China's SCS Strategy Thread

[manqiangrexue]

Man! I haven't had this much fun since Ronald Reagan occupied the White House! too bad we can't clone Mattis, and Pompeo!
Man I love it! The British and the French military are just as encouraged as I am to have Trump in the White House!

Ok, I gotta go turn down the radio, the "Honey Badger" is scowling! I don't think she likes "WHO LET THE DOGS OUT!"

That's a lot of excitement there over empty posturing as China makes concrete gains, but I guess if empty posturing is all a country has, it'll have to do; we all need excitement, right? The West can keep sailing ships in circles (while it can) to try to look like it's doing something and China can keep building/expanding/militarizing islands; works for me right now.

Yes, I likely wish more than you that they be cloned, not nearly as much as I wish that Trump is, however. Let China's rival nations be forever run by the geriatric and the loud-mouthed and let China be run by those who get tangible feats accomplished.

 

[Ali Qizilbash]

That's a lot of excitement there over empty posturing as China makes concrete gains, but I guess if empty posturing is all a country has, it'll have to do; we all need excitement, right? The West can keep sailing ships in circles (while it can) to try to look like it's doing something and China can keep building/expanding/militarizing islands; works for me right now.

Yes, I likely wish more than you that they be cloned, not nearly as much as I wish that Trump is, however. Let China's rival nations be forever run by the geriatric and the loud-mouthed and let China be run by those who get tangible feats accomplished.

Agreed. China is accomplishing tangible results on ground but one has to admit that US is also now backing up its rhetoric with some degree of tangible measures.

Hope both parties can stay sane and live in harmony

 

[manqiangrexue]

...but one has to admit that US is also now backing up its rhetoric with some degree of tangible measures.

I don't "admit" that at all. The current actions of sailing ships in circles is a reflection of helplessness and desperation, the opposite of tangible measure.

If, for some reason, I have taken issue with my neighbor's modifications to his house, "tangible measure" would be if I found a way to stop him from making his modifications. Running circles around his yard occasionally stepping on his lawn while cursing at him would mean I have absolutely no idea how I'm going to deal with him and I am at my wit's end. It's quite frankly a mental breakdown on my part if I were to act like that.

 

[Ali Qizilbash]

I don't "admit" that at all. The current actions of sailing ships in circles is a reflection of helplessness and desperation, the opposite of tangible measure.

If, for some reason, I have taken issue with my neighbor's modifications to his house, "tangible measure" would be if I found a way to stop him from making his modifications. Running circles around his yard occasionally stepping on his lawn while cursing at him would mean I have absolutely no idea how I'm going to deal with him and I am at my wit's end. It's quite frankly a mental breakdown on my part if I were to act like that.

When I wrote about some degree of tangibility on US part, RIMPAC disinvite was on my mind.

What do you say on that.

 

[manqiangrexue]

When I wrote about some degree of tangibility on US part, RIMPAC disinvite was on my mind.

What do you say on that.

I say that's clearly the opposite of any tangible gain; it's complete juvenile nonsense possibly even more so than sailing ships in circles to annoy people. RIMPAC exercises involving both China and the US are operationally valuable to neither; it's just a gesture, a handshake between rivals, like glove-touching before a boxing/MMA match. Cancel it, no problem. Nobody needs to touch gloves in the first place. Quite frankly it's another show of despair and despondence from the US.

 

[ougoah]

At this point it seems the best course of action for China is to be quiet and not respond to the RIMPAC, sink your islands claim, sensationalised American articles claiming various things. Just get on with business as usual. One side wants tangible gains the other wants to prop up their image. There's a win win situation here. The longer this is kept up, the less likely the US has any realistic means of stopping PRC from eventually taking her claims. No group of nations in the region can even hope to challenge China economically or militarily and they don't have a reason to do so. It's not like the PRC is moving around invading sovereign nations and murdering their citizens like a colonial power. They are simply taking what's their's and PRC's claim to SCS islands is certainly as strong if not considerably stronger than Vietnam's, Philippine's, and Malaysia's. Those three have basically zero claim (based on fact, history, precedence, international law, sovereignty) apart from this zone should be international waters. Sorry but those islands were NEVER part of their national sovereignty throughout known history. So the only reason for the gang up claim is to take it away from China's hands. Except these islands have actually been first officially chartered and officially discovered by the Chinese (written records). Which already puts China's claim in front. Now that Vietnam first started pouring concrete and tried their pathetic attempt at building islands China thought why not play just as dirty? Japs want to unilaterally sell an island that is disputed to a private citizen, well China can play that dirty trick too.

It must be remembered that these other asian nations tried pulling the dirty when China is happy to "let disputes be settled with the wisdom of future generations" (paraphrasing Deng) but its magnanimous attitude is commonly considered weakness and taken advantage of by less well-natured leaders. If they don't want the carrot, they can have the stick. China's the one with the tools this century and it would be a shame not to take complete advantage of political and military might. China behaves like a saint compared to the horrifically evil colonialists from the west who went around murdering millions around the world... often times just out of spite. So let's not compare the two.

 

[solarz]

At this point it seems the best course of action for China is to be quiet and not respond to the RIMPAC, sink your islands claim, sensationalised American articles claiming various things. Just get on with business as usual. One side wants tangible gains the other wants to prop up their image. There's a win win situation here.

My concern about this is that Trump strikes me as the kind of person who believes his own lies. If the Americans believe, even falsely, that China would back down to their pressure, it increases the chance of an armed conflict.

 

[ougoah]

My concern about this is that Trump strikes me as the kind of person who believes his own lies. If the Americans believe, even falsely, that China would back down to their pressure, it increases the chance of an armed conflict.

If they can keep up the image of their pressuring leading to China "withdrawing", that should be enough to release the pressure. If however they consider that weakness on China's part and actually take military action, it is unprovoked because it would be attacking first while China has "retreated" and "capitulated". This is not a great position. But if it is indeed the course of action due to insanity or a host of strange reasons, armed conflict will either end in stalemate with Chinese islands and facilities there destroyed while US bases in the region receive a lot of guided ordinance, many times more than what they have to intercept them. If they want to escalate, there's no telling how much both sides will lose. If they want to settle there, both are bloodied and it would appear more as a Chinese victory owing to the loss of several important US bases against the loss of some islands that the western chauvinists hold in such low regard. Small price to pay. I'm sure the US leaders understand that Chinese ability to destroy them twice over is effectively the same as their ability to destroy China 100 times over. When this is considered, China can play it like Russia, ask them who has more to lose from losing everything. That's if things escalate. The essence of this is there is no possible win for the US engaging China using its military. But that does not mean China should stop fortifying the islands and preparing for one. No one really understands the true agenda behind the deep state and what they are prepared to do.

PS Guaranteeing worldwide nuclear winter and death of humanity in an MAD scenario would have been made a priority since China's first hydrogen bomb. I'd be willing to bet that most military resources have been poured into this during the earlier days as an insurance policy against something like Libya happening to China. Improving delivery methods and hardware has always been ongoing like the Russians. If less than shrewd or well-natured leaders have been in power of the PRC, they could have taken all claims by force. Russia reinforced this their position re Ukraine and Georgia and NATO could not do a single thing apart from sanctions which happen to be effective against Russia. The consequences of China doing similarly with SCS, Taiwan, and Diaoyu would be to sour relations with most of the world and hurt its claim of being a peaceful rising power. Still I would have done it but better men are in charge I suppose.

 

[solarz]

If they can keep up the image of their pressuring leading to China "withdrawing", that should be enough to release the pressure. If however they consider that weakness on China's part and actually take military action, it is unprovoked because it would be attacking first while China has "retreated" and "capitulated".

No, I mean that if they believe that China conceded to their demand this time, they will come up with stronger demands next time, and if they keep manipulating the narrative to make it look like they win every time, then they will continue to strengthen their demands until we reach a point where China will be forced to respond forcefully, leaving them in a position to either back down and commit political suicide, or continue escalating until armed conflict results.

 

[manqiangrexue]

No, I mean that if they believe that China conceded to their demand this time, they will come up with stronger demands next time, and if they keep manipulating the narrative to make it look like they win every time, then they will continue to strengthen their demands until we reach a point where China will be forced to respond forcefully, leaving them in a position to either back down and commit political suicide, or continue escalating until armed conflict results.

I think there are 2 different groups of people here. 1. The group of people/officials who make decisions and 2. The American public which needs to be appeased by group 1. Group 1 is well-educated and understands what's going on. They know exactly who capitulated how much and that they didn't get an inch out of China with their flamboyance as China continues to build, expand, and militarize. However, this truth angers group 2 very much and that's bad for group 1. So group 1 has to make up stories for the poorly educated and not very intelligent group 2, for example, telling them that mobile launchers can be assumed to have been withdrawn just because they aren't lined up 5 on a beach in their original spots anymore. This makes group 2 happy, and group 1 can get some breathing room, but group 1, the real decision makers, know that pushing China any further is stupid because they haven't gotten anything out of the last pushes, supposedly prompting them to move forward in a measured way. Group 1 is playing a delicate balancing act between making group 2 happy by appearing to capitulate China and the reality that they can't capitulate China. They're going to want to be careful not to do anything too big that would make China react in a way that blows their cover, showing group 2 that group 1 is not succeeding in a way they claim and that China is not backing down.