By the way, it's here: "
" . Here's my take. It's an enormous construction site and requires billions of dollars. So, these billions of dollars could have gone to more productive parts of economy, instead of building this unnecessary military headquarter. Is this gargantuan headquarter so vital? I don't think so. They should have diverted recourses to AI, quantum computing, chip production and satellite launch technology in which the Chinese fall behind the west.
Fall behind? China's killing the west so bad at all tech they need to pull some funding to make things interesting. The West is basically standing still compared to China's young tech whizzes.
Alternatively , these funds could have helped to boost birthday at the least.
That's how Euros like to spend their money? That's how they ended up going from top of world tech to America's latrines.
I have got an impression that Ms Xi is obsessed with the Taiwan reunification, and he wants to achieve that by any means, including by sacrificing half of china 's GDP. Truly a sad story for everyone, except maybe Americans.
You got the wrong impression, which is no surprise from another foreigner who thinks he can understand China. If that was the case, Taiwan would already be reunified and China would be fighting the sanctions. Xi's taking his sweet time because the cost of taking Taiwan gets cheaper by the day.
great that you mentioned "It's called peace through strength" and "makes another Hundred Years of Humiliation less likely" . That implies you believe that building that headquarter contributes to chinese strength. And that's correct. But then a question rises: what contributes more to chinese strength, building military headquarter or domination in emerging techs? to me the answer is clear and it is not the headquarter. "Hundred Years of Humiliation" could come to the chinese if they fall behind in the emerging techs, especially AI and quantum computing. Reportedly, China poses around 550 intercontinental launchers; that means that "Hundred Years of Humiliation" wont come by military means. But "Hundred Years of Humiliation" may very well come if:
It will not come at all because China will be militarily and technologicall superior to the West. All trends point to it; China's got many more resources to put wherever they can be used. Your bitching and moaning over building one military complex is poor European mental disease. To China, it's a detail in the budget.
1) the west outpaces china in AI, which is the current situation.
It's questionable where the West is in relation to China, be it at little ahead or a little behind in different aspects but China undoubtledly outpaces everyone at every part of AI. China's not shitting itself over some Western AI app; the West is shitting itself over Deepseek and it's just the beginning of a long slope.
2) the birthrate in china doesn't go up, which is the current situation.
Don't worry about it; we've got a lot of time of time where we have higher population and higher per capita STEM majors, made of smarter people with stronger work ethic. And it's not like the West is doing well in birthrate either.
3) The west outperforms china in quantum computing, which is currently the case.
China invests more in quantum computing than any other country and China gets the biggest bang for the buck compared to any modern country. How long to you think the West can last?
The chinese real strength lies in the economy and high tech, not in oversized military headquarters; you can't threaten or dethrone the USA with the military might because the USA has excessive military capabilities, such as ohio submarines.
Those are China's traditional strengths. The military is China's developing strength. 50 years ago, none of them were Chinese strengths. We overtake one by one. What's not ours today is ours tomorrow.
Apparently, tiny deepseek caused more tangible trouble for the USA than Russia's invasion of ukraine.
Because Russia itself is not a comprehensive challenge to the US. These aren't even on the same dimension. One is your side-gig and one is your main means of survival.
All in all, if china really wants to become number one in the world, economy and high tech will work and not headquarters, missiles and a number of ships.
All of them, not A and B, not C. China will dominate in every aspect. In the end, when all civility is pared away and domination is linked to survival, military might will determine the victor, although it may achieve its effects without actual use.
If china continues unnecessary militarization, it will resemble USSR.
We spend under 2% of GDP on the military. We can easily spend plenty more. Besides, we can always use the US as the canary in the coal mine on that indicator.
