Going to War With China - WW3
Not to start any conspiracy theories here, but I just got off Skype from an interesting debate after a conference with my firm's team in their Beijing office. Someone at their office mentioned a meeting by its execs on protocols and plans to move our employees out of our Asian offices in the case we attack China or they attack us.
The debate was interesting. A guy brought up the point that China holds 1/3 of our entire debt. But then again, "debt" and "govt bonds" are simply pieces of paper. If we can't pay back our debt, we simply attack them under the guise of something (Iraq was oil, China will prob be something too) and make the concept of debt, null and void.
Someone else also mentioned that he was voting for Romney and read his foreign policy essay on China and the fact that he mentioned "military" in almost every paragraph, labeled them a "regime" and blasted their "human rights" record, Romney does not look favorably upon China, military-wise. If Romney doesn't win, Obama isn't any better about this. Just the other day ABC released a news report that the Obama Admin has China on some sort of hit list (http://in.news.yahoo.com/flawed-us-plan-war-china…). And Hilary Clinton's recent remarks on China were pretty damn ugly.
Anyhow, IF (im not saying we will. most likely we wont) we attacked China, it's definitely gonna be WW3 in that entire fucking region - Russia with their pissed off impoverished people and massive nukes, Syria - china's ally, Japan, Taiwan, India and their nukes, Pakistan and their nukes, all them bitches gonna start blasting each other. Hey, never had a generation that didnt have a huge fucking war.
So what do you all think? Do you think we'll be going to war with China either by end of this year, or within the next decade? Hey, it IS a great way to get out of our debt LOL. Has anyone in your offices talked about protocol to bring employees back from Asia? Just wanted to get some opinion on this.
Why am I reminded of Major Kong from Dr. Strangelove when I read this?
YOU CAN'T FIGHT IN HERE, THIS IS THE WAR ROOM
Mr. President, I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed. But I do say no more than ten to twenty million killed, tops. Uh, depending on the breaks.
You ain't got a fucking clue OP.
how so? and don't say it's because everything we use is made in china. the presidents we elect could give a lesser shit.
Trolling? Regardless, the last China thread got locked and I'm sure this will too once "they" come to its defense.
Not trolling. And I dont' see why anyone would find the need to lock this thread. This isn't racist nor any different from any thread on the Iraq war or speculating on war with Syria...
It was a legitimate debate we had and the upper management in our asian offices are actually making protocol for quick removal of asian employees. not trolling here. i dont see why this is trolling. do you all seriously think there is a 0% possibility of war in the eastern asian region?
this is a legit geopolitical debate i'd like to have here.
I don't know about this decade, but probably more likely in the 20s or 30s it could probably go there.
Dont worry bro noones trying to lock your thread. Its just a bit much to imagine that world wars can be accurately predicted.
I was implying a lock because of the Chinese Olympic thread we had going. I didn't say I wanted this locked. In fact, I got 4 MS thrown at me in that thread which means I was probably correct in what I said.
To answer your question, full scale war would be unproductive for both sides. Though, I think we have to maintain our proverbial dominance through a stronger economy than theirs and advances in military tech. As long as we are one step in front of them in regards to combat gear etc, we will have an advantage in conventional warfare to make up for our smaller population.
In regards to economic factors: innovation and self-sufficiency (DRILL).
There is a 0% chance of the US and China going to war. Good idea for discussion over beers but ridiculous to consider it in reality. Same with US / Russia.
Personally I think the most we'll get to is a Cold War situation like we had with Russia with no casualties. But here's the thing -- there are really high-up Communist Party officials who sit on the board and have deep strategic advisory-type connections to the top execs at my PE firm (and this isn't advertised at all because it just sounds bad) and recently they heard something from said advisers which prompted them to make plans to bring employees out of Asia in the case there is a war. Basically they were advised quite literally "in the possibility of a war with your base country, your firm will need to do this, this, and that." I'm just going off of that and found it interesting to discuss.
I find this very difficult to believe. Top ChiCom officials do not sit on the boards of U.S PE firms. They have plenty of business interests abroad, but they do not sit on the boards of foreign investment management companies, that would be freaking stupid. You are making this up aren't you?
General Jack D. Ripper: Mandrake, do you recall what Clemenceau once said about war?
Group Capt. Lionel Mandrake: No, I don't think I do, sir, no.
General Jack D. Ripper: He said war was too important to be left to the generals. When he said that, 50 years ago, he might have been right. But today, war is too important to be left to politicians. They have neither the time, the training, nor the inclination for strategic thought. I can no longer sit back and allow Communist infiltration, Communist indoctrination, Communist subversion and the international Communist conspiracy to sap and impurify all of our precious bodily fluids.
If two nuclear powers go to war, it will end in 30 minutes and both will lose. China knows this too.
If grain prices keep going up, China will happily trade their US debt for a year's supply of wheat and soybeans.
Fighting a War creates massive debt. Going to war over debt would be fucking retarded.
US/China are co-dependant upon each other.
Our military is over worked and has been for 11 years.
Defense budget is going to be cut, as well as the size of our military. Due to lack of conventional enemies, US Military is focusing more on irregular warfare/unconventional warfare.
The public don't have the stomach for 10's of thousands dieing in a short time when they flip out about a douch killing 13 in a theatre.
Ton of other reasons I don't have the care to write.
Veteran of Iraq 2005, 2008 and currently Afghanistan. U.S. Infantry. There is literally zero rumors of speak of China. Rumors fly around the military especially prior to deployments are announced. Haven't heard shit. Your more likely to see a limited scale conflict with Iran than China. At least in the next 30 years.
Thank you for speaking some sense. It's pretty disheartening that professionals in finance are having discussions as fundamentally stupid as this.
As a multiple-tour veteran of OIF and OEF (only limited boots-on-the-ground time, but flew a shit-ton of missions off aircraft carriers into country) what is being said here is pretty close to reality. These budget cuts to the military will eventually turn out to be a blessing in disguise as it will force the operating forces to accept the reality that the Cold War is over. Specifically, that the days of large standing forces during peacetime are over.
One thing that I saw quite a bit on the Navy side of the armed forces is an intense desire by the defense establishment (high ranking officers, pentagon technocrats, contractors) is the desire to 'manufacture' a new cold war with the PRC standing in to fill the role previously occupied by the USSR. The reason being that this new cold war would help justify propping up the defense industry.
Totally agree with constructing the enemy. I'm sure part of it driven by $ but part of it is also cultural. When the military isn't at war, it plans to go to war. Always looking for a fight.
War with China is not on the horizon, yet
I don't see how going into a war, with direct costs that will likely run way into the trillions and will carry unfathomable indirect costs, is a great tactic for getting out of $1.2 trillion in debt. Brown U did a study and and estimated that the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq cost $3-4 trillion. Nothing compared to what a war with China would cost. We'd lose carriers and other naval assets. We'd lose lots of aircraft. It would take massive numbers of ground forces. It'd be a conventional war the likes of which the world has never seen. Not to mention, China has long range ICBMs that can target U.S. cities. It gets ugly fast. But we'd write off $1.2 trillion. Awesome.
As for what the politicians are saying... They are posturing, signaling, and making their attitudes known. This type of talk rarely translates into military action. It's a nuanced form of communication that used in foreign policy. Can't take it literally.
Furthermore, I completely tune out what presidential candidates have to say unless they have any real foreign policy experience. I've got 10+ in the special operations and intelligence communities, have worked in 17 countries, and hold a Master's in IR from SAIS. I'm not saying I'm the sharpest tool in the shed, but it's not hard to tell that Romney isn't the most knowledgeable guy on the topic. Besides, that's not what's important right now. Soundbites that resonate with the masses... that's what's important. Romney, if elected, will surround himself with really smart people, will be spoon fed the most critical pieces of information, and will learn. Just like O'bama learned that saying he was going to shut down GTMO felt great coming out of his mouth but wasn't really all that great of an idea in the end.
But I digress. China threatens the U.S. in many other ways. Influence in Asia, cyber warfare, etc... But the U.S. threatens China in the same way. At the end of the day, China isn't doing anything so aggressive as to precipitate a war. So don't see war on the horizon. I also don't see us being close allies. There could be some parallels to the Cold War but I see it being much better than that. It'll be more diplomatic and economic jockeying rather than military. Cyber warfare could be the new covert war... so those of you looking for a job, get into cyber security now. But there are also plenty of areas where cooperation makes sense. The concept of zero sum won't be as universally applied.
Personally, If I had offices overseas, I'd have plans for how to shut them down and get the hell out of dodge. Not because of war, but because of civil unrest and diplomatic tensions. When that stuff happens, it gets ugly quick. But then again, I'm scheduled to appear on the next episode of Doomsday Preppers so take that for what it's worth.
I cannot tell you how true this is. A good friend of mine spent six years in the Navy as a crypto and cyberwarfare officer. After that, he picked up his MBA at UNC-KF and got a job with GE in their cyber security department. Guess what his starting salary was? Three hundred grand. Not bad for a 30 year old single guy.
i didn't know that burger king locations had telecons with foreign franchisees.
I have a friend who has been working full time in China for about half a year now, after having spent several stints there throughout college and studying Mandarin since high school. He tells me that the pedestal Chinese culture places on whites, particularly Americans, never ceases to amaze him. He tells me he feels safer walking down the streets of Beijing unarmed in the middle of the night than he does anywhere he's been in the US--not beacuse all Chinese regard whites highly, or even because there's less violent crime in China; but because the police force/government cracks down on anti-American crime extremely, extremely harshly. Apparently, mugging an American citizen and being caught will likely result in imprisonment or death. Not the way we roll here with decade long trials--you'll literally be given an hour long trial and murdered behind a police station within a week or two. It seemed this would be the case with Gu Kailai last week. For allegedly poisoning a British diplomat, she was not expected to even be living right now (the case has since hit a few snags: see below). http://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/bo-xilai-case-tricky-matt…
Anyway, if these measures to prevent anti-American crime are truly this tangible to an American citizen working in China, there is little doubt in my mind they are by design. China needs us. Do they hold billions in American debt for interest payments? Do they make examples of anti-American criminals because they truly adore their white friends across the pond? Get out of my face. They now have a hand in our pocket, which will serve them greatly for the coming decades when their currency fixing and GDP slowing comes back to bite them. They are a forced ally with which we share a symbiotic relationship, one which neither the US nor China wants to see corrupted.
The amicability we share with China will only break down when one or both of us is no longer able to sustain the mutual benefit. Simply because of their ~1.3 billion population (and growing...), I foresee the US being put in a place wherein we are expected--but reasonably unable--to provide them with whatever our end of the bargain may be, whether it's soy beans, grain, aid, or money. I don't think it's impossible for this situation to occur, I just don't see it happening any time soon. Neither of us are desperate yet.
China and the US's economies are inextricably linked. They are not going to go to war. Besides, the bulk of the US debt is still held by the federal government and us households at close to $10 trillion, China's at $1.2.
And from a military standpoint, the US surpasses China but can't afford to finance another war. So the US is a bit of at an impasse.
Why are people so delusional? This isn't the Cold War anymore Bob, we trade with China and last time I checked, the $ amount and interdependency is pretty damn high.
Yea because the appetite for war in this country is huge right now...
The appetite for war after World War 1 wasn't exactly high, but look where that ended up.
Somebody watched the latest episode of political animals and got an idea for a troll post. Hooray!
Serious military enthusiast here, not just in the weapons themselves, but who's developing what, since when and selling to who. It's a fascinating pattern.
I'll take this one seriously. I personally don't believe China benefits from a war with the US, and the US could not possibly invade China. Not just from a military point of view, but a logistical and consequences (the entire world would rally against them).
However. the US could definitely join a war to prevent Chinese expansion, either directly or indirectly, Given that China has Russia to the North, India to the West (hello nukes) and water to the east (and japan), it's only option to expand would be south, through the relatively undefended islands and also the mineral heaven that is Australia and the heavily contested gas fields down there.
The Chinese definitely view the threat of the US seriously, the stealth technology they bought off the serbs during the kosovan war (from the downed F117) was not converted into a stealth plane or boat, but a stealth missile, which had one purpose, to sink aircraft carriers. It's possible to interpret this as a sign that its preparing to repel a US naval force that seeks to meddle in its affairs.
The US has previously (and repeatedly) joined a conflict on a significant scale to prevent a country becoming too big, so this sort of intervention is definitely not off the cards.
However I will hedge these 2 scenarios with the following facts:
1) China seems to gain territory by acquisition, not invasion. It is buying up vast tracts of Africa and exporting its people there. It owns it and works the land itself, its China in all but name.
2) The US is selling very high tech weapons to some border nations. Taiwan has the Aegis missile system, as well as extensive naval defenses (they aren't gonna walk there), not to mention other hardware:
"In July 2010, former United States Air Force deputy under secretary for international affairs, Bruce Lemkin said that Taiwan's ability to defend its airspace had degraded due to its aging fighters and that the sale of new fighter aircraft to Taiwan was an urgent priority.1 On 21 September 2011, it was announced that the US had agreed to a US$ 5 billion upgrade to the F16s.2 In 2012 Rob Nabors wrote that the United States was considering the sale of fighter aircraft to the ROC.3 (The republic of China, is Taiwan for those of you, like me, who got real confused when they saw that).
The US doesn't fight it's own wars any more to contain borders, it sells hardware to keep regions in check.
China won't risk a test of it's own military dominance. If it loses, it'd face an internal revolution, something the ruling caste would be stupid to risk, given the lives they lead thanks to the corruption involved in a communist regime.
There's also no question of a naval conflict right .. because the US navy has quite unchallenged dominance over the seas? The guarantor of world trade
If this is sarcastic, well done, you got me, although I don't believe it is.
The US 7th fleet is the only naval force you have in a massive range. If China were to pursue interests in that region, you would have 8 minelayers and other non fighting combat vessels, one carrier and related support group to hold them back. Yes you have the upper hand, navy vs navy, but they're about a months sailing away.
I see you play Risk religiously. Maybe that is what you meant by military enthusiast.
Natural resources, gas fields and australia.
This is hilarious.
This has now become a thread for arm-chair Generals.
predicted wars never happen.
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