Thai Chinese air drill likely to create turbulence in procurement of F35 fighter jets

[kimamey]

On 8/20/2022 at 6:04 PM, GinBoy2 said:

This is for the Europeans chickens coming hone to roost.

 

The only reason Russia can afford this war is because idiots, in particular Merkel decided to become an energy cuckold to Russia. If you cut off the demand for energy from Russia, which is pretty much all they have to sell, they would be on their knees within a month.

 

But here we are, Western Europe without many energy options essentially funding Russia's war in Ukraine.

 

Well Done!

I think there was some logic to engaging with Russia economically at first but it should have been realised some time ago that Putin wasn't going to take the opportunity seriously. The same could be said for China. 

[placnx]

On 8/18/2022 at 8:17 PM, bangon04 said:

and the CCP already has the full spec for the F-35 in its huawei folder.............

Might be true, unfortunately.

[placnx]

On 8/19/2022 at 2:47 AM, GinBoy2 said:

Don't wanna derail this thread, but...

 

If Xi was to decide to invade Taiwan that would also imply taking out US military assets in Japan at the same time.

 

Thats a WW3 scenario, and I'm not sure Xi is ready for that....yet!

The Chinese first choice must be without firing a shot. Second would be a rapid, near stealth, takeover where the world would have to acquiesce because China would then control the supply of high end semiconductors. This second option could become ineffective if EU and US have already built enough fabs at home to live without the supply from Taiwan.

 

If Taiwan has not seriously upgraded its defense capabilities with sufficient effective weapons tailored to a number of scenarios, plus a lot of military training, it would be difficult to hold on for long. China has been busy preparing to deny US et al access to Taiwan in a confrontation.

[GinBoy2]

20 hours ago, kimamey said:

I think there was some logic to engaging with Russia economically at first but it should have been realised some time ago that Putin wasn't going to take the opportunity seriously. The same could be said for China. 

I would agree with that.

 

At the time the thought was that admitting China to the WTO, would make China look more like Hong Kong.

 

Well fast forward 20 years and Hong Kong is now looking a helluva lot more like China!

[placnx]

3 hours ago, GinBoy2 said:

I would agree with that.

 

At the time the thought was that admitting China to the WTO, would make China look more like Hong Kong.

 

Well fast forward 20 years and Hong Kong is now looking a helluva lot more like China!

The problem was that Russia in the 90s was not of interest to Western business people except oil companies, while China dangled the illusion of a market of 1.3 bn souls. Greed won out. Meanwhile the Russian economy was dismembered under the influence of American economic ideologues.