Generational Dynamics World View

[Warren Dew]

(02-07-2017, 08:12 AM)John J. Xenakis Wrote:

(02-05-2017, 09:24 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: >   I don't know what your definition of "planning war" is; that's why
>   I'm asking for a clarification. You say that the only use for
>   China having "thousands of missiles targeting the US and Russia"
>   is that they're "planning war"; by that logic, it seems to me that
>   the US and Russia are also "planning war", since we both have
>   thousands of missiles targeting each other and China as well.

>   I feel reasonably confident that I understand what the US is
>   planning. We have contingency plans for all sorts of scenarios in
>   which war could occur; in that sense we are "planning war".  We
>   may well be planning conventional strikes in Syrian territory, and
>   keeping our nukes in reserve as a deterrent against unwanted
>   escalation; in that sense also we may be "planning war", or at
>   least we did in Iraq and Afghanistan.  On the other hand, we
>   aren't likely to attack China or Russia in an unprovoked war of
>   aggression; in that sense, we are not "planning war".

>   I'm trying to get a feel for which of these senses you are using
>   when you say China is "planning war". If it's in the contingency
>   plan sense, I'd agree; I think all nations with significant
>   military power "plan war" in that sense.  If you're talking about
>   use as a deterrent against escalation while they wage a limited
>   conventional war, I'd be interested in what limited conventional
>   war you think is planned.  If you think they are planning an
>   unprovoked war of aggression against the US in the sense that we
>   are not planning an unprovoked war of aggression against China,
>   I'd want to know why you think the situation is not symmetric. And
>   if you think the US is planning an unprovoked war of aggression
>   against China, I'd be interested in that too.

>   So, can you clarify in which of those senses you are using
>   "planning war", and in particular, do you see the US and Russia
>   fitting that sense as well?

Well, you're right, I suppose every country is always "planning
war" in the sense of preparing to defend itself in case of war.

In the case of China, it's a lot more than just building one weapons
system after another whose only purpose is to destroy American cities,
military bases, and aircraft carriers.  It's the series of aggressive
actions that China is taking on all its borders, similar to Hitler's
actions in the late 1930s.  I think that with some thought, one could
distinguish between defensively or offensively "planning for war."

So we're agreed that the systems "whose only purpose is to destroy American cities" are irrelevant here, cognate only to American systems "whose only purpose is to destroy Chinese and Russian cities"?

I have a very difficult time seeing any similarity 1930s Germany here.  Germany actually seized populated territory in the late 1930s - Austria, the Sudeten, the rest of Czechoslovakia.  Then they went too far with Poland.  If I look for a modern parallel to 1930s Germany, what I see is seizure of South Ossetia, Crimea, and eastern Ukraine.  That's by Russia, not China.

This is not to say there isn't any adventurism on the part of China.  They most definitely made moves in the South China Sea once the US stopped naval presence patrols in 2013.  However, those moves are targeted at natural resources, not at populated territory.  They were also opportunistic, taking advantage of a regional power vacuum left by the Obama administration.

I do think that China was hoping to become a regional power, given that the Obama administration was charting a course toward a multipolar world.  In a multipolar world, it makes sense for China to be one of the poles.  They'd be constrained by the US pole to the east, India to the southwest, and Russia to their northwest - why not fully occupy that sphere?

Of course, it doesn't make any sense for the US to accede to a multipolar world.  The US ought to be working on consolidating its position as global commercial hegemon.  There are signs that the Trump administration recognizes that, with a laudable push towards a nuclear balance with the rest of the world combined, rather than just with Russia, and a resumption of naval presence patrols, notably in the South China Sea.

China's reaction will be interesting to watch.  They might foolishly challenge the US for full control over the South China Sea, which seems to be what you expect - correct me if I'm wrong there.  Or, they might acquiesce in US strategic superiority as long as they can continue to exploit the resources they are now exploiting there.  Right now, the latter seems more likely to me, given their willingness to help Trump by "taking care of" North Korea through their coal embargo, which is likely to topple the Kim Jong Un regime unless North Korea alters its policies.

Quote:

(02-05-2017, 09:24 PM)Warren Dew Wrote: >   Except in the deterministic sense that what happened is obviously
>   what happened, yes, I think there are scenarios where the US could
>   have sided with Nazi Germany in WWII. If the Great Depression had
>   hit France harder, causing the centrist French government to be
>   replaced by a militant Communist government strongly allied with
>   the Soviet Union, for example, I can see Churchill and the US
>   intervening to help Nazi Germany survive to prevent Communist
>   hegemony over the continent.  I can think of other scenarios too,
>   up until 1938 or 1939.  I'm not sure what relevance that has,
>   though.

That's an interesting answer, not one that I was expecting.  You're
saying that if a communist Hitler had risen in France who was
worse than Germany's Hitler, then we would have sided with France.

That's not what I'm saying - sorry if I gave the wrong impression.

What I'm saying is that a weak communist government could have come to power in France, which would then have acted as a Soviet puppet.  Coordination between France and the Soviet Union would then have given the Soviets the strategic advantage, allowing them to limit Germany's gains in the slavic states and start building an eastern European empire a decade earlier.  For example, when Germany took the Sudeten, the rest of Czechoslovakia might have been occupied by the Soviets instead of by Germany.

In this case, the same balance of power concerns that drove Churchill to intervene against Germany would instead have driven him to intervene against the Soviet Union and France.  Culturally, France was more of a traditional enemy of Great Britain than Germany was, anyway.  And the US, which  considered Stalin at least as bad as Hitler in the first place, would have followed.

So what I'm saying is that we would have sided with the weaker of Hitler and Stalin, and it was far from predetermined which one was weaker.

Quote:The reason that I asked the question was to show that the choice
of sides in a generational crisis war is pretty much
predetermined.  If we assume that there was no such French
communist Hitler, then I would say that the choice of France
our ally was predetermined.

But if you're going to make that kind of assumption, then you
could also have assumed that America's leader could have become
another Hitler, and sided with the Nazis.

So I would say two things.  I think that if you look back in history
and analyze the 100 years war, the 30 years war, the war of the
Spanish succession, the French Revolution, the American Civil war, WW
I -- then Hitler could not have arisen in America, Britain or France,
and only Germany has the history and geography that would have
permitted the rise of Hitler.  And second, under those circumstances,
we could never have sided with the Nazis.

So maybe I asked the question the wrong way.  I should have asked: Is
there any scenario where we would have sided with Britain's enemy,
whether Germany or France, assuming that Britain maintained it's
historic government (and that there was no British Hitler).  I would
argue that we would have chosen whatever side Britain was on, and that
there were no circumstances where we would be joining some other
country in bombing London.

The same kind of reasoning could be used today.  Could we side with
China and Pakistan against India?  I don't believe so.  Could Russia
join China and Pakistan in war against India and Iran?  Once again, I
don't see any reasonable scenario where that's possible.  I believe
that the alignments that I've been describing for ten years -- the US,
India, Russia and Iran versus China, Pakistan and the Sunni Muslim
countries -- are pre-determined and will not change.

Hopefully I've now made my answer clear enough that you'll see I really don't think the sides were predetermined.  I do agree that the US and the British were going to be on the same side:  we were the same nation, in the cultural and linguistic sense, even if distributed across two states.  But no, there was no guarantee the nation would have sided with Stalin against Hitler.  Under only slightly different circumstances, we could have sided with Hitler against Stalin instead.

Neither we nor the Russians are the same nation as India.  In the matchups you posit, the sides would be dictated by strategic interest.  Yes, the US could side with China and Pakistan against India, if India were the greater threat.  More sensibly, the US could stay out of a Pakistan versus India fight, and China could limit themselves to indirect support.  I see the same thing with Russia - they have no reason to join a war between India and Iran and Pakistan directly.

The way the US gets dragged into the crisis war is culturally by siding with western Europe against Russia, or against China if they are stupid enough to sink one of our aircraft carriers like Japan was stupid enough to bomb Pearl Harbor.  But there's a good chance we could stay out of it, the way Victorian England stayed out of the 1860 crises, providing only indirect support to prevent the establishment of spheres of interest conflicting with ours, and to prevent the establishment of a dominant Eurasian hegemon.  Then we can pick up the pieces afterwards.