China's Peaceful Rise

[Colin]

Thanks interesting

[Josh]

Can't say I disagree:

'Asked if the Chinese pilots and ship captains were acting on their own or not, he said, “I believe they’ve been directed to be more aggressive and they have followed those orders.”'

https://breakingdefense.com/2023/11/chinese-military-directed-by-beijing-to-be-increasingly-provocative-navys-paparo/

[glenn239]

And, surprising no one, the Russians are now calling on the Chinese to work with Russia on advanced military projects suitable to the defense of both nations,

Putin calls for closer Russia-China cooperation on military satellites and prospective weapons | AP News

 

[Josh]

11 minutes ago, glenn239 said:

And, surprising no one, the Russians are now calling on the Chinese to work with Russia on advanced military projects suitable to the defense of both nations,

Putin calls for closer Russia-China cooperation on military satellites and prospective weapons | AP News

 

He can ask for whatever he wants; that doesn’t alter the fact that the Chinese don’t need him. Unless Russia wants to send marine nuclear engineers to China, I don’t see what they have to offer.

[glenn239]

21 minutes ago, Josh said:

He can ask for whatever he wants; that doesn’t alter the fact that the Chinese don’t need him. Unless Russia wants to send marine nuclear engineers to China, I don’t see what they have to offer.

It would never occur to me in a million years that a player of Putin's caliber would ever make such a statement unless the agreement to do so had already been signed with Beijing.

 

Edited November 9, 2023 by glenn239

[Josh]

13 minutes ago, glenn239 said:

It would never occur to me in a million years that a player of Putin's caliber would ever make such a statement unless the agreement to do so had already been signed with Beijing.

 

Because Putin is known for his honesty?

[Strannik]

Rus help to China with early warning systems is 4yo news.  So they likely to link theirs if not yet.

 

[Strannik]

2 minutes ago, Josh said:

Because Putin is known for his honesty?

And any politician is?  Yet this is your argument? Sad...

[Josh]

Just now, Strannik said:

And any politician is?  Yet this is your argument? Sad...

My argument is that I wouldn't take anything Putin says at face value. If you do, then that is...sad.

[Strannik]

9 minutes ago, Josh said:

My argument is that I wouldn't take anything Putin says at face value. If you do, then that is...sad.

No, but certain cooperation is self evidently beneficial for both states. Chines ate trying to milk the trade relations with West till the last drop, so they won't be forthcoming with details. 

[Strannik]

 

 

[glenn239]

4 hours ago, Josh said:

Because Putin is known for his honesty?

Putin is not one to make an announcement of this nature without the details having already been worked out ahead of time.

 

[Josh]

1 hour ago, glenn239 said:

Putin is not one to make an announcement of this nature without the details having already been worked out ahead of time.

 

And your evidence for this is?

I’ve no doubt there is some minor cooperation, but this just sounds like boilerplate standard cooperation language Allie’s powers throw around all the time rather than some new dynamic. And as I said before, I can’t imagine that the Russians have any more to offer China that they’re willing to give.

[Roman Alymov]

16 hours ago, glenn239 said:

And, surprising no one, the Russians are now calling on the Chinese to work with Russia on advanced military projects suitable to the defense of both nations,

Putin calls for closer Russia-China cooperation on military satellites and prospective weapons | AP News

 

As i have repeatedly said, there are no prospects of real allience between Russia and China as long as Russia is controlled by pro-Western elite (sorry for quoting my old post below - i am trying to save typing)

At tthe same time, there is minor cooperation in non-strategic things - like this China-made ATVs presented to Putin during his today's visit to direction HQ in Roistov-on-Don (where he, i think, was giving hard time to Shoigu and Gerasimov for failure to take Avdeevka before his visit to China - probably, this show of Chineese device now in service with RusArmy was linked to this)

But it is not hightech at all.

[glenn239]

4 hours ago, Roman Alymov said:

As i have repeatedly said, there are no prospects of real allience between Russia and China as long as Russia is controlled by pro-Western elite (sorry for quoting my old post below - i am trying to save typing)

Right, but I reject argument that Russia is controlled by pro-Western elites on account of the fact it makes no sense based on practically all observational evidence so far.  Stelkov's motives are the same as Prigozhin's - he hopes Russia loses the war in Ukraine in order to seize power for himself.  

So no, if you're thinking Russia and China are not going to accelerate technical cooperation on the basis of conspiracy theories, then I suspect you are going to be disappointed.  But, I'm sure as it gathers momentum Strelkov will pull another tin hat theory out of his ass to try and 'explain' why Russian technical projects with China are actually the Western pro-appeasement party playing 4 dimensional chess.

 

 

 

 

 

[Roman Alymov]

16 minutes ago, glenn239 said:

Right, but I reject argument that Russia is controlled by pro-Western elites on account of the fact it makes no sense based on practically all observational evidence so far.  Stelkov's motives are the same as Prigozhin's - he hopes Russia loses the war in Ukraine in order to seize power for himself.  

So no, if you're thinking Russia and China are not going to accelerate technical cooperation on the basis of conspiracy theories, then I suspect you are going to be disappointed.  But, I'm sure as it gathers momentum Strelkov will pull another tin hat theory out of his ass to try and 'explain' why Russian technical projects with China are actually the Western pro-appeasement party playing 4 dimensional chess.

I'm sorry but why you refer to Strelkov here? With all my respect to him, his knowlege of affairs outside Russia is very limited (as far as i know, his only time outside ex-USSR was his service as volunteer in Yugoslavia), and he do not pretend to know the subject. 

    Re "Russia is controlled by pro-Western elites on account of the fact it makes no sense based on practically all observational evidence so far" - actually, looking from inside Russia, perception is different. More over, hopes of Russian leadership of some sort of massive improvement of relations with West not so long before "big war" is not my guess, but knowlege based on facts. For obvious reasons, i am not going to publish this facts, so if my word is not enough - it's ok, let's agree to disagree (after all, our chats here got very little practical meaning).

[glenn239]

2 hours ago, Roman Alymov said:

I'm sorry but why you refer to Strelkov here? With all my respect to him, his knowlege of affairs outside Russia is very limited

You posted his stuff constantly here, so you must want us to form an opinion on him, and I have.  Strelkov wants personal political power and sees a Russian defeat in Ukraine as the means, perhaps the only means, to that end.  In terms of his actual understanding of foreign affairs, I would assume from what I've read of him that he's probably far more knowledgeable than he writes, but I suspect that he wants to tone it down for his audience so that they don't get the 'wrong' idea and back Putin against the foreigners.  

 

Quote

Re "Russia is controlled by pro-Western elites on account of the fact it makes no sense based on practically all observational evidence so far" - actually, looking from inside Russia, perception is different. 

Maybe, but from the West it looks like a tin foil hat theory.  There is no one over here arguing that Putin is a secret stooge of Biden.  The only argument similar to it that I've seen is that some on the Left have argued that Trump is an agent of Putin.  IMO, you should pay careful attention to that.  Not because Trump is an agent of Putin, but because the that conspiracy theory is designed to attack Trump on the basis of a false allegation.  Just like what happens to Putin from what you call "pro-Russians". 

There's an old saying over here  that anyone that points a finger, they will have three fingers pointing back at themselves.  It means to beware of the motives of anyone pointing fingers.

 

 

 

 

 

Edited November 10, 2023 by glenn239

[Roman Alymov]

On 11/10/2023 at 9:01 PM, glenn239 said:

You posted his stuff constantly here, so you must want us to form an opinion on him, and I have.  Strelkov wants personal political power and sees a Russian defeat in Ukraine as the means, perhaps the only means, to that end. 

Of course you are free to form any opinion from my posting, but as for me personally it is wrong. To achieve "a Russian defeat in Ukraine" Strelkov was not in need to leave his more of less comfortable position of retied FSB Col and risk his life as volunteer : entire Russian policy in Ukraine (and other places, including Russian Federation itself) prior to 2014 was allready defeat, and Maidan was just manifestation of this defeat.

On 11/10/2023 at 9:01 PM, glenn239 said:

  In terms of his actual understanding of foreign affairs, I would assume from what I've read of him that he's probably far more knowledgeable than he writes, but I suspect that he wants to tone it down for his audience so that they don't get the 'wrong' idea and back Putin against the foreigners.  

What exactly foreigners audience is to support Putin against? The ones he constantly calls "our respected parthners"? To support "Putin against the foreigners", first step is for Putin himself (not personally, but as "collective Putin") to stop clatching the straw of hopes to negotiate "return to normality" aka conditional surrender, and start addressing the reality, call enemies enemies, war as war etc.

On 11/10/2023 at 9:01 PM, glenn239 said:

Maybe, but from the West it looks like a tin foil hat theory.  There is no one over here arguing that Putin is a secret stooge of Biden.  The only argument similar to it that I've seen is that some on the Left have argued that Trump is an agent of Putin.  IMO, you should pay careful attention to that.  Not because Trump is an agent of Putin, but because the that conspiracy theory is designed to attack Trump on the basis of a false allegation.  Just like what happens to Putin from what you call "pro-Russians". 

There's an old saying over here  that anyone that points a finger, they will have three fingers pointing back at themselves.  It means to beware of the motives of anyone pointing fingers.

I'n sorry but you first invent simplistic theiry of "Putin is a secret stooge of Biden" and then criticize it as "tin foil hat theory". It is just fact that entire Russian elite (not only top officials - but all people down to district level) was formed by throwing out any person of pro-Russian views (not because it was some sort of secret plan - but simply because this sort of people were unconveniet for pro-Western gang to work with, disrupting the process of converting national wealth into London palace or small flat in Burgas depending on the level of officials). Now this officials got children (often educated in Western univercities) also continuing their "family business" (except those who are too stupid for that and only fit to playboy life abroad). It is not dependent on Putin personality, every "next Putin" will find himself on the top of the same pyramid of people who could support him - or throw him downslope, and no alternative pyramid to rely on. Analogy with Trump is now working here - as neither Trump nor his opponents are focused on taking their assets away from Russia and then bailing out (like Kozyrev, Chubais and numerous others). 

Following is translation from my friend Andrey "Murz" Morozov, former political prisoner and now Russian Army Sergant (https://t.me/wehearfromyanina/2269)

"We will start today's wall of text with a very old political joke. He's at least fifteen years old.

One young lady is traveling by train, and Santa Claus, Roke Alva, Batman, the Patriotic Tower of the Kremlin (PTK) and Georgian are sitting in the same compartment with her. And this whole company is having a casual small talk. The train pulls into the tunnel, there is a dark, dark darkness in the compartment, a rumble, it is impossible to talk, and then the young lady feels someone's hand will grab her by the knee! And crawled-crawled up the thigh, to irreversible, so to speak, consequences. The young lady doesn't know what to do anymore, but then the train jumps out of the tunnel, and the hand literally disappears from the hip a second before. Daylight again illuminates the compartment through the window, everyone is sitting in their seats and continuing to chat animatedly. The question is – who groped the young lady in the dark? The correct answer is Georgian. Because all the others are fictional characters.

Of course, WWII, in reality there is no PTK, despite the fact that the second or even the third generation of "interested in politics" has grown up, which transmits oral traditions that the PTK exists. Divov said very correctly and concisely on this topic: “Russia has no foreign policy, it has foreign trade.”

Our two “towers” are the “tower of defeat" or the “tower of the negotiator-on-any-terms (this is called surrender, yes cho)” and the “tower of the honorable dirty agreement”, after which our “unshakable vertical” remains more or less in its former form and no one goes to The Hague.

The key point of both cases is the preservation of “international relations”, in which the children of our elite, together with their descendants, will be able to live in the West in a comfortable super–income created by their parents at the expense of the people of Russia, and the representatives of elite clans themselves will be able to prolong their lives for 20-30 years with the help of the achievements of advanced Western medicine. “We are our own, bourgeois.”*

They look at all our military propaganda there as at the court of some Louis on Italian comedians discharged at the expense of the royal treasury. “Who is the main-clown-in-favor-of-war there now? Kadyrov? And how? Are you bored already? Well, let's be the main-clown-in-favor-of-war Prigozhin.”

The victory, I repeat this purely conditional description from the text of almost a year and a half ago, of “people with dachas in the suburbs” over “people with villas on the Cote d'Azur” in 2021, which led to the beginning of its, was not that someone convinced Putin of the need to destroy Nazi Ukraine as a state, no.

When it became clear that politics in Europe, with the help of the United States, had defeated the economy, and the newly built Nord Stream would not be launched by a political decision except in the format “All the same, you have to support Ukraine, which will try to return Donbass and Crimea by military means,” when it became clear that the EU political elites would do what they were told from overseas, and themselves too - - -…

In general, they did not convince Putin that destroying Nazism was good, right, and long overdue. They were convinced only that the rapid military defeat of Ukrainian Nazism would be... a good trump card in negotiations, which otherwise simply would not be."

*  - quote from Putin, i have allready explained the roots of this quite in another thread

 

Edited November 13, 2023 by Roman Alymov

[Strannik]

A contrarian (wrt western) view on China's aging population 

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3241125/prominent-chinese-economist-justin-lin-paints-rosy-picture-chinas-greying-population

[lucklucky]

Australia accuses Chinese destroyer of using active sonar to hurt frogmen that were cutting fishing nets that stopped an Australian frigate in Japanese ZEE.

Edited November 19, 2023 by lucklucky

[TrustMe]

James Cameron has only been the Secretary of State for a week and is already cozying up to China again 🤫

 

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-67517955

[futon]

Pretty much everyone is trying a warmup things again after the recent APEC sideline meetings in California. 

[Strannik]

A cool graph showing historical GDP comparison between China and India and it's drastic divergence after 1989

 

 

[Strannik]

Look who is a shithead now 🤣

 

[Strannik]

Looks like France is not decoupling anymore - Huawei to build a new mobile phone network equipment factory in France (5G, say hello)

https://www.reuters.com/technology/huawei-start-building-first-european-factory-france-next-year-source-2023-12-11/