Global Conflict Escalations

[Renegade7]

15 minutes ago, PeterMP said:

 

I will point out that I'm not a big fan of this type of thinking.  The past is often not a good predictor of the future (past performance is not indicative of future performance).

 

It seems likely to me eventually there will be the use of a significant nuclear weapon, and then all of those numbers will change really quickly.

 

Spikes happen...does that mean after someone else does it it may be the norm?

 

The general point is fair to challenge because our climate has been fairly stable, which is looking not to be the case soon.

 

600 years is still a lot of data to throw away in regards to progress on how we typically "handle things".

Edited January 1 by Renegade7

[Renegade7]

44 minutes ago, Larry said:

 

Just pointing out another possible explanation. 

 

The Pentagon's job is to be prepared, in advance, for anything that might happen. 

 

And it's really hard to be certain that something can't happen. 

 

And this is why we have a State Department as to not expect a diplomatic resolution from what agency who's job is to win wars.

 

44 minutes ago, Larry said:

And, we have to be prepared for it in advance. Being a dictatorship gives China the ability to mobilize quickly. For example, I understand that when Covid hit, Beijing built two hospitals of 5,000 beds each, in 4 weeks. And staffed them, by drafting medical personnel from elsewhere. 

 

 

Democracy is losing the battle of saying authoritarianism isn't worth it because of how dysfunctional our current democracy is. 

 

Democracy isnt designed to be efficient from a decision making standpoint, it's designed to be reasonable. 

 

Efficiency in decision making is not the same as efficiency with resources.  USSR got results in being one of the few to see strong economic growth during the Great Depression...but look at what it cost them with respect to how wasteful they were with their human resources and the lives it cost to "catch up" with the rest of the world.

 

Our government can do a lot in the conversation of this OP via leading by example through more efficient usage of our resources and not spending so much time sabatoging it's own decision making process.  Countries like India concern me saying they are the largest Democracy but slowly not acting like one.

Edited January 1 by Renegade7

[PeterMP]

57 minutes ago, Larry said:

 

Just pointing out another possible explanation. 

 

The Pentagon's job is to be prepared, in advance, for anything that might happen. 

 

And it's really hard to be certain that something can't happen. 

 

And, we have to be prepared for it in advance. Being a dictatorship gives China the ability to mobilize quickly. For example, I understand that when Covid hit, Beijing built two hospitals of 5,000 beds each, in 4 weeks. And staffed them, by drafting medical personnel from elsewhere. 

 

Actually, the military's job isn't to be prepared for anything that might happen.  Giving somebody that job would just be stupid because it isn't a job that can be done.

 

I believe the current military is supposed to be geared to winning two regional conflicts simultaneously.  So this would be fighting a war against Russia in Europe and fighting one Asia against China.  We aren't then also asking our military to be prepared to also fight a war between some groups of countries in S. or C. America.  It is 2 at once.  They've been given a goal to reach far short of fighting everywhere all of the world all at once (which would be included in being prepared for everything).

 

The military/intelligence community is also supposed to do reasonable risk assessments.  And historically, they've done a pretty bad job of focusing on "big" singular risk over many smaller ones.  The Soviets never were the risk in terms of desire or ability to invade western Europe that was predicted by the US military/intelligence organizations.

 

The European countries (closer to the Soviet Union and more directly impacted) did a better job of actually assessing the risk.  Currently, Taiwan's military budget is about 2.6% of GDP and they don't seem to be pushing to acquire nuclear weapons. (2.6% puts them above much of Europe but below Israel).  When they push over 3% or start making moves to acquire nuclear weapons (through much of the 1960s and 1970s W. Germany was over 3%.  We're about 3% now.), I'll become more concerned because that starts to indicate that they are actually seriously concerned.

 

If there is a betting pool of the next thing that results in greater than 100 US military conflict related deaths is China vs. something else, I'll take the something else. 

 

(

Edited January 1 by PeterMP

[PeterMP]

1 hour ago, Renegade7 said:

 

Spikes happen...does that mean after someone else does it it may be the norm?

 

The general point is fair to challenge because our climate has been fairly stable, which is looking not to be the case soon.

 

600 years is still a lot of data to throw away in regards to progress on how we typically "handle things".

 

In the context of thousands of years of human civilization, 600 years is a blip.  You're looking at the blip and saying that's real.  This point is made in the Vox article your graph is from.

 

https://www.vox.com/2015/6/23/8832311/war-casualties-600-years

 

"A recent paper, by Nassim Nicholas Taleb and Pasquale Cirillo, argued that our current peaceful era was a statistical myth: that dips in war deaths should be expected, as Roser's chart shows, and that there's no reason to believe this time should be different."

 

Pinker is right though but his being right is really just based on the existence of nuclear weapons.  We've postponed the large conflict and then subsequent smaller conflicts that would have come with a global realignment and made a blip.  If it weren't for nuclear weapons, China would have already tried to invade Taiwan (and what has prevented them is nuclear weapons.  Not capitalism, democracy, etc.).  But once nuclear weapons are used at a significant level, then things will change quickly.  Unless you believe we are capable of having nuclear weapons indefinitely without using them.

 

You don't need the use of nuclear weapons to become the norm.  You just need them to knock us out of the current geopolitical/technological structure where war is fought a certain way using certain technology.  Once that happens, you go back to the way things were.  It is a blip with a cause.  But I suspect eventually that cause will also kill a bunch of people disrupting the current geopolitical/technological status of things and return us to the longer historical norm.

Edited January 1 by PeterMP

[Renegade7]

@PeterMP

 

In documentaries I've seen and research I've done to keep my mind sane, takes as few as 11 nuclear weapons to cause a global nuclear winter.

 

A lot will say at least 100, some will say it's the global fires that really do it.

 

The point is what your describing isn't a blip ,it's the potential end of human civilizations.  The adage of not knowing what WW3 will be fought with but assurance that WW4 will be fought with sticks and stones is playing in the background somewhere.

 

We cross that Rubicon we got bigger problems, so I don't see an increase in nuclear weapon usage as inevitable. Folks know the stakes at this point.

 

Edit: this isn't to discount the that was also raised in Oppenhiemer movie last year that nuclear powers would avoid direct conflict between nuclear powers who then fight each other vicariously through smaller countries and seemingly smaller conflicts simultaneously (what Cold War was in a nutshell).

Edited January 1 by Renegade7

[NickyJ]

I guess I'm a bit of an outlier, but I don't see the defense of Ukraine as strategically vital. I think that it's morally right, so I support it, but at this point, I view it as charity.

 

If Ukraine fails, I don't think it reflects on NATO's strength. Ukraine isn't a part of NATO, so it has done nothing but supply weapons, money, and intelligence to Ukraine, and only piecemeal at that. No actual fighting strength. I don't foresee Russia attacking a NATO country because it will be nearly a full continent drawn directly into the war.

 

My only concern about NATO is how easily it can be derailed by countries like Turkey, who are valuable to have on our side, but often act counter to what NATO stands for. The biggest example now is preventing Sweden from joining because of Sweden's refusal to restrict speech that Turkey disapproves of. It's a thorn in NATO's side now, but what will it be if actual conflict were to force NATO into action?

Edited January 1 by NickyJ

[PeterMP]

2 hours ago, Renegade7 said:

@PeterMP

 

In documentaries I've seen and research I've done to keep my mind sane, takes as few as 11 nuclear weapons to cause a global nuclear winter.

 

A lot will say at least 100, some will say it's the global fires that really do it.

 

The point is what your describing isn't a blip ,it's the potential end of human civilizations.  The adage of not knowing what WW3 will be fought with but assurance that WW4 will be fought with sticks and stones is playing in the background somewhere.

 

We cross that Rubicon we got bigger problems, so I don't see an increase in nuclear weapon usage as inevitable. Folks know the stakes at this point.

 

Edit: this isn't to discount the that was also raised in Oppenhiemer movie last year that nuclear powers would avoid direct conflict between nuclear powers who then fight each other vicariously through smaller countries and seemingly smaller conflicts simultaneously (what Cold War was in a nutshell).

 

The research on nuclear winters seems to be all over the place.  In general, it seems to me people are suggesting it will be less bad then initially predicted which suggest to me that the earlier studies were wrong and over hyped.

 

It seems to me that access to WMD technology (including nuclear) is expanding.  Given that, it to me only seems a matter of time until somebody that wants to use it gets their hands on it.  Especially as I'm not sure that as some of the current nuclear powers decline they are going to be careful to keep the technology safe.  France, Russia, China are all clearly in decline, and I expect it to continue.  As they decline, I suspect they won't prioritize keeping their WMD technology/infrastructure safe and I suspect corruption will increase.

 

Due to our global integrated specialized economy, I think it will take a relatively small percentage of unexpected deaths to disrupt the system.  If modern farmers can't get what the equipment, seeds, and other inputs that they are used to using to farm because the global communication and transportation system has been interrupted in anyway, then they have problems pretty quickly.  And because they lack the experience/expertise a modern farmer is going to be much less efficient using 1960s technology than your average farmer in the 1960s using 1960s technology.

 

Realistically, the same is true for essentially any industry.  The modern biopharm industry is a global industry depending on activity all of the world.  If any major part of it goes down, then the whole thing will go down pretty quickly.  And the average biotech worker using 1960s technology will be much less productive than the equivalent worker in the 1960s because they don't know how to use the technology.

 

Even if you cleanly take India and Pakistan out of the global economy, that has huge trickle down effects because of the expertise you'll lose and the specialization required for the modern world to work.

 

If you consider a Thanos snap scenario, I suspect losing even 10% of the population randomly and unexpectedly causes large down stream affects.  I suspect that there isn't enough over capacity of skilled workers in the nuclear industry to safely maintain our existing nuclear infrastructure if you lose 10% of the workers.  And I think that's probably true for most industries.  I suspect heavier losses in one area (geographical or specialty) will have a similar impact.

[PeterMP]

5 hours ago, NickyJ said:

I guess I'm a bit of an outlier, but I don't see the defense of Ukraine as strategically vital. I think that it's morally right, so I support it, but at this point, I view it as charity.

 

If Ukraine fails, I don't think it reflects on NATO's strength. Ukraine isn't a part of NATO, so it has done nothing but supply weapons, money, and intelligence to Ukraine, and only piecemeal at that. No actual fighting strength. I don't foresee Russia attacking a NATO country because it will be nearly a full continent drawn directly into the war.

 

My only concern about NATO is how easily it can be derailed by countries like Turkey, who are valuable to have on our side, but often act counter to what NATO stands for. The biggest example now is preventing Sweden from joining because of Sweden's refusal to restrict speech that Turkey disapproves of. It's a thorn in NATO's side now, but what will it be if actual conflict were to force NATO into action?

 

I wouldn't say it is vital.  But I also wouldn't say it has no reflection on NATO's strength.  If Ukraine falls, that doesn't mean NATO is next, but it is concerning.  I think having an independent Ukraine that leans to the west and towards democracy benefits us, NATO, the west, and democracies in general.

 

I think a big issue for democracies always is do they have the political will to do what is in their interest long term.  I think if Russia wins in the Ukraine because we failed to support them then in this case we've failed to act in our long term interest.  It also seems contrary to the initial response where initially Ukraine had large scale popular support in the west.  It then raises the question of has Russia discovered a method to undermine our ability/will to act in our long term interest and turn the tide of public opinion to more in their favor.  Has the nature of the modern/corporate press, social media, and divisions changed our ability to act in a cohesive and (I'd argue) coherent manner?  Using social media, the nature of our press, and political system can we be influenced away from a response that was generally initially widely supported and accepted and I'd argue in our long term interest?

 

If Russia wins, somebody is going to do something else based on the idea that our failure to continue to support Ukraine is an indication that there is a new template to undermine the actions of (western) democracies (whether it is Russia acting somewhere else, China, Iran in the ME, or whatever). 

 

At some level, if we aren't going to continue to materially support Ukraine, we would have been better off essentially doing nothing from the start.  You always have to be concerned with falling for a sunk cost fallacy, but we have sunk cost and reputation into Ukraine.

 

There has to be something in between in being vital and failure meaning that Russia is going to attack a NATO state next and not mattering at all directly to us.  Reality is more nuanced than that.

Edited January 2 by PeterMP

[Fergasun]

@Bang

I don't see how China wants to go to war with their number one trade partner.  In fact, of their Top 5 trade partners, it is US, Japan, Korea plus Hong Kong/Taiwan and then Vietnam.

 

I don't have any insight into CCP domestic policy.  But I was shocked to learn that even into 1987, Korea was a dictatorship.  So, I don't know how domestic Chinese politics are... but I think the first priority of the CCP is to ensure that they can remain a dictatorship.  

 

And then there's something like the Peng Shuai case.  Let's just disappear one of our premier tennis players.  

 

[I wrote this response yesterday but never hit "Submit Reply"]

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Bang]

They want Taiwan.

Simple as that.

They will go for that and fight anyone who tries to stop them. They believe Taiwan is part of China, and treats it as a wayward child. Once China, always China, and the fact Taiwan provides the microchips that make all of our computers work to the world doesn't hurt. They control more than 60% of the global market, and that is a lot of power.

This is why we are scrambling to build microchip facilities of our own in Ohio and Arizona.

As far as our trade partner goes, if we cut trade ties with them it's we who would suffer. Either we buy from them or we rebuild industry and manufacturing here, and pay the costs for goods that manufacturing here would cost. I very much doubt that will go well, we're used to inexpensive goods, and we're comfortable turning a blind eye as to why they can be so cheap. 

 

China used to b content with just China. But not so much anymore, and for global dominance, we stand in their way.

 

~Bang

[Cooked Crack]

 

[Destino]

 

[Fergasun]

* find out has entered the chat.

[Destino]

This is Bernie Sanders former national press secretary creating an exciting new definition for “nonviolent”.

[CousinsCowgirl84]

Some ****es be crazy like that 🤷‍♀️

[Larry]

13 hours ago, Destino said:

This is Bernie Sanders former national press secretary creating exciting new definition for “nonviolent”.

 

Hey, I think the "Jan 6 Lost Cause" movement might have beat her to it.  

 

(No, that doesn't make it OK.)  

 

[Captain Wiggles]

How is launching anti-ship ballistic missile at vessels in international waters "nonviolent efforts"? 

 

[CousinsCowgirl84]

8 minutes ago, Captain Wiggles said:

How is launching anti-ship ballistic missile at vessels in international waters "nonviolent efforts"? 

 

They missed 🤷‍♀️

[Destino]

39 minutes ago, Larry said:

 

Hey, I think the "Jan 6 Lost Cause" movement might have beat her to it.  

 

(No, that doesn't make it OK.)  

 

You’re right, it’s the same reality bending madness we’ve seen applied to that day. If a violent attempt fails, it was peaceful.

[Bang]

Pretty sure the Argentines used Exocet anti-ship missiles in the Falklands war in the 80s, and it resulted in several large British Navy ships going to the bottom or at least severely damaged. Also, even if they were 'peacefully protesting' by attempting to board, destroy or commandeer commercial vessels, the disruption of world trade is justification to use lethal methods of ending the 'protest'.
 

~Bang

 

[DCSaints_fan]

On 1/2/2024 at 6:55 PM, Bang said:

They want Taiwan.

Simple as that.

They will go for that and fight anyone who tries to stop them. They believe Taiwan is part of China, and treats it as a wayward child. Once China, always China, and the fact Taiwan provides the microchips that make all of our computers work to the world doesn't hurt. They control more than 60% of the global market, and that is a lot of power.

This is why we are scrambling to build microchip facilities of our own in Ohio and Arizona.

As far as our trade partner goes, if we cut trade ties with them it's we who would suffer. Either we buy from them or we rebuild industry and manufacturing here, and pay the costs for goods that manufacturing here would cost. I very much doubt that will go well, we're used to inexpensive goods, and we're comfortable turning a blind eye as to why they can be so cheap. 

 

China used to b content with just China. But not so much anymore, and for global dominance, we stand in their way.

 

~Bang

 

They've been pretty consistent in what their goals are for a long time - unification of Taiwan and recognition of the South  and East China Sea as "theirs". 

 

The extent to which they've made noise about these issues have varied over the years. For a while they didn't do much at all, because they wanted closer ties with the US and the tech transfer to develop their own economy.  The recent noise has I believe to do with the forthcoming elections in Taiwan, in an effort to intimidate voters to get them to vote for the KMT, which at least recognizes "One China".  My understanding is they've already started to dial it down a notch.

 

Its unclear if they want to go beyond that - the "second island chain", and become the hegemon at least in East Asia, and push the US out at least militarily.

[China]

Houthis Mistakenly Target Tanker Carrying Russian Oil - Ambrey Report

 

Houthi militants mistakenly targeted a tanker carrying Russian oil in a missile attack on Friday off Yemen, British maritime security firm Ambrey said.

 

The United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) organisation said it had received a report of a missile being fired 90 nautical miles southeast of Yemen's port city of Aden.

 

"The master reported a missile landing in the water 400-500 metres away, and being followed by three small craft," the UKMTO advisory note said, adding that there were no injuries or damage.

 

Ambrey said: "This was the second tanker mistakenly targeted by the Houthis whilst carrying Russian oil."

 

Click on the link for the full article

[Larry]

Maybe we let those missiles hit?  

[Fergasun]

I don't get it.  Attacking global shipping traffic (randomly) is like "Free Palestine" protestors randomly attacking any random taxpayers house because their tax money supports Israel.  

 

I actually listened to that Joy Joy Brie's podcast on this (for a bit) and felt smarter.  But I don't get what these people poking US with sticks are going to accomplish.  Yes, they might think Israel'a treat Palestinians like they are a bag of dicks.  But attacking others just means your the bag of dicks.  

 

We better retaliate 10 to 1 for every missile they launch 

[Bang]

"Oops that is Russian oil" sort of shoots down the entire pretense of disrupting trade in support of the people of Gaza.
But we will continue to give them their propaganda excuses.

Thankfully, smart people are hitting back.

 

~Bang