Re: Great China VS U.S war book
You can use whatever historical equivalent you want in writing a fictional novel. If it is entertaining and does not take on too much of a dogma, perhaps it will sell well. I like that about the free market.
Of course you
can write it. I am not about to send chekists around to confiscate all your manuscripts and send you to an undisclosed location in Siberia. :rofl:
As to my novel, I know that no one felt that a Germany-Russian alliance in the early days of World War II was plausible. It took everyone by surprise...and yet they did it. Some of the alliances in this novel are exactly like that.
First of all, it is non-aggression pact, not alliance. Whatever you feel about it, does not make it alliance. USSR tried repeatedly to be involved with French little entente, but due to Polish mistrust of Soviet Union, that was not possible in the end. Also to get Britan and France on board with anti-nazi pact, but to vacillation of Western governments, there was no avail. Stalin always overestimated Anglo-French power - pact with Nazi Germany was
last resort. Stalin built Stalin Line, Stalin read Mein Kampf. Temporary measure like non-aggression pact (also with Japan signing) is not the same thing as actively arming and to have alliance. I suggest you take a closer look at sources from the day, it is not as simple as it sounds.
And again, the basic logic of your argument is flawed. I said before, something happened before is not the same thing as saying something will happen again. You take ONE event of a supposedly unexpected non-alliance being signed, and use it to support another unlikely alliance being signed, one that is between different parties, under different world-historical conditions, and in completely different time. All this boils down to is that something unlikely happened before, it can happen again.
Well, yes, it
can happen, what we are discussing is if it will plausibly happening again.
As comparing one dictatorship to another...that's fair...they are different. But the key ingredient is that they are dictatorships based upon single parties who are totalitatrian. As to there being no historical precedent...well, let's just agree to disagree on that in the modern era. Tibet, India, Vietnam, the Spratleys, and even the current tensions in the Formosa Straits all indicate (at least from my perspective and I realize otherts perspectives will differ) a propsensity to use force outside when it suits them.
1) we can actually dispute if China is totalitarian - there is lively debate about whether it is authoritarian today or totalitarian, and most is inclined to suggest former being the case. 25 years ago, I would agree with you. Today, not so much. China, by necessity is much more open and decentralised than faschist Germany. You can't control 1.3 billion people all from Beijing, and being a huge trade power, China has to be more open. There are one million Taiwanese in China alone.
2) In various times over the last half-century, Cuba, Yugoslavia, Poland, Chile, Vietnam, Mongolia, all were 'dictatorships based upon single parties who are totalitatrian'. I think it is quite clear that just that one point alone is not sufficiency of basis to plot their future actions. More important is socio-economic factors, geo-political factors, and miltiary balance of power... all of which as suggested before, meaning China would be quite unlikely to start on a march of world-conquest.
3) I am by no means saying People's Republic is model world-citizen since day 1. In fact, during Cultural Revolution, some of the rhetoric was downright scary. But first, China of today was not China of yesteryear (and all wars you mentioned happened before current generation of leaders, which you agree, I think, is quite different from Mao's lot).
HOWEVER, all the examples you named are not the same! They were either based on
a) existing territorial claims (India, Tibet, Spratleys, Taiwan) of PRC, which hadn't changed since 1949 (contrast with faschist Germany, which had extended its claims every
year) in any great extent except when border demarcation treaties cause a few hundred square kilometres to change hands (such as Pamir in border with Tajikstan), or
b) limited war fought over well-defined objective with no intention of holding land (Vietnam, Korea).
This may be evidence for
aggressive behaviour, but it is not evidence for expansionism, let alone conquest on that scale.
Look, I really do appreciate your work, and this is in no way meant to disparage you. I fully understand that what you want to do (I state quite earlier on I think that this has audience for Americans, a parable of - as you put it - moral values) and how difficult it is to come up with a situation where all the weapons would be plausibly developed - you NEED a foeman worth your steel for that, and I am thankful that for once it isn't Russia
.
But that is not what this book is about. It is a fictional techno-thriller meant to be entertaining, and to allow some fictional dealving into potential weapons systems, and meant (and I admit this unabashedly) to interject moral values into the book to offset what I see is rampant immorality imbedded into literature during the current times. So, commitment to traditional family, values, etc. is presented (and on both sides I might ad) in an effort to write an exciting novel without all of the horrible language and particularly immorality that comes along with others.
Well, that is agreed, and it IS entertaining. That is one point all posters on this thread seem to find agreement on!
It is also meant to, using fictional leaders and the decisions they make, to show how in any society, and in any conflict, that the intrinsic faith and actions of collective free peoples and the multipliers associated with that, can possibly win out over totalitariansm, wherever it raises its head...but at great cost.
To be honest, I think at present, the force of history is incredibly tilted against totalitarianism. Count forces array against them. America. Europe. Japan. India. ANZ. Just for starters... 70% of the world's economic output, more than 80% military power. Absolute domineering position in technology and science. The 'neutral' powers, those who work against the before-mentioned powers sometimes, but mostly value relationship with them due to trade and co-operation issues, Russia and China and assorted others.
'Rogue nations'... North Korea, Iran, maybe Sudan and a few more. You can, as you did, with a huge stretch, include China in that list... but the sheer poverty of resources of this global opposition is I think apparent to all. The sheer fact that Axis of Evil was Iran, Iraq and North Korea really says much.
So cheer up, democracy is definitely winning!
Anyhow, thanks for all the comments. They are helpful and interesting and I appreciate the various view points, even if they do not necessarily reflect my own.
Well, what's the use of listening to viewpoints that's exactly like your own, is I always ask?
