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Is Trump embracing aggressive withdrawal?
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(02-05-2017, 12:43 PM)SomeGuy Wrote: To which the natural rejoinder is, what about China?  It's an interesting question...I would say that there is a realist streak (classic balance of power, ally with number 2 on the Continent versus number 1), and perhaps an intent to use saber-rattling as a negotiating tactic versus somebody who unlike Russia is a major trading rival.  Possibly a racially motivated bit as well (pushing around little yellow people versus other white people) which could influence the calculus of what they feel they can get away with, which would be unfortunate and likely to cause problems.

Why would Russia wish to adopt a hostile position wrt China?  In recent times, both powers have tended to support each other against the US.  The US and Russia have little basis for a great power coalition.  It is hardly in their interest to support US hegemony.

As for the bully comment, I would point out that both China and Russia are authoritarian regimes and have the institutional knowledge to be good players of the great power game.  They should know what they are doing and do not have to worry about electoral politics.

I submit that Russia's greater number of nukes does not confer the sort of power than large and capable conventional forces--at least not in the perception of players of the game like Russia, China and the US. And so their is no reason to show more deference to Russia than China, if anything the reverse would be true.

My reasoning is as follows. The USSR and the US were both nuclear powers facing off against each other for 40 years.  By the 1960's the USSR gained the ability to devastate the US with their nukes, while the US had been able to do this from 1950's.  Both powers were immensely strong in the nuclear dimension and so were effectively invulnerable to attack from the other. Yet both spent large amounts on conventional weaponry despite their nukes.  Clearly neither side saw nukes by themselves as an effective instrument of power.  In contrast, both sides demonstrated a belief in the effectiveness of conventional power by using it in Korea, Vietnam and Afghanistan.  After the Cold War ended, the US continued to maintain an enormous advantage in conventional weaponry, and wielded it in Kuwait, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya--you get the point. This argues that the US still continues to believe in the effectiveness of conventional forces.

As you have pointed out, China is building conventional forces. What China never did was build up a nuclear arsenal like the other two superpowers, which they could easily do if they wanted to (nukes are a lot cheaper on a cost per firepower basis than conventional forces).  It seems clear to me that China does not see nukes as particularly useful instruments of national power--but they do see conventional forces in this way.

It seems to me that there is no reason at all to assume that Russia, China or America believe that nuclear forces are what matters in estimation of relative strength and not conventional forces.  By a conventional forces measure China either is or is in the process of becoming a much stronger power than Russia, and there is nothing Russia can do about it.  The US must know this, so it seems curious that Trump shows so much more deference to the weaker of the two.
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Messages In This Thread
RE: Is Trump embracing aggressive withdrawal? - by Mikebert - 02-05-2017, 04:37 PM
MIC spending is way too high - by Ragnarök_62 - 04-01-2017, 07:52 PM
RE: MIC spending is way too high - by Warren Dew - 04-02-2017, 01:09 AM
RE: MIC spending is way too high - by pbrower2a - 04-02-2017, 02:46 PM
RE: MIC spending is way too high - by Warren Dew - 04-02-2017, 06:15 PM
RE: MIC spending is way too high - by pbrower2a - 04-02-2017, 07:16 PM
RE: MIC spending is way too high - by Warren Dew - 04-16-2017, 02:09 PM

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