The Big One: Preparing for a Long War Between the U.S. and China | Hacker News Reader

The Big One: Preparing for a Long War Between the U.S. and China

foreignaffairs.com

12 pointsjseliger8 comments

This is written from a very USA based ideology. Unlike the USA, China doesn't have a long track record of starting wars. China is unlikely to attack anyone, but clearly cannot rule out the possibility that they might and could.

China takes a longer and less forceful approach: political and economic control are their preferred choices by far.

Wars do not benefit anyone bar the arms manufacturers for the most part.

> Unlike the USA, China doesn't have a long track record of starting wars.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-Vietnamese_War

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-Indian_War

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Annexation_of_Tibet_by_the_Peo...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uyghur_genocide

You think the Uyghur genocide is war? Its despicable, but its not very war like as I understand warfare, even civil war. For completeness wouldn't it be sensible to list the US foreign aggressions across the same time?

It's genocide which is worse.

https://english.news.cn/20220902/735703a45cfd458791179d4c0a8... - 201 wars started by the USA since world war 2 finished. That's only until 2001, there are many more since. Okay that's from a China based news service (which I honestly believe far more and the incompetent and biassed USA news services).

Wikipedia suggests quite a few less: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_wars_involving_the_Uni... but still a lot.

I believe (but haven't checked) that the USA has started at least one war every year since 1945. This was true in the mid 2000s, it might not be now.

That you managed 3 (or at a push 4) versus a hundred or so is a great comparison in favour of my comment: China does NOT want a war. It's bad for business.

Well yeah it’s our military doctrine. Your whataboutism isn’t persuasive here. Also Xi’s been all about combat readiness all year.

https://archive.ph/0Wo5G

Modern wars are industrial wars. The winner is the the country with the bigger manufacturing capacity and the bigger population of military-age men.

That was true of the US in 1942 against the weaker and smaller countries of Japan and Germany.

In today's world, China is the country with the bigger population of military-age men and the bigger manufacturing capacity, not the US.

Just good old arithmetic.

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