The US is quietly arming Taiwan to the teeth
The US is quietly arming Taiwan to the teeth
America is using its own money to send weapons to a place it officially doesn't recognise.
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Good. Even if nobody likes 'murica, their weapons work well enough to deter China from doing something stupid.
Imagine if the roles were reversed, and it was China arming i.e. Panama. How would you feel then?
(Because the USA has done a lot of "something stupid"s as well).
Edit: Folks, you can analyze the bigger picture without being a tankie. It's unfortunate that so many ex-Redditors would rather block and report any display of critical thought
Imagine if the roles were reversed, and it was China arming i.e. Panama. How would you feel then
False equivalence, Panama's risk of being suddenly invaded in the current political climate is nearly zero. Taiwan (is #1), on the other hand, has to be ever vigilant. Also, Panama doesn't house the 'rightful' government of the US.
How about Cuba, then?
Same deal. They've suffered an unjust embargo, sure, but are under no real threat of invasion.
I probably should have said Cuba in my main comment. Doesn't look like it helped people understand, though!
There's nothing to understand, it's the same situation. Neither Panama nor Cuba are currently under threat from the USA. The USA does not claim ownership over either, and is not threatening their sovereignty.
You're the one not understanding the false equivalency.
Would you feel comfortable with China putting weapons on Cuba? Because the US got real upset last time, and as you said, the US doesn't even have plans to invade Cuba (anymore)
It would be irksome, sure. But there is no amount of weaponry that China could supply Cuba with that would threaten the USA (short of nukes), so it would be a moot point. Business as usual. Taiwan similarly has no hope of success in attacking China, regardless of how many weapons the USA provides. Meaning: this only works one way, and if China is upset about that then maybe they should keep their eyes (and hands) within their own borders and everything will be fine.
Obviously they're different. But failing to empathize when given the analogy shows either the inability or unwillingness to understand China's position.
it's just a poor analogy, not worth taking seriously.
I understand the PRC's position just fine because they've been explicit about it for decades: They believe that Taiwan, an island they've never controlled, is theirs by imperial right based on the Qing dynasty's rule over it for ~200 years prior to 1900.
We don't need to "empathize" with a desire for imperial conquest, we just need to stand in the way of it.
The US wouldn't be arming Taiwan if China wasn't making the claim that it is part of China. Taiwan poses literally zero threat to china. There is no US comparison here.
It's the same shit with Ukraine and Russia, and China is watching closely. It's probably easier politically for Republicans to fund a nation not in conflict, because the deterrence doesn't look like as big a win for Biden, so this is why they intelligently to along with it.
From Wikipedia:
Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia.
What were you saying?
What's your point? Did you just stop there and not read the next sentence that says "It is located at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest"?
My point is that Taiwan IS a part of China. Two different governments but the same country. And both say they are the "real" China.
Wait until you hear about the official names of China, or North and South Korea
(For the uninitiated: People's Republic of China, Democratic People's Republic of Korea, and Republic of Korea. Tl;dr there's more than one issue if you're going off the country's official name for which land they own)
I'll piss on the CCP any day of the week, thank you very much. I'm a communist, by the way.
Nobody needs to understand chinas positions. They are irrelevant.
Permanently Deleted
.ml means 'Marxist-Leninist'. From their about page:
"In particular, I would like to see someone (or a group of people) create a mainstream, or liberal instance. That should help to avoid further drama, and avoid attempts to turn lemmy.ml into something that it is not."
But really, it's Mali. But they could have set it up that way for the Marxist Left thing
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/.ml#:~:text=ml is the Internet country,domain (ccTLD) for Mali.
Yeah that’s what I mean. Same as .dj is Djibouti, but people use it for music; or .mu (Mauritius) or .am / .fm (Armenia/Federated States of Micronesia); .io (Indian Ocean Territory) for tech (from Input/Output); .gg (Guernsey) for gaming or gambling; or .tv (Tuvalu) for Television.
If you're comparing China/Taiwan circumstances to USA/Panama I'm sorry but I cannot call that a critical thought. The only similarity is proximity.
As an American who knows how evil our government is, I would be like "good for panama but also China is probably not doing this out of justice and freedom"
Neither is the US. We're doing it because Taiwan is a strategic ally
That's fine! We should not invade Panama. I don't think the US is currently planning on it, but after the last 20 years I'm pretty sure most citizens would be fucking glad for any excuse for our military to think twice before invading a foreign country.
The one other one is a democracy, despite being a flawed one. The other, an unabashedly totalitarian state. And before any CCP apologists comments and nevermind what the domestic Chinese think, ask South Korea, Japan and South East Asia what they think of the Chinese Communist Party claiming the entirety of South China Sea and sending armed merchant vessels and the Chinese navy bullying other Asian fishermen in the region. Not to excuse American imperialism, but it's clear which is the better option for many.
ask South Korea
너 지금 한국에 사는 사람한테 답하는 거야...
Do you speak on behalf the population of South Korea?
No, but I thought it was funny someone likely from the West tried to use that argument when I suggested the idea of a weapon deployment next door might make you uneasy
Philippines in the 1990s have elected to kick out the Americans from their bases in the country. Back then, there was strong nationalist sentiment against American troops being stationed. Fast forward to twenty years later, many Filipinos have been blaming the past government with hindsight that they should have let the Americans stay because China took the opportunity to camp in an shoal within the Philippines' legally recognised maritime borders. If the Americans had remained, China would not have been so bold to violate other country's borders.
That's the problem with realpolitik. If it's not one country or entity, another would prey on the weak. That's might be a poor analogy considering what I would say next but the point stands. And the American bases, it's not like US unilaterally set up bases in hundreds of locations across the world. There is given permission by these countries hosting military forces. Of course, nation states still being tribalistic and only after their own interests, others feel it is an affront to see such bases next door. Even the nuclear missiles about to be set up in Cuba in the 1960s, Cuba invited the Soviet Union to do so, not that the Soviet Union unilaterally decided to set up the nukes in the island. Cuba and Soviet Union have mutual interest. The former needs a deterrent to prevent another American inteference, while the latter wants leverage on the US to be convinced remove the missiles from Turkey.
Why don't we ask South America, the Middle East, and Vietnam what they think about the US?
but it’s clear which is the better option for many
.... American tax dollars are at this moment funding the genocide of Palestinians.
EDIT to add: I should clarify I'm no CCP apologist, nor do I uplift China as an example of what we should strive for. But I also really get tired of seeing America put on a pedestal. America was built on genocide, slavery, and exploitation, I don't see how it should ever be an example of how to do things better, BECAUSE that line of reasoning ("at least we're better than them") has been used to justify many of the horrors of our history.
By using that bit of propaganda, you're contributing to things like Americans looking the other way/enabling - for the past 75 years - genocide. It's the same "they're savages" shit that was used to justify literally the most savage acts against Native Americans.
Our democracy also isn't actual democracy. By definition, a democracy must represent the will of the people. Ours does not. It is already a failed democracy, and has been for my entire life. America also produces more propaganda than any other country. Do we have more personal freedoms in many areas than people in China? Absolutely. Are there many areas throughout society where I think America has pushed the world forward and made it a better place? Absolutely.
But I'm getting really sick of seeing America compared to China just to say "we're better".
Funny you should ask
https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2015/04/30/vietnamese-see-u-s-as-key-ally/
Yet four decades after the controversial war, the Vietnamese public sees the United States as a helpful ally and even embraces some of the core tenets of capitalism.
Today, the Vietnamese view the U.S. in a positive light. About three-quarters of Vietnamese (76%) expressed a favorable opinion of the U.S. in a 2014 Pew Research Center survey. More highly educated people (89%) gave the U.S. especially high marks. Young people ages 18-29 were particularly affirmative (89%), but the U.S. is seen positively even by those who are old enough to have lived through the Vietnam War. Among those ages 50 and older, more than six-in-ten rated the U.S. favorably.
Yeah I shouldn't have used Vietnam as an example bc I am aware that they're somehow largely favorable to the US still, but the lasting effects of US imperialism on the population there is what I was really trying to get at.
Past atrocities does not justify today's actions by another at the present time. US hasn't been meddling Latin America since the cold war. In Asia Pacific, US isn't the one who is bullying Japan, South Korea and SE Asia. And funny you mentioned Vietnam, as someone already said that Vietnam view US favourably in spite of history, the former actually dislike China more than the US. Vietnam has a much longer historical animosity with China than the with the US. At present, US and Vietnam have mutual interests in containing China.
Cuba and Venezuela are both in Latino America. And both have being targeted by the US as "cold" enemies.
Past atrocities does not justify today's actions by another at the present time.
I'm not saying that. I'm saying that holding America up as a standard and saying that we're somehow better is hypocritical and dangerous because it helps to justify/overlook shit like what's happening in Palestine rn, and I'm sick of the general mindset exactly because it has helped lead to the ignorance and complacency we see with a genocide that is fueled largely by American desire to retain influence in that region for capitalistic purposes, with no regard for human rights.
Vietnam has a much longer historical animosity with China than the with the US.
I mean yeah no shit, they've been at it for thousands of years lmao.
And, as I've said elsewhere I was more getting at the human rights atrocities perpetrated by the US which still have great effect on Vietnam.
I'm in no way trying to justify anything. Again, I'm just saying I'm sick of seeing people hold the US up as "hey look we're better" because I really don't know that we are. We care about human rights at home, to an extent, but we don't give af who that affects in other parts of the world. Is that really better than China pretending to care about it's citizens with communism while abusing their human rights and exercising insane governmental control over their lives?
The US has been and continues to be the direct and indirect perpetrator of a lot of evils, and the more I learn about these things, the more I dislike seeing America characterized as a standard of morality, because it directly reflects propaganda which has allowed for many of these atrocities to happen.
No one is holding US as the gold standard. But with the present dog-eat-dog realpolitik, the US is seen as the "least of all evils". Last time I checked, a survey carried out across the world said most still prefer the US than China or Russia. In my opinion, it's better to have a multipolar world to stop the current set up humanity is having right now.
Greetings from Hanoi. The Vietnamese in general view the USA quite favorably. Much more so than they feel about China which is regularly killing their fishermen and destroying VN oil and mineral development facilities. The 1000 years of Chinese occupation seems to have also left a bit of a bad taste.
Taiwan is a full democracy, not a flawed one. At least according to the widely respected Economist Democracy Index.
Taiwan is more democratic than Canada and Germany. And a lot more than the US, but that's not surprising.
Countries helping arm one another is good. Every country should have the capacity to defend itself. My country got steamrolled during WWII because we had few and outdated wapens
Gives me Cuban Missile Crisis vibes.
I'm not as happy that the US sells arms, but I'm convinced by the geopolitical climate that arming Ukraine and now I might add arming Taiwan is better for the world than worse. Refilling Israel's Iron Dome is probably a good idea too, though we are yet to see what the US sends and how defensive or offensive those weapons we send are.
There might be better comparisons though in the weird chess games we played in the middle east with Russia. They armed some insurgents, we armed some insurgents, etc. Afghanistan was a disaster for Russia too, though it was worse for us.