Taiwan tells China to piss off...

[Alinestra Covelia]

I've talked to Indonesians and Thai individuals who are of Chinese descent, and they do not consider themselves Chinese... although they will only marry other people of Chinese descent or Chinese people.

HMB, my evil exhousemate, is dating an Indonesian girl who is not actually Chinese at all, but who just happens to look Chinese. That evidently is enough of a factor to cause her to look only to East Asian boys for boyfriend material. (She did date a westerner once but that lasted less than a week - something about how they weren't circumcised...)

Then again, you've got people like myself who've lived overseas extensively (11 years in UK, 7 years in USA) who do consider themselves Chinese.

Probably because we're already professional foreigners wherever we go dammit

[Alinestra Covelia]

Originally posted by DaShi
Ali, I swear that I've seen a Chinese girl who looks just like your avatar at my school here in China. You haven't been taking any trips to Zhejiang recently, have you? Or maybe you do all look alike.

Funny you should mention that.

I did go back to Zhejiang with my dad, but that was in 2002. I met a few relatives there who were living in the ancestral homestead.

However, none look like me because they were all fully Chinese by blood, not half-white like me.

There was one cousin who was really good looking though. I'll try to put her photo online.

[Drake Tungsten]

Historically, it was the strength of the Chinese culture that eventually unified the country after periods of division.

Really? I always thought it was force of arms, sometimes by the Chinese, but oftentimes by "barbarians" like the Mongols and Manchus.

[DaShi]

Originally posted by Alinestra Covelia


Funny you should mention that.

I did go back to Zhejiang with my dad, but that was in 2002. I met a few relatives there who were living in the ancestral homestead.

However, none look like me because they were all fully Chinese by blood, not half-white like me.

There was one cousin who was really good looking though. I'll try to put her photo online.

Phone numbers help too.

[Alinestra Covelia]

That's the problem. I don't know her phone number. She's studying at the Hangzhou Business University, if that's any help.

She won an award for one of her essays on Sino-Japanese trade links, and she decided to spend the money on a photo shoot. This is one picture from that.

Bear in mind that she's 23. (!)

[PLATO]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Taiwan tells China to piss off... again!

Originally posted by Urban Ranger


That means Chen's scheme was foiled. Or rather, not even some members of the DPP want to get their arses fried.

Watered down perhaps, but foiled?? The measure DID pass and it DOES add new provisions that move Taiwan toward possible future independence.

Do they? It looks to me that Chen has played his ace-in-the-hole. Sorta like the Confederates at Gettysburg.

Yes. Chen's deck may also have more than one ace. So far this appears to be the second "ace in the hole" he has played.

In addition, the Confederates were close at Gettysburg...oh so close.

Freedom is such an empty word by now.

Poor UR! The word will never be empty! It may not always be adequately persued by inadequate men, but forever should it be their ideal!! You cannot lose sight of the goal...you must always strive for it...you cannot ever let it go. Once you do, you are destined to never have it.

Renew your faith in freedom, for that is the hope of mankind.

[DinoDoc]

Re: Re: Re: Re: Taiwan tells China to piss off... again!

Originally posted by Urban Ranger
Freedom is such an empty word by now.

You'll have a future in the CCP yet if you keep up with talk like this.

[Alinestra Covelia]

Not really. To really have a future in the CCP, you need to have good inside connections with big business.

Politics don't come into it these days.

[DaShi]

Originally posted by Alinestra Covelia
She won an award for one of her essays on Sino-Japanese trade links, and she decided to spend the money on a photo shoot.

Typical Chinese girl.

Bear in mind that she's 23. (!)

Oh, she's only a year older than my ex, who went insane and fell in love with a cardboard cut out. :sigh:

[Mr. Harley]

Some corrections -

from Nationmaster.com: The Republic of China has a population of 22.2 million. More than 18 million, the "native" Taiwanese are descendants of Chinese who migrated from Fujian and Guangdong Provinces on the mainland, primarily in the 18th and 19th centuries. The "Mainlanders", who arrived on Taiwan after 1945, came from all parts of Mainland China. About 370,000 Taiwanese aborigines inhabit the mountainous central and eastern parts of the island and are believed to be of Malayo-Polynesian origin.

Taiwan has it's own indigenous Chinese who emigrated two plus centuries ago. They consider themselves their own culture, albeit related to China. Chiang Kai-Shek brought the remnents of his dictatorship there and established a nice little authoritarian government. Chen is Taiwanese, and if I remember correctly campaigned in part over just this issue. Taiwan has now become a democracy, with the majority more-or-less indigenous Taiwanese population now having their own government. (the real Taiwanes that are largely confined to the mountains, have minimal rights like most displaced minority indigenous peoples).

Militarily, China might be able to take Taiwan, but the resulting victory would devastate it's military. A missle bombardment would do some damage, but as the Nazis found out, ballistic unguided, or modern semi-guided, missles without WMD warheads do no real military damage. Kill a few civilians, but that typically only increases the support for the goverment that is attacked.

Aviation wise, PRC would have some real problems.

http://idun.its.adfa.edu.au/ADSC/Air/Air_paper_Ji.htm

The Taiwanese aircraft include 60 Mirages ( I cannot remember which model), 150 F-16's, 130 IDF (excellent locally grown air defense fighter), plus some F-5E's still in service. Please note this is mostly from memory, and I don't have a current Jane's as I cannot afford the subscription.

PRC has the aircraft to take these out, but it would be hideously expensive at this time. China would lose at least half, probably more than 80% of it's aviation assets. They have enough aircraft to "human wave" the Taiwanese air defenses, i.e. make the airborne aircraft run out of missles and still have enough aircraft to multi-team the Taiwanese aircraft. Hideously expensive, but workable if you are honest about your aviation capability. The last country I saw that was honest about taking massive losses like that was the Soviet Union in WW2. Any "believe our own propoganda" thoughts could actually lead to the PRC losing the air war, feeding in its air force piecemeal.

However, we just had the case of illegal export of aviation electronics by a Chinese ex-pat ex-human rights type in the US, you have Chinese imports of both air frames and electronics from the Soviet Union, etc. Sometime within the next decade there could be a "sweet spot" for the PRC, when they have superior aircraft and the US has not sold it's newer technology to Taiwan. Taiwan will still probably have overall electronic superiority, but it will be much smaller, lethally so for Taiwan if a conflict ensued.

The PRC has the assets to invade Taiwan if it has air superiority. Taiwan has a nasty small anti-shipping missle, jointly produced with Israel using an enlarged warhead. It's designed to kill small ships, which is what almost all the PRC navy consists of. The PRC would take hideous losses. However, with air superiority they can afford to. The Taiwanese navy would have trouble surviving a conflict, as the PRC has been upgrading and expanding it's submarine fleet as well as it's larger small ships, like destroyers and frigates. The PRC has been purchasing eletronics and ASW equipement from Europe, and has the ability to again inflict defeat on the Taiwanese navy. Just like the air war, the resulting losses would be terrible.

Whether the PRC would have the amphibious assets to succeed after taking the requisite aviation and ship losses is problematic, again based on essentially an honest U.S. Grant type strategy, i.e. let's play meat-grinder. Done from the outset, it can be very effective. However, you cannot play half-measures with this type of strategy.

The more important question is whether the leadership that ordered this blood-letting would survive in power. Look at my signature below. 'Nuf said. As long as there are factions in the PRC leadership, and there is enough balance-of-power that the leader(s) ordering this kind of attack could be kicked out during the next party congress, it won't happen. But if any one group gains total ascendency within the party aparatus, then this scenario vastly increases in possibilty.

One other factor that mitigates against this is the claim-jumping of oil reserves by the PRC in the area of the Spratly Islands. The PRC claim is based on another disputed claim, in this case of an island off the coast of Vietnam, which itself is disputed. The claim is very shakey, the forces backing it are not. However, once it lost most of its navy, the other nations involved in the dispute - Malaysia, Philippines, Vietnam, and Brunei (Taiwan is also, but for obvious reasons is discounted given a war with the PRC) - would have the forces to reassert their claims. I have seen reports that this is possibly the largest new offshore field since the North Sea, and again with the PRC's growing hunger for oil, it makes the chance of a military conflict with Taiwan decrease.

In summation, a unified communist party (which means NO internal divisions, which hasn't been the case since Mao) that sees retaining Taiwan as an integral part of the PRC can and will resort to force if it so chooses, and will win. It will also take terrible losses, and could lose oil assets. This doesn't even begin to count the economic disaster that would ensue for the PRC, which other posters have addressed. Could it happen? Yes. Will it happen? Probably not, I agree with most of the posters here. However, that is the problem with totalitarian governments. Once the cadre of people in control gets small enough, they can make decisions that look stupid to the rest of us. I could make a domestic comparison, but that would be trolling.

[mindseye]

Originally posted by Plato
Additionally, it appears that the mainland will not make the necessary concessions to freedom necessary for the reunification to be anything beneficial to Taiwan other than not being attacked.

I don’t see that at all. As Ali noted, the gov't here is in a state of steady transformation, most of it positive. Just look at the case of Hong Kong. While there have been problems since the handover, Hong Kong has not been turned into a police state.

Originally posted by Ned
On communism vs. fascism in China, it would be interesting to see just how much of the economy continued to state owned and planned. Also, do their farmers exist only in communes, etc.

About two years ago the 50% line was crossed, i.e. the private economy contributed more to GDP than SOEs - and the rate of privatization just keeps accelerating and accelerating ... It's endlessly fascinating to watch free market capitalism bloom here in all its manifestations, from mammoth corporations to neighborhood shops. Simply amazing to behold at the speed with which it's progressing!

As for communes, jeez Ned ... have you heard that Chairman Mao has died?

Ali, does China have independent corporations that can make what they choose, sell it for unregulated prices, make as much profit as it can, and distribute dividends to its stockholders?

Yes, in fact there's a stock exchange right here in Shanghai! The amount of gov't interference depends on the industry. For instance, a private publishing house has to walk a fine and constantly changing line that a publicly-traded disposable-diaper manufacturer would never have to deal with. For most corporations, I think official corruption is a far larger problem than any kind of official interference. Most gov't officials want to grow, grow, grow their burgeoning local private sectors - not restrict them!

Questions like this remind me of how dated many westerners' views of China are. Some contemporary indicators of urban life in China (lead by Shanghai):

Gone: rickshaws, Mao suits, sidewalk dentists, communes, little red books, people calling each other "comrade", backyard iron smelts

Happening: private auto ownership, pizza, home broadband internet access, personal satellite dishes (latest ad under my door promised, among other things, the Playboy channel), cool electric scooters, tattoos, gay pin-up magazines at public newsstands , and the latest: just found a bong shop in Shanghai


Where the communes once stood:

[Urban Ranger]

Originally posted by shawnmmcc
A missle bombardment would do some damage, but as the Nazis found out, ballistic unguided, or modern semi-guided, missles without WMD warheads do no real military damage.

What are you talking about? These are missiles, not unguided rockets. The arsenal now also include cruise missiles and long range ASM and anti-radiation missiles.

As I said, that wouldn't be necessary. A missile flies overhead of Taipei will cause a few tens of billions of dollars to evaporate from the market.

[Kuciwalker]

"[The separatist forces] are set to pay a high cost if they think we will not use force against their conspiracy to promote formal independence."

It's a conspiracy to promote independence? Last time I checked, the PRC did not rule Taiwan

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Alinestra Covelia
Not really. To really have a future in the CCP, you need to have good inside connections with big business.

Mea Culpa. I was confused by all of the goose stepping UR was doing.

UR: Your missile idea has been done. Taiwan is still here.

[Ned]

Mindseye, thanks for your post. But, this raises the question, in what way is China still communist at all?