4 ms·

Fan fiction, but: Civil wars might do it, the Russians need to overthrow Putin, Xi in China, and we need to elect peace hawks in places that have democracy. Peo

by neom 3y ago

Fan fiction, but: Civil wars might do it, the Russians need to overthrow Putin, Xi in China, and we need to elect peace hawks in places that have democracy. People would have to really really really really not want a word war. On the history part, I have no clue, but I do know that today the citizenry is more connected and able to strategize for ourselfs than at any point in history before.

wombat-man 3y ago
Putin's old, but he isn't that old. Plus I assume there are similar people waiting in the wings to takeover. Idk how to fix the situation but it would make me nervous for them to have a civil war in a nuclear power. Xi might go, but that party isn't going anywhere.
- neom 3y ago
  It's a damn shame everything going on, really gets me down sometimes. My mum said the other day one of the reasons my folks had us when they did was the Cold War was ending(Gorbachev came in), there would never be war in Europe again, and the world was happy and healthy for the future.
  - eric_cc 3y ago
    > there would never be war in Europe again Lol
- m0llusk 3y ago
  > Xi might go, but that party isn't going anywhere. Geographically probably not, but politically the Chinese Communist party already covers a very broad spectrum with Xi and others currently at the top being the most insular, paranoid, and economically impractical of all the various factions. A "fix" to the situation is unlikely, but changes that yield improvements are all but inevitable at this point.
  - neom 3y ago
    This is interesting to me, I naively think of the CCP as being highly unified as they paint such a great picture of that, I always thought there would be some decenters but for the most part complete unification. I should probably learn more about this and would gladly accept any resources on digging into the modern CCP more.
    - alisonatwork 3y ago
      There is loads written about this. Wikipedia has a category page for it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Factions_of_the_Chinese_Communist_Party https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Factions_of_the_Chine... Painting a great picture of party unity - and national unity - is a key propaganda goal of the CCP, so if that's what you see then they are succeeding. In practice, the party has almost 100 million members so naturally it is composed of people with many different points of view, although those differences are rarely expressed openly and they're all still shaped by the overall political and educational environment of the PRC. It's generally accepted that Xi Jinping has used his anti-corruption drive to wipe out rival factions, and one unlikely conspiracy theory is that he somehow orchestrated Bo Xilai's fall from grace in 2012 so he could take control of the party. The whole thing could provide material for stacks of palace intrigue thrillers... and in fact it did, which resulted in the Causeway Bay Books disappearances of 2015. Gotta control that narrative, after all. If you're interested in the propaganda side, I recommend reading China Media Project: https://chinamediaproject.org/ https://chinamediaproject.org/ If you just want to know about the party maneuvering, all the usual thinktanks (CSIS, Brookings, CFR etc) publish a ton of English language content.
    - ninjin 3y ago
      You can start here and work outwards: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_clique https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_clique I am not a historian, but I have always found diversity of thought inside large political bodies: Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Jimintou, etc. Surely if you have a large political party where you are from, you have also seen that they have factions as well?
protomolecule 3y ago
"the Russians need to overthrow Putin, Xi in China, and we need to elect peace hawks in places that have democracy." We overthrew communists in 1991, USSR crumbled, in 1992 Pentagon declared that America's "first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival" [0] and 17 years later NATO, after multiple rounds of expansion, announced that it would expand into Georgia and the Ukraine [1] despite all the promises given by Western leaders [2]. The trust between Russia and the collective West will not be rebuild for a very long time. [0] https://www.nytimes.com/1992/03/08/world/excerpts-from-pentagon-s-plan-prevent-the-re-emergence-of-a-new-rival.html https://www.nytimes.com/1992/03/08/world/excerpts-from-penta... [1] https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_8443.htm https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_8443.htm [2] https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2017-12-12/nato-expansion-what-gorbachev-heard-western-leaders-early https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2017...
- mopsi 3y ago
  > despite all the promises given by Western leaders This gets repeated a lot, but who on the Russian side has ever confirmed it? Many people from that time are still around. Both the USSR's last minister of foreign affairs (1985-1990) and the first Russian minister of foreign affairs (1990-1996) have called that bullshit, with the latter adding in a recent interview that people believing this are "chumps and useful idiots"[1]. [1] https://newlinesmag.com/reportage/russias-ex-foreign-minister-on-his-totalitarian-country/ https://newlinesmag.com/reportage/russias-ex-foreign-ministe...
  - protomolecule 3y ago
    "This gets repeated a lot" I gave a link to the documents, not to hersay. "who on the Russian side has ever confirmed it" You mean apart from 'nationalists', 'hardliners' and 'communists'?
    - mopsi 3y ago
      > I gave the link to the documents, not to hersay. It's a speculation that has been categorically refuted by the very persons it mentions. > You mean apart from 'nationalists', 'hardliners' and 'communists'? Apart from people like Putin, who at the time was nowhere near the foreign policy circles, but served as an enforcer for St Petersburg's mayor, collecting protection money and bribes from businesses.

by neom 3y ago

wombat-man 3y ago

Putin's old, but he isn't that old. Plus I assume there are similar people waiting in the wings to takeover. Idk how to fix the situation but it would make me nervous for them to have a civil war in a nuclear power. Xi might go, but that party isn't going anywhere.

neom 3y ago
It's a damn shame everything going on, really gets me down sometimes. My mum said the other day one of the reasons my folks had us when they did was the Cold War was ending(Gorbachev came in), there would never be war in Europe again, and the world was happy and healthy for the future.
- eric_cc 3y ago
  > there would never be war in Europe again Lol
m0llusk 3y ago
> Xi might go, but that party isn't going anywhere. Geographically probably not, but politically the Chinese Communist party already covers a very broad spectrum with Xi and others currently at the top being the most insular, paranoid, and economically impractical of all the various factions. A "fix" to the situation is unlikely, but changes that yield improvements are all but inevitable at this point.
- neom 3y ago
  This is interesting to me, I naively think of the CCP as being highly unified as they paint such a great picture of that, I always thought there would be some decenters but for the most part complete unification. I should probably learn more about this and would gladly accept any resources on digging into the modern CCP more.
  - alisonatwork 3y ago
    There is loads written about this. Wikipedia has a category page for it: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Factions_of_the_Chinese_Communist_Party https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Factions_of_the_Chine... Painting a great picture of party unity - and national unity - is a key propaganda goal of the CCP, so if that's what you see then they are succeeding. In practice, the party has almost 100 million members so naturally it is composed of people with many different points of view, although those differences are rarely expressed openly and they're all still shaped by the overall political and educational environment of the PRC. It's generally accepted that Xi Jinping has used his anti-corruption drive to wipe out rival factions, and one unlikely conspiracy theory is that he somehow orchestrated Bo Xilai's fall from grace in 2012 so he could take control of the party. The whole thing could provide material for stacks of palace intrigue thrillers... and in fact it did, which resulted in the Causeway Bay Books disappearances of 2015. Gotta control that narrative, after all. If you're interested in the propaganda side, I recommend reading China Media Project: https://chinamediaproject.org/ https://chinamediaproject.org/ If you just want to know about the party maneuvering, all the usual thinktanks (CSIS, Brookings, CFR etc) publish a ton of English language content.
  - ninjin 3y ago
    You can start here and work outwards: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_clique https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shanghai_clique I am not a historian, but I have always found diversity of thought inside large political bodies: Communist Party of the Soviet Union, Jimintou, etc. Surely if you have a large political party where you are from, you have also seen that they have factions as well?

protomolecule 3y ago

"the Russians need to overthrow Putin, Xi in China, and we need to elect peace hawks in places that have democracy." We overthrew communists in 1991, USSR crumbled, in 1992 Pentagon declared that America's "first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival" [0] and 17 years later NATO, after multiple rounds of expansion, announced that it would expand into Georgia and the Ukraine [1] despite all the promises given by Western leaders [2]. The trust between Russia and the collective West will not be rebuild for a very long time. [0] https://www.nytimes.com/1992/03/08/world/excerpts-from-pentagon-s-plan-prevent-the-re-emergence-of-a-new-rival.html https://www.nytimes.com/1992/03/08/world/excerpts-from-penta... [1] https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_8443.htm https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natolive/official_texts_8443.htm [2] https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2017-12-12/nato-expansion-what-gorbachev-heard-western-leaders-early https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/russia-programs/2017...

mopsi 3y ago
> despite all the promises given by Western leaders This gets repeated a lot, but who on the Russian side has ever confirmed it? Many people from that time are still around. Both the USSR's last minister of foreign affairs (1985-1990) and the first Russian minister of foreign affairs (1990-1996) have called that bullshit, with the latter adding in a recent interview that people believing this are "chumps and useful idiots"[1]. [1] https://newlinesmag.com/reportage/russias-ex-foreign-minister-on-his-totalitarian-country/ https://newlinesmag.com/reportage/russias-ex-foreign-ministe...
- protomolecule 3y ago
  "This gets repeated a lot" I gave a link to the documents, not to hersay. "who on the Russian side has ever confirmed it" You mean apart from 'nationalists', 'hardliners' and 'communists'?
  - mopsi 3y ago
    > I gave the link to the documents, not to hersay. It's a speculation that has been categorically refuted by the very persons it mentions. > You mean apart from 'nationalists', 'hardliners' and 'communists'? Apart from people like Putin, who at the time was nowhere near the foreign policy circles, but served as an enforcer for St Petersburg's mayor, collecting protection money and bribes from businesses.