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Comment by osullivj | Hacker News Reader

"It is worth recalling today, as Russia and China confront the United States, that the proximate reason for America’s entry into World War II was its determination to save those two countries from extinction."

Nonsense! Great powers act in their own interests. The US entered the war because of Pearl Harbor. Hitler welcomed the opportunity to wage unrestricted submarine warfare on the US shipping supporting UK & USSR in the struggle against Hitler; hence his declaration of war on the US. Above all the US did not want Nazi/Japanese dominance over Europe, Asia and the Pacific.

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The US entered the war because of Pearl Harbor, but long before then, the US was working in favor of Great Britain as hard as possible short of war. They were also working against Japan.

And the Pearl Harbor attack was an attempt at a saving throw as the US had blockaded Japanese oil supplies as the latter's imperial expansion threatened the US colony of the Philipines.

(not trying to portray the US as the aggressor in any way, just agreeing that the author's model is utterly broken)

> the US had blockaded Japanese oil supplies

Arguably tantamount to war.

> The US entered the war because of Pearl Harbor.

The US openly entered the war because of Pearl Harbor. But the US had already been secretly involved in the war for some time before that. And a major part of that was Lend-Lease aid to the Soviet Union.

The case for the US wanting to save Nationalist China from extinction is much less clear since US aid to them was much more lukewarm and inconsistent.

Also, it's kind of amazing that they consider that it's China who is "confronting" them. China has enormous trade with the US, it has not attempted in any way to diminish that, quite the opposite, it's been trying really hard to increase trade! What action has China taken that shows it wants to "confront" the US???

China committed the cardinal sin of international politics: it allowed its GDP to grow to be about as large as that of the US.

Taiwan

Why do you consider China's instance on Taiwan (i.e. the one-China policy) to be confronting the USA? It's not like Taiwan belongs to the USA. It boggles my mind how people still see the USA as the police of the world, with rights to determine which countries can and cannot do what, even on the very other side of the planet.

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