| |
| ▲ | Larrikin 11 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Chiang Kai-shek is a standard part of the world history course in the US in high school. We know why China wants Taiwan at the personal level, much of the world is just interested in that not happening. It's a civil war like the American revolution was a civil war and France helped out. | | |
| ▲ | yanhangyhy 11 hours ago | parent [-] | | This is the first time I've ever seen a non-Chinese person say it this way on Reddit, X, or this platform.
I must have scrolled through way too much Reddit. | | |
| ▲ | buu700 11 hours ago | parent [-] | | Yep, it's 100% common knowledge. I distinctly remember Mr. Eyerly making a point to explain why Chiang Kai-shek and Jiang Jieshi were both valid transliterations in my 10th grade world history class. No one in America with a high school education believes that Taiwan is an unrelated country that China randomly decided to pick on after throwing a dart at a map. Chinese history from antiquity to modern European/Japanese colonialism and war crimes to the unresolved civil war and KMT's retreat from the mainland are standard course material; the history and politics around reunification aren't some big mystery. Don't get me wrong. The history is interesting, but from an American perspective interesting history doesn't translate into justification for violent incursion on an established nation's sovereignty. We largely don't even support our own past unprovoked invasions, much less invasions by rivals against stable and prosperous liberal democracies that we have long-standing friendly relationships with. The American lesson from our history isn't "we screwed up in Iraq and Vietnam, so other countries should get a pass to behave similarly"; it's "let's work to prevent such tragedies from repeating". | | |
| ▲ | anonymous908213 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > We largely don't even support our own past unprovoked invasions, much less invasions by rivals against stable and prosperous liberal democracies that we have long-standing friendly relationships with. Of course you don't support invasions of your puppet nation that only exists because of your intervention. But let's flip this around. Suppose that there was a second American civil war, one side lost and retreated to California. PRC funds the losers, stations troops there, signs a treaty guaranteeing to defend their independence. Do you think the US would ever, in a million years, accept that? Even after 75 years, it's obvious the US is going to state that California still belongs to it, and would try to reclaim it whenever possible. If you looked at this objectively, rather than from your perspective as the defender of the puppet state, it would be clear that PRC's claim is justified. All the more so because not only was the territory rightfully theirs, but now they have a hostile power from halfway across the world threatening to use it as a staging point against them. Your American lesson, also, does not disbar any country from having any claim to any land. America is by far the most egregious actor in the world stage because it routinely does, in fact, invade lands that are halfway across the world. It can be true that invading a country on the other side of the planet is wrong, and that seeking to re-unify your partitioned country is not so wrong. That said, I don't particularly expect it to ever come to war, anyways. I think it's much more realistic that PRC will exercise political influence and economic pressure to achieve re-unification rather than invasion. | |
| ▲ | yanhangyhy 10 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | so the war in Venezuela... | | |
| ▲ | pjc50 7 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | .. would be an illegal American war, yes. Like most of the American incursions into South America and violations of sovereignty of South American countries. | |
| ▲ | buu700 9 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | Yep, any war of aggression would be wildly unpopular today. Limited actions may be somewhat tolerated inasmuch as they're seen as being at the behest of the legitimate Venezuelan government in exile, but no one wants a land invasion or to see American missiles killing civilians. I'm not saying it could never happen, but the party in power would be burning a ridiculous amount of political capital, to put it mildly. A big part of the reason President Trump even exists is the perception that Bush lied to get us into Iraq and Obama kept us there. Trump consistently ran as the "anti-war" candidate, and Biden was also known for his dovish politics. | | |
| ▲ | Braxton1980 8 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | Blaming Bush is justified because he lied about WoD. Obama pulled out in 2011, the date Bush agreed to in 2008. Are you referring to 2014s invasion because of ISIS? | | |
| ▲ | buu700 8 hours ago | parent [-] | | I'm not referring to any specific actions or commenting on who did what. I summarized what I've observed to be the common perception, which is that Iraq and Afghanistan were "forever wars" conducted against the informed consent of the American public, and a spectacular failure of our institutions and both party establishments. If that sounds lacking in nuance, well, I never claimed to believe American political discourse was particularly nuanced ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ |
| |
| ▲ | Braxton1980 8 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | I don't understand why you think an invasion or widespread airstrikes would be unlikely. - Trump has been building up our military presence in the area over the last few months[1] -He's already striking boats that he claims have weapons of mass destruct... I mean drugs in them - Trump said “I don’t think we're going to necessarily ask for a declaration of war. I think we’re just going to kill people that are bringing drugs into our country, OK? We’re going to kill them,” [1] - He declared the cartels terrorist groups [2] I believe he's going to link Marudo to the cartels and use it to justify a war to force him out of power. Republicans, will support him. He'll lie, like he always does, and they'll believe it either due to stupidity or tribalism. The further they follow him the more painful admitting they are wrong will be. [1]https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/trump-won-t-congress-ove... [2]https://www.state.gov/designation-of-international-cartels | | |
| ▲ | buu700 8 hours ago | parent [-] | | I haven't commented one way or another on the likelihood of an invasion. My claim is that an escalation from limited airstrikes to full-scale invasion would be wildly unpopular, which I stand by. |
|
|
|
|
|
| |
| ▲ | pjc50 7 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | I think a lot of us recognize it was a civil war. The idea that it is a civil war, conducted in the present tense, is the weird and dangerous one. When was the last actual fighting, WW2? There are a number of frozen conflicts around the world, like North/South Korea and Cyprus. Both of those could be regarded as "civil war with external support", like Vietnam. What would be better is if those involved could recognize the situation as it actually is on the ground, and withdraw their claims and intents of actually resuming armed conflict. Europe knows all about reigniting pointless conflicts over ancient grudges, from the Hundred Years War to the Balkans. The post-WW2 world order was an attempt to finally draw a hard line underneath that. | | |
| ▲ | yanhangyhy 6 hours ago | parent [-] | | > Europe knows all about reigniting pointless conflicts over ancient grudges most of the conflicts today is created by Europe(+US). for example, the china-taiwan issue didn't resovled before is because USA Intervene. The tragedy of the Rwandan genocide originated from the artificial division of the same ethnic group during the colonial period; the India-Pakistan conflict was a deliberately left-over dispute by the colonial powers upon their withdrawal(UK); the border issues between Cambodia and Thailand(France), as well as the ongoing turmoil in the Palestinian region(UK USA), are all closely linked to historical interference by external forces(Europe). | | |
| ▲ | anonymous908213 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | Korea is also permanently partitioned thanks to being played as pawns between the Former Europeans and Vodka Europeans. Europeans really managed to get their fingers in everything. |
|
| |
| ▲ | achierius 11 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > that's something you rarely see on Western forums. No, it's quite common. | | |
| ▲ | yanhangyhy 11 hours ago | parent [-] | | My personal experience tells me that people are happy to praise China’s achievements in technology and poverty alleviation, but when it comes to the territorial issues of Taiwan, Tibet, and Xinjiang, a completely uniform narrative has already formed.
Every single day on Reddit I see a new map of China being Balkanized. |
|
|
