China

[broncoty]

oh my god... and do you think mainstream media is more credible? You must be a fan of Fox News.

I just picked the top few articles that conveyed my points well and linked to them. You want a "plausible" source? Here , surely written by Joe Harvard himself, PH.D.

Come on man, wake up to current events. Turn on the news, be it Fox, - you'll still hear about it. And yes I am currently living in the US, although I'm not a citizen quite yet even though I'm legible to attain citizenship, which I will be doing very soon.-omega

Decided to start a new topic and above is the last quote

I believe yes in the short term china will rival us in economics due to just sheer numbers and its industrial capabilities. I also believe china is not even close to rivaling the U.S militarily.

The thing with china is that it will have to change in order to keep up, communism is proven to fail, and with the change will have to come freedoms and as soon as that happens its all downhill for them. At that point it will be weakened, whether it is beyond recovery is debatable.

One would have to be an idiot to not acknowledge china as a superpower, but some of your thoughts such as

"better start learning chinese"

are ridiculous, democracy and capitalism has time and time again outlasted communism

and no I do not use fox I use Google scholar among other scholarly publications for my information.

such as the Journal of International Business Studies,

The Quarterly Journal of Economics,

or

Science Direct

which are publications written by actual experts, directly from the universities, and who obviously know what they are talking about

and has very little bias due to the fact they are frequently written as though a science or technical research paper would be written, they give real data with real trends and very carefully and supported opinions if they are included at all.

[Omega]

I also believe china is not even close to rivaling the U.S militarily.

At the moment, probably not, unless you want to take into account China's overwhelming military personnel count (but lets not for the sake of this argument).

Yes China's military is not as advanced as America's, but all it really takes is a stockpile of nukes. You could've made the same argument during the Cold War against Russia, yet a war was deterred due to the fact that either country could blow the world to hell. All it takes is one delusional dictator ... man, it amazes me how it hasn't happened yet.

And as I've said in the other thread - strong economy -> more military spending -> new/improved technology. China's got so much revenue that it doesn't even know whether to spend it or stare at it and shit its pants in disbelief. What we do know is that China is investing more and more of these profits into their war machine. Give it a few years. That and the fact that China will play an even more significant role in the near future (even without conflict) is why I think it's not a bad idea to learn the already most widely spoken language in the world.

[Slavic]

The only pervading problem I can see China facing is its environment. Because of China's literal overnight industrialization, the environment has gone to shit. There are large areas that have a brown haze due to the pollution, or ashes falling from the sky from coal processing and other industries. Not to mention I don't think that their dammed up rivers would be that refreshing to drink from.

Although their environment is crappy I've read that lately China has been organizing high level comities and projects to reverse the environmental effects. Even measures to wean themselves away from coal and oil as sources of energy.

[Havok]

Based on what I've seen of footage in Afghanistan and Iraq, and American training videos, the American Army is mollycoddled. The Chinese, North Korean and Russian Armies are treated like proper troops. For instance, when the Chinese aided the North Koreans against UN troops in South Korea, a lot of them weren't even given shoes -- and they're used to that, because it's the most effective way of adapting to foreign environments and beating the enemy.

Yes, perhaps America may have better equipment, etc. than other countries, but it's the men behind the equipment that matter, and generally, that's why American armed forces become less effective. There was a very big inquest recently of a squad of American A10 'Warthogs' that bombed a British convoy in Iraq; (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/6333853.stm) and as far as I'm concerned, anyone who uses the word 'dude' in common sentences shouldn't be trusted behind the controls of a multi-million dollar aeroplane.

And yes, America has a large nuclear arsenal, but that's nothing to be proud of, because the use of nuclear weapons is completely banned by the Geneva Convention, and seen as China and America are both Permanent Security Members of the UN, there would be no way in which either side would be permitted to use them or even go to war in the first place. Just look at McArthur, he suggested to send nuclear missiles at China following the Korean war, and he was sacked for it.

And, besides, superior air-force? How would you plan on travelling that far without it taking a few weeks? The British or the French sure as hell wouldn't let you refuel in their countries. You would be as stuck as we were during the Falkland Islands war.

P.S. I know I went on a rant, but this is my last post on the matter.

[Pancake Batter]

And, besides, superior air-force? How would you plan on travelling that far without it taking a few weeks? The British or the French sure as hell wouldn't let you refuel in their countries. You would be as stuck as we were during the Falkland Islands war.

P.S. I know I went on a rant, but this is my last post on the matter.

The U.S. have bases stationed at places like Japan and South Korea, plus we have carriers so planes can refuel there, there's also that plane that is used to refuel in mid-flight. You can't really expect our airforce to fly around the world just to do a bombing run without refueling now can you?

[Zero001]

Pancake is right. America doesn't need another country for fuel. I don't know where Havok gets off even mentioning that part. It's almost as he completely forgets the U.S has over 700 bases around the world and the largest Carrier Fleet in the world. With KC-135's flying around the bombers never even have to land.

Havok is right about WMD's and the Geneva Convention. I don't even think they should be mentioned as as option for any country, even as a scare tactic. Everyone knows there's enough nukes to destroy the earth. Using them will accomplish nothing but mutual destruction. (Although I do think he who strikes first would win. There isn't a single anti-missile defense that's capable of stopping those things, so Havok was wrong when he brought the defense up the last time around.)

I don't know where you guys are coming off mentioning military might and war, when this is about the economy. If you actually bothered to read the CNN article Omega brought up, it lays the down the plan to how China might fail. In the end the world needs the U.S. At least for now. If we just decided to pack up and leave everything and isolate, the entire modern world would feel the backlash.

[Slavic]

A war with China can't relay entirely on its air force. Yes, the US mainly used its air force for the first few months of Iraq alone and was able to destroy most of the Republican Guard's vehicles, but Iraq does not have an adequate anti-air program. I'm sure that China has multiple anti-aircraft gun and missile bases set up through out the country. The US can't just go in and bomb the place like it did Iraq. They would need to land multiple amphibious assaults which could be costly concerning China's large land army.

This is another reason that is preventing us from going to war with Iran, besides the fact that it is completely stupid. Iran has a series of SAM sites through out the Iranian coast line.

[Zero001]

End the war talk. It's all speculation and in the end if it does happen would just lead to the death of someones mother, father, brother, sister, ect... to accomplish what? The rules are simple. War is only used in self-defense or with the U.N Security Council Approval.