Russia-Ukraine war and related tensions Megathread

[2952-0-0]

Why does it matter to you WHY India is buying Russian oil? The fact is that they are buying tons of it and that is great to give Russia a way out of the sanctions!

What is exactly that you’re bragging about? Uhh India is helping Russia but it’s not because they like like Russia, they still like us better. Is international geopolitics like middle school to you people or something?

It’s so fascinating to see how most people here tend to frame everything under a morality or friends logic lmao. The other dude was posting some irrelevant map about what powerless average people abroad think of the US.

Newsflash: there isn’t morality OR true “friendship” in geopolitics. Everyone is driven by their self-interests. They can be directed towards different things simultaneously and sometimes may be even misguided internal strategies, but no ones does anything only because they have more personal friendship with one country more than they have with another.

No, of course not. Indians have always been world-renowned for haggling, so they aren't making decisions based on friendship or feelings. The fact that the Indian government calculated that it was the best course of action to order its buyers to buy Russian oil at a price cap the western countries imposed, which effectively forces the Russians to sell the oil at barely any profit, means they're happy to let the Russians suffer if they save some foreign exchange. The fact that the Indian government ordered its buyers not to use Chinese Yuan to buy Russian oil out of distrust of China - and directed them to use what is effectively a sovereign-backed US Dollar-based stablecoin instead - also means they would rather perpetuate US financial hegemony than enjoy whatever benefit that might exist with trading in Chinese Yuan. Nothing wrong with that, but it disproves any notion that the Global South is coalescing around Russia in its fight against western hegemony.

As for that map that showed that most people in many developing countries have a favourable view of the US - that's fine. Many of them also have a favourable view of Russia, China, France, India, or whatever other country. But if that's the case, wouldn't any government that claims to be democratic be working hard to improve relations with all the countries their citizens have a favourable opinion of? If they actually did so, then it would ironically become more difficult for a small number of wealthy countries to assert their will on the rest of the world. It would, of course, also make wars like the one we're discussing here, more difficult to justify.

I also find it incredibly arrogant to refer to "powerless average people" as if elite barons in their Mercedes were referring to the street vendors they pass, while not entirely falsely accusing the western countries of imposing hegemony on the world.

I wasn't the one who brought up the idea of morality or friends on this thread, and I don't think someone who dismisses public opinion in developing countries as "powerless average people" is at all qualified to complain about western hegemony.

[2952-0-0]

BTW, was not the sanctions suppose to destroy the Russian banking system?   It seems like it is the other way around.

So if the US's tough-on-Russia stance led to the failure of some US banks connected to the tech and crypto bubbles, wouldn't that mean China's no-limits friendship with Russia led to the collapse of numerous Chinese banks, whose protesting customers were beaten up by Party-sent thugs and whose phones were given red QR codes?

[2952-0-0]

"The person said Putin did not appear to be reconsidering the conflict despite the heavy losses and setbacks of the last year. The diplomat noted that the Russian president was a former KGB operative and said they are trained to always continue to pursue their objectives, rather than reassessing the goals in the first place."

https://twitter.com/maxseddon/status/1640804621299113984?s=20

Is that his training or mental illness?

It's just his tendency to procrastinate. Any realistic end to the war represents a shift from the status quo which carries a risk to his position as president. He may prefer to simply run the clock until he dies or a much more favourable outcome somehow presents itself.

I've personally believed for a while that while Putin initially wanted to blitzkrieg Ukraine, his failure to do so made him shift the purpose of the war from a means to an end, to as an end to itself. It now exists just for his own power, with whatever happening in the Donbass or Zaporizhzhia unimportant. Even if the Russians are pushed back to the pre-2014 borders, Putin will continue the "special military operation", which would consist of a steady stream of skirmishes along the border that are staged for performative purposes. Maybe he will also order "Ukrainian" missile strikes against apartment blocks inside Russia, like what occurred shortly before he came to power. But he doesn't need to "win" the war in order to achieve his objectives.

[2952-0-0]

Are there any concessions with Taiwan to Xi to make him order Piglet to end the war immediately?

It's funny that there's a meme where Putin becomes Piglet to Xi being Winnie. It wasn't long ago that then-Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam was being compared to Piglet.

https://hongkongfp.com/2018/10/23/satirist-compares-xi-jinping-hong-kong-leader-carrie-lam-winnie-pooh-piglet/

What if Mr. Putin's ill advised foray into Ukraine had less to do with keeping the former Soviet Republics in line, preventing the spread of NATO (and EU membership) Eastwards, but rather to ensure that the Russian people would stand in line and not rebel against the regime?

Tightening the screws is not a cause, but a consequence. A consequence of Putin being an agent of the Chinese National Communists, intent on weakening Russia enough to make it a weak-willed Chinese puppet like the impoverished DPRK. And anyone with enough sense to see this betrayal becomes Putin's personal enemy. Like this journalist who loves Russia, for example.

The idea that Putin will become Beijing's puppet is too simplified and doesn't capture the required nuance. The problem remains that, the stability of Putin's regime isn't dependent on whatever foreign assistance he might receive - if it falls into crisis, then I don't think any amount of aid from abroad can save him.

Also, do not, do not, do not underestimate the internal dynamics within the CCP. The CCP was traumatized by the events of 1989-91, and did plenty of internal debate on their significance. The consensus that emerged was that one-party rule could be sustained by giving its Party elite opportunities to enrich themselves, and give the people just enough to be thankful for the Party. However, this consensus began to fray by the late 2000s, as the corruption within the Party was eroding its discipline (you can Google "second-generation reds" for some insight). Also, by then, China's economy had evolved to the point that further economic reforms that would enrich the nation as a whole would damage the interests of the Party elite.

Xi Jinping personally is also known to have been obsessed with studying the Soviet collapse. Soon after he became General Secretary, he very publicly made a secret speech about how the Soviet Union fell apart because its Party members had lost interest in the ideology. He especially mentioned how the Soviet military lacked the ability to execute the August 1991 coup due to a lack of support. His actions since then, and increasingly his own words, indicate that he views less economic growth and even conflict with the western-aligned powers as a necessary price to pay to maintain the Party's hegemony at home. There has been a steady stream of murmurs of discontent from within the Party elite, but they were quietly voiced to western media outlets.

What does this mean to Putin and Russia in the present time? It's clear that Xi Jinping views Putin's job security as tied to his own. If Putin were to fall from a window, or just become little more than a warlord controlling the Moscow region, that would be a huge psychological blow to the CCP's morale. Everyone from the second-generation reds to the millions of Party apparatchiks would see this as a gross failure of his judgment. To be sure, such an event would probably not be enough to force Xi from power, let alone cause the Party to fall apart - I don't even think the CCP is guaranteed to fall apart if it tries to take Taiwan and is defeated. But, it's clear that Xi thinks he can't let Putin fail. The trouble is, Putin's regime is too complex and too big to bail out.

[2952-0-0]

His actions since then, and increasingly his own words, indicate that he views less economic growth and even conflict with the western-aligned powers as a necessary price to pay to maintain the Party's hegemony at home.

why would high economic growth threaten the party's hegemony?

It depends on how it occurs, who benefits, and who loses out. The type of economic growth that would make the Chinese people as a whole best off would require liberalizing economic reforms while introducing a comprehensive welfare state. It would also require political reforms which, at minimum, include a separation of powers and a genuine rule of law, rather than rule by law. But, these would cause millions of Party apparatchiks to lose their jobs and their powers, and the Party elite would question whether they still need to be loyal to the Party for their interests.

If Xi had his way, China's economy would be dominated by state-owned, or CCP-directed national champions which were world leaders in their fields, allowing him to maintain full control over a growing pie. But, events of the past decade have proven that isn't realistic, and a choice has to be made between increasing the pie, or maintaining full control over the pie.

[2952-0-0]

In response to your post in general, I think Winnie the Pooh will not be upset at all if something happens to the Putin regime or Russia. I think there is nothing more profitable for him than using Russia as a kamikaze in a nuclear war against the United States. Or at least to use Russia for blackmail: peace in Europe in exchange for the annexation of Taiwan.

Oh no, I disagree with this. The events of 1989-91 shook the CCP to the core. It just so happens that the people who were in their political formative years back then are now in the halls of power, including Winnie himself. For the same thing to happen again 30 years later, but in a much more dramatic fashion (i.e. the west destroyed Russia by using a smaller part of Russia to wage a proxy war), would re-traumatize them. It would shatter the domestic political narrative. Again, I don't think this will be fatal to Xi or the CCP, but it's not something they want.

Then there's the question: to what extent could China really help Russia in its war, especially if it's failing? Suppose say that Winnie agrees to send a million artillery shells to Russia. He can easily order this. Then, the shells are loaded onto a train heading north. The train arrives at Irkutsk, where the local army commander demands that 100,000 shells be offloaded in order to boost up the nation's strategic reserves. Then, the train moves on to Krasnoyarsk, where the local army commander makes the same demand. Then Novosibirsk, Omsk, etc, etc. By the time the train arrives in eastern Ukraine, there are only 200,000 shells left. That might be enough to bombard another Ukrainian city and capture its ruins. But, Russia itself will be on the brink of a civil war.

And, even if Winnie were to openly use Russia as a blackmail to get his way elsewhere, that will only embolden the western powers into taking the gloves off. Murmurs among the Republican Party that too much aid is going to Ukraine will vanish. The Ukrainians are preparing to receive M1A tanks - just a token few dozen for now, but the US can easily send hundreds it has in storage. F-16s are also coming, sooner or later. After that, it won't even be funny. One of the events in the period between 1989-91 that shocked the CCP was the Gulf War: Iraq's army was very similar to China's army in terms of equipment and training, and to see it annihilated within days was deeply shocking in Beijing.

[2952-0-0]

snip

I'm honestly surprised that the UOC wasn't just banned after the invasion. Sure, it would have been an "authoritarian" move, but no more so than banning pro-Russian parties as was done fairly early, and both seem to present serious security risks in wartime that fully justify a limitation on civil liberties.

The threshold for banning religious organizations must be much higher than for banning political parties, since freedom of religious belief includes the freedom to form organizations without government interference. Banning the UOC-MP would also lead to social division which could be exploited by Russian propaganda, and raise questions about the Ukrainian government's commitment to fundamental human rights during a time of war, to a much greater extent than banning pro-Russian political parties. Of course, individual clergy who commit crimes against the state should still be prosecuted as would any other Ukrainian citizen, but targeting the organization as a whole would raise many more questions than it would answer. Obviously, religious organizations that actually direct acts of violence should be held accountable before the law. There's no easy answer to this question, but whatever action is taken must respect the principle that, without religious freedom - including the freedom of adherents to form organizations outside government control, all the other fundamental human rights would be in question.

[2952-0-0]

Russians get the way through the sanctions, Saudis and Indians get their easy money and Westerners can feel morally superior to everyone while still virtually buying Russian products and burning the money they have to spare. Everyone happy, I guess.

https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2023/03/15/russias-oil-revenue-sinks-as-sanctions-bite-iea-a80491

Russia's oil-export revenue sank by almost half in February compared to last year as Western powers tightened sanctions on the country, the International Energy Agency said on Wednesday.

The country earned $11.6 billion from its oil exports last month after the European Union imposed a ban on Russian petroleum products alongside a price cap agreed with the Group of Seven and Australia, according to the IEA.

This was down from $14.3 billion in January and a 42% drop from $20 billion in February last year.

Russia, however, was still shipping "roughly the same" amount of oil to world markets, according to the IEA, which advises wealthy nations.

"This indicates that the G7 sanctions regime has been effective in not restricting global crude and product supplies, while simultaneously curtailing Russia's ability to generate export revenue," the IEA said.

Think of it this way: under the direction of the western powers, the Russians are providing the much poorer Indians with a source of free money, while ensuring global oil markets still receive their needed supplies. Everyone is happy, except the Russian finance minister.

[2952-0-0]

You repeat the same esoteric. To use the word shock in this context is ridiculous. The collapse of the USSR was a consequence of the fact that for decades the spring of nationalism of the Soviet peoples was held back, especially nationalism was overripe among Russians and Ukrainians. Now both the Chinese state and the Russian state are nationalist, they are in complete harmony with the nationalism of their main ethnic groups, and a tiny number of real liberals are excluded by all means from influencing politics. Absolutely nothing threatens either Vinnie's regime or Piglet's regime. This field has been cleared.

Yes, it was ultimately nationalism that destroyed the Soviet Union. But, that was made possible because the Party's rank and file no longer felt that listening to the Kremlin served their interests. They then found another potential source of power in the form of local nationalism. Nationalism was the symptom, not the cause, of the Soviet Union's collapse.

As for China, Xi Jinping himself has repeatedly warned that the Party could very quickly fall apart due to a lack of internal cohesion. His speech about his theory on why the Soviet Union feel apart, which I previously mentioned, says it all:

https://chinadigitaltimes.net/2013/01/leaked-speech-shows-xi-jinpings-opposition-to-reform/

The most striking part of Xi Jinping’s “new southern tour speech” is his revisiting the topic of the Soviet Union’s collapse. He said, “Why did the Soviet Union disintegrate? Why did the Soviet Communist Party collapse? An important reason was that their ideals and beliefs had been shaken. In the end, ‘the ruler’s flag over the city tower’ changed overnight. It’s a profound lesson for us! To dismiss the history of the Soviet Union and the Soviet Communist Party, to dismiss Lenin and Stalin, and to dismiss everything else is to engage in historic nihilism, and it confuses our thoughts and undermines the Party’s organizations on all levels.”

“Why must we stand firm on the Party’s leadership over the military?” Xi continued, “because that’s the lesson from the collapse of the Soviet Union. In the Soviet Union where the military was depoliticized, separated from the Party and nationalized, the party was disarmed. A few people tried to save the Soviet Union; they seized Gorbachev, but within days it was turned around again, because they didn’t have the instruments to exert power. Yeltsin gave a speech standing on a tank, but the military made no response, keeping so-called ‘neutrality.’ Finally, Gorbachev announced the disbandment of the Soviet Communist Party in a blithe statement. A big Party was gone just like that. Proportionally, the Soviet Communist Party had more members than we do, but nobody was man enough to stand up and resist.”

Here's a more recent take, that more explicitly makes my comparison:
https://asia.nikkei.com/Editor-s-Picks/China-up-close/Xi-s-Gorbachev-obsession-put-China-on-a-Soviet-path

As for how the CCP could fall apart, it won't be the exact same way as the Soviet Union, where local Party use nationalism to dismantle the Party's structures. Deng Xiaoping had hoped to create a tacit agreement where market reformists and statists would take turns leading the Party every ten years. Before his death, he even declared that Hu Jintao (the one who was led away at the last Party Congress) would serve as General Secretary between 2002-2012, and that the Party would be able to select Hu's successor in a structured process.

But, by the late 2000s, ideological factions were increasingly openly sniping at each other, and that could very well have led to a split in the Party. It was in this context that Winnie came in, promising to recreate the Party's cohesion, and hence his speech on his theory on why the Soviet Union fell apart.

That also explains why the CCP chose to crack down in Hong Kong: internal documents revealed that they were aware of the Baltic republics, which, despite being the wealthiest and westernized parts of the USSR, were also the most resentful of Moscow and the first domino to fall. Hence, they viewed Hong Kong as a threat to the CCP's rule over all of China, and therefore a crackdown was the most logical option.

They also extensively studied the KMT in Taiwan, and the PRI in Mexico: two other long-time one-party dictatorships that fell apart. In both these cases, they concluded not inaccurately that a lack of cohesion within the ruling party made the party elites question whether they should continue supporting the system.

Hence, they are acutely aware of the risk to regime stability, and it is their #1, #2, and #3 priority. Everything else is subordinate to that, and the impression that the Party's rule is rock-solid forever is the product of their own propaganda. Winnie is secure for now, but I dare say that before you know it, sniping among the Party elites will become more and more difficult to ignore.

Second, I don't see why China might not want to supply the Russian army, because China has been supplying the Russian army for a long time, both itself and through its satellites. The West turns a blind eye to this, because the Western and not only the Western economy is tightly tied to China.

Here's a statistic you may want to consider: about 200 million Chinese jobs are dependent on foreign trade, about 20-25%. This is according to ex-Premier Li Keqiang, who probably did so to rain on Winnie's parade. A China that openly supports the Russian army in vast quantities (more than deniable drones or spare parts) would most certainly invite retaliation from the Western powers.

For starters, I can see the EU, US, Canada, UK, Japan, etc imposing a 10% (or something) tariff on imports from China, which would go towards supporting Ukraine. The Trump Administration's tariffs on Chinese imports did cause some economic costs to the US economy, but the costs to the Chinese economy were greater, and that's why the Biden Administration kept them. Such a Ukraine tariff would cause some cost to the western economies, but it would be a fraction of the cost of just a fraction of the many millions of Chinese jobs that would be lost. If you want to give the CCP any credit, it's that they will do whatever it takes to prevent domestic mass unemployment. Unfortunately for them, their room for error is shrinking: China's export manufacturing sector is ailing even according to its official statistics.

And that's just the direct employment aspect. Until recently, the US has been struggling to convince its allies to go along with its efforts to restrict the flow of advanced technology to China. A major reason for this was that the Europeans had been skeptical about Washington's agenda, and wanted to assert their strategic presence. A China that abandons the pretense of neutrality will make it much easier for Washington to co-ordinate technology sanctions. What happened recently in the semiconductor sector could very easily spread to other sectors. It won't immediately threaten the CCP's regime, but they're very vocal that they view these sanctions as a direct attack on their core interests.

Winnie himself wants to be another Mao, but he lacks the cunning or intelligence of Mao. He obviously has a man crush on bunker grandpa, but he's constrained by the Party structures and China's vast size in his ability to micromanage affairs. He's also constrained by the fact that, while China's economy is vastly wealthier than Russia's, that's because it's far more globalized and more vulnerable to external factors.

[2952-0-0]

China's economy isn't even vastly wealthier than Russia's it just has 9-10x the population.  Its nominal GDP pc is just under 90% of Russia's and its PPP GDP pc is at about 65%.

It hasn't yet even achieved the Soviet Union's peak estimated GDP per capita relative to the US of about 35% in the early 70's.  Still pretty far from that even on a PPP basis.

Yes, true. But, China's economy is far more industrialized, complex, and globalized than Russia's. And that conversely makes it more vulnerable to Western sanctions, because these would immediately cause a mass unemployment crisis, and cripple large parts of its advanced industrial sector which depend on inputs from now-enemy countries. That didn't happen in Russia, because Russia's economy is dominated by state-owned natural resources, and it's easier for the Kremlin to guarantee jobs that provide just enough for sustenance.

[2952-0-0]

Yes, true. But the question is whether Xi even cares about the economy anymore. If he really cared about the economy that much, his behavior would have been very different for the past 5 years, since many of this actions damaged the economy. He can always ramp up Keynesian military spending and conscript the previously unemployed people who worked in the export sector into the army, while suppressing dissent with calls to patriotism and other anti-Western rhetoric. What he cares about is his own place in history and the notion that he is some sort of messiah that is going to bring an end to Western hegemony. In my view, he could be charging headlong into a suicide march taking China with him, and if so the economy won't figure very importantly in all his plans. The common unifying factor of Putin, Biden, Trump, and Xi is that all of them prioritized geopolitical confrontation over economics.

Winnie has made it clear that he doesn't view the economy (as in, rising living standards) as his priority. But, that doesn't mean that he's eager to turn China into West Korea right now, because even he's aware that's not doable in the short term. His administration still needs to at least pay lip service to welcoming private investment, because China's domestic consumption and export sectors are currently in serious trouble, which has immediate consequences for weiwen ("preserving stability").

The sudden loss of eight digits of export sector jobs would be beyond the ability of even the CCP's mobilization abilities to manage. Conscripting more than a fraction of them into the army would be useless in any hypothetical war against Taiwan, unless the plan is to use their bodies as land fill. Mobilizing them into military industries would immediately put the Western powers on alert.

Then there are the tech sanctions. China's semiconductor sector is already a decade behind global standards, and that's after spending hundreds of billions trying to bridge the gap. Tighter sanctions still will widen that gap further, and sanctions in other advanced technologies would achieve similar results.

Putting these two together, China would be grappling with mass unemployment (though over time, this could still be alleviated by replacing capital with labour) and an increasingly disappointed Party elite, with a numerically massive army that is technologically inferior to its adversaries.

So Winnie is stuck in a quandary where he wants to prioritize his regime's stability over the economy, but the economy is - in the long term - what gives his regime its stability.

And what does all this have to do with Russia? Well, if Putin's regime becomes increasingly dependent on support from Beijing, then a stagnating Chinese economy will find it increasingly difficult to support Putin even when doing so becomes more and more important for its own regime stability. That's exactly what doomed the Soviet Union into stagnation, which paved the way for its collapse.

[2952-0-0]

Piglet has been talking for twenty years about preserving stability, "well-fed decade" and "but we have peace." And washed away his entire agenda one February morning. When dealing with extremist leaders, pay attention to their deeds and ignore their words.

That's true. Until quite recently, too many foreign government and corporate leaders were still thinking China was the same China of the 1990s/2000s, when the leadership was motivated to open the country for business (to provide Party bureaucrats for more opportunities for grift). Now, the CCP are trying to have it both ways, in stepping up internal propaganda while trying to convince the rest of the world that the country is still a good place for business. It's becoming harder and harder to continue playing this double game.

As for Winnie himself, his actions show that, while he wants to take risks, he does know to pull back when he reaches the limit. For instance, throughout all of last year, China was still locked down long after the rest of the world had moved on from the pandemic. Winnie himself openly stated that the lockdowns were necessary as a political loyalty test, and that it was worth sacrificing economic growth to that end. Vast amounts were being spent on enforcing the ever more tougher lockdowns, to the point that many local governments were going bankrupt. It was clear to everyone that he wanted to maintain the lockdowns in the long term, for many years in the future.

Then, suddenly, he ordered a complete end to all control measures. The Party had triumphantly led the people to a great victory against the virus (never mind that it unleashed perhaps the fastest wave of mass deaths for any reason in human history). You may not believe this, but shortly after the U-turn was announced, all Party members were told to catch the virus as quickly as possible so they could serve as vanguards for the rest of the people. Partially, his hand was forced due to the mass protests that shocked everyone including, no doubt, the security apparatus. But, a larger explanation for his u-turn was that he finally realized that the lockdowns were causing irreversible damage to China's economy, and in particular its high-tech manufacturing sector.

All this proves that, no matter how pig-headed he is, Winnie can be persuaded to u-turn in a triumphant and glorious way, if he realizes that his current trajectory was damaging his own position.

There are plenty of other issues on which Winnie made u-turns on policies where he previously declared personal ownership, but all these U-turns were done quietly. His decision to suddenly U-turn on lockdowns was shocking for everyone, but it does prove that he is flexible when push comes to shove.

Winnie and his daddy aren't entirely comparable, but I won't really be surprised if the daddy performs a similar U-turn on Ukraine. Ukraine has always been our brotherly nation, and Crimea has always been a part of Ukraine, and the Special Military Operation can be called off now that it has successfully eliminated all the secret gay Nazi bases in Ukraine.

[2952-0-0]

Morals can and ARE adapted to fill into the goals of each country. And it’s clear by the way morals are adaptable in the West, that they see as part of their interest the subjugation of the third world as a means of keeping their global dominance through the white fear of the “other”. Which is how Europe gets to be pushed as this unquestioned place of alliance while the non-white world is seen with suspicion, condescension and through an inhumane lens of “ moral higher ground”.

Then explain why Putin is targeting young men from Russia's non-European racial minorities, followed by migrant men from Central Asian former Soviet republics, and followed by Russian men from its poorest regions, to his meat grinder. Meanwhile, men from Moscow and St. Petersburg, and those whose families can schmooze the right people, are generally spared. Isn't that racist, chauvinist, and classist? A way to ensure that Russia remains demographically and socially dominated by ethnic Russians and the elite?

[2952-0-0]

The Global North vs Global South divide evidenced by Ukraine and Western Double Standards after decades of not living up to the moral speech they defend they “represent” is the big story of this century. Multipolar World: We have one side pushing for it and the other trying to repress it in order to protect their unbalanced share of power. Ukraine just happened to be the catalyst for all this because it’s where it became evident that the compassion given to a white european country in danger is extremely different than what has always been given to non-white countries.

But, isn't Russia itself a white European country, which is using its non-white subjects, and its poor subjects, to wage war against another white European country? What makes one of them "global south" and the other "global north"?!

The reason why we're discussing this here is that Putin sees the mere existence of Ukraine as a threat to his own rule in the Kremlin, and so he takes the sons of ethnic minorities, and poor Russians, to die for himself.

The British Empire, for all its faults, had a social expectation for the sons of the upper class to enlist in the military. That at least provided some restraint against purely "useless" wars, even when the empire itself was motivated by enriching the upper class.

Meanwhile, the sons of the Russian elite are still posting on Instagram about their exploits in London, Switzerland, and Miami. Their words are just that - words.

The same is true about the sons of the elites of Iran, China, Cuba, Venezuela, etc: they're all living the high life in countries that are denounced in their own official propaganda.

And since the “rules-based world order” doesn’t exist, or exists to be more in favor of people who look a certain way over others, we’re seeing people behave accordingly because it means we need to construct a completely new and more balanced world order. And the 1st path to this is necessarily weakening the dollar. The future is in the South and South-South collaboration..

It's always a good idea to look for other means of transactions. In reality, the rise of blockchains means it might be possible that, in the near future, there will be no reason why an Indian importer must make payments to an Argentinian exporter in a currency that neither of them truly need, and that it would be technically impossible for any third party to unilaterally obstruct them.

Having said that...

A means of storage of wealth is still necessary. It was gold and silver in the past, before fiat currency became the predominant means in the last century. The US Dollar emerged as global hegemon, in very large part because its capital markets are the most liquid. Is it unfair? Yes, because there are many countries with more stable political and institutional systems and which also have better opportunities for investment, which are neglected as a result of this hegemony.

But China is simply not an alternative, at all. The Renminbi is not freely convertible, which means it doesn't even meet the definition of a storage of wealth. Why isn't it convertible?

Look at these:

https://twitter.com/carlquintanilla/status/1645878241217900546

https://twitter.com/abcampbell/status/1645719205763772416

According to official statistics, China's M2 money supply is equivalent to the money supply of the US, the Eurozone, and the UK combined, despite still having a much smaller economy than the US, and is still generating new money supply at a record pace while the money supply of the western economies is contracting. What does this mean?

It means that the Renminbi is massively overvalued, and that its true value without capital controls would be about 15-20 to the US Dollar instead of the 6.5-7.0 that it is now. Its current per capita GDP is roughly equivalent to that of Argentina or Costa Rica. At the hypothetical "true" exchange rate, it would be around the level of Guatemala or El Salvador. No one thinks these countries are up-and-coming superpowers.

In other words, for China to offer a credible reserve currency, it would have to make the Renminbi to become fully convertible, but doing so would cause it to collapse and trigger widespread domestic social unrest. That's why in recent years, even routine cross-border transactions have become a bureaucratic pain in the ass: it's hardly a sign of confidence in the future.

Is the current US Dollar hegemony unfair, because it sucks up investment that could otherwise go to other countries? Yes. But, I don't see a good future for China under the current situation, and the actions of its leadership indicate they don't, either.

[2952-0-0]

It simply means what we all can see.

China is by far no1 in Industry, Trade, and Construction in the world, so it's logical for them
 to also have the largest money supply because of all the transactions.

By all appearances the Chinese economy probably overtook America around the late 2000's, even if no one wants to admit it.

You only have to look at the number and condition of their cities compared to America's.

China's official numbers are bogus, and even the top leadership admit as such.

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-china-economy-wikileaks-idUSTRE6B527D20101206

A study of satellite imagery of night lights also provides hints at the scale of fudging of official economic numbers in all dictatorships. The more repressive a dictatorship, the greater the fudging of numbers. You'll see there are no countries where official economic numbers are fudged to be less than reality.

https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2022/09/29/a-study-of-lights-at-night-suggests-dictators-lie-about-economic-growth

As for construction, well, even the top leadership admit that overbuilding has become a systemic crisis. There are now enough empty homes to house the entire population of Germany, Italy, France, and the UK combined, all in a country where the population is declining. And that has been at the heart of what appears to be the boom: money is printed to fund construction projects which could never be occupied.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/chinas-property-bust-compounds-economic-pain-11674123815

Here are some real numbers, about the real incomes of real people:

https://twitter.com/alvinfoo/status/1411723958072659970?t=gXIidAfVBFFigBgyOqPl3g&s=09

China's median income is, being very generous, below $4000 per year. Less than 10% of the population have an income above $9200 per year, which even in the Chinese social consciousness, is considered the bare minimum for a new graduate. This means that China is, in reality, a desperately poor country for all but the top 5%. These fancy skyscrapers are of no relevance to the other 95%.

So, given all these facts (massive fudging of economic numbers, that much of the boom was a fictitious bubble, the eye-watering income inequality), the additional fact that China has been printing money at the fastest pace in human history doesn't bode well for its future. Appearances are deceiving.

Anyway, enough about this tangent.

[2952-0-0]

You are both right, but you look at it from different points of view. From the perspective of the Chinese government, per capita GDP and the well-being of citizens are completely irrelevant. This is the government that once starved to death up to 45 million of its citizens as a result of the idiotic sparrow extermination, that is, twice as many as the Japanese killed the Chinese in World War II, even considering the Nanjing Massacre, but still the Chinese government does not allow the thought  about its fault.

This is not entirely true. What they fear the most is mass unemployment, and they will pull out all stops to prevent that. It's the most important pillar of weiwen, above even using violence to crush dissent. And that explains why Beijing has been printing money at the fastest rate in history to build homes that will never be occupied: to keep able-bodied men too busy to cause trouble.

Another facet is that the Party elite had made a deal with themselves: you stay loyal to us, and we'll give you the first opportunities to enrich yourselves. Therefore, there still needs to be some real increase in living standards, to provide the Party elite the incentive to remain loyal. For instance, the "second generation reds" were given control of the state-owned monopolies in the 1990s, just as they were preparing to be listed on the stock market. That created an incentive to actually raise the standard of living for the masses and build infrastructure: Jiang Zemin's son was given control of the telecom sector while he was General Secretary, and then oversaw the rapid rollout of the mobile phone network, before he got his payoff: the IPOs in Hong Kong and New York. A similar story can be told about Premier Li Peng: he was the one who pushed for sending in the tanks, and his family was rewarded with control over the electricity sector. All these create an incentive for the Party elite to grift, while actually building infrastructure in a way that benefited the masses.

Of course, the Party is ready to use violence to crush dissent. But, its leaders also understand they can't solely rely on violence to that end. Chinese history is replete with Emperors who increasingly have to turn to their army generals to crush rebellions, only for the army general to decide he wants to run things.

Standard of living also matters for another reason: Beijing could use access to 1.4 billion consumers for political leverage to foreign governments and multinationals. If the vast majority of the 1.4 billion simply can't afford these imported products, then political threats against these foreigners would lack credibility. Look at all these western multinationals which were targeted with boycott campaigns due to some slight over Taiwan or some other nonsense: most of them simply shrugged it off after a few months.

All this means that, because China's economy and society are much more complex than countries that depend on commodity revenues, then the CCP's social contract is much more complex than that of, say, the Arab princes, or of Putin. To some extent, it gives the average Chinese more freedom in his life than his Arab or Russian counterpart, but that's not because the CCP are nicer.

What matters to the Chinese government is overall GDP, how many tanks and missiles they can produce, and China's GDP has always been colossal. Even in the Middle Ages, China's GDP was a quarter of the world's GDP.

That doesn't quite capture the whole nuance, as well. Of course, they want a larger pie. But, who controls the pie is more important than its size. This is true under any political system, but even more so where political power is concentrated in a small minority. Winnie has been very open about this: that explains his crackdown on the tech bros. Yes, China's tech bros were jerks, but their real offense was hogging the attention of China's youth and entrepreneur class.

In addition, much of China's GDP has been tied up in unproductive investments, like all these apartments which will never be occupied. Overbuilding in the construction sector also meant overbuilding in the heavy industrial sector: steel, coal, cement, metal refinery, etc. This meant that the money printing press kept not just the real estate market on a sugar high, it also contributed to a supply glut in the heavy industrial sector, which Beijing has actively tried to reduce. Yes, this is the only government in history to actively and deliberately reduce its heavy industries. All this is complete idiocy from an economics standpoint, but it accomplishes the overarching political goal: keep potential troublemakers busy.

As for your point about the military: of course, they want a large military. But, they also know that too large a military is a threat to their power. Mao said that "the Party must always command the gun, and the gun must never command the Party". We all know that a bloated military-industrial complex can subvert democracies, and it could also undermine the leadership of a one-party state. There was also my previous point about how Chinese emperors were often threatened by their own generals. So, there are limits on how large that can go.

Anyway, my point remains: China's money supply is vastly larger than its real economy should justify, by a ratio of at least 2.6 (by official numbers, its GDP is 72% of the US, and has double the US money supply), and likely higher still (since if its real GDP is much smaller than its official numbers, then the ratio would be higher still). And it's still printing money at a pace faster than even the Fed at the height of the pandemic!

The chinese can't be falsifing the trade figures of the West, and it's western statistics that I rely upon.

You went on about how Chinese cities are full of modern buildings, and therefore China has the appearance of being already the wealthiest country in the world since the late 2000s, and that everyone is pretending otherwise, without citing any proof.

I then cite proof that China's official numbers - which still state that its GDP is lower than the US by a lot - are severely fudged, including a Wikileaks cable where a senior official even joked about it. I then cite proof that these modern buildings are just appearances - not a Potemkin village, but a sign of deep trouble in the Chinese financial sector. Then I cited real numbers issued by a Chinese state-affiliated think tank that 95% of Chinese have incomes that, by first-world standards, make them impoverished.

Here it is again:

https://twitter.com/ZichenWanghere/status/1269256786969874432

[2952-0-0]

The difference between the China of the noble empires and the China of the National Communists is about the same as between Alderaan and the Death Star.

To reduce the discontent of the intellectuals, the Chinese emperors entrusted the intellectuals with grandiose scientific activities. The National Communists simply gave the intellectuals to the mobsters for lynching.

Medieval Chinese officials were subjected to eternal disgrace for the execution of the objectionable general Yue Fei. Mao dumped the marshal, who was an equal hero, and started a civil war against his own army just for fun, and he is still idolized.

But doesn't that prove my point, about how Chinese rulers have all felt threatened by their own generals, and need to cut them down to maintain their own power?

One way or another, after Mao destroyed China, China will sooner or later return to its natural state, regardless of the current postscripts and poverty of citizens. Already, China is on a par with the United States in terms of GDP, and having finally healed the wounds inflicted by Mao, China will naturally become the country with the largest budget in the world. And I want to say that the military threat of China and its satellites must be taken as seriously as possible. No bravado and no closing of the eyes.

Do you remember what Mao said about nuclear war?

If the CCP really healed the wounds inflicted by Mao, it would not have elected Xi as its leader, and would not have allowed him to consolidate power, let alone allow a personality cult.

In addition, the Qing Dynasty had as much as a third of the world's GDP - even more than the US today - when it was being picked apart by the European imperial powers. It failed, because its leadership were disinterested in enacting the political reforms needed to compete with the Europeans, because - as in Japan - these reforms meant upsetting the power structure at home. Hence, even after its defeat at the hands of the Europeans, the Qing Dynasty spent vast sums modernizing its army and navy, and hired the best instructors from Prussia and Britain. But, because there were no accompanying political reforms, this vast and modern military fell apart at the hands of the much smaller Japanese in 1895. It was plagued by corruption, supply line challenges, lack of interest at home, and factional rivalries - everything that went wrong with Russia in Ukraine.

And that defeat plunged the Qing Dynasty - still the world's second largest economy even during its final decade - into an existential crisis that it didn't recover from. The Dynasty was put out of its misery in 1912 by General Yuan Shikai, who commanded the "New Army", proving that even its half-hearted attempts of modernization led to its feared loss of political power. General Yuan then went on to strangle China's nascent constitutional democratic republic in its crib, before himself dying as the "Emperor" of a shattered ruin.

The Republic that followed it, and the CCP that rules today, are both haunted by that legacy. It's also very telling that comparisons between the CCP and the Qing Dynasty are quickly censored. The lesson here is that raw GDP, or even the size of the military, is not a substitute for political structures. It's even more true, when the current leadership in Beijing openly states they don't even consider the economy as their top priority. It's internal security that matters more than anything else. GDP, standard of living, military strength are all subordinate to that.

Does this mean there won't be a war? No. Putin started his war in Ukraine because he didn't want to fall from a window, after all. But that has to be put into perspective.

As for your comment about Mao and nuclear war, well, all the CCP elite have their children in enemy western countries. It's as relevant as Vladimir Solovyov's outbursts about nuking London, where his son works as a model.

[2952-0-0]

The outbursts of Solovyov and dozens of other Putin mouths, including Medvedev for example, repeat in other words the same message of Mao. And this should be alarming.

The agenda of the Ruscists as a whole coincides with the agenda of the Chinese National Communists: Maoist Stalinism, Maoist hatred of Khrushchev; hatred for the British and Americans, which grew after the Opium Wars and cemented after the Korean War, in which the Chinese died for Stalin's wishes, as now the Russians die for Winnie's wishes; the capture of fraternal Tibet, when the Chinese destroyed half of the entire population and almost completely destroyed the fraternal Tibetan culture, the Russians are quite consistently trying to repeat it in Ukraine; Putin's gangs modeled on the Red Guards and Zaofan; again, crazy rhetoric about nuclear war and so on.

Before the Age of Shame, the Chinese did not have a normal industry, they relied on artisans. The Chinese have taken this into account, now the whole world relies on their industry. It must be borne in mind that, unlike the same Russians, the Chinese are able to learn from their mistakes, and now the Russians who ruled China have themselves become ruled by China.

The words of the elite of dictatorships who profess hatred against the west would be more credible, if they didn't stash their wealth in western banks, put their family and mistresses in western countries (even ensuring they had western passports), and bought mansions in western cities. That's why Solovyov exploded when it was revealed his son was, in fact, living in London. Similarly, last year, when Chinese social media sites started displaying the IP locations of all posters, an unintended consequence was that many "Little Pinks" immediately became laughingstocks. As for Winnie himself, his sister lives in Canada, his ex in the UK, his cousin in Australia, and his daughter studied at Harvard. The Soviet elite never came close to this, even if they did enjoy privileged access to western goods. Yes, they want the ignorant masses to genuinely believe their nonsense, but they have cognitive dissonance: they simultaneously believe their nonsense, but don't act like it.

And, the idea that the CCP are uniquely able to learn from the past is an Orientalist trope. If the CCP did learn from their mistakes, they would not have elected Winnie as the General Secretary, and then built a personality cult around him, don't you think? It is certainly true that the CCP invested huge resources into studying the Soviet Union's collapse. It is true that, in previous decades, it correctly blamed the USSR's failure on its internal economic and ideological stagnation, and that Gorbachev simply brought what was inevitable. But these lessons evolved in the wrong direction more recently, blaming the collapse on Gorbachev's reforms themselves.

https://thediplomat.com/2022/10/the-ccps-changing-understanding-of-the-soviet-unions-collapse/

As we know, learning the wrong lessons is worse than not learning anything. It's been clear for some time that Winnie has become the Chinese Brezhnev, with increasingly absurd propaganda and a personality cult masking the ideological and economic stagnation that has taken hold. The similarities even extend to their frosty relationship with their respective Premiers (Li Keqiang and Kosygin), who were more technocratically and economically minded, and eventually sidelined by the boss. Even the types of jokes told about the two are similar: Winnie is senile, illiterate, and possessed by delusions of grandeur. As we know, Brezhnev's era was the height of Soviet power in the world. He also didn't hesitate to crack down on dissent both inside the USSR and in the Soviet Bloc. But Brezhnev became, in retrospect, synonymous with stagnation. His final acts as leader were to crack down on Solidarity in Poland and invade Afghanistan: in retrospect, these were the beginning of the end for the entire system.

What does this mean for China's future? Well, we can expect stagnation to continue to take hold. It's possible that a war that Winnie thinks could be quick and easy would be waged, though - just like Brezhnev, he won't be so reckless as to start a war where he thinks the west would directly intervene. But as time drags on, the rot will become unmistakable, and his demise will lead to something unpredictable. The end result is that, far from learning from the mistakes of its own past, and of the Soviet Union, the CCP will not have learnt anything after all.

There's also the misconception about China's place in global industrial supply chains: yes, it's massive. But its supply chains are critically dependent on imported components from the west, and its efforts to create its own alternatives have been frustratingly slow and expensive. This means that, rather than the notion that the western powers are dependent on China's industries, it's the reverse that is closer to the truth.

[2952-0-0]

There's been a second murder committed by a previously convicted murderer that was pardoned after fighting for Wagner, this time in the breakaway statlet of South Ossetia:

"Local authorities announced in the early hours of Tuesday that they had arrested a man who was suspected of murdering Tsugri. The man, who was identified by state-run media, was Georgiy Siukayev, a convicted murderer who was recruited from jail last autumn by the Wagner paramilitary organisation to fight in Ukraine."

https://twitter.com/JuliaDavisNews/status/1650107604092190721?s=20

My prediction from last September:

Give another few months, and you'll see hundreds of thousands of angry, traumatized young men returning from Ukraine with their weapons and who refuse to accept any authority, with a demoralized police force surviving on tips from whomever they can extort.

Not a recipe for peace of any sort.

[2952-0-0]

I noticed from the very beginning of the special military operation that Putin's Russia is almost perfectly replaying the role of Imperial Japan during its invasion of China. Everyone remotely familiar with the 20th century history of East Asia notices the parallels.

https://jordanrussiacenter.org/news/similarities-between-putins-russia-and-late-imperial-japan-backgrounds-and-implications/

No, Russia is not about to run out of fuel and expand its war out of desperation. And Russia is not ruled by a military junta beset with infighting between its army and navy. And no, the war won't end with the US dropping nukes on Russian cities.

The last two paragraphs provide a uniquely Japanese perspective, in that it addresses grievances against the current western-led world order in a way that would strengthen it.

The war Putin is waging against Ukraine will have a long shadow no matter what happens from this point forward. If Russia lost the war and Putin fell from power, one possible strategy for its future development would be to make a fresh start as a pacifist nation, discarding any “great-power” ideals. However, given the widespread apathy the Putin regime has cultivated among Russians for over two decades, and taking into account that no foreign country is likely to invest in creating a large-scale mechanism to direct Russia’s rebirth as a democratic nation, Russia will face much greater difficulties with reconstruction than Japan after the Second World War.

While the behavior of Putin’s Russia is idiosyncratic for today’s world, we cannot exclude the possibility that other marginalized states may take aggressive actions based on their frustration. China, in anticipation of becoming the world’s most powerful economy, is challenging the Western-centered world order, but has no powerful close allies and remains semi-peripheral on the world stage. The resulting sense of thwarted national ambition may lead to unexpected actions. A similar problem could arise with India. To prevent such a situation, the international community must unite and help ensure the failure of Russia’s war in Ukraine, thereby demonstrating the futility of armed invasion in the twenty-first century. At the same time, we need to understand that the hierarchical structure of the world order is problematic in itself, generating discontent among various countries. It is necessary to break away from Western-centrism, precluding those consigned to the “periphery” from using anti-Western discontent as a pretext for aggression.

[2952-0-0]

As I've highlighted on this thread, China's industrial supply chains are integrated with those of the western powers, and not in its favour. This is a vulnerability that its leadership have spent vast amounts of time and resources trying to resolve, but progress has been much slower than expected.

Here's an incredible statistic: China spends more foreign currency importing semiconductors, than oil. Here's another incredible statistic: the percentage of semiconductors that are consumed in China, that are produced in China, has been hovering at 20-25% for the past decade, and that is despite hundreds of billions of $ spent in an attempt to raise that percentage.

On its own, its domestic semiconductor sector is at the level of the early 2010s - anything more advanced than that requires imports of components from Taiwan, South Korea, the US, and other potentially hostile countries. Ditto for its aviation sector - even its supposedly home-made jet aircraft requires jet engines from France or the US. Even its high speed trains - no doubt its most visible accomplishment - require components from Germany and Japan for basic maintenance.

So, on that alone, China is simply not capable of fulfilling its own needs for advanced manufactured goods, let alone supplying the rest of the developing world.

And if that's the case with China, it's far more true with Russia, whose most advanced military equipment depended on semiconductors from...Taiwan. And that's a major reason why the longer this war goes on, the more that the Russians must rummage through ancient equipment.

[2952-0-0]

https://archive.ph/NkxYU

South Africa's Foreign Ministry has obtained legal advice stating that there will be no choice but to arrest Putin if he were to attend the BRICS summit in person, and therefore he would have to attend by Zoom.

[2952-0-0]

Separately, I note the bastardity of the rocket attack on May 1. In the USSR and same in the post-Soviet countries this is a big bright holiday, Labor Day. People congratulate each other, rejoice. Piglet, whenever possible, always tries to spoil the holidays for Ukrainians with rocket attacks.

I wonder what he's planning for the even more important day of May 9. If the Ukrainian air defences are as successful as they were last night, these would be the most expensive fireworks.

[2952-0-0]

None of what you just postulated, even if it was true, is any modicum of proof for your claims here.
If there is any difference, if anything it would be the opposite of how you are putting it; if you can't censor in a total way and you can't stop people from saying anything through direct means, then the solution is to flood the space with untrue things so that you don't lose credibility. You have more incentive to lie, not less.

But, in a democracy, you are free to investigate and question official claims. Hence, Ukraine had to officially walk back some of its more absurd claims, such as the improbable deaths of Russian generals (remember then?). Becoming known as a liar would also open the door for the enemy to spread disinformation without consequence. On the other hand, questioning official Russian claims means you will be "discrediting the Russian army" or "spreading fake news" (best), or your bullet-strewn body will be found on the ground under an open window (worst). It also means that enemy disinformation (such as rumours about Putin's health) cannot be credibly refuted even when they are actually false.

[2952-0-0]

Ukraine probably has a more transparent officer corp within the military but they absolutely do make up random propaganda for the media which are obvious lies. Nothing wrong but ots whats happening

The Ukrainian government and military have to deal with domestic criticism. A few months ago, there was a scandal that the Ukrainian military had food supply contracts where the stated prices were far higher than reasonable. As a result, the contracts were changed, and the officials responsible were fired. The officials should feel lucky that Ukraine is dependent on western aid: if it weren't, they would have faced the firing squad.

https://www.pravda.com.ua/eng/news/2023/02/28/7391403/

These stories also prove that Ukraine's democratic institutions are still doing their jobs and having a real impact:

https://kyivindependent.com/investigative-stories-from-ukraine-defense-ministry-allegedly-buys-food-supplies-for-military-at-inflated-prices/

By contrast, any criticism of the Russian army - even from the true Zealots who criticise its corruption and incompetence - is dangerous. Hence, it still hasn't resolved the problems that were exposed at the beginning of the war.