Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Rock]

Or the 'rise of China?' This isn't meant to be political. But I'd just read how China had "hacked into the pentagon" also hacking into Germany's defense systems. It was purely for military motives. Why? What's up?

I get the willy's everytime I think of Chinese world hegemony, wondering if this will be the end of everything we know, as dire as that may sound.

I also wonder at the reality of it all, or if it's just notional, political hype, hubris. What do you think are the flaws in this argument, that China will reign?

Or the argument that America is in demise?

[laogaiguk]

Won't happen. China will collapse on itself sometime, become a democracy and go back to be a normal country. I don't think people really realize how things are over there.
Anyway, Chinese wouldn't make a good world language

[mehmeh]

Americans spend entirely too much on their millitary and have become, technologically speaking, decades ahead of China. However, China does have one thing America doesn't, people.

The recent cyber attacks on America represent China's attempts to level the playing field. Knock out American military networks and they are all but blind, if only for a short time.

As an American I'm not scared since this type of attack isn't viable for a full scale offensive. However, as a Tiwanese, I'd be a terrified. Such an attack would prevent Americans from stepping in to save the island in the event of a mainland invaision.

The Economist does a good job of explaining this, look it up.

[contrarian]

The military answer to large populations are nuclear weapons. The great equalizer.

[LuckyNomad]

Invasion of Taiwan? Tis to laugh. Unfortunately for China, there's a little thing called, The US Navy which would brush aside anything the Chinese had to throw at them.

China has a rather lengthy history of internal uprisings and rebellions which ravaged the country and brought down its dynasties.
Their internal problems are as big as their population. Water shortages. Overcrowded cities. Female infanticide. A demographic spread with too many people on top and not enough on the bottom(thankyou Mao).
Too much pollution. Not too distant future conflict with Russia, over who controls Siberia and Central Asia. Human rights abuses that will be very difficult to continue, given the amount of contact that China is having with the rest of the world.
The communists are not the Second Tang Dynasty.

The US defense budget is only 5% of its GDP. We spent way more in the 80's.

Why did they hack into the Pentagon? Because they are impatient and they don't want to have to wait another year and a half for Bill Clinton to get back into office.

[mehmeh]

Don't blow it off. A lot of China's military build up is designed around taking back Taiwan if it were to push for independence. You're right, the US Navy is a major deterrent but that is where the OP's point comes in. China is seeking to disrupt American communications and organization through electronic warfare. Combined with a larger Chinese navy (including submarines) and improved anti-ship missiles, China would probably be very successful at holding the US navy at bay long enough to overtake the island. By the time the US Navy could get back up, there would be no choice but to invade from sea and that would be a very unpalatable situation.

China doesn't want to take out the US and probably couldn't do it a while even if it wanted to. It does want to be able to hold it at arms length for a while, that's all they need.

[reactionary]

we got the neutron bomb! we got the neutron bomb! gonna drop it all over the place...you're gonna get it in your face!

[contrarian]

One American Boomer has 16 missles each with about 4 warheads. That is 64 big nuclear missles. There are over 10 such Boomers.

In short one US sub has more nuclear capability than the entire Chinese stockpile. If the Chinese did anything like using even one itty bitty nuke China would then be a glass parking lot.

[mehmeh]

US is going to use a nuclear bomb to defend Taiwan...yeeeaah...don't count on it.

[contrarian]

No the US would use nukes if the Chinese used even one little one. Or of they did a large scale attack on the US fleet.

This world is not a Tom CLancy novel where a prinipled President Ryan refyses to use them.

If the US were smart they would look for an excuse to pick a fight with China. I would expect 3 to 6 months of blockaded petroleum would cause chaos and melt down in CHina.

[Rock]

There would be a quick attack similar to suicide bombing which has no prediction. Therefore, America would be caught in the net and all of these sad people, including the West Coast of the US, thereby leaving China with enough leverage to dominate the economy of their makintg, ie., credit cards.

[contrarian]

And China would be flat black and glow in the dark. No factories to produce bugger all. By the way modern bombs like the US uses have much less fallout - nothing reaches the west coast.

[Ya-ta Boy]

Governments spy on each other. All the time. All governments. On everyone else. And all governments know it. It's just SOP.

Announcements like this one are done to score political points by embarrassing the other party. This one could be related to trade issues, or something else.

The interesting thing about this one is that it came out in the British media. My guess is that it is meant to punish American generals for criticizing British actions in Iraq. But it could well be connected to a British wish to embarrass China for some particular between those two countries. The most interesting part is how did the British know the Chinese army hacked into the US military computers?

[djsmnc]