15 hours ago, Morch said:

 

The 'trash talk' comment was not directed at you, or any other poster. It was a reference to Trump's style.

But hey...you just demonstrated your own point.

I understand very well your reference to Trump's trash talk.  The point you evidently don't get are your frequent insults to posters with whom don't align with your views.

48 targets struck non inside Iran not a good idea to mess with uncle sam!

5 hours ago, Hawaiian said:

I understand very well your reference to Trump's trash talk.  The point you evidently don't get are your frequent insults to posters with whom don't align with your views.

 

Yeah, done with the 'code'. But be that as it may, I did not insult you, so your comment doesn't have much to do with my post.

On 2/2/2024 at 8:36 PM, Arindos said:

 

China wants to keep the United States away from its border regions (which is why the Chinese have been funding the Taliban to keep the US out of Afghanistan and prop up North Korea), but they also want to secure the trade routes out of China (which is why the Chinese have been building military facilities in places such as Sri Lanka).

 

While I assume that the Chinese will continue to fund anti-American interests in the Middle East, I also envisage a situation where the Chinese move military assets into the Middle East to fight against terrorism and piracy (similar to how the contradictory policy of supporting Afghanistan while fighting Xinjiang works).

I work on the assumption that China supports only China, and every foreign activity is decided on the basis that it will advance Chinese interests and confound it's enemies ( IMO China has the US on its enemies list ). I may well be wrong, but IMO supporting the US against the Houthies is not in China's interests, and anything that removes American influence in the Middle East is to China's benefit.

On 2/1/2024 at 9:57 PM, Arindos said:

The idea that the US can simply avoid using its military is silly because only the US will defend US shipping and other assets in the Middle East. It's alliances with other countries were about projecting US military power overseas and therefore most other countries are not going to be sympathetic. The only positive is that countries such as India are putting a lot of military into the Middle East as a consequence, and the US should push China to put its military assets in the Middle East as well.

And I do consider the mess in the Middle East to be part of a world war. You've got a lot of controversy on the western side of the Middle East due to the Migration Crisis and Israel-Palestine, and you have also drawn in the Chinese and Indians through the war between Iran/Afghanistan/Pakistan on the eastern side of the Middle East (the Chinese are widely believed to be funding the Taliban). It now waits to be seen what the Russians will do.

It now waits to be seen what the Russians will do.

 

If Putin has any sense he will not do anything. America is fast alienating the Arab nations over support for israel, Iran is already invested in anti American efforts in the region, and it's not looking good for the US and it's allies in that region.

Putin can look on and enjoy the unfolding morass for the US as it edges ever closer to yet another disastrous Middle East mess.

5 hours ago, thaibeachlovers said:

I work on the assumption that China supports only China, and every foreign activity is decided on the basis that it will advance Chinese interests and confound it's enemies ( IMO China has the US on its enemies list ). I may well be wrong, but IMO supporting the US against the Houthies is not in China's interests, and anything that removes American influence in the Middle East is to China's benefit.

 

@thaibeachlovers

 

I'm sure that it is not complicated to understand that countries may have more than one interest to tend to. It's not like China is single minded invested in anti-USA stuff. There are economic interest, domestic ones - and many of these are interrelated. If the Houthies effect on maritime traffic, costs effects China's economy, that may take precedence. If war break out, it's surely not going to do much for China's energy needs as well. Negative effects on the economy might lead to domestic unrest of one sort or another - and so on. Just some easy examples.