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What would be the more sane version? Allow nuclear armed states to invade whoever they want whenever they want?

jonplackett 2y ago
This comment comes from a misguided position of believing USA are in the position to allow or disallow. As this article shows, ‘disallow’ is not as straight forward as it seems.
- paulryanrogers 2y ago
  It's not solely up to the USA. The larger question remains, how does the world prevent nuclear states from simply taking over their neighbors?
  - dukeyukey 2y ago
    By giving nuclear states a vested interest in maintaining the world order as it is. We've mostly managed to do that so far, even if with Ukraine and potentially Taiwan it's looking a bit iffy.
    - llamaimperative 2y ago
      Yeah, and obviously so long as that continues then the US won't go to war... the conversation is about what happens if China invades Taiwan.
  - IncreasePosts 2y ago
    It seems like the current system is working, since it hasn't really happened? Otherwise wouldn't Russia have just walked into Ukraine with a nuke saying "we're the boss now or eveyone is dead"?
    - ceejayoz 2y ago
      Russia has consistently used nuclear blackmail in Ukraine. The West has responded with a very slow, incremental ramping up of aid to avoid triggering it. If Russia didn't have nukes, the situation in Ukraine would look very different.
      - IncreasePosts 2y ago
        Why is Russia fighting an actual war with half a million casualties if nuclear blackmail works?
        ceejayoz 2y ago
        Nuclear blackmail is what stops NATO from ending the war overnight tomorrow with a massive air assault on Russian troops in Ukraine. Instead, we ship arms over the border and wring our hands with every small ratcheting up of aid calibrated to hopefully not trigger it. Blackmail doesn't have to be perfect to be functional. The West has correctly assessed "they're not going to nuke us over x" so far, but it remains a consideration.
        lostlogin 2y ago
        A less charitable view of the strategy is that the west is letting Ukraine bleed out defending itself with too little support to win, and too much to lose.
        petre 2y ago
        The current war situation is quite convenient for the US. They watch the Russians screw themselves up in Ukraine while mostly supplying it with aging weapons that were mostly sitting around close to being decomissioned. O handy way to get rid of old inventory and also to push Eastern European NATO members to update their stuff: donate your USSR-made scrap to Ukraine and we'll give/sell you more modern NATO compatible equivalents. Putin was dumb enough to start a war and enable this. And this time the US reacted with more than just sanctions.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  Who is under the impression that the USA allowing/disallowing is straightforward? Do you think it's some secret that war is costly?
  - jonplackett 2y ago
    sadly for some people yeah
criddell 2y ago
The more sane version is China leaving Taiwan alone.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  Well... sure.
jjulius 2y ago
... I dunno, not going to war over something like that, maybe?
- ceejayoz 2y ago
  Yeah, that's the "just give Hitler Czechoslovakia and hope he's satisfied" approach. It hasn't historically worked that well.
  - jjulius 2y ago
    "Not going to war" starts with "don't invade another country".
    - ceejayoz 2y ago
      China gets to "don't invade another country" with regards to Taiwan. If China chooses to invade, the US is left with a choice of how to intervene. "No war" isn't on the table any more, even if the US choice is "don't get involved in the war and let our ally get clobbered".
      - petre 2y ago
        Except China doesn't consider Taiwan another country and goes to lenghty efforts to prevent anyone else from doing just that.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  So to allow nuclear armed states to invade whoever they want, got it.
  - jjulius 2y ago
    Ah, thank you for adhering to general internet commenting guidelines, where we insert words into others mouths that aren't the most generous interpretation of what they could be saying. No, I certainly wouldn't have stepped back further, as another respondent said, and argued that China should leave Taiwan alone, nope - I definitely insinuated that nuclear-armed states should invade folk at their own whim and we should do nothing about it. Yep, you're right, that's definitely where I was going with it. Edit: To make things perfectly clear, "not going to war" starts with "don't invade another country". I'm not sure how that isn't obvious.
wing-_-nuts 2y ago
When I say I 'hope that sanity prevails' I'm hoping that China realizes Taiwan isn't worth the cost. I'm also extremely dubious that it's worth 10's or even 100's of thousands of American lives for us to intervene. I'm happy for us to sell Taiwan as many weapons as they want for them to defend themselves, but I draw the line at putting American lives at risk for a country that has taken a negligent attitude to it's own defenses in the hopes that we bail them out.
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  Directionally agreed, but what gives you reason to say Taiwan has neglected its own defenses in the hopes that we bail them out?
  - wing-_-nuts 2y ago
    I compare them with Israel, another small nation with high defense needs. They've spent less than 2% of their GDP on defense until very recently, they don't have a strong history of conscripting and training their civilian population. In short, they seem to have operated under the assumption that the united states would ride in to save the day. I am a little sick of seeing the US, a country with two friendly neighbors, and massive oceans between us and our nearest peer adversaries spend ~ 1T / yr on defense to be the 'world's police'. The real threat to our security is at home.
    - llamaimperative 2y ago
      Why is 2% a meaningful number? Less than that is insufficient and more than that is sufficient? Taiwan couldn't effectively defend itself against China regardless of how much it spends on defense. Nor could any other country on the planet except potentially the US. > I am a little sick of seeing the US, a country with two friendly neighbors, and massive oceans between us and our nearest peer adversaries spend ~ 1T / yr on defense to be the 'world's police'. If you think the US isn't a major beneficiary of global peace and open trade, you are very mistaken. It isn't a charity project, it's a strategy. > The real threat to our security is at home. What does this mean?
mandibles 2y ago
Isn't that the current status quo?
- llamaimperative 2y ago
  No, as evidenced by the massive amounts of western arms currently preventing the rape and pillaging of the capital of a democratic European city.
outop 2y ago
Why should China be an exception?

This comment comes from a misguided position of believing USA are in the position to allow or disallow. As this article shows, ‘disallow’ is not as straight forward as it seems.

paulryanrogers 2y ago
It's not solely up to the USA. The larger question remains, how does the world prevent nuclear states from simply taking over their neighbors?
- dukeyukey 2y ago
  By giving nuclear states a vested interest in maintaining the world order as it is. We've mostly managed to do that so far, even if with Ukraine and potentially Taiwan it's looking a bit iffy.
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    Yeah, and obviously so long as that continues then the US won't go to war... the conversation is about what happens if China invades Taiwan.
- IncreasePosts 2y ago
  It seems like the current system is working, since it hasn't really happened? Otherwise wouldn't Russia have just walked into Ukraine with a nuke saying "we're the boss now or eveyone is dead"?
  - ceejayoz 2y ago
    Russia has consistently used nuclear blackmail in Ukraine. The West has responded with a very slow, incremental ramping up of aid to avoid triggering it. If Russia didn't have nukes, the situation in Ukraine would look very different.
    - IncreasePosts 2y ago
      Why is Russia fighting an actual war with half a million casualties if nuclear blackmail works?
      - ceejayoz 2y ago
        Nuclear blackmail is what stops NATO from ending the war overnight tomorrow with a massive air assault on Russian troops in Ukraine. Instead, we ship arms over the border and wring our hands with every small ratcheting up of aid calibrated to hopefully not trigger it. Blackmail doesn't have to be perfect to be functional. The West has correctly assessed "they're not going to nuke us over x" so far, but it remains a consideration.
        lostlogin 2y ago
        A less charitable view of the strategy is that the west is letting Ukraine bleed out defending itself with too little support to win, and too much to lose.
        petre 2y ago
        The current war situation is quite convenient for the US. They watch the Russians screw themselves up in Ukraine while mostly supplying it with aging weapons that were mostly sitting around close to being decomissioned. O handy way to get rid of old inventory and also to push Eastern European NATO members to update their stuff: donate your USSR-made scrap to Ukraine and we'll give/sell you more modern NATO compatible equivalents. Putin was dumb enough to start a war and enable this. And this time the US reacted with more than just sanctions.
llamaimperative 2y ago
Who is under the impression that the USA allowing/disallowing is straightforward? Do you think it's some secret that war is costly?
- jonplackett 2y ago
  sadly for some people yeah

criddell 2y ago

The more sane version is China leaving Taiwan alone.

llamaimperative 2y ago
Well... sure.

jjulius 2y ago

... I dunno, not going to war over something like that, maybe?

ceejayoz 2y ago
Yeah, that's the "just give Hitler Czechoslovakia and hope he's satisfied" approach. It hasn't historically worked that well.
- jjulius 2y ago
  "Not going to war" starts with "don't invade another country".
  - ceejayoz 2y ago
    China gets to "don't invade another country" with regards to Taiwan. If China chooses to invade, the US is left with a choice of how to intervene. "No war" isn't on the table any more, even if the US choice is "don't get involved in the war and let our ally get clobbered".
    - petre 2y ago
      Except China doesn't consider Taiwan another country and goes to lenghty efforts to prevent anyone else from doing just that.
llamaimperative 2y ago
So to allow nuclear armed states to invade whoever they want, got it.
- jjulius 2y ago
  Ah, thank you for adhering to general internet commenting guidelines, where we insert words into others mouths that aren't the most generous interpretation of what they could be saying. No, I certainly wouldn't have stepped back further, as another respondent said, and argued that China should leave Taiwan alone, nope - I definitely insinuated that nuclear-armed states should invade folk at their own whim and we should do nothing about it. Yep, you're right, that's definitely where I was going with it. Edit: To make things perfectly clear, "not going to war" starts with "don't invade another country". I'm not sure how that isn't obvious.

wing-_-nuts 2y ago

When I say I 'hope that sanity prevails' I'm hoping that China realizes Taiwan isn't worth the cost. I'm also extremely dubious that it's worth 10's or even 100's of thousands of American lives for us to intervene. I'm happy for us to sell Taiwan as many weapons as they want for them to defend themselves, but I draw the line at putting American lives at risk for a country that has taken a negligent attitude to it's own defenses in the hopes that we bail them out.

llamaimperative 2y ago
Directionally agreed, but what gives you reason to say Taiwan has neglected its own defenses in the hopes that we bail them out?
- wing-_-nuts 2y ago
  I compare them with Israel, another small nation with high defense needs. They've spent less than 2% of their GDP on defense until very recently, they don't have a strong history of conscripting and training their civilian population. In short, they seem to have operated under the assumption that the united states would ride in to save the day. I am a little sick of seeing the US, a country with two friendly neighbors, and massive oceans between us and our nearest peer adversaries spend ~ 1T / yr on defense to be the 'world's police'. The real threat to our security is at home.
  - llamaimperative 2y ago
    Why is 2% a meaningful number? Less than that is insufficient and more than that is sufficient? Taiwan couldn't effectively defend itself against China regardless of how much it spends on defense. Nor could any other country on the planet except potentially the US. > I am a little sick of seeing the US, a country with two friendly neighbors, and massive oceans between us and our nearest peer adversaries spend ~ 1T / yr on defense to be the 'world's police'. If you think the US isn't a major beneficiary of global peace and open trade, you are very mistaken. It isn't a charity project, it's a strategy. > The real threat to our security is at home. What does this mean?

mandibles 2y ago

Isn't that the current status quo?

llamaimperative 2y ago
No, as evidenced by the massive amounts of western arms currently preventing the rape and pillaging of the capital of a democratic European city.

outop 2y ago

Why should China be an exception?