The US is quietly arming Taiwan to the teeth
The US is quietly arming Taiwan to the teeth
America is using its own money to send weapons to a place it officially doesn't recognise.
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So if Iran goes full monty and China invades Taiwan while Russia is grinding down its population on the Ukrainian front, we'd have WW3 on our hands I reckon.
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Great what a time to be alive! /s
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nah because no country is allowed to be a part of the russo-ukranian war as ukraine is neutral.
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Is there any active or potential war the US isn't paying for?
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The US is paying because it needs Taiwan. If Taiwan didn't have value for the US, it would have been overrun by China a decade ago
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The bulk of the US economy is based on taking money from working people and then consolidating it to billionaires that run defense corporations. So "paying for" it's basically just an engine for making rich Americans more rich.
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If China invades Taiwan our entire economy will come to a screeching halt. Hence why America is interested.
If China wanted to invade, idk, Thailand, we'd just kind of shrug and say "Hey, don't do that."
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Are there any it hasn't?
kind of /s
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Yes. Syria,
Yemen, Libya.Yemen: US funded, Saudi Led Anti-Houthi Rebels in Yemen.
The Saudis fighting with Hezbollah.Wait I think we did sell weapons to the Saudis lol. The conflicts in and around Turkey. Congress has [blocked arms deals to Turkey](blocked arms deals to Turkey), but Biden has tried to make it happen. We are arming Ukraine, but not arming other countries in the former Soviet bloc that would probably enjoy more independence from Russia right now. We're not arming Africa which aims to stop piracy, stop foreign boats from dragnetting their shores, and has some internal conflicts with governments and insurgents. We aren't arming Mexico to stop the drug cartels. (Although US citizens frequently arm the cartels).And don't worry, Europe has arms to replace now thanks to the Ukraine-Russia war. US Plans to Backfill the Donated Arms.
Yeah you can pretty much look up "US sends weapons to X" and get a positive result that we have indeed. We are also actively stopping Syria, Iran, Turkey, and Russia from arming more rebels whenever we can. US siezes Iranian Ammo, Sends to Ukraine.
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Well, all those General Dynamics and Raytheon shareholders deserve maximum return on their investments, according to St. Friedman.
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Good. Even if nobody likes 'murica, their weapons work well enough to deter China from doing something stupid.
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Imagine if the roles were reversed, and it was China arming i.e. Panama. How would you feel then?
(Because the USA has done a lot of "something stupid"s as well).
Edit: Folks, you can analyze the bigger picture without being a tankie. It's unfortunate that so many ex-Redditors would rather block and report any display of critical thought
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Imagine if the roles were reversed, and it was China arming i.e. Panama. How would you feel then
False equivalence, Panama's risk of being suddenly invaded in the current political climate is nearly zero. Taiwan (is #1), on the other hand, has to be ever vigilant. Also, Panama doesn't house the 'rightful' government of the US.
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If you're comparing China/Taiwan circumstances to USA/Panama I'm sorry but I cannot call that a critical thought. The only similarity is proximity.
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That's fine! We should not invade Panama. I don't think the US is currently planning on it, but after the last 20 years I'm pretty sure most citizens would be fucking glad for any excuse for our military to think twice before invading a foreign country.
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The one other one is a democracy, despite being a flawed one. The other, an unabashedly totalitarian state. And before any CCP apologists comments and nevermind what the domestic Chinese think, ask South Korea, Japan and South East Asia what they think of the Chinese Communist Party claiming the entirety of South China Sea and sending armed merchant vessels and the Chinese navy bullying other Asian fishermen in the region. Not to excuse American imperialism, but it's clear which is the better option for many.
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Countries helping arm one another is good. Every country should have the capacity to defend itself. My country got steamrolled during WWII because we had few and outdated wapens
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Gives me Cuban Missile Crisis vibes.
I'm not as happy that the US sells arms, but I'm convinced by the geopolitical climate that arming Ukraine and now I might add arming Taiwan is better for the world than worse. Refilling Israel's Iron Dome is probably a good idea too, though we are yet to see what the US sends and how defensive or offensive those weapons we send are.
There might be better comparisons though in the weird chess games we played in the middle east with Russia. They armed some insurgents, we armed some insurgents, etc. Afghanistan was a disaster for Russia too, though it was worse for us.
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Quietly? They have been doing so for at least 40 years. Everybody knew and knows.
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It's in the BBC ffs how quiet can it be?
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Well Taiwan can either go with the US or China. They've been wanting to stay independent from China for a while now so I don't think it's much of a surprise.
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BBC found out about it. It aint that quiet.
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Give them a bunch of nukes and biological weapons and after they arrive send a message to the PRC
"Just a fyi, we sent them a 100 but they only received 80. Be a real shame if Taiwanese operators had planted them in randomly selected cities on the mainland."
It will be hilarious way to end the world.
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Aaaand... Música, maestro!
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There's a theory that Taiwan could achieve mass destruction with just regular cruise missiles, no need for actual WMDs.
The destruction of Three Gorges Dam would kill millions of people from the resulting flood. Be a tough target and air defense would be a nightmare, but it is still within Taiwan's cruise missile range.
There's been no acknowledgement ever of this plan, but it's pretty obvious.
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I mean, yeah, why wouldn't they?
Should we just let China carpetbomb Taiwan instead?
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And act just like Israel?
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The US is wrong to support Israel's genocide of Palestinians.
The US is right to help Taiwan defend itself against assimilation by the CCP.
Genocide and imperialism are bad. Supporting the victims of them to defend themselves is good. Not so hard to understand, is it?
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If China had the chance, they would love to act like Israel is acting towards palestinians, yes.
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...and Israel, for that matter.
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At least Taiwan isn't an apartheid state.
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This is the best summary I could come up with:
When US President Joe Biden recently signed off on a $80m grant to Taiwan for the purchase of American military equipment, China said it "deplores and opposes" what Washington had done.
It is sending a clear message of strategic clarity to Beijing that we stand together," says Wang Ting-yu, a ruling party legislator with close ties to Taiwan's President Tsai Ing-wen, and to US Congressional chiefs.
He says the $80m is the tip of what could be a very large iceberg, and notes that in July President Biden used discretionary powers to approve the sale of military services and equipment worth $500m to Taiwan.
But Dr Lai says it's possible to make educated guesses: Javelin and Stinger anti-aircraft missiles - highly effective weapons that forces can learn to use quickly.
A war-gaming exercise conducted by a think-tank last year found that in a conflict with China, Taiwan's navy and air force would be wiped out in the first 96 hours of battle.
The focus will switch to ground troops, infantry and artillery - repelling an invasion on the beaches and, if necessary, fighting the People's Liberation Army (PLA) in the towns and cities, and from bases deep in the island's jungle-covered mountains.
The original article contains 1,687 words, the summary contains 202 words. Saved 88%. I'm a bot and I'm open source!
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Let’s hope this is enough of a deterrent…
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The best weapons are ones that make it so you never need to use them.
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In a world of guided missiles everywhere... invasions probably won't go so well.