China... how to deal with them?

[Rasulis]

There are not a lot that other countries could do about Hong Kong or Xinjiang. Pretty much limited to diplomatic and economic pressures.

Taiwan is more straight forward. US and other western countries just need to make it clear that they will defend Taiwan. Not a hard decision to make. The world semiconductor market is dependent on Taiwan. It is one of two countries that produced 5-nanometer silicon wafers, and the only one producing 3-nanometer silicon wafers with 2-nanometer wafers coming soon. We can’t let China get their hands on Taiwan.

Somebody mentioned that only 7% of the chips manufactured in China is used domestically. The reason for that is that China can’t make the high end chips that it needs. Currently it can only make 14-nanometer silicon wafers. It has failed several times to build fabs that can make 7-nanometer wafers. Here is a good reading - Semiconductor fraud in China highlights lack of accountability. So for its technological development, China is dependent on the US, South Korea and Taiwan.

US has a lot of leverage when it comes to using high end chips to limit or slow down China’s technological development. All the high end chips manufactured in South Korea and Taiwan use US licensed technology. If the US say “don’t sell to China”, they won’t sell to China. In fact, currently they need a special US license to sell to Huawei.

US also has almost 100% monopoly on the tools needed to manufactured those chips which turned out to be even harder to manufacture than the chips themselves. The world’s most important suppliers of these tools needed to make high end chips - Applied Materials Inc. (Santa Clara, CA), KLA-Tencor Corp. (San Diego, CA) and Lam Research Corp. (Freemont, CA) - all hail from the US. You can’t build a fabrication plant or even perform research without their tools.

[Mihalik]

The government is under is irrelevant. Them being denied independence or even a legal route to do so is what applies to pretty much any country tying to gain independence. The legality of it means jackshit.


But whatever, Hong Kong is Chinese, so its none of our business anyway. But everybody can fuck off with only supporting Hong Kong because it hurts China while going against any independence movements in liberal countries.

Again. Not the case.

Both Scotland and Catalonia have legal paths to independence.

In the case of Scotland it just had a referendum on the issue relatively recently. And in all likelihood it will have another one soon.

In the case of Catalonia, separatists never actually attempted to take the legal route to independence because they just do not have sufficient political capital to go for it, because again, probably only somewhat above a third of the population of Catalonia wants independence while about half the population outright rejects it and refuses to participate in the referendums because they do not follow the legal path to independence.

https://english.elpais.com/elpais/20...28_254701.html

Again. You can't declare independence based on winning 90% of an illegal referendum that 50% of your population outright boycotted.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2017_C...nce_referendum

Catalán independence requires a constitutional reform. This is actually a lot easier in Spain than in many other countries as it only requires a simple majority in Congress, which is relatively easy to get due to how coalitions work in Spain. This could allow a legal referendum to be organized on the issue.

Most left wing and regional and ethnic parties are open to such a constitutional reform.

The main point of contention why the major left wing parties reject pushing for such a reform is because Catalan nationalists actively treat their own non-nationalist citizens with a combination of disdain and legal discrimination especially in areas of language use, education and public community funding and policing.

So, the Catalan nationalists would have to first stop treating half their own population like second class citizens. That would go a long way towards actually allowing for political dialogue to happen within Catalonia which could allow for an actual legal referendum to take place, without half the population worrying that they might be reduced to second class citizens in a new nationalist run Catalan nation state.

Again, firstly you do not understand the issues, second you're drawing moral equivalency between something that is a political/legal problem with peaceful legal solutions and something that's a human rights problem with no peaceful or legal solution.

I'm starting to get a bit of tankie vibe from you.

[Omega10]

1) Live up to our words. Since a lot of the world considers Yemen to be a US assisted genocide, they pretty much tune us out when we complain about... alleged... Chinese atrocities.

2) The word alleged goes there because it wasn't that long ago the US lied about EVERYTHING. The US also reneged on agreements it had made in the past. Regaining the trust of the world will take a while. And people still remember that even before Trump the US word was not that trustworthy as we manufactured quite a few lies to justify our military adventures in the Middle East. Our drone attacks there, our use of depleted uranium, and our assassination of the Iranian diplomat have impeded our attempts to sell ourselves as the good guys.

3) The next wars will not be military but will be economic. Right now China is fighting those wars by working to decouple from the US. Our corporations have stated quite clearly that there is no way they would build in Nashville Tennessee or Birmingham Alabama what can be built in China. There is currently a worldwide chip shortage, and China is working feverishly to build up a decent chip building infrastructure while we try to figure out who to outsource our chip production to. China is working to build its own planes, its own internet, its own operating system, and its own internet. As they gain more and more independence from us, we if anything are becoming MORE dependent on them, not less. Every dollar we spend on our military is a dollar that isn't being spent to fight these economic wars, and gives us a false sense of security that we are actually DOING something.

While we have big political battles over mask mandates in Texas, they have big battles over where to build their new chip production facilities, how to further improve their silk road, and how to deal with decoupling more and more of their economy from the US. The war between the US and China has been going on since Trump declared it 4 years ago, and they are winning it by default. Actually, they are crushing us.

[Draco-Onis]

The US is in bed a lot of monsters Bin Laden and Saddam were among them. We will do what is best for us economically same for Europe the whole human rights thing is really PR.

[jonnysensible]

But whatever, Hong Kong is Chinese, so its none of our business anyway. But everybody can fuck off with only supporting Hong Kong because it hurts China while going against any independence movements in liberal countries.

mr international solidarity strikes again, well done buddy

[Rasulis]

1)
3) The next wars will not be military but will be economic. Right now China is fighting those wars by working to decouple from the US. Our corporations have stated quite clearly that there is no way they would build in Nashville Tennessee or Birmingham Alabama what can be built in China. There is currently a worldwide chip shortage, and China is working feverishly to build up a decent chip building infrastructure while we try to figure out who to outsource our chip production to. China is working to build its own planes, its own internet, its own operating system, and its own internet. As they gain more and more independence from us, we if anything are becoming MORE dependent on them, not less. Every dollar we spend on our military is a dollar that isn't being spent to fight these economic wars, and gives us a false sense of security that we are actually DOING something.

China's semiconductor industry is still 3 - 4 generations behind. The US, Taiwan and South Korea can easily shut it down or slow it down right now. The US has the monopoly on the tools required to make those chips. No US tools, no fabs. As simple as that.

You definitely can build fabrication plants in the US. TSMC is building a 5-nanometer fab in Arizona. With more planned in Texas and Alabama. Around 75% of Intel fabs are in the US (Arizona, California, New Mexico, and Oregon) with more in the pipeline.

[Zan15]

remember back in the 70's and 80's we were this worried about japan too?
Do we really need to "deal with them"?

[Slant]

Create cheap alternatives to everything Chinese in order to reduce reliance on them. That's the best strategy. Trying to coerce China too much will only turn the people against the outside world and consolidate support for the CCP.

That's a good suggestion. Personally I think Africa is criminally underrated. The only disadvantage Africa really has is a hot climate, ie. you'd need a lot of cooling for those factories.

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remember back in the 70's and 80's we were this worried about japan too?
Do we really need to "deal with them"?

Hot take, but not entirely unjustified. Little difference, to actually make your case, you really don't want to gloss over the colossal human right violations and massive oppression going on in China, vs. Japan who very much try to do the right thing and adhere to human rights and have a properly functional democratic system installed, from grassroots level to the very top.

After all, that's what we're discussing, not the actual "who's the biggest top dog in the economic pissing contest" question, although that is interesting enough in itself. But for another time, perhaps.

[Calfredd]

That's a good suggestion. Personally I think Africa is criminally underrated. The only disadvantage Africa really has is a hot climate, ie. you'd need a lot of cooling for those factories.

Actually once again, PrimaryColor does not have a good suggestion. China is already using sweatshop-levels of cheap labor as well as already dipping into Africa itself. To beat them and go lower than that would possibly require going back to unpaid labor.

[Slant]

Actually once again, PrimaryColor does not have a good suggestion. China is already using sweatshop-levels of cheap labor as well as already dipping into Africa itself. To beat them and go lower than that would possibly require going back to unpaid labor.

They have their fingers in some countries but not all of them... if we actually put our money where our mouths are and actually invest into Africa on a big scale, you know... more than the handouts they get now, we could totally turn the entire continent into a production powerhouse. You wouldn't start on the whole continent, you'd start in specific countries. Namibia immediately jumps to mind here. I am actually puzzled why nobody is doing it. Africa must be cheaper than China already, and yet somehow nobody says... hey, just get a big ass a/c unit and that building is just as good as the sweat shop in that random Chinese slave village. With the added bonus that you get ACTUAL leverage on China. Imagine being able to tell China to go fuck themselves. Just the ability of it would change the tone of everything. Dramatically.

And Africa has all the resources right on their continent already. It's a crime really that we're not giving them money to kick China's ass specifically. Have them run their stuff, make money off of us directly and cut the Middleman out.

[Mihalik]

That's a good suggestion. Personally I think Africa is criminally underrated. The only disadvantage Africa really has is a hot climate, ie. you'd need a lot of cooling for those factories.

Africa's climate is in no way an issue for manufacturing. Not in a temperature sense.

Much of the Chinese industrial base is located in the Pearl River Delta, which includes Hong Kong, Macau, Guangdong and Shenzen. The entire region has a humid subtropical climate.

Same applies to other emergent Asian manufacturing areas in Vietnam, Bangladesh, Bengaluru (India's Silicon Valley, which is in a tropical climate region).

There are 2 major considerations when it comes to whether a region is favorable for manufacturing or not and temperatures isn't either of those.

1. Access to infrastructure, power, roads, rail and perhaps most importantly waterways or sea ports.

2. Access to large volumes of water. And I mean large volumes.

Industrial regions tend to develop around waterways, rivers and sea ports for a reason. This has been true throughout history and remains true today.

Africa's arid climate regions have an issue derived from lack of access to water, not an issue related to the prevalent temperatures.

Africa's two greatest problems are a lack of infrastructure and a lack of skilled labor.

China's primary export to Africa is infrastructure.

[kaid]

remember back in the 70's and 80's we were this worried about japan too?
Do we really need to "deal with them"?

Honestly a lot of the stuff china used to make is shifting to places like vietnam and some other countries in the area. I suspect if china keeps pushing they will wind up killing the goose that laid the golden egg and foreign countries start giving up on trying to trade with china and divert elsewhere. Sure china is a big market but is it really worth giving up all your intellectual property to gain access to it? When hong kong was a port that seemed somewhat western to trade in a lot of places were willing to keep doing trade. When hong kong loses the last of its special treatment a lot of that business is going to likely go elsewhere.

If the manufacturing in china gets cut off from the west it will suck for a few years to a decade but the demand will force production to appear in other countries and life will move on.

[Slant]

Honestly a lot of the stuff china used to make is shifting to places like vietnam and some other countries in the area. I suspect if china keeps pushing they will wind up killing the goose that laid the golden egg and foreign countries start giving up on trying to trade with china and divert elsewhere. Sure china is a big market but is it really worth giving up all your intellectual property to gain access to it? When hong kong was a port that seemed somewhat western to trade in a lot of places were willing to keep doing trade. When hong kong loses the last of its special treatment a lot of that business is going to likely go elsewhere.

If the manufacturing in china gets cut off from the west it will suck for a few years to a decade but the demand will force production to appear in other countries and life will move on.

In parts this is already happening. Germany's auto industry (and other big tech) is already pretty pissed off at the IP shenanigans going on in China and are in the process of moving out of China or about to start that process.

[Omega10]

China's semiconductor industry is still 3 - 4 generations behind. The US, Taiwan and South Korea can easily shut it down or slow it down right now. The US has the monopoly on the tools required to make those chips. No US tools, no fabs. As simple as that.

You definitely can build fabrication plants in the US. TSMC is building a 5-nanometer fab in Arizona. With more planned in Texas and Alabama. Around 75% of Intel fabs are in the US (Arizona, California, New Mexico, and Oregon) with more in the pipeline.

The semiconductor gap gives us some breathing room. Currently, this semiconductor gap is quite large. If I remember correctly, the Chinese hope is to be only 1 generation behind in 5 years, which at the worst is "good enough". And of course they plan to build large numbers of all the generations that they can effectively mass produce.

[Zardoz541]

Again. You can't declare independence based on winning 90% of an illegal referendum that 50% of your population outright boycotted.

I mean, that would just be taking a page out of the book the US wrote when we stole Hawai'i...

I agree with your position and principle. It's just that, sadly, precedent exists that opens the door for it being tried anyway.

[PetalExpress]

Just going to point out that Trump's import taxes kept them in check.

But, you know, everybody hates Trump, so nobody's going to admit he was right.

Right?

[Felya]

You have one person that can’t afford shit, because they get shit compensation for their work. You have another person that is treated so much worse, they build suicide nets at work. Now the first person can’t afford anything, that isn’t made by the country with worse off workers. While the second person can’t afford it’s government programs, without the demand for cheap goods from the first.

Which one is the badie?

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Just going to point out that Trump's import taxes kept them in check.

But, you know, everybody hates Trump, so nobody's going to admit he was right.

Right?

We pay the import tax, not China... what do you even mean kept them in check? Did Walmart end their manufacturing there or something?

[Shadowferal]

Just going to point out that Trump's import taxes kept them in check.
But, you know, everybody hates Trump, so nobody's going to admit he was right.
Right?

Another Trump-er that lives across the pond. What is it with you guys...?

[LilSaihah]

Just chill out with this armed insurrection, civil war and secession talk. The only way China can actually break out of its regional containment is if America is taken out of the picture, which I suspect is exactly why the talk is being ginned up by America's foreign adversaries.

If America keeps its shit together for another 20-30 years China will be well into a demographic death spiral and the problem solves itself.

[Omega10]

Just chill out with this armed insurrection, civil war and secession talk. The only way China can actually break out of its regional containment is if America is taken out of the picture, which I suspect is exactly why the talk is being ginned up by America's foreign adversaries.

If America keeps its shit together for another 20-30 years China will be well into a demographic death spiral and the problem solves itself.

Another good reason for America to keep its shit together is... well we live here.