I guess we'll soon find out if Blinken's Christmas wish came early this year. He better have something important to say when meeting Xi Da Da, no more of this no decoupling but we need guardrails nonsense.
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- Thread starter bd popeye
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I guess we'll soon find out if Blinken's Christmas wish came early this year. He better have something important to say when meeting Xi Da Da, no more of this no decoupling but we need guardrails nonsense.
Rather than going to them militarily to collect, it would be easier to take back the same or more in penalties from the west, since the west has more stakes inside China than the other way around.
China doesn't need a large military because it needs to collect from unreliable nations. It needs a large military to fulfil it's international obligations as the largest economy, to keep trade lanes safe and open, to stop expansionist countries and deal with international crisis.
And when countries like America half-confess or at least refuse to wash their hands clean of alleged desire for expansion, and these countries have raised their military spending far above the normal and are building dozens of aircraft carriers, then China must eclipse such countries militarily, to keep the global balance stable.
AssassinsMace
Lieutenant General
For people who think that Western propaganda is all lies. Back channel negotiations about meeting Xi were probably positive as long as Blinken's meetings with Qin and Wang Yi went well
From 2 weeks ago:
France summons allies in challenge to German-led air defence plan
France is challenging a German-led plan to build up Europe’s air defences, in another sign of brewing tensions over how the region should counter the threat posed by Russia.
The disagreement will set the backdrop to an air defence strategy conference in Paris on Monday, which partly aims to wrest back momentum from the Berlin-backed European Sky Shield initiative, whose launch blindsided French officials last year.
Convened by President Emmanuel Macron on the sidelines of the , French officials describe the event as a forum for debate among EU defence ministers, US and Nato military officials, and industry executives.
But Macron’s push also reflects more fundamental differences between Paris and Berlin over how to promptly strengthen military defences against Vladimir Putin’s Russia while at the same time fostering Europe’s industrial base.
German chancellor Olaf Scholz unveiled Sky Shield last October to create a European air and missile defence system by jointly procuring equipment, and 17 countries have since signed up, including the UK, the Baltic states, Sweden and Finland.
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and its heavy use of munitions and missiles to attack from the skies were a wake-up call that Europe could no longer neglect its air defences. “We have a lot of catching up to do in Europe”, Scholz said in an August speech setting out his vision for air defence.
But key countries such as France, Italy and Poland have remained on the sidelines, showing the challenges of overcoming national industrial interests even as are up across Europe. Paris in particular was caught off guard by Sky Shield’s announcement and a Franco-German summit in part to signal its pique.
While French and German officials have avoided public criticism of each other’s plans, differences are evident behind the scenes. Germany initially planned to send a senior official instead of defence minister Boris Pistorius, but changed course over the weekend.
Macron has implicitly criticised Sky Shield for relying too much on weapons systems manufactured outside Europe, while not adequately considering how to best deter Russia, including by potentially acquiring long-range missile strike capabilities.
Air defence “is first a strategic issue before being an industrial one, but obviously, it must be based on a balance of offensive actions and defensive actions”, Macron said in a recent speech.
“When I see certain countries which increase their defence spending to massively buy non-European systems, I simply tell them: ‘You are preparing the problems of tomorrow!’”
In Berlin, officials see the French criticism as unfounded and argue that the urgency of closing gaps in air defences means that procuring “off-the-shelf” systems is preferable to “lengthy and often cost-intensive” new developments. In the letter of intent sent to Nato last year seen by the Financial Times, the countries taking part in Sky Shield agreed to “pragmatic solutions” to “enable swift progress” on air defences.
Although countries in Sky Shield each make their own procurement choices, Germany has said it plans to buy Iris-T missiles from homegrown manufacturer Diehl group for medium-range protection, the Patriot from US-based Raytheon Technologies for long range, and the Arrow 3 from Israel for very long range. The German parliament last week signed off on the first purchases: a set of six Iris-T units for €900mn and the first tranche of funds in a $4.3bn deal for the Arrow 3 missiles.
In Paris, the exclusion of the Franco-Italian SAMP-T missile defence system made by MBDA and Thales, which serves a similar range as the US-made Patriot, has proven a sore point.
“France is upset that Sky Shield is largely based on US and Israeli technology when there is a European alternative, and that the project has in effect left out southern Europe,” said Shahin Vallée, a former adviser to Macron who works at the German Council on Foreign Relations.
A French official denied that Paris was motivated by such competitive concerns. The conference was not intended to undermine Sky Shield, the person said, but rather to hold a much-needed discussion over the broader strategy of how to protect European skies, including the roles of Nato and the EU as well as deterrence from nuclear weapons held by France and others.
A second French official pointed out the risk that spending billions on air defence systems could provoke a new arms race with Moscow.
About 20 officials at minister level were expected to attend the conference, along with representatives from Nato and the US.
No specific deals are expected at the conference. But Macron is expected to speak at the closing and Paris may hold similar events in the future.
One senior western official whose country is part of the Sky Shield initiative was unenthusiastic about the French manoeuvring with the conference. “It’s perplexing and difficult to understand why the French feel the need to do this,” the person said. “The whole point is to not have competing ideas.”
Within Nato, the Sky Shield initiative is seen as a positive step to achieving better interoperability and standardised defence platforms, the lack of which has been laid bare by the war in Ukraine. Countries’ weapons often do not work seamlessly together and militaries cannot always resupply their allies.
Pistorius said it was important to him that the Sky Shield initiative was not seen as a rival to Nato or the EU.
“Everything that is procured can be integrated into the existing structure,” he told the FT. “You can see from this that we are not in competition with the French conference in Le Bourget.”
I sometimes really think that the German Chancellor is a brainiac. This joint European air defence plan actually didn't inform the French, but chose to work with the British instead, seriously?
I have the feeling that next week there will be new proposed pack of sanction against Chinese companies, never trust the American snake
Wow, the filter that Washington Post used is as dark as America's future! Sad!
I wonder if Bill Gate's visit had anything to do with this.
I'm pretty sure rich people in the US have an out-sized say in how the US is run and honestly the US oligarchs are feeling a bit uneasy with US-China tensions lately.
The number of CEO's visiting China plus Bill Gates arriving and meeting in person might be the real powers behind the US meeting Xi Jing Ping, and then having the figurehead come along with some good PR.
plawolf
Lieutenant General
Seizing foreign assets in your own territory is always a dubious move, since even though those assets are foreign owned, they are still in your country generating profits, employing people, paying taxes and generally contributing to your economy. From a national prospective, seizing them is like moving change from your left pocket to your right pocket, the value of the asset and its economic contribution doesn’t change.
It only makes sense in the west because connected private individuals gets to massively profit off of those seizers by making foreign government assets into their own private property, so they get to collect the interest/royalties from those assets instead of foreign governments, and can sell those assets for massive personal profits. But those ‘benefits’ are meaningless in modern China where such overt and blatant corruption has been largely tamed.
Seizing foreign assets also will negatively impact FDI, as it fundamentally undermines trust in the safety of those investments.
Finally, with the way the world economy is developing, Chinese own assets in western countries will soon be worth more than western assets inside China, if that tipping point has not already been reached.
Also, maybe I wasn’t being as clear as I could be, China developing a large and powerful military with global reach isn’t just, or even primarily about literal debt collecting at the point of the sword. It’s about being able to impose unacceptable and inescapable direct costs on the west as a means to get them to moderate their greed and cuntfuckery. You think the Italians will be more likely to be reasonable and respectful to you if you make a great moral argument from afar, or if you can come and leave a horse head in their bed when they try to fuck with you and yours?
US Secretary of State Blinken finally managed to beg "get arranged" for a meeting with Chinese President Xi: