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We Need Taiwan
- myspy 3y agoAre there any articles out there that show how advanced the UX of online services in Russia is?
- konart 3y agoI don't think I will be able to write a good article (tough task in you don't really have anything to compare with) but I can make some screenshot\videos, just name a feature. But honestly - yeah, our online banking apps and app for state frovided services are pretty good.
- dkcj77 3y agoMichael Hudson, of super imperialism fame, has a good take - get others to keep your biggest rivals occupied - https://michael-hudson.com/2023/11/israel-as-a-landed-aircraft-carrier/ https://michael-hudson.com/2023/11/israel-as-a-landed-aircra...
- sgu999 3y agoI wish western political leaders would spend a bit more time learning from Taiwan instead of arguing about whether it is part of China, without even having set foot in any of the two. Having lived a couple months in Taipei, my only complain really is the bloody ICE scooters. It boggles my mind that they didn't solve this problem yet. The air quality is absolutely horrendous, and you'll have trouble sleeping anywhere near a main road. It is even more shocking when we realise how convenient and efficient their electric counterparts are, Gogoro in particular is doing an amazing job [1]. It made me realise that we're doing something wrong in Europe by not including them as part of the solution for climate-friendly transportation. The main thing I keep on raving about in Taiwan is the lack of urban sprawl: it's very difficult to find suburb-style detached homes even in the countryside, single-family homes exist but they are usually packed together in hamlets. It means that shops are always close because the settlements are dense enough for them to be viable businesses... [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpOQpwKeSnI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HpOQpwKeSnI
- jonatron 3y agoA few weeks ago, standing at an incredibly busy pedestrian crossing in Shenzhen, China, I noticed how strangely quiet it was for somewhere so busy. Then I noticed, every car, bus, and scooter was electric. I went to Taipei after, and the constant roar from mostly scooters was unexpectedly loud. I hope we speed up the shift to electric vehicles.
- actionfromafar 3y agoIt will resolve itself sooner or later, especially ICE scooters will soon not be attractive.
- throwaway4good 3y agoThe electric scooters from China are still far away from being as practical as the ICE scooters; a scooter like you see in Taiwan or Vietnam can carry the whole family and has a top speed of a 120 km/h.
- edu 3y agoProbably it's not a good idea to take the whole family on a scooter...
- csomar 3y agoChina is running light speed toward electrification and renewable because they are concerned of a conflict with the West. Europeans think they are doing it to take advantage over their car manufacturers but they are really thinking inward on this.
- quelsolaar 3y agoSure we could all use more positive visions for the future, but... The most immediate need we have to Taiwan is TSMC. Without them Nvidia, AMD and Apple are effectively dead, along with any car company, and a good deal of the products and services we use. A war with China would make 2008, 9/11 and the Internet bubble look, like tiny blips in terms of economic upheaval. What bothers me most are three misconceptions about the ramifications of an invasion: The first is that people don't recognize how important TSMC is, and how much its hardware powers. The second is that people think US/European firms could just do the same. The skills, effort, time and money that TSMC has put in to be where they are is not easily replicated and we would happy if we could do it in 10 years, but that is doubtful. The third is that China could just take over and run TSMC. You cant build chips in a warzone. And even if Chine would take over swiftly, and the infrastructure would be largely intact, each fab has thousands of employees, and all it takes for one of them to sabotage a fab is to cough in the wrong place, and it may never run again, and it would need to be abandoned. You do not need to smuggle in a bomb to disrupt a fab. Even if they did keep some fabs running, they wouldn't sell the output to the west. On the upside, I get the feeling someone in the know has given the right presentation at the white house, because Biden looks like he understands this and takes this seriously, unlike many others.
- aa-jv 3y agoThe third thing is, what if there is no need to invade? Taiwan is a liability, on the grand scheme of things. We need to not have a concentration of such vital capability in a single source. The cost of an invasion or the cost of booting up fabs in more Western nations - or even in the global south? This is the real question. War will only happen when the decision is made that its cheaper to steal a factory than build another new one. This is not always the focus of the conversation when it comes to the hegemonic power of China's ability to make things... but it should. Especially when The Western Empire™ makes decisions about the values of other states ..
- actionfromafar 3y agoDo you really think the The Chinese Empire™ cares about TSMC? Generations have now been told Taiwan is and forevermore is a part of China, to be reunited. The existence of TSMC matters little. Once you connect a regime's domestic prestige to a project, external motivations matter little. Once not attacking Taiwan is seen as a "being weak" at home, you will have a war.
- yodsanklai 3y agoUnfortunately, I don't think we need Taiwan. I agree with the first part of the conclusion. > The Taiwanese are some of the most wonderful people you’ll ever meet. As a free and open democratic society, they would deserve our support for that alone. Part of my family is Taiwanese so I'm biased of course. But it's really a tragedy that these people may get attacked and invaded by China in the near future. What drives me crazy is people who try to argue that it's right for some historical reason. "Taiwan belongs to China" like if an entire population's faith could belong to some dictator. Conflicts are not always clear, but it's really a good vs evil fight in that case. I wonder what will be the US stance on this.
- yieldcrv 3y agoright now the US is catering to a people whose strongest talking point relies on the idea that a new national identity cant appear over the last century (unless it preexisted 2,000 years ago) so thats going to be awkward for us to cater to a national identity that appeared over the last century, at the drop of a hat obviously none of us actually care, but its fun to pretend to keep a couple of instagram followers and employment
- soco 3y agoAhem I think you meant "no new national identities can appear after 1776".
- wombat-man 3y agoNot an expert, but PRC claims Taiwan, and interestingly the ROC also claims the mainland? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan#Political_and_legal_status https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan#Political_and_legal_sta... So it sorta seems like they both agree on 'One China', but not who should be running it. I do think we need taiwan and TSMC is a big part of it. There is too much cutting edge tech in Taiwan, I think the US would go toe to toe to defend Taiwan if necessary. But we're trying to reduce that dependence by building fabs in the US, so that could change in the next 10 years.
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- churchill 3y agoI feel no conversation about the Taiwan situation can be complete without noting that they had an active nuclear program that was close to developing weapons before the Americans pressured them to shut it down [0]. Judging by how that gesture turned out for Ukraine, we can safely assume Taiwan won't fare better as well. [0]https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_and_weapons_of_mass_destruction#Research_program https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Taiwan_and_weapons_of_mass_des...
- lucubratory 3y agoI suspect most people don't want to bring it up because it doesn't really fit the modern Taiwanese independence argument. Those nukes were going to be used to nuke the PLA and invade mainland China to end the civil war, which is why the US shut it down. I think in the modern day most in the West would rather forget that it was not that long ago that the Republic of China was actively planning to invade the Chinese mainland to end the civil war, because it makes "Taiwan is an independent country that isn't Chinese and all this 'PRC invasion to end the civil war' stuff is just nonsense made up by Chinese propaganda" not seem particularly credible. It's not very believable to be adamant about mainland China and Taiwan being the same country that you will rule after conquering the mainland when you have a significant military advantage in tech and allies, then when the mainland gains the upper hand militarily you start insisting that actually you're not both part of China, the civil war is ancient history and wasn't really a civil war anyway, and anyone who appears to be willing to breach the status quo with violence is horrible. It comes across as disingenuous, like if Taiwan was militarily significantly stronger than the PRC today then it wouldn't be "Taiwan independence" being advocated, it would be "eliminating the communists to unify China" being advocated.
- dontlaugh 3y agoThis is the bit that I find most annoying: westerners insisting that the government and people of Taiwan want to be their own country separate from China. Certainly the government doesn't, they still claim the entire territory the PRC controls and more. The people generally consider themselves Chinese when asked and wishing for peaceful reunification, with a small (and possibly growing) minority disagreeing.
- yieldcrv 3y ago[dead]
- Barrin92 3y ago"While form too often trumps function in the West, pragmatism is on clear display in Taiwan[...]The structures are all simple reinforced concrete designs without ornamentation, lengthy ramps, wide shoulders, or any other modern features." A great goal but I don't have much hope for it because in the West you'll have to fight on two fronts for this. One is the sort of ground level activism against seemingly anything that resembles construction, and an upper echelon of people who think functional, cheap architecture is a crime against humanity because they want to cosplay as Belle Époque Europeans. The willingness of Taiwan, and also mainland China as they're not different in this regard to just build cheap but with very decent quality and quickly is just completely lost. In most of the Western world people will rather blow 40% of their income on rent than get someone into power who will just build some decent apartment blocks.
- debok 3y agoI don't think there is anything wrong with spending money to make buildings look beautiful. Beauty is important, and we often overlook the impact that beauty has on our psyche.
- dontlaugh 3y agoIt's the same hatred towards Eastern European blocks of flats. I grew up in one, it was fine.
- sgu999 3y ago> than get someone into power who will just build some decent apartment blocks. That's because they want a house, with a garden, and at least one car so that they can have a "bbq with some friends on sundays" like they've seen on countless ads and movies. Everything else is secondary in western urbanism. Have you seen the architecture of modern suburb houses? Commie blocks could pass for Art Deco in comparison.
- CrzyLngPwd 3y agoIf Taiwan is not careful, it will be Ukrained. Taiwan is important and valuable until it isn't.
- pjc50 3y agoIneptly invaded by its irridentist neighbour with huge losses?
- CrzyLngPwd 3y agoSeems like you nailed it.
- reisse 3y agoUgh, gross. Western man discovers people outside of the West are not living in huts! The paragraph about how "wonderful" Taipei Metro is so laughably demonstrates the disconnection between Western expectations of public transit and Asian reality. I'd like author to visit Tokyo, Beijing, Shanghai, Seoul, Moscow, Dubai - wonder what his opinion will be.
- mplewis 3y agoThis was my feeling too. “Man, this guy should check out Tokyo next.”
- AlchemistCamp 3y agoThis makes no sense. Taipei's metro is much nicer than Tokyo's. That was true, even 20 years ago. I lived in Beijing a decade ago, too, and its metro was also a far worse experience than Taipei's.
- soco 3y agoThe author is from NZ so he's possibly more eastern than any of us.
- Alethios 3y agoFWIW, I've lived in Thailand and Nepal. I've travelled reasonably extensively through Borneo, Vietnam, Laos, and India. Visited Hong Kong, Cambodia, Singapore. Did an exchange with a Japanese boy from Hiroshima as a kid. All of those places are amazing in their own ways, but I maintain that Taiwan is both incredibly special, and perhaps the most underappreciated.
- throwaway2990 3y agoI can’t speak for Moscow or Dubai but it’s obvious you’ve never been to Taipei. It’s leaps and bounds above Tokyo, Beijing, Shanghai, Seoul. Especially during new years celebrations. They block off entry and only allow a portion of people go to the platform at a time. It’s so efficient and orderly. No pushing or shoving. No one gets upset or angry. Beijing at new years was absolute chaos.
- wangii 3y ago> The Taiwanese are some of the most wonderful people you’ll ever meet. this applies to everywhere. no new information. > As a free and open democratic society, they would deserve our support for that alone. ah, so it's really about ideology? > If that’s not enough, then we should support them out of pure self-interest, as we’re all better off for having them. ??
- rainworld 3y agoNo, “you” don’t “need” Taiwan. Those who run the American Empire have an interest in denying China the strategic advantage, everything else is window dressing. Doesn’t look good for them, though. https://taiwaninsight.org/2018/02/26/cross-strait-relations-the-strategic-importance-of-taiwan/ https://taiwaninsight.org/2018/02/26/cross-strait-relations-...