comes from.

etempleton 4y ago

If an invasion is to happen it probably has to happen the next decade. Xi is getting older and China's population has now officially started to decline. I can't see an invasion happening without massive loss of life on both sides and destroying Taiwan's value. Perhaps their plan is to conduct a massive long-term blockade. This would be more in-line China's typical actions of being aggressive in diplomacy and in stretching the boundaries of international law. If they outnumber the US in the Pacific what can the US do but watch? The US almost certainly would be unwilling to fire the first shot.

lambo4bkfast 4y ago
Given that their population is on decline, why would sacrificing many of their young population be to their benefit?
- etempleton 4y ago
  That is why I think they might be more inclined to conduct a blockade.
- bioemerl 4y ago
  You take what you can while you're powerful, it's easier to defend what you have when you're weak. Russia is in the exact same boat, they were running out of time and young people as well
- int_19h 4y ago
  It probably wouldn't be to the benefit of China as a country. But that might not matter given how much Xi has consolidated power - the question is whether it benefits him. And if he wants to end up in the history books as "great leader who completed reunification of the country" or some such, he might have to rush even if that significantly increases the costs. (There are good reasons to believe that something similar wrt Putin is the primary motivation behind the war in Ukraine, BTW.)
- esturk 4y ago
  That's more true of Taiwan's population. Taiwan's fertility rate is set to be the world's lowest.[1] So it doesn't seem like the population is Taiwan's advantage. [1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/04/21/asia-pacific/social-issues-asia-pacific/taiwan-birthrate-children/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2021/04/21/asia-pacific/so...

ssnistfajen 4y ago

A war would be a great distraction for the local population until the quick victories stop happening. They would only do it when they have nothing to lose. And based on the amount of children of CCP officials in Ivy League schools (including Xi's own daughter) and Wall Street firms, they do have everything to lose for the foreseeable future. I firmly believe in the odds of a hot war being extremely low until the children of high ranking CCP officials start a mass exodus from their comfy white collar lives in the Western world, much like Putin recalling his yachts on the eve of the war in Ukraine.