[xone]

Are you Chinese? The Chinese have done and do much that a normal westerner wouldn’t conceive doing. Thinning the herd for starters.

[Black Agnes]

If by ‘thinning the herd’, you mean the Great Leap Forward, yes, that helped. Genocide usually thins the herd.

China already had the problem of an aging population and their labor force was no longer the cheapest.

One child laws saw to that.

This will make the supply chain migration out of china happen sooner rather than later.

If by ‘thin the herd’ you mean this virus? Probably not. 2% isn’t that great a mortality when compared with other viruses that have burned through humanity. However humanity hasn’t seen one with this kill rate in about 100 years. We’ve forgotten.

[Axenolith]

As they’ve stated, as long as the party survives 1/2 their population can die and it’s ok if their objectives with respect to the west are achieved. The main conundrum they faced when considering defeating the west was not having a nuclear exchange initiated if they released a biological weapon. It’s essentially a “last man standing” issue at this point from their point of view if this is part of some plan. Nukes ostensibly don’t get used because at this point they have reasonable international plausible deniability. At that point it becomes Who can hold their societal 💩 together while suffering through this and come out the other side as a functional society.