this post was submitted on 03 Oct 2023
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China lacks capability to project power basically anywhere. Their north is covered by Russia (lol) and Mongolia (neutral and without significant marginal value). Their south is a dense jungle that's basically impossible to properly invade (see: Vietnam, Korea, Vietnam 2). Their southwest is boxed in by the Himalayas that are literally the world's biggest wall. Invading the west would basically be asking for ETIM 2. Invading over the ocean to the east is essentially impossible, and going from that straight into a densely-forested mountain or densely-populated city is even less possible.
China has no ways of being a military adversary because they, by geography, have no offensive options. The only thing China can feasibly go after is unpopulated "land" that's basically free to claim.
You know the US is flanked on either side by oceans? Literally invading over an ocean is a thing we have been doing for over 100 years at this point.
Yeah, how's that worked out?
Pulled out of Korea, pulled out of Vietnam, pulled out of Iraq, pulled out of Afghanistan.
The US achieves nothing through its invasions except (when successful) overthrowing a government and allowing a more corrupt and despotic government to take it's place. Why would China want to do that?
Yeah, we didn't pull out because it was impossible to wage a war there. We pulled out because it became clear that we can't win the hearts and minds of a populace by bombing them into the stone age.
War has never been a problem for the US. Understanding local customs, elevating popular representative leaders and providing resources for reconstruction... that's typically been the weak point.
Said right in the same paragraph without a hint of irony
War isn't about killing people, it is about achieving strategic objectives. The former is literally how the nazis viewed warfare and was antiquated back then.
Oh, glad to hear you think war isn't about killing people. What a nice little world you live in.
War involves killing people, the goal of war isn't to kill people. Do i need to explain the difference between a method and a goal?
That's like saying you don't have to be good at kicking a ball to play soccer, since the goal is to just get the ball in the net.
No, that's like saying if you can only kick you're not going to be good at getting the ball in.