China’s Mistakes Are Adding Up

themickey

themickey

Opinion
Mark Gongloff
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/a...na-s-mistakes-are-adding-up?srnd=premium-asia

China’s Mistakes Are Adding Up

From Taiwan to semiconductors and more, it keeps being its own worst enemy.

1600x-1.jpg

Don’t get carried away.

Photographer: Feng Li/Getty Images AsiaPac
By Mark Gongloff 12 August 2022Follow the authors

A River Runs Through It
My favorite Sun Tzu quote might be: “If you wait by the river long enough, the bodies of your enemies will float by.” First, it suggests I can win at life by doing three of my favorite things:

  • making no effort
  • enjoying a water feature
  • relaxing
Second, it lets the imagination run wild with why the enemies ended up floating in the river dead. Did they have a violent confrontation with some third-party enemy? Did their camp devolve into anarchy over the last s’mores marshmallow? Did they comically hop one-legged into the river trying to put on their battle pants? The mind reels.

The US and China are not quite “enemies,” exactly. The state of their relationship is mostly icy with a chance of Thucydides Trap. They’re barely controlled bitter rivals like SEC football schools or Real Housewives. But Sun Tzu’s dictum still applies here. And at the moment, the US seems to be the one sitting by the river while China keeps injuring itself with its own weaponry.

The latest example is China’s effort to squeeze Taiwan after Nancy Pelosi committed the unforgivable sin of visiting it. After reminding the island of all the cool ships and planes it has, Beijing put out a paper suggesting Taiwan could be the next Hong Kong, under the same “one country, two systems” model. Given how much Beijing has squeezed those “two systems” into one miserable, autocratic system lately, Matthew Brooker writes, Taiwan has all the more reason to avoid China’s embrace.

Beijing has also lashed out over Pelosi’s visit by cutting off climate talks with the US. All that does, Hal Brands writes, is remind a world already suffering the effects of anthropogenic warming that China is one of the prime causes of said warming. Holding the entire climate hostage because it has a sad over Taiwan will only make China more enemies.

China has been making such mistakes for years. Tim Culpan points out Beijing blew $100 billion on its semiconductor sector over two decades but still badly lags rivals in Taiwan and South Korea. This is largely because it chose to deprive itself of any outside help, to prove the superiority of its system or something. At the rate China is self-sabotaging, the US can almost just sit back and watch the river.
 
Five U.S. Lawmakers Arrive in Taiwan Amid Tensions With China
The delegation, led by Senator Ed Markey, Democrat of Massachusetts, is visiting less than two weeks after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s visit set off tensions with China.

14taiwan-visit-02-articleLarge.jpg

A photo released by Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs showing members of an American congressional delegation arriving Sunday and being greeted by Douglas Yu-tien Hsu, center, a Taiwanese diplomat.Credit...Taiwan Ministry of Foreign Affairs, via Associated Press

By Jane Perlez Aug. 14, 2022
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/08/14/world/asia/taiwan-congressional-delegation-visit.html

A five-member congressional delegation arrived in Taiwan on Sunday, less than two weeks after the contentious visit by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi that infuriated China and drew intense Chinese military drills off the island’s coast.

The bipartisan group, led by Senator Ed Markey, Democrat of Massachusetts, was welcomed by Taiwanese officials who said they appreciated the show of solidarity during the escalating tensions with Beijing.

There was no immediate response from Beijing, but the presence of the five American lawmakers so quickly after Ms. Pelosi’s visit was likely to provoke a sharp reaction, possibly of more military exercises, analysts said.

The visit was apparently planned months ago, said Bonnie Glaser, director of the Asia program at the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

“Many congressmen want to visit to show U.S. support,” Ms. Glaser said. Another congressional group is expected to visit Taiwan before the end of the month, she added.

One member of the delegation, John Garamendi, Democrat of California, is the chair of the House Armed Services Subcommittee on Readiness, a panel that has direct input into the Pentagon’s spending on Taiwan’s military needs.

The group is expected to meet Monday with Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-wen, and to consult with the foreign affairs and national defense committees of Taiwan’s legislature, a statement by Taiwan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.

“We thank the like-minded U.S. lawmakers for the timely visit and unwavering support,” the ministry said.

China’s reaction to Ms. Pelosi’s visit — the first by a speaker in 25 years — was designed to menace Taiwan, and warn American allies in Asia about supporting Taiwan.

After the visit, Beijing fired five missiles into waters that are part of Japan’s exclusive economic zone, a warning to Japan and the United States about coming to the aid of Taiwan in the event of a conflict. Last week, China wrapped up 72 hours of live-fire exercises that encircledTaiwan and that simulated a blockade of the island. China’s air force continues to fly military aircraft on a daily basis across the median line of Taiwan’s Strait.

China insists that Taiwan, a self-governing democracy supported with U.S. defense capabilities, is its territory. President Xi Jinping has vowed to take Taiwan, by force if necessary.

China is very likely to respond to the congressional visit, said Charles Kupchan, professor of international relations at Georgetown University, who served on the National Security Council in the Obama administration.

“I expect Beijing to take steps to express its displeasure, like it did with Pelosi,” Mr. Kupchan said. “This is how confrontation builds.”

After the three days of shock and awe live-fire military drills using jet fighters, warships and missiles, Beijing issued a policy document on Taiwan last week, called a White Paper, that reiterated Beijing’s determination to make the island part of China.

Given the intensity of China’s reaction to Ms. Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, the situation remained “extremely volatile,” said Lyle Goldstein, an expert on China’s military and director of Asia engagement at Defense Priorities, a Washington research group.

The visit by the delegation “may contribute to the escalation cycle we have been witnessing over the last five years,” Mr. Goldstein added. “The U.S. and China are now on a dangerous collision course.”

Amy Chang Chien contributed reporting from Taipei, Taiwan.
 
UsualName said:
Indeed… mistakes are adding up but autocrats are going to autocrat.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1559096970513350657
More...


that is how you get a bigger army and convince war solves a problem... go after the young unemployed who have no hope for a job or future and get them into the military where you clothe and feed them and pay them and tell them who is to blame for their misfortunes.

Worked for Hitler, Castro, Mao because it is a successful model.
 
One small point on the OP, China is not the the "cause" of global heating, even though they are largest current emitter of GHG. No, the UK, the US, and Europe are the leading causes, for the simple reason that because CO2 persists for centuries, it is those countries' historical emissions that are in the main driving today's heating.

China's biggest mistake was making the same bargain with the fossil fuel Devil the rest did, which is sad because they actually had time to see the problem and say 'no'. Can they simply leapfrog development right into renewables? They seem to think so, but unfortunately for them their people and economy are already taking a terrible hit from heating that everyone is contributing to. I don't think they can catch up with the West, their GDP figures notwithstanding.
 
I have remarked in various threads about how the Chinese real estate market is China’s Achilles heel. Indeed everyday the first thing the Chinese government does every morning is figure out where to put more toothpicks under it to hold it up for one more day.

The whole country is involved in the real estate market. As an example a extraordinary amount of local municipalities revenue comes from sales of land to developers. This has become a primary revenue stream for things like local roads, trash collection etc. Try to understand the levels of real estate sales, collateral and investment that runs through nearly everything in China. Everything you may be asking. Yes, truly nearly everything.

People worry about China invading Taiwan but the Chinese know our countermeasures will be to pluck the toothpicks holding up the hyper inflated real estate scheme that threatens to collapse the entire country. And yes I mean collapse the entire country. Like set it back a couple of decades. This is a good thread and I’m glad on the Chinese real estate bubble:

https://twitter.com/x/status/1559878491969146884
 
UsualName said:
People worry about China invading Taiwan but the Chinese know our countermeasures will be to pluck the toothpicks holding up the hyper inflated real estate scheme that threatens to collapse the entire country. And yes I mean collapse the entire country. Like set it back a couple of decades. This is a good thread and I’m glad on the Chinese real estate bubble:
More...
Let's not be too smug, realestate is also the Achilles' heel in the west.
Imo, this industry is one big scam where government effectively uses it to hit citizens with more taxes. Its largely unregulated allowing RE prices to continually inflate which brings yet more money into the coffers.
It's biased toward rich people who use negative gearing to enrich themselves while the poorer people subsidise the rich via tax their breaks.
Poor people become slaves to motgages, rich people benefit from it, all the while governments are encouraging it along.
In my opinion, this will be a leading cause of Western civilisation collapse due to this blatant government corruption.
 
themickey said:
Let's not be too smug, realestate is also the Achilles' heel in the west.
Imo, this industry is one big scam where government effectively uses it to hit citizens with more taxes. Its largely unregulated allowing RE prices to continually inflate which brings yet more money into the coffers.
It's biased toward rich people who use negative gearing to enrich themselves while the poorer people subsidise the rich via tax their breaks.
Poor people become slaves to motgages, rich people benefit from it, all the while governments are encouraging it along.
In my opinion, this will be a leading cause of Western civilisation collapse due to this blatant government corruption.
More...

This west certainly has its problems, especially with property taxes being regressive. But it’s nothing like the scheme in China. Overvalued property is marrow deep in that country and cracking. The fallout will go deep.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top