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US general warns troops that war with China is possible in two years
- wheelerof4te 4y agoWhy do people predicts such things? Why aren't your working towards a peaceful solution instead?
- rcme 4y agoWhat is a peaceful solution?
- Overtonwindow 4y agoA dramatic and sudden coup that overthrows the communist party of China, and elects a free and democratic government.
- mr90210 4y agoAs if democratic governments don't start wars. Yeah right.
- Ekaros 4y agoIf they are not declared are they wars?
- CogitoCogito 4y ago> If they are not declared are they wars? I'm not sure if this is sarcasm, but yes of course they are.
- wheelerof4te 4y agoIf history is the guide, the most "democratic" governemnt on the planet has so far started the most wars. It seems like, the more democratic you are, the more wars youstart. Except, the USA is trully a Republic. Figures, same as Rome.
- aintgonnatakeit 4y ago[flagged]
- wheelerof4te 4y agoIt's a fact. Deal with it.
- LarryMullins 4y agoElsewhere in this discussion you are blaming America for Russia's decision to start a war with Ukraine. Obviously you have been steeping in authoritarian anti-American propaganda. You should probably stop doing that.
- yucky 4y agoAcknowledging the role of the US State Dept & CIA in the 2014 coup in Ukraine, doesn't require thinking Putin is a saint or even justified. But denying our role in the coup is denying reality.
- netsharc 4y ago[flagged]
- mr90210 4y ago“Ego protection” Almost as deep to a person as religion.
- zug_zug 4y agoWhat wars has canada started, eh?
- wheelerof4te 4y ago[flagged]
- CogitoCogito 4y ago> How about, overthrowing the traitor puppet government in Taiwan and peacefully uniting with the mainland? > Oh, and yeeting the Yankies out of Taiwan. You are calling for China to go to war with Taiwan and to call it peace. Why not just be open about it? What's the purpose of pretending you're advocating peace when you're clearly advocating for war?
- jeoqn 4y ago[flagged]
- rcme 4y agoAre coups typically peaceful?
- mr90210 4y agoAlmost never.
- Overtonwindow 4y agoQuite a number of nonviolent revolutions have occured. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonviolent_revolution https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonviolent_revolution
- LarryMullins 4y agoRelatively so. The Romanian Revolution in 1989 killed less than two thousand people (including Ceaușescu and his wife, who's well deserved executions were the last executions in Romanian history.) And what was the cost of peace? Ceaușescu and his wife killed far more than 2000 Romanians every year with their brutal communist regime.
- mytailorisrich 4y agoActually I don't think that's a good scenario for the US as, if anything, that'd ultimately make China a more formidable adversary and reunification with Taiwan more likely (which the US and Japan do not want for strategic reasons).
- turbobooster 4y agoTikTok dance collabs
- worldsavior 4y agoBecause there never will be.
- wheelerof4te 4y agoFor starters, how about stop provoking China using military drills (and assistance!) with Taiwan and sending carriers through Sout China Sea?
- LarryMullins 4y ago>Abandon Taiwan How about No.
- wheelerof4te 4y agoWhy not? What is there to gain? EDIT: Except WWIII?
- AndrewPGameDev 4y agoWe obviously can't just let tyrants like Xi invade another country. Furthermore, if China invaded Taiwan it would be China starting WWIII not America.
- smcl 4y agoThis user is way too far down the rabbit hole to be persuaded by mere trifling matters such as “facts” or “the events that actually happened”, they look beyond that into the unprovable unknown and concoct a fantasy reality. People like this see Russia invading Crimea, Donetsk and Luhansk in 2014 and go “ah-ha, clearly the work of the USA”. They see Russia launch a full scale invasion in 2022, and see a secret USA/NATO plot to destabilise Russia. They see Trump losing an election and deduce that it must have been some pro-war nefarious deep state trickery. They are broken, unless you want to have a bit of fun winding them up a bit you would have a more enriching conversation with a brick wall :-)
- 4y ago
- tomrod 4y agoTypically: - Budget - Seen as a leading voice - True conviction Any one of the three are enough.
- whynotminot 4y agoHe's a man of war. It's his job to prepare those under his command for non-peaceful scenarios. He would be failing at this if he did not instill discipline and rigor into the forces he's responsible for. It starts with putting them in the mindset for battle. It's not his job to make peace. It's his job to put a well-honed weapon into the hands of the Statesman back in Washington. It is their purview to actually preserve the peace through diplomacy. But make no mistake, the peace starts with China understanding that the weapon in-hand is sharp and ready.
- seanmcdirmid 4y agoThe guy said war was possible, well, duh, it’s always possible. Is it more likely? Ya, if China makes a military play for Taiwan, the USA is most definitely getting involved (but you think Russia’s failure in the Ukraine would have dissuaded them?). It would be dumb for America to assume no war is possible as dumb as it would be for America to instigate that war themselves.
- wheelerof4te 4y agoWhat is the USA's goal in Taiwan? Why should USA risk WWIII because of it? And what is the USA even doing in China's sphere of influence, if not provoke? Do you see Chinese shipps patrolling the Mexican bay?
- whynotminot 4y agoUSA's goal is Taiwan that continues to govern itself freely. This has been stated many times over. China's sphere of influence? Are you also an apologist for Russia's adventures within their claimed "sphere of influence" ?
- wheelerof4te 4y agoI see how the Ukraine is governing itself "freely", ever since the coup in 2014th.
- Lio 4y agoSi vis pacem, para bellum. That's sue for peace, prepare for war and it's as true now as when it was first written.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- watwut 4y agoThat phrase tends to be mainly popular in societies that starts the wars tho. Like, neonazi like to tattoo it. So, imo, that phrase primary serves to get ready for violence you intend to start, all the while you are convincing yourself your intentions are good and you are just a victim of circumstances.
- wheelerof4te 4y agoImagine the wealth of the Western countries if they did not start any war ever. Yeah, I can't either.
- throwanem 4y agoThat's "If you wish for peace, prepare for war." It's good advice; all else equal, the visibly weak are more often assaulted than the visibly strong. But it can be taken to excess; it's one thing to carry oneself as if one means business, and quite another to go everywhere with one's finger on the trigger of a shotgun with a chambered shell. After a certain point, you make people feel they need to defend themselves from you.
- LarryMullins 4y agoThe US has been working towards peace with China since 1972. These predictions of imminent war are the culmination of those decades of effort.
- echelon 4y agoThe fate of Taiwan sets the geopolitical and economic tone for the remainder of the century. Whichever side wins (if there is a clear victor) will see more of the world shift alliances and trade to them. I wrote a little about it here [1]. [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34418600 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=34418600
- trashtester 4y agoIt might set the tone for 20-40 years, not 75 years. And it may do it in different ways than you may think. Should the US win such a war, it may cause China to go even more militaristic than they currently are, and seek a rematch in 2050, or so. That's what happened after WW1, and there are plenty of cases throughout history of countries losing a war going for a rematch 1-2 generations later. And IF there is a rematch in 2050, even if China loses again, the economic costs of two such conflicts may drain both countries to such a degree that a new power emerges as dominant. India would be the most likely candidate, but by the end of the century, one could even imagine a rejuvenated Europe
- NicoJuicy 4y agoYeah, that worked out great with Russia. Peace by trade failed.
- wheelerof4te 4y agoWar in Ukraine started in 2014th, with the violent coup orchestrated by the USA. If that didn't happen, there would simply be no war in Ukraine.
- netsharc 4y agoFine, I'll bite... Because if the president is corrupt and the population is angry about it, it's USA's (or EU's) fault? There's a good record of Yanukovych's luxury residence (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mezhyhirya_Residence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mezhyhirya_Residence), do you believe is it also just Western lies and propaganda? Maybe the Western governments should just let protesters know that they the support corrupt governments? Of course it's hardly a good argument from me because this is what the West does a lot, e.g. with Saudi Arabia or the Egyptian government before the Arab revolution. I suppose what you want is everyone supporting authoritarian governments, because hey, at least there the oppression is quiet and doesn't involve mass violence (e.g. individuals will be tortured behind closed doors instead of masses being shot in public).
- wheelerof4te 4y ago"Because if the president is corrupt and the population is angry about it, it's USA's (or EU's) fault? There's a good record of Yanukovych's luxury residence (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mezhyhirya_Residence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mezhyhirya_Residence), do you believe is it also just Western lies and propaganda?" This is a weak argument. There are plenty of luxurious residences in the West, from the Buckingham Palace to Palace of Versailles, etc. Why should they be exempt from the evidence of "corruption" you speak of? The second paragraph should be a clear indication that the West cares not if the country is democratic or not. As long as it serves their interests.
- postalrat 4y agoWhy do people predict servers going down?
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- mensetmanusman 4y agoBecause authoritarians are historically not very peaceful, so someone has to do the dirty job of predicting their predictable behavior. We are lucky the US was predicting the Russians were going to invade last year; the preparation saved the country (for now).
- wheelerof4te 4y agoIraq, Libya and Syria weren't so lucky.
- dirtyid 4y ago> Minihan, who as head of Air Mobility Command Domestic acquisition politics, current USAF tanking fleet lacking 50-150 airframes to persecute stand off war outside of first island chain according to analysis. AF wants grab piece of pie like everyone else, and this man wants more tankers, which would take decade+ to acquire in sufficient numbers let alone by 2025.
- throwanem 4y agoReminds me of MacArthur. Specifically, it reminds me of how MacArthur lost his job.
- subradios 4y agoAnd yet, MacArthur has been proven historically prescient.
- throwanem 4y agoYou're gonna need to expand on that one. As is, it sounds like you're saying Cold War domino theory is a live concern in 2023, but that would be just too absurd a position to imagine anyone seriously taking. In any case, what cost MacArthur his job was putting too many toes over the bright line of civilian control of the military. I don't think Minihan's being as brazen about trying to influence policy as MacArthur was, but I suspect he may be being brazen enough, both from someone having leaked this memo in the first place, and from this: > A U.S. defense official, speaking on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue, said that Minihan’s comments “are not representative of the department’s view on China.” If you don't know how to read these things, let me help you: this is DoD/military bureaucracy speak for "he fucked up."
- legutierr 4y agoOr this could have been leaked purposefully to send a signal to China that the US prepared for war if it acts against Taiwan—even if the official position is more diplomatic.
- throwanem 4y agoA deliberate leak to reinforce a hawkish foreign policy stance, for one thing, doesn't come out of a staff command. For another, it doesn't get disavowed by DoD in the military's official news outlet. There's a significant difference between "deniable" and "denied".
- Oxidation 4y agoWhile I don't think it's particularly special that military leaders tell soldiers to be ready and angle for more funding or attention, can we just imagine how breathless and fake-outraged the reporting would be if this came verbatim from a Chinese general: > ... directs airmen who are qualified to use a weapon to “fire a clip into a 7-meter target with the full understanding that unrepentant lethality matters most” sometime in February. > “Aim for the head,” he said.
- starkd 4y agoThat is what militaries do. Successful militaries do not engage in academic discussions about what pronouns to use.
- 13of40 4y agoOfficers carry pistols so they can coerce enlisted men to stand up and run into machinegun fire, not because they're meant to engage in combat. What the general is talking about is just one of those head games to make people put on their war face, like making someone attack a scarecrow with a bayonnet on a plastic M-16 while they scream about blood making the grass grow green.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- abudabi123 4y agoBecause the F-35 won't be ready to fight tonight or tomorrow night.
- rafale 4y agoThe F-35 is ready and networks well with EWACS and 4th gen fighters. It's stealth allows the navy and air force to execute many scenarios much better than before. Watch this: https://youtu.be/mGwU9HKH_Eo https://youtu.be/mGwU9HKH_Eo
- newaccount2021 4y agoNeolibs all over the internet are simultaneously - cheerleading war in Ukraine - cheerleading anti-China sentiment (on their iPhones!) - lamenting being laid off Well guess what folks - we have a massive enlistment deficit in every armed service Kill three birds with one stone, enlist today!
- Leary 4y ago2025? That late? Another general already predicted a Taiwan war would happen in 2022: https://nypost.com/2022/10/21/china-could-invade-taiwan-later-this-year-top-navy-officer-warns/ https://nypost.com/2022/10/21/china-could-invade-taiwan-late...
- earthbee 4y agoAdmiral not General, and the article pretty clearly says could not would
- kraig911 4y agoGenerals typically WANT war. Why work so hard for a saber if you can't rattle it.
- HarryHirsch 4y agoNo, it's actually like in any tech giant - staff officers want postings that make them look good to earn a promotion. War over Taiwan will no one make look good and will not lead to promotions.
- throwanem 4y agoYeah, no kidding. One thing that could easily happen in a real fight between the US and China over Taiwan is the first combat loss of an American aircraft carrier since the Second World War. Which admiral do you think wants to risk ending up with the responsibility for that?
- HarryHirsch 4y agoThat fellow who suggested going to war is in military logistics, he is an Etappenschwein, not a Frontschwein, as Ernst Jünger would have said. If anyone won't see combat, that's him!
- LarryMullins 4y agoLook up how much American generals get paid, then tell me why any general would want to rock the boat with something so uncertain and dangerous to the status quo as a war.
- markus_zhang 4y agoAssuming it is not a nuclear war, and it does happen, how can we prepare for the event?
- ninethirty 4y agoMove to South America. All you can do stateside is prepper stuff: SPAM, water filters, etc.
- Havoc 4y ago>Taiwan’s presidential elections are in 2024 and will offer Xi a reason. United States’ presidential elections are in 2024 and will offer Xi a distracted America. Xi’s team, reason, and opportunity are all aligned for 2025. It's not terrible reasoning, but there is a big gap between calendar dates & people actually shooting
- chaosbutters314 4y ago2027 is most likely. desantis unfortunately wins in 2024, america goes full isolationist. as the 2028 election approaches, china will invade to ensure desantis becomes a war president and stays out of it. pushes racist chinese talk and makes sure china takes over taiwan. american then suffers massive tech inflation from lost semis and trade driving US into 2030 recession that will push for a Dem wave in 2032. basically, the whole 2000-2008 period is starting again. sigh
- tjr225 4y ago[dead]
- jwally 4y agoPossible? Sure. An asteroid ending all life on earth is possible in the next two years. Better question is how PROBABLE is war with China?
- barbazoo 4y ago> An asteroid ending all life on earth is possible in the next two years. That's the first time I hear that. Source?
- jwally 4y agoThe point I was trying to make is that conflating POSSIBLE with PROBABLE to me smacks of click bait; my opinion. It doesn't really tell you anything meaningful but sounds extremely scary. Weasel words. A more useful quip from the general might be "shooting war with china in next two years all but certain"
- trashtester 4y agoMuch more probably than an asteroid doing that within our lifetime. Also, an astroid needs to be quite big to destroy ALL life, even bacteria deep within the Earth's crust. I would give a Chinese attempt to invide Taiwan between now and 2035 at least a 25% probability.
- midoridensha 4y agoWhen people talking about an asteroid "destroying all life", they probably don't usually mean it literally like that, but rather just all multicellular life on the surface.
- trashtester 4y agoMaybe, though my guess is that most people who use this phrase really don't know or even care precisely what they mean, beyond "cause a bigger catastrophy than humanity has ever seen". It's the same for poeple talking about extinction from nuclear war or climate change. There is little support in "The Science" for any prediction of a fatality rate of 100% from either (given current arsenals in the case of Nukes). People simply do not want to imagine what the world would be after a large scale nuclear war. So if they're given advice that would actually significantly increase survival chances (such as duck&cover, having some store of fresh water, etc), they prefer to laugh it off instead of taking it seriously.
- Sol- 4y agoMan, a Chinese-American war would be a great tragedy. Think about how many problems there are on earth and how a beneficial cooperation of these two powers would be in solving them. Climate change alone would need that, just for China's manufacturing power alone (so many cheap solar panels could happen!). Alas, realizing that war is generally bad for human welfare is of course a somewhat trivial remark. I hope China and the US find a way to de-escalate. Recent commentary and media reports make it seem that a war in the 2020s is a foregone conclusion.
- shrimp_emoji 4y agoAlso, China's at its best position to fight a war right now. In a few decades or a century, demographic collapse[0] will mean it'll be at a fraction of its current power. In adversarial terms, for China, it's now or never; for the U.S., it's later or never. 0: Check out how dark blue it is. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_sex_ratio https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_sovereign_states_by_se...
- ninethirty 4y agoWhy would the CCP tolerate demographic collapse? They have all the levers to incentivize people to have children.
- danaris 4y agoThat's making a bunch of assumptions. China has been trying to incentivize people to have more children for a few years now, and it hasn't been working. Turns out, when the future looks bleak and you don't have time outside of work to socialize, let alone raise a child, you're less likely to be willing to have one. Add to that all the work China did for decades to promote and enforce its widely-known one-child policy, and you've got a recipe for demographic collapse.
- ashwagary 4y ago>China has been trying to incentivize people to have more children for a few years now, and it hasn't been working. Seems a bit premature to draw any conclusion when the window includes the years of covid lockdowns.
- bobjordan 4y agoAmerican here. Lived 10yrs in China, still own a business there now primarily operating in Shenzhen. What I learned living there is, the Chinese mainland population are 100% certain, that Taiwan is wholly owned property of Mainland China. Now, considering the nature of war, winners win and losers lose, and there's no doubt the communist party won the war, took control of mainland China, and the Nationalists lost, fled to Taiwan. From Mainland China view, just because they didn't take Taiwan then doesn't mean they don't own it! This view will never change. In my view, USA should stay out of it, we don't belong there!
- midoridensha 4y agoI guess you think Ukraine also rightfully belongs to Russia, right?
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- bobjordan 4y agoI have no experience with Russia or Ukraine. I do however have 10 yrs experience in China, and a lot of people have no idea that 1.6B Chinese vehemently assert ownership of Taiwan. Your question is off topic and add no value.
- midoridensha 4y ago100+ million Russians vehemently assert ownership of Ukraine. That doesn't mean they have a right to it. If I vehemently assert ownership of your house and bank account, should I get it? I think I should. And the police should stay out of it, because it's none of their business; it's just between you and me. Your post adds no value.
- bobjordan 4y agoFYI - from Wikipedia. A straw man fallacy (sometimes written as strawman) is a form of argument and an informal fallacy of having the impression of refuting an argument, whereas the real subject of the argument was not addressed or refuted, but instead replaced with a false one.[1] One who engages in this fallacy is said to be "attacking a straw man".
- xrayarx 4y agoThis has been discussed already: U.S. general warns troops that war with China is possible in two years(https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/01/27/us-general-minihan-china-war-2025/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/01/27/...) 8 points|MilnerRoute|1 day ago|15 comments Air Mobility Command Boss Predicts War with China in 2025 in Dire Memo(https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/usaf-general-warns-of-war-with-china-over-taiwan-in-2025 https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/usaf-general-warns-of-...) 4 points|graderjs|1 day ago|1 comments Air Force general predicts war with China in 2025(https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/us-air-force-general-predicts-war-china-2025-memo-rcna67967 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/us-air-fo...) 3 points|baybal2|1 day ago|0 comments U.S. four-star general warns of war with China in 2025(https://www.reuters.com/world/us-four-star-general-warns-war-with-china-2025-2023-01-28/ https://www.reuters.com/world/us-four-star-general-warns-war...) 4 points|Kukumber|19 hours ago|3 comments US general warns troops that war with China is possible in two years(https://www.stripes.com/theaters/us/2023-01-27/us-air-force-memo-war-china-8913860.html https://www.stripes.com/theaters/us/2023-01-27/us-air-force-...) 27 points|okasaki|45 minutes ago|50 comments Air Force general predicts war with China in 2025, tells officers to get ready(https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/us-air-force-general-predicts-war-china-2025-memo-rcna67967 https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/us-air-fo...) 7 points|ironyman|14 hours ago|3 comments Japan, Netherlands Agree to Limit Exports of Chip-Making Equipment to China(https://www.wsj.com/articles/japan-netherlands-agree-to-limit-exports-of-chip-making-equipment-to-china-11674952328 https://www.wsj.com/articles/japan-netherlands-agree-to-limi...) 3 points|mfiguiere|14 hours ago|1 comments
- mytailorisrich 4y agoThe US aren't going to war with China but it's the job of the military to be ready or at least to give a fact-based assessment. I don't think the US military does the latter, at least publicly, as the factual reality is that a direct war is a lose-lose situation
- Ekaros 4y agoAlso it is not like militaries in general don't have internal goals of increasing their budgets and trying to gain more funding. And thus advancing their own careers or gaining various forms of power. In the end they are similar to bureaucracies, big companies and so on.
- mshaler 4y ago"We have always been at war with Eastasia..."
- r053bud 4y agoA lot of people stand to make a lot of money if this comes true. Makes me think people who say this crap actually want it to happen.
- Oxidation 4y agoJust like Brexit. A very few people can make out like bandits, and everyone else pays, and somehow we end up doing what the bandits want and even when we don't, it's a constant rearguard defense.