Cadence of Conflict: Asia, November 16, 2020

America is one of the most cunning nations, almost as much so as Britain. Chinese are known for signing contracts early, then negotiating after—something the West calls “reneging”, which breaks the contract. London always knew China wouldn’t be able to keep a promise, let alone a promise to not control and interfere.

But, almost as cunning is the appearance of election-based chaos stirring in America. Republican and Democratic voters have been building mutual hatred for a long time. Fighting within the country is real and believable. It was sparked by ambiguity, the cause of which is easily explained by what appears, for all intents and purposes, as vote fraud. That doesn’t take much manipulation of the masses, only a small push to send society tumbling over the ledge of insanity. And, China was sure to believe it.

But, there is a difference between America and China which the Chinese cannot understand: centralized power. Chinese-based governments, including democratic Taiwan, struggle to think outside the box of micromanagement. China doesn’t know that the US Navy in the Indo-Pacific region is capable of operating and responding, even if all communication is cut off from Washington. That was the purpose of the “boomer” submarines.

The Chinese people are beaten down. It’s a culture-wide mental state akin to groupthink Stockholm syndrome. The Beijing government truly believes the Chinese people will never rebel. So, when they see America in disorder, they will think democracy itself has failed. But, they don’t understand that the people of a nation are always stronger than the institutions they create, including government, which only derives its power from the people who allow it to be so powerful. Not only can America’s government continue to function with American society in a level of chaos, China’s government cannot be stronger than its own beaten-down people.

If China wanted to be strong enough to stand against America, it could have started by living up to the name of its army and actually “liberating” its people from a culture in which everyone is an oppressed-oppressing slave. Yes, America can deal with riots at home and kick China’s ass in the Pacific at the same time. China doesn’t think so; that’s exactly what the Pentagon hopes.

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Cadence of Conflict: Asia, September 28, 2020

There are no new developments with China, only old squabbles. China is shouting louder and louder, and Western media publish more in-depth stories outlining the many countries China has squabbles with. China is losing over the TikTok ordeal, as well as companies that helped build artificial islands which were not supposed to be military bases anyway, but somehow became military bases anyway. Sanctions fly from the US, as well as diplomats to Taiwan.

At the UN, Russia said a few words leaning in China’s direction, but that’s quite a tall order to expect Russia to devote resources helping China win every territorial squabble with India, Taiwan, the US, and Japan. Russia will more likely condemn the West with soft tones, then offer China moral support after its inevitable humiliation.

Humiliation is a funny thing. That seems to be China’s perspective all around. China feels humiliated and thinks humiliating others will solve its humiliation problems at home. China wants to own Taiwan because China feels humiliation for various and sundry reasons often created in attempt to escape humiliation.  China may even think a Taiwan “D-Day”, or “T-Day” would lead to victory—forgetting that Normandy was about free allies reclaiming lost land from expansionists. China has no alliance, China would be the expansionists, and the free people would be defending their homes. Humiliation blinds us and drives us to do crazy things. Russia knows this and plays for any opportunity—not to help China, but to manipulate China through the paradigm of humiliation China just can’t let go of.

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Cadence of Conflict: Asia, August 17, 2020

All of us enjoy the results of the paths we choose, paths which no one can choose for us. Americans believe this so strongly, it often leads to unhealthy apathy toward others in distress. When America finally decides to help others, it is often from a kind of “Messiah” complex, viz Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan. From this American worldview, including the good and the bad, America would have no motive to “keep China from rising”. We just don’t think about others that much, you see.

Nonetheless, China has frequently claimed its destiny and right to rise to greatness, using this claim as an excuse to threaten, attack, and oppress others, all the while adding another claim that resistance to forced Chinese subjugation is an attempt to “keep China from rising”. But again, free-minded people, whether self-absorbed or genuine, have no motive to keep others from rising.

Why do voices from China’s government suppose the intended motives of a free-thinking people, which the Chinese Confucian Communists cannot themselves identify with? Is this a random misunderstanding? To suspect ill motives of others toward oneself while at the same time seeking unchecked authority over others is more reminiscent of the paranoid narcissist. Adding to that China’s legislated policy for Hong Kong, against its UN-registered treaty of 1984, and for Taiwan, of which it still remains unable to assert jurisprudence, we now have signs of Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder. OCD was never about being clean and organized, but rather using excess rules of organizing as a means to control others. Added up, China demonstrates personality disorders from all three clusters.

That is an explosive mix, so to speak.

But, while insanity is a threat to others it is always a greater threat to itself. In addition to narcissism, an over-inflated view of self falls within purview of the Biblical proverb, “Pride goeth before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.” We in the West should not fear Chinese aggression, rather the fallout of narcissistic rage as China painfully learns that it cannot be a worldwide dominator. That lesson may cost a tuition of lives in the millions.

Yes, we are going down this path. August 15, this past weekend, marked the 75th Anniversary of Japan’s surrender to the United States and serves as a reminder of Western resolve to stop the map from changing. Almost four years prior, Japan had provoked the West against the wise advice of China; today, those roles seem reversed. We have no reason to fear, but we must be honest with ourselves enough to be ready for what has been brewing a long time.

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Cadence of Conflict: Asia, June 1, 2020

China says every effort will be made for peaceful reunification with Taiwan as long as there remains hope; force is the last resort. But, Taiwan wants peaceful freedom from tyranny; force is the last resort. There is no hope for China to find any reunification with Taiwan of any kind. China has removed any desire for peaceful reunification with it’s pressured propaganda campaigns around the world and in Taiwan, not to mention terrible handling of Hong Kong. Taiwan has prevented any hope of forceful reunification by arming to the teeth in response to China’s backfired PR campaigns.

Taking Taiwan would hurt and cost both lives and resources. And, Russia knows this. With steep cliffs on the east coast, complex deltas plains on the west coast, and a capital city inside a mountain bowl at the north, any beach landing would make Normandy Beach look like a walk in the park. With mountains peaking even higher than Fuji, China faces a jungle battle like halted America in Vietnam, except this battle would only be uphill.

If China prioritized such a venture, using either or both of its two copied aircraft carriers with its copied fighter jets and its copied missiles and copied drones, China’s neighbors would see an opportunity even if the US didn’t respond with any of its forty-four home-made carriers.

India, with one billion people, is no forced-friend of China, especially in recent months. A Taiwan distraction would be the perfect chance to free Tibet. Two thousand years of anti-friendship relations between Vietnam and China would require enormous numbers of soldiers to keep the Vietnamese from taking Nanjing as a pathway to the island of Hainan. Vietnam has a motive anyway, keep China at a safer distance for its history of aggression. With China occupied at the west and east while squandering enormous forces at Taiwan, Japan—a larger economy than India—has its own grudge and would love the chance for target practice near Beijing. None of the other countries small enough to be bought off and bullied would bring much help nor will to China’s aid.

Then, there’s the US after China would be in enough trouble. Russia doesn’t want more trouble, for all Moscow’s effort to seduce Europe by appearing pacifist. If China ever did manage to reach a Pyrrhic victory over Taiwan, China would have no defenses left, Tibet might be gone, then Japan and Vietnam would have taken their own bits out of the map. China would be clean pickings between the US and China’s frenemy Russia.

Russia is no friend of China. Who do you think gave China the idea of this wasted pursuit? All of that assumes things go well with the one billion Chinese who hate their government more than ever before in history.

So, why did Taiwan request a lower-grade missile—because it comes with a vehicle Taiwan already has? It’s not because Taiwan actually needs it. No. Talking about arming again to the teeth already armed to puts a kind of social pressure on Beijing, a sense of urgency. Taiwan sees what China is up against. Taiwan knows that Confucian culture can’t pass up the opportunity to self-destruct in order to save face. Taiwan’s policy is clear: Bring it.

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Cadence of Conflict: Asia, September 23, 2019

China is dipping into its pork reserves while America is largely unaffected by the surge in oil prices. The pork crisis in China started with an outbreak of the African Swine Flu and has been exacerbated by the trade war. China doesn’t have energy independence like America does. Soon, China will have a crisis of both food and energy. Wars have started over less.

Taiwan is ready and on high alert. Though there is a surrender movement in Taiwan as always, Taiwan stands ready with the advantage. Projecting power for an invasion is not as easy as defending an impossible island. With a coastline of either cliffs or marshes and jungle mountains everywhere else, Taiwan is no walk in the park. Taiwan’s president is wise to the bullying of China and believes in taking a stand. This is why she supports Hong Kongers as she does.

The situation in Hong Kong is past dire. As foreseen, the protests turned violent because of a deaf government. “No” means “no”, but China and its puppets can’t bring themselves to accept that, and Hong Kongers won’t let “no” mean anything else. Chinese Confucian Communism now faces the determination of the West. The great showdown between the Shame culture of the Far East and the self-determined culture of the West has begun. It’s only going to escalate. And, all those people who preached “capitulation to the bully” and the “invincibility of Chinese Shame” are about to be proven drastically right or fatefully wrong.

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Cadence of Conflict: Asia, February 4, 2019

The PDT Symphony Asian Mad Scientist Theorem is hard at work—that history unfolds as if a mythical mad scientist has finished societal experimentation on North Korea and has now decided to implement the same principles in China, this time with a seemingly faster canter toward communist calamity. Rather than nukes, China makes noises of sinking US aircraft carriers and invading Taiwan.

The theorem is not truth, but it helps to accurately anticipate how history will unfold, and anticipate it has. It foretold that the mythical “miracle of China” would be exposed for the myth it always was.

The so-called “China miracle” seduced too many. There was no miracle happening inside China. There was no invention, no innovation, no new ideas. Even China’s socioeconomic framework was reverse-engineered from Russian Marxism. Now, government requires itself to be the head of even religion; an Atheist government wants to define the truth for a religion that believes in a God that the government does not. How can that not be a course for calamity?

China gained its money, not from its own human ingenuity—since the Confucian education culture purges all ingenuity inclinations. No, the money came from Americans who would drive half a dollar’s distance in gasoline to save a nickel—thinking that this made sense. It didn’t make sense, it didn’t save cents, but it did make dollars for China. But, now, those dollars are all gone—the dollars China believed in, and the dollars that made Western saps believe in China. The “miracle” was never from China, but from the United States’ innovative, free-thinking, God-fearing economy.

China continues to grab for power—not because it feels powerful. While its economy and international respect have taken a nosedive, China is all the more adamant about “reclaiming” what is China’s ostensibly by rite. The looming invasion of Taiwan won’t happen because China believes it is economically strong enough to win, but that reclaiming Taiwan would solve all other problems to make China economically strong again. China believes China is a poor nation only because it hasn’t yet “retaken” more control of more lands, such as Taiwan—an island that the Communist Party never once controlled.

Even King Belshazzar feared the writing on the wall without understanding it. But, Western saps didn’t fear the writing written in their own economic language. Now, three Canadians are shocked and caught off guard. They should have known better than to put themselves in such peril during our dangerous times. So should the coupon clippers in America’s consumer base have known better. So should the American companies about to watch their investments get “appropriated” have known better.

And, China should have known such a trade war was coming. Lack of reciprocity started the Opium Wars. China should have researched America’s history books for the phrase “Indian giver”, which often described America’s government much more than it described America’s Natives. China should have known that American consumers would respond in wrath when their jobs had been exported from their homes and imported into a country that prohibits free speech and religion. China should have known that a trade war was in the making from the first day that American manufacturers outsourced their labor to the Chinese.

But, the Americans never told China because the Americans were too consumed with their own consumerism.

The obvious has been ignored. Now, the inevitable results are playing out. Whatever course history takes, the results must run their course, but we know it won’t be pretty, not for a while anyway. But, of all the things it never was, it was always foreseeable to those who wanted to look at what was right in front of them.

It takes two to start a war, so everyone should have known the war that was starting because everyone was starting it long, long ago.

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