[FooBarWidget]

What sort of historical precedence?

Historical precedence from the Ming dynasty showed that even when they have a big fleet, they're not interested in colonizing territories. The Ming fleet only traded, not conquered. Look up Zhang He.

Historical evidence from the Qing dynasty showed that in the 18th century, Chinese mining settlers in Malaysia tried to submit themselves under the rule of the Qing, but the Qing emperor refused, saying China is big enough already. Lookup Lanfang Republic.

Historical precedence from the Republican era showed that the People's Republic has given up territory compared to the Republic. See all of outer Mongolia, which was ceded (and which Taiwan, a.k.a. the Republic, still formally claims).

Historical evidence from a few years ago shows that China's policy is non-interventionist. Lookup Yanis Varoufaski, former Greek minister: https://youtu.be/9tJatdtv4jQ Lookup Gyude Moore, "China in Africa: an African perspective"

Where is the evidence that we can expect China to behave like the US?

[whereis]

History is littered with examples. But for China's ambitions, maybe it will depend on the nature of their alliances by then (2050 is their goal).

There's a complicated relationship with Russia vis a vis scientific collab in space, and now we're entering the openly militarized age of space. Russia's relations with China, meanwhile, are improving.

Besides, the nature of domination going forward, in any kinetic sense, won't involve nukes, bayonets, bow and arrow, or the like, except as backup offensive strats. Could involve, say, leaking a virus from a lab.

The nature of global domination may be far less violent than we've seen, historically, but certainly has the potential to be far more insidious.

I'd much rather do my part helping the West maintain their incumbent role. As for Snowdon/surv topics: everyone did it, everyone does it, espionage is the 2nd oldest profession.

May I ask if you support China's ongoing initiative to reclaim Taiwan? They seem to be willing to use force to do so.

[FooBarWidget]

Re Taiwan I think calling it an "ongoing initiative to reclaim Taiwan" is misrepresenting the situation. I think PRC would be happy to maintain status quo indefinitely, even allowing Taiwan to have strong informal ties with the world, as long as all parties don't try to break the One China Policy. The status quo has been hugely beneficial to both parties while still allowing de facto independence. By Korean standards, China is already reunified. In the late 80s or early 90s the PRC did offer One Country Two Systems with many negotiable options, but the KMT back then was too arrogant and shot that down, thinking PRC would collapse. Now that ship has sailed.

I'm hoping for a peaceful resolution. Whether that's reunification, or an acceptable form of independence, I'm fine with both. It wouldn't be that bad if China-Taiwan becomes like US-Canada: independent but at peace and with good relationships. Just... Stop fighting and hating on each other, for fscks sake.

I oppose any violent resolutions. But from my perspective, many parties involved in the matter seem to be hellbent on forcing a violent resolution.

[whereis]

China has been seeking escalation of late:

https://www.foreignaffairs.com/articles/china/2021-06-03/chi...

[FooBarWidget]

Yeah but that's after years of escalations by DDP and US. Before DPP, we could even say that China-Taiwan relationships were at its peak. China's recent moves are primarily a response instead of a proactive move.

The DPP has done a lot of dubious things that raise tensions, all for political scoring, such as:

- blatantly lying about that they warned WHO about knowing about the Wuhan virus. They later published their email to the WHO... And their own email shows that they've been lying. :-(

- at the start of the Wuhan outbreak, they immediately banned all mask exports to China.

- they've banned TV and news outlets that have a pro-mainland stance.

- more recently, they've banned importing vaccines from China, even though they don't have alternatives. Even donations of western vaccines from mainland NGOs are rejected.

I mean, I understand the desire for independence. But surely you can advocate that without the need for immoral populist moves that harm not only the mainland government, but also the people, right? Lying about COVID and banning masks really pissed off a lot of mainland citizen. Banning mainland vaccines harms Taiwanese people. All this for scoring political points.

If you look at Tsai Ing Wen's Twitter, you will see a lot of mainland citizen mocking her. The article says the government has "fanned the flames of Chinese nationalism". But sorry, I can't agree with this. The article makes it seem as if Chinese people's thoughts are a wholly artificial construct created by the CCP. But Chinese nationalism existed before the CCP. Lots of people genuinely care about the Taiwan issue. There's a saying that if China becomes democratic, then it would have launched an invasion yesterday.

The article also makes it seem as if China has been strengthening its military with the primary goal of invading Taiwan. I also cannot agree with this. Its military strenghtening's main purpose is to defy foreign aggressions. One of the CCP's founding purpose, and its source of legitimacy among the people, is to end the era of foreign imperialism. China has suffered a lot, for 100 years, because it was weak and could not resist European and Japanese colonizers. Building a capable military is their version of "never again".

Military strengthing was accelerated due to Obama's Pivot to Asia. Around 2010,the US sent warships to the South China Sea, and instigated UNCLOS issues even though the US didn't ratify UNCLOS. Then China was like "so you want to play military games? Fine, have it your way". And now we have artificial islands in the South China Sea and aircraft carriers... https://original.antiwar.com/dave_decamp/2020/07/19/the-us-h...

As for the US again, they tried sending diplomats to Taiwan, which is like 1 step away from formal independence. They knew full well that doing this will trigger an aggressive response from China (and would have since 1949), but they still went ahead and did it. This still amazes me because it was the US in the 70s who co-created the One China Policy in the first place.

Like I said: multiple parties are hell-bent on forcing a violent resolution. For no concrete gain that benefits anybody.