Isn't natural gas supply one of the long term contracts signed in the Trump trade deal? This is a comical level of paranoia
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- Thread starter bd popeye
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Well looks like the US army will grow old before China grows old
I was told the same thing hydrocarbons and agri products were Trump era trade deals.
They want to sell soybeans at a 10,000% premium to the market. Eventually, at some point the US is probably going to ban all exports because it’s indirectly related to the super soybean military program.
Not going to happen. If America stops exporting commodities to China, it'll be the start of decoupling and Chinese exports to America will stop.
Looks like Elon's takeover of twitter is really happening.
I think he's in for a big surprise when he finds out the twitter censorship comes directly from government and not twitter itself. Imagine paying $44 billion to become the establishment mouthpiece.
Those German elites with a normal brain naturally know that China is Germany's natural ally. There are no mutual threats whatsoever, only commercial competition. As RCEP is becoming the largest and the richest region, Germany has an enviable jump station in China to expand lucrative business interests. To a lesser degree, France would eventually fall into that category. On the opposite side, UK is losing in the RCEP region as it does not have much to offer. While US is holding its position in high tech and finance, its weight in the RCEP region is decreasing vis-a-vis China. Therefore, Germany and France will not align with US and UK to contain China in any meaningful ways. Noises coming from small EU countries are loud and annoying. But Europe still is the play ground that belongs to Germany, France, UK, Italy, Spain. With UK so immersed in the war that wrecks havoc in the European economy, I think UK has effectively lost Europe. So I see a silver lining in Europe and expect Europe to wake up somewhat in the next 6 months or so.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Are we sure it’s actually the Saudis duping him and not just Biden getting confused again?
Florida man.
manqiangrexue
Brigadier
Correct. When a starving child in rags asks you for money, it is called begging. When a mafia boss with 8 people behind him holding guns asks you for money, it is called robbing. See, the same actions can be very different depending on who does it.
It only works when the host country allows it to work. Anything you made can be banned and the host's media can totally overwhelm you in an instant with hostile coverage. You think it's effective because you're seeing "like-minded" countries "convince" each other. It's like thinking you're a master debater getting everyone to agree with you that the earth is flat when you did so at a Flat Earth Convention.
It's the best way to attract socially weak and rejected people. There is no power there and no such thing as "soft power" in general.
Most people only consume and are influenced by the media that their government allows them to.
I never said the video games don't make money; that is a completely separate issue. But the fact is that I have never heard of any politician or decision-maker who is attracted to anime and has swayed the country to make Japan-leaning decisions before. Rather, the typical scenerio is that people either casually play a few games without being mentally-controlled by them, or they become addicted and fall down a rabbit hole of gaming/anime at which point most of these people are socially rejected and often even have trouble getting dates. They are those types I mentioned and have no influence on how a country's government behaves.
Yes, no problem, they can. And China has made military games too. American entertainment is successful at spreading its propaganda because 1. American is rich enough to make good ones, and 2. American hard power makes these things make sense. Everything rests on a foundation of hard power. But even then, the citizens of nations hostile to the US are still hostile to the US, because their governments protect them from this propaganda, either through bans or by overwhelming their effects with far more anti-US propaganda. Hence we've come full circle for why it's useless to try to spread "soft power" through media as it only works on friendly nations.
You're imagining weapons that don't exist and that's foolish. There is no soft power, only an extension of hard power, as I have demonstrated time and time again. What you think is soft power is only an extension of hard power; it will naturally and effortlessly come to China when our hard power has matured to a dominant stage.
It goes to show once again, do not waste your time coveting others; make yourself strong and they will covet you. It is true in personal life and in international relations.
Let's do it.
None of your questions made any sense. Nothing done here was begging and none of it was soft power. That's America threatening people that if they don't take the ecuses as given and do as told, they're going to get f'ed up by American hard power, whether it be physical or through bans, etc... The exact same things can be done by a lesser nation with no hard power and everyone would just laugh, but when done by America, its hard power makes these things real. That is evidence that there is no soft power but only non-violent extensions of hard power. You need to understand that because right now, it feels like you are stuck at the level of "talking = soft power; beating up= hard power." It's childish and you need to move past it. Threats are all hard power.
No, it was all possible because America possesses the largest nominal GDP and military in the world and is known to totally abuse it when it doesn't get its way. Nothing is possible without hard power.
Soft power doesn't even exist. It's all making threats and backing it up with hard power. Without hard power, it is begging; with hard power, it is a threat. Threats work; begging doesn't.
You've perfectly illustrated how there is no soft power and everything depends on hard power.
No. The problem is that Japan has no hard power so it's just a cute little joke.
No, life lessons for you.
Chinese people love to watch Chinese movies. I said that the US can afford to do so but that doesn't mean that China can't; I meant that American movies are outstanding in the world because most countries can't afford it. But compared to American movies, Chinese movies will always take a far back seat competing in countries that are pro-US and anti-China and it doesn't matter a darn thing how well you made it because every government has near total control over its domestic media.
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