Fourth Taiwan Strait Crisis

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KevinG

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Existential threats? Lol why? Because their economic performance wasn't up to expectations? Aren't all western economies are essentially in recession? Yet those countries including the U.S. isn't bring discussed as facing terminal threat now are we?

And Pelosi's stunt was of substance? By virtue of her capacity and role as a CONGRESSWOMAN her role in affecting Foreign Policy is ZILCH. That avenue belongs solely to the executive branch which is headed by the President through his appointed SOS in this case Bumbling Blinken.

Before you make any provocative comments you ought to at least consider that your audience, even if predominantly See See Pee sympathizers and Chinese we are more than familiar to the American system than Americans to the Chinese. We ain't stupid or ignorant.
Between the China and the west, economic recession has the big difference politically. US economy is bad, Democrats is probably going to loose the upcoming election. Can CCP loose an election?
 

Overbom

Brigadier
Registered Member
Honestly the entire Chinese propaganda staff should really just undergo a massive audit to cut the fat and bring in some new, competant blood. Never mind Russia, the Chinese propaganda wing would be lackluster even compared to Qatar's.
People are deservedly clowning the Propaganda guys, but we shouldn't forget that these old fossils were among the very first to wake up from hibernation in the late 2000s after sensing the danger coming from the West.

They are incompetent at their jobs, but they are very patriotic and vigilant people. But yeah, a change of guard is probably long overdue at that department.
 

KevinG

New Member
Registered Member
Honestly the entire Chinese propaganda staff should really just undergo a massive audit to cut the fat and bring in some new, competant blood. Never mind Russia, the Chinese propaganda wing would be lackluster even compared to Qatar's.

If that is the CCP's angle, this just seems like a really bad play. If they want their people to forget about the COVID restrictions and domestic issues, showing a strong and assertive hand in this crisis should be what they do. Quite frankly, unless they somehow manage to salvage a PR win from this by either sailing one of their destroyers up to the American carriers or by sailing their fleet within a stone's throw of Taiwan, this is a PR loss for China both on the world stage and in the domestic sphere.
PLA does not have the capabilities to sail along the California coasts yet. Military moves around Taiwan is already on schedule. China just needs to play on the edge, both China and US do not want a war, and Taiwan does not have the right to choose.
 

gadgetcool5

Senior Member
Registered Member
I believe China achieved a minor victory by not being goaded into shooting down Pelosi or doing anything drastic that would have prevented her from landing, just as I predicted. It makes Pelosi look like the instigator and China look like the reasonable party. The American "China hawks" are in truth deeply disappointed, since if China had used force, it would have strengthened their hand tremendously. Now they are denied what would have been a huge coup for them. Xi played this absolutely correctly. As for Pelosi, she will no longer be Speaker in six months. She is an old woman at the end of her rope. Tsai will also not be president of Taiwan in 2 years either. These two are has-beens who will soon fade away into obscurity as long as China remains calm.
 

Biscuits

Colonel
Registered Member
What's even worse is that the US did not even put on a show of force. They sent a handful of F-15s and an AWAC. They didn't raise DefCon, didn't emergency steam ships from Guam or Pearl, didn't empty the Reagan with multiple F-18 squadrons in the air, didn't raise strategic command alert levels, didn't do anything that indicates they took things seriously.

They mobilized more for some North Korean axe psycho in the 70s.

This shows US didn't even take China as seriously as North Korea and a minimal show of force was enough.
Lol

They knew China wouldn't shoot on her if the US military itself doesn't enter China.

Beijing doesn't want to fight US directly over their own province. Why fight US when they can just let the US delegation leave and then fight the rebels, without forcing Biden into fighting because his delegation got killed?

If they emptied the Reagan and sent huge forces, China might be forced to shoot down and sink every US ship in sight since such a move can easily be seen as an invasion.

Notice how they kept every platform at the very edge of Chinese anti shipping missile range, only dipping in to deliver the minimum of fighters then returning further outside and avoided the whole nine dash line area.

If you want to talk about how seriously US took it, they took it seriously enough to try and protect their CVN extensively, which is more than they did when they fought in actual wars.
 

wxw456

New Member
Registered Member
I was one of those who urged the CCP to do nothing much, since the US still has the upper hand (this is the bitter truth). However, what's the point of making these crazy statements about "red lines" when it was all exposed as huff? Rhetoric should match reality.
Was a fun couple of days watching this thread blow up. I think there are some misconceptions about the statements made during the lead up to the situation:
  • Official statements by the government essentially stated that the visit would be against China's interests. A direct shootdown and air/naval battle was never explicitly stated. Some tougher words may have been said, but no explicit guarantee of a military battle was made.
  • The idea of a direct shootdown or air/naval battle was based on opinions and articles from the Global Times. I've always personally thought that people put way too much emphasis on what state media publish. The idea that every state media publication is directly equivalent to government policy is absurd. It's the ye old lazy "government media implies government policy" trope.
  • It didn't help that foreign media picked up on this and ran with the rather sensationalist title/scenario (tbf it probably generated a lot of clicks and views :p).
That being said people here are puzzled about the lackluster response (no intercept or shootdown + military exercises are not enough). It doesn't feel like a response matching the rhetoric has been made ;). If you look at it from another perspective the Chinese government might take this incident as a casus belli to escalate elsewhere or later. That is to say there is no obligation to directly and immediately retaliate (i.e. shoot down the plane). Instead the option to provoke the DPP or US elsewhere and retort "Maybe Pelosi shouldn't have made a visit!" becomes available (excuse the future provocation with this incident).

The main benefit to the above approach is that you open up the retaliatory options available instead of a narrow set of options (shoot down the plane or not) and gain the initiative if you initiate the retaliatory incident. I leave it to the imagination of the posters as to what an appropriate counter provocation should be (Be more imaginative!). (Go ahead and reply on what you think would be a good option!)
 

Franklin

Captain
This simply shows you how irresponsible American leaders have become. That Nancy Pelosi the speaker of the house would create a international crisis for personal agrandissement. Because her visit was both opposed by the Pentagon and the White House so she is going their without any political, diplomatic or strategic initiative. Its nothing more than a personal photo op. And America and maybe the world will pay for that photo op.
 

siegecrossbow

General
Staff member
Super Moderator
I believe China achieved a minor victory by not being goaded into shooting down Pelosi or doing anything drastic that would have prevented her from landing, just as I predicted. It makes Pelosi look like the instigator and China look like the reasonable party. The American "China hawks" are in truth deeply disappointed, since if China had used force, it would have strengthened their hand tremendously. Now they are denied what would have been a huge coup for them. Xi played this absolutely correctly. As for Pelosi, she will no longer be Speaker in six months. She is an old woman at the end of her rope. Tsai will also not be president of Taiwan in 2 years either. These two are has-beens who will soon fade away into obscurity as long as China remains calm.

What you said would be true if they didn’t play up the drama domestically and abroad. Now it has backfired tremendously.
 
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