[JumpCrisscross]

> The US could even pay back that debt with money they themselves issued if needed

Intergovernmental debt is a geopolitical concern. The U.S. could freeze interest payments and redemptions to China. It could place those holdings in receivership and pass a law granting those oppressed by Beijing damages from it.

With international debt, the debtor holds the cards.

[luckylion]

> With international debt, the debtor holds the cards.

I think this sentence needs "if the debtor has equal or superior military capabilities". Some small country owing to the US certainly isn't in the same position.

[zazagura]

Not true.

Please point to a case where US attacked a defaulting debtor.

You can't, because using the military against a defaulting debtor is against UN law.

[JumpCrisscross]

> Please point to a case where US attacked a defaulting debtor

Gunboat diplomacy [1] features vibrantly in history. "The Venezuelan crisis of 1902–03," for example, "was a naval blockade imposed against Venezuela by the United Kingdom, Germany and Italy from December 1902 to February 1903, after President Cipriano Castro refused to pay foreign debts and damages suffered by European citizens in recent Venezuelan civil wars" [2].

Broadly speaking, the UN provides guidelines--not actual limits--to the anarchy that is geopolitics.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunboat_diplomacy

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venezuelan_crisis_of_1902–1903

[luckylion]

You shouldn't put words into my mouth. A military intervention is always on the table - what pretense you use is a different question. That the US has been very liberal with the pretenses in the recent decades is well documented.

The fact of the matter is that military strength is what -internationally- decides who holds the cards.

[zazagura]

Not in matters of debt.

Just look at how EU was forced to erase more than 50% of Greece's debt.

Or look at how US hedge funds are still fighting Argentina (in court) to recoup some of the money. According to your logic US should have threatened Argentina by now.

[luckylion]

> Just look at how EU was forced to erase more than 50% of Greece's debt.

Greece is a member of the EU.

> Or look at how US hedge funds are still fighting Argentina (in court) to recoup some of the money.

Private interests aren't the nation's interests, until they are large enough or invest enough money into PR, see United Fruit Company.

It also doesn't mean that any and all questions of international diplomacy will be handled by the military. But if push comes to shove, and the country with the far superior military isn't happy with the conditions of the default (or nationalization, or annexation, or... anything, really), they tend to come down not to international contracts, the UN, or ethics, but to military strength. Consider the situation in Ukraine for a well-documented example that certainly would have played out very differently, were Ukraine and Russia similar in military strength (that is in this case: if Ukraine still was a nuclear power).

[zazagura]

The Ukraine situation has nothing to do with debt.

Show me an after WW2 example were one country used the military against another because of unpaid debt.