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Comment by nsonha | Hacker News Reader

I'm sure people have said this countless time but here it is: Cold War mentality.

I'm from a small country. You would think that countries like us tend to have to pick a side but since a very young age, in our textbook, we're taught that the world is no longer the place it used to be and there are no such things as friends nor enemies.

Honestly all the propaganda from the US about Russia caring so much and always tries to undermine them and how their politics are fuelled by their policies toward "the enemy", whether that's China or the Middle East, sounds stupid to me.

Australia is the same, all they do is whining about China instead of, you know, build a stronger country.

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Its best to stop bullies well before they have a chance to start causing real trouble. That was a lesson learnt the hard way in the 1930s.

If you mean by whining, protesting about the treatment of minorities in China, then you may have different values to Australia.

Whining as in complaining about China having the better end of the deals that Australia itself signed. Well, stop being incompetent and look out for your OWN interests then.

Thanks for the alienating message I'm not surprised at all.

"Cold War Mentality", thats a Chinese embassy talking point.....

does it matter? I'm supposed to invent new terminologies? I'm not pro China. I'm just calling bullshit governments instead of addressing their economic policies that China takes advantage of, chooses to go the military route instead. The world no longer works that way.

If you don't like someone being so successful, do better than them, get the better end of the deal. Don't go to your gangster friend and whine like a loser.

China has been known to bribe individuals and coerce them with stated ramifications to their families in China to steal secrets of other nations as well as sign deals that would be otherwise illogical.

Is this the “gangster” mentality you refer to?

Chinas economic rise has come through a generous allocation of an “emerging economy” status under many provisions at the WTO and other international organizations. Are you in favor of other countries kicking them out?

You speak as if China invented bribery and every other nation is some sort of angel?

Idk you can call that a cheater, gangster is like using violence and, you know, kill people, like blatantly, like in wars.

Like I said I don't do enemy, I don't look at a map of the world and see a country and say this is pure evil and set out to destroy them, kick them out of WTO or whatever. Because first of all that sounds ridiculous and second of all, I'm kind of not an angel myself.

No, i'm referring to your comment where you claim China is simply taking advantage of a loose system of government policy in negotiating a better deal for themselves in Australia which is simply not true. It is through deceit, fraud, and illegal practices such as the ones i have outlined above.

The point here is one that should not be of contest. Nations are part of international agreements on the basis of mutual trust and respect. It isn't a foregone conclusion as you lay out.

Other nations cannot simply continue accommodating favorable economic status to China when they establish an aircraft identification zone in international waters with the threat of surface to air missile batteries in place for those that choose to not recognize those claims.

The WTO and other international forums that China has used thus far to their advantage should reasonably be a lever that nations that feel wronged by their use of economic progress , converted to military posturing should have the freedom to resort to. That is simply the point.

Gangster friends? I dont think my "gangster friends" have set up concentration camps to "re-educate" an entire ethnic minority have they?

"Gangster friends" another term widely used by the Chinese goverment and friends....

I'm from Vietnam and if China is a threat to anyone it's my country, so if you are implying I'm a CCP member of something, you can drop it.

Sure let's compare alledged re-education camps to waging wars all over the world for decades.

And people have been protesting about thoses wars on the streets, in the media, films, tv,mc, newspapers, books and everywhere else you can think of for the last 20 years. I havent seen any protests against the opression of the Uighars in China at all. Unless you can point me to it?

Vietnam? What a wonderfully free and democratic nation you come from!

Why did you dodge the question of what is more damaging to the world? I mean you have the freedom to protest? yes. Have those wars not happened anyway? Wasn't it an elected government that started them? and millions died? What are you trying to say?

I won't talk about minorities in China, that is a separate issue and I won't pretend to know. Trade deals, military ramp-up, and wars, on the other hand, are relevant to inter-nation-al politics. I was contemplating bringing up immigrant camps and the war crimes in Afghanistan, but's they aren't really rellevant either and would drag me down to your level of discourse.

I didn't call you out, but since you just kept going, you do realise you were not making any argument and simply labeling? These are the same words used by CCP, you're from a communist country bla bla. You're representing the intellect of the Australian public very well.

By the way, that's how personal attack feels.

You don't know about the treatment of minorities in China??? Don't they have the news in Vietnam? You know all about what the west does but strangely nothing about what China does. Shall we talk about Tiannenmen Square, are you allowed to?

I know about it as much as you do. If you're saying that knowing a subject is reading about it on the news, especially when it involves a country that is famous for lack of transparency, and a lot of the news can't be confirmed, then you and I are very knowledgable on a lot of subjects.

Scroll in this thead to find a comment of mine mocking CCP's Long March.

I consider it a contained issue of China and not high on the list of international interests. I also consider Australia's treatment of the indigenous that too, do you want to talk about that?

Let me make myself clear. Unlike you who reduce nations to a single thing and categorise them as good and evil, like a retard (China: lack of human rights, US: war mongering, UK: the Queen, Australia: Emus vs Roos), I understand that countries have good and bad and it's better to criticise their behaviors instead, and do it in a way that is relevant to the problem at hand.

The tension between China and Australia went way back before all the allegation of treatment to minorities. Unfair trade is the core of that. So I suggest addressing it, instead of partaking in the military tension leading up to cold war 2.0. It is a very childish thing to do if you value peace and collaboration, not just for the 2 countries but everyone else in the region who would be dragged into this show.

Oh I'm an Australian too, after your comment that I "may have different values to Australia", I thought it'd be awkward to mention.

If almost every country in Asia sees China as a threat, then it is most likely that it is actually a threat. And Xi Jinping is increasingly looking like a new Mao, which is bad news both abroad and domestically.

China is massively bigger than all of its Asian neighbours except India. That's a risk in itself as they may want to avoid becoming satellite states because of that. It's a bit like a small country next to the US...

Well India sees China as a threat. And outside of Cuba, I don’t see a lot of concern from being in the sphere of influence of the US.

Exactly.

The USA has its issues but it has great relations with its neighbours (minus Cuba), while on the other hand China's big neighbours all see China as a threat (except perhaps for Russia).

Seems to me it boils down to the CCP being a ruthless totalitarian regime headed by a dictator-for-life with an increasingly aggressive foreign policy (exhibit A: constant offensive cyberwarfare). Its neighbours can never be comfortable with that.

I think the exception is not Russia but Pakistan.

It understandibly doesnt make many headlines, but the Russians are hemoraging resources, technology and yes, even territory to keep the peace with China.

They are not friends, the are being used.

How is Russia hemorrhaging territory? What territory have they lost, when, and to whom?

Remember that the area around Vladivostok was annexed by Russia from China... and that Russia had 'treaty ports' similar to Hongkong in China (most notably Tianjin, Harbin, and Dalian)

And China sees India as a threat... They have opposed interests and border issues inherited from the British (at a time when China was being cut piece by piece).

I don't think that there is more concern one way or the other beyond the FUD about China. There are a lot of unease in central and South America but the US have had time to impose a tight grip, including by force. Perhaps that's what China's neighbours want to avoid.

It seems to me, reading on the relation between Australia and China, that Australia tends to have a superiority complex. Australia is a country of 25 million: they are no match to China or any other major powers, so whilst it is of course right for them to defend their interests I don't see how their current aggressive rhetoric can lead to anything positive.

It’s a lot more strategically complex than that. Fo example, America manages the majority of its signals intelligence for a large chunk of the Asian content through various faculties such as pine gap [1].

You’d be foolish to postulate that geopolitically charged agendas are driven by a simple explanation such as “a superiority complex”.

1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_Gap?wprov=sfti1 https://maps.apple.com/?ll=-23.799000,133.737000&q=Pine%20Ga...

Of course the US are powerful, and in fact pretty much control Australia, which is indeed a small country. Australia is getting a bit ahead of itself if they think they are a match for China. I think Australia would be foolish to believe that being best bud with the playground's biggest bully means that they can freely do as they please and that it is useless for them to remain civil to others.

Your statement is contradictory - on one hand you agree that the US values Australia therefore justifying their decision for this agreement, and on the other you say Australia is independently matching itself to China - it’s not appropriate or correct to selectively choose parts of either statement because they are are in fact mutually exclusive relative to your argument. Either Australia is a puppet of the US and therefore by postering towards China it is not an AU vs CN issues but instead a US vs CN (via AU) issue or somehow Australia has managed to convince US to give them top secret technology and have independently decided to tackle CN. Over to you - which is it?

Australia is a puppet of the US and at the same time is having a "complex of superiority" (which permeates the West as a whole, to be fair), because who are those 'Chinamen', anyway? Nothing contradictory, there are several aspects at play, but I am foolish as you say.

Considering the history of Australia the hypocrisy is grotesque, and this just shows that the bad old habits die hard.

Australia doesn't have an independent foreign policy. This deal just shows who is in who's pocket. Australia has no choice because it can't defend itself. It has no military capability to defend against any enemy.

It means we Australians are destined to follow the US again into whatever conflict the US finds itself in. Because if we don't, we're on our own, and a very big (geographically) and soft target.

You're right but I don't think that this implies that they have no choice but to be an American 'protectorate'. It obviously used to be a British colony (and obviously is still formally part of the British Realm) and IMHO effectively switched to being an American 'protectorate' during WWII.

Having the technology to sink the massive kind of surface fleet an adversary needs to reach Australia, guarantees Australian freedom, independence and self determination. Australia has friends in the world with no desire or interest in oppressing them.

I've had this discussion a few times. I don't think we live in the same world any more, where physical invasion of country is advantageous. What exactly are we defending against?

I just don't see the Chinese trying to invade and control Australia. What would they get from that? All the resources? They already get those - and it's a lot cheaper to just buy them than it would be to keep a hostile invading army in place to dig them up themselves. China even operates some mines on Australian soil already (with all-Chinese staff, flown in direct from China). What on earth could they take from us that we won't sell them freely?

Australia is a US naval/supply/intelligence base, and that's it. The only militarily interesting targets in the country are owned by the US.

I think the Kiwis got the right idea here. The only way to win this game is to not play.

Subs could be useful to protect/attack shipping or military assets that are protecting/attacking shipping.

It does seem improbable that we will see large scale land invasions of developed countries. However, European nations also thought that was improbable pre-WW1. It's not crazy to err on the side of caution here. After all you could ask the same questions about the Chinese military build-up --- no-one's going to invade mainland China, obviously.

NZers definitely don't want to be in the nuclear sub business but I think the majority of NZers are concerned about the direction of the CCP and are happy to be part of ANZUS and Five Eyes. Sure, we want to keep taking China's money but if push comes to shove there's no doubt which side we're on.

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