Posted on 05/10/2005 6:11:01 PM PDT by hedgetrimmer
The Middle East is just a blip. The American military contest with China in the Pacific will define the twenty-first century. And China will be a more formidable adversary than Russia ever was
For some time now no navy or air force has posed a threat to the United States. Our only competition has been armies, whether conventional forces or guerrilla insurgencies. This will soon change. The Chinese navy is poised to push out into the Pacific—and when it does, it will very quickly encounter a U.S. Navy and Air Force unwilling to budge from the coastal shelf of the Asian mainland. It's not hard to imagine the result: a replay of the decades-long Cold War, with a center of gravity not in the heart of Europe but, rather, among Pacific atolls that were last in the news when the Marines stormed them in World War II. In the coming decades China will play an asymmetric back-and-forth game with us in the Pacific, taking advantage not only of its vast coastline but also of its rear base—stretching far back into Central Asia—from which it may eventually be able to lob missiles accurately at moving ships in the Pacific. In any naval encounter China will have distinct advantages over the United States, even if it lags in technological military prowess. It has the benefit, for one thing, of sheer proximity. Its military is an avid student of the competition, and a fast learner. It has growing increments of "soft" power that demonstrate a particular gift for adaptation. While stateless terrorists fill security vacuums, the Chinese fill economic ones. All over the globe, in such disparate places as the troubled Pacific Island states of Oceania, the Panama Canal zone, and out-of-the-way African nations, the Chinese are becoming masters of indirect influence—by establishing business communities and diplomatic outposts, by negotiating construction and trade agreements. Pulsing with consumer and martial energy, and boasting a peasantry that, unlike others in history, is overwhelmingly literate, China constitutes the principal conventional threat to America's liberal imperium.
How should the United States prepare to respond to challenges in the Pacific? To understand the dynamics of this second Cold War—which will link China and the United States in a future that may stretch over several generations—it is essential to understand certain things about the first Cold War, and about the current predicament of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the institution set up to fight that conflict. This is a story about military strategy and tactics, with some counterintuitive twists and turns.
I have to admit, I fear that they may pull an "Argentina" to focus their citizens away from where the problems really lie.
"Nice way to backtrack your original comments, saying that nukes were too expensive and useless."
My argument was that additional nukes were not useful.
Again, minimal deterrence works. You haven't explained why anything beyond minimal deterrence is necessary.
The only way to contain China from getting too bold is an alliance of nations. I think Bush is setting it up as we read this.
Check out DIMITRI DUDUMAN on the web.
He's but the better known and most extensively informed of such things . . . among many.
This whole discussion is silly. The Chinese would have us begging for peace in days. They declare war on us and immediately surrender 1 million POWs to us. If we do not capitulate, they surrender another 2 million - and then 4M ... doubling the number every time until we beg for mercy.
"at 400 million dollars aday how do you finance an aconomy if you repudiate your debts?"
If we repudiate our debts, we won't NEED to finance our economy--the resulting global depression will probably cause a massive collapse and die-off in the Third World, and then we move in and set up new colonies.
"If you stiff your creditor for approaching atrillion then who will lend to you? This would precipitate a economic melt down so do we stiff them or do we do what they want when it gets to nut cutting time?"
In an economic meltdown, we'd lose the luxuries. The ChiComs would lose the ability to eat.
I TOTALLY AGREE.
It's shades of the puppet masters and Pearl Harbor all over again.
They must be deliberately neutering or weakening our potential responses.
They probably realize that regardless of their plants in the military, we have enough true patriots left there to do the enemy some real damage.
Du-du Man? Doo Doo Man? Sounds like something my 5 year old would say... :-O
I'll check him out...
"Your the one that said nukes were useless and too expensive."
In response to an argument for more nukes. I asked why buy more nukes.
Either learn to read, or go back to the DF.
There was a suggestion that we hit Three Gorges dam last summer if China tried to attack Tawain. That had the chinese leadership fuming at us for months.
The PRC is making money to upgrade its pathetic Air and Naval forces; doing it with greenbacks. And using N Korea as a wildcard, threatening Japan and Taiwan.
The PRC doesn't have the capabilities yet; read Sun Tzu. They're drawing us into "Fatal Ground".
Go back to 1961. The Soviets pulled the same sh*t with Cuba. Everyone called it a draw except Castro. But this time the PRC has allies in an oblique attack; the Iranians and the fascist Islamists as well as the screwball in NK.
You are kidding, I hope. That stuff (his "visions" and "visits") are to be dismissed, at minimum.
When you owe the bank 10 million dollars; the bank owns you.
When you owe the bank 600 billion dollars; you own the bank.
We stiff the chinese and their economy crashes in a few hours.
,,, they're quietly building up credentials in South and central America as well as in parts of Africa and island States in the Pacific too.
I think he was Romanian--KGB in the Romanian Navy. . . . until God overwhelmed him and his life in miraculous ways and set him on a completely new course.
His son has the website. He's dead . . . as of a few years ago. Told his family that when he died, it would be a big clue that the time of the fulfillment of his dreams and visions was not that far off.
I've known several different people who had fairly direct access to him--all honorable authentic Christians. They all assert that he was the REAL DEAL and above reproach.
Maybe I can find the website quickly though my shortcut has disappeared with a recent required reinstall.
This is not his son's site but it has some of his plus those of others:
http://www.whatsaiththescripture.com/Prophets/Prophecy.Duduman.America.html
I guess it's his grandson. This is one of the docs but I'm not convinced it's the grandson's site yet.
http://www.revlu.com/warnDud.html
And, I think It's Dimitru. I rarely get the spelling right.
This site seems to have a lot of foreign dreams, visions, prophecies about America:
http://www.angelfire.com/rant/watchman2001/DumitruSum.html
This site has an interesting collection of docs and sites about prohetic info and issues.
http://www.revlu.com/
Something we have to think about at home.....read the label.
Not at all kidding.
I wish I were.
Closer to home, as best as I can recall . . .
ALL . . . as in a rare 100%
of the truly authentically spiritual earnest Christians I know who hear God best; most accurately etc.
100% of them agree with Duduman. That would be say about 12-24 rather disconnected individuals.
These are people I most respect and would most trust my life to or the lives of anyone or any family I deeply cherished.
These are people who commonly, usually know every major thing that occurs in some at least generalized impression sort of way. Some of them had warnings about 911.
Scoff if you wish. The sobering time is coming all too soon.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.