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Subject: China; is it a headache for the U.S.?
MasterCaution    7/10/2004 5:37:42 PM
China has a 'limited' Nuclear capability, and has the potential to make further advances in Nuclear weapons technology. Should the U.S. and other allies start giving more priority to Chinese targets, rather than the typical Russian 'Bad Guys'?
 
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displacedjim    RE:China; is it a headache for the U.S.?   7/10/2004 8:49:34 PM
Have no fear, MasterCaution, we've shifted our emphasis away from FSU (the Former Soviet Union) and onto ROW (the Rest of the World) for quite a few years now. China is right up at or near the top of the list of countries to watch out for, although since 9/11 there's been a bit of shuffling of some of the guys near the top. Displacedjim
 
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cateyes    RE:China; is it a headache for the U.S.?   7/10/2004 9:47:50 PM
The problem is due to that the US doesn't know how to handle the issue, not because of Chinese nuclear weapons, whick are much less than US owns. For US, coping with Russia is not a big challenge, even Russia has a lot more nukes, just make more yorself. But Chinese strategists totally change the landscape of competition, they have totally different way of strategic thinking. That is the root.
 
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Nanheyangrouchuan    RE:China; is it a headache for the U.S.?   7/13/2004 2:16:28 PM
The US has not spent much time studying Chinese strategic thought and the military makes no effort to promote open exchanges of dialogue between senior officers and civilian officials.
 
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elcid    Nan is (surprisingly) incorrect   7/17/2004 5:25:09 AM
To begin at the end, the US does indeed promote contacts between officers of PRC and USA. More specifically, the last commander of SAC, who still lives in Omaha, has the officers of Strike Command (successor to SAC) and China's counterparts (they call them Second Artillery) over for dinner and discussion. I have this directly from Gen. Butler, and I can scan and send you Nan - if you like. As to not studying Chinese strategic thought, it has always recieved some attention. Interestingly, though, it does not get a lot of alarmist publicity, for the reason that Chinese strategic thinking is highly regarded for its reasonable goals reasonably and economically executed. Almost in complete contrast to all other policy areas, even rabid anti-Maoists like myself think the decision to build nuclear weapons (made in 1955) was virtually forced on China. Nixon and Eisenhower maintained to the end that they had indeed explicitly threatened China with nuclear weapons, in 1952 (in re Korea) and in 1954 (in re ROC). You can get a good summary of this in McGeorge Bundy's Danger and Survival. You can get the Chinese view from China Builds the Bomb. A Stanford academic product, it is based on three declassified and official PRC histories, integrated with international materials. China did not enjoy nuclear blackmail (which is what we would call it if anyone did it to us) and sought nuclear capability ONLY to deter such threats in future. China never contemplated offensive use of nuclear weapons, and invented the formal concept of "no first use" and "no use against a non nuclear power." Because of these modest goals, China resolved to ride out even a nuclear attack, then reply. China also does not trust just anyone with these weapons, so no one has both warheads and delivery systems. This is one reason the one SSBN has never made a deterrent patrol, and no missiles were built to arm her. China can claim to have a "triad" for prestige purposes, but there is no risk of a renegade commander at sea! Similarly, there is no risk on land either. The missile and bomber units do not have any warheads. The weapons arrive AFTER some other nation used nuclear weapons on China, and the weapons come with the orders to use them. A completely different organization controls the weapons and the delivery sytems - similar to the system first set up in the USA by President Truman (when the AEC had custody of the bombs and USAAF had custody of the few B-29's fitted to deliver them). There are signs of theoretical change in Chinese nuclear thinking, from "minimum deterrence" to "limited deterrence." There is no evidence the expense of converting has been authorized. Minimum deterrence is the cheapest option, and requires few systems. Limited deterrence would require up to an order of magnitude more resources. While China did consider using EMP from nuclear weapons, for example, in the end it elected to develope a non nuclear EMP weapon. And for whatever reason, possibly technical, it appears China has not attempted to build deep penetration bunker busters.
 
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vok    RE:China; is it a headache for the U.S.?   12/22/2004 2:06:44 PM
chicom doesn’t even need the nuke to threat u.s. unlike rus, chicom is the second biggest holder of u.s. treasury bonds. if china decides to dump those assets. jap sure will follow. do you know who is fueling the current housing boom? yep, the chicom is the reason for those historic low mortage rate. you really think chinks and japs are that stupid that they keep making products for below the market price and dump them in the u.s. market, then help americans to make up deficit by buying up a huge amount of u.s. debt so they can consume even more? believe what i said today, there will be a day of reckoning, when u.s. lost her last drop of industrial base. the table will turn. u.s. is like a coke crackhead, addicted to consumption but lost the ability of creating wealth.
 
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french stratege    vok   12/22/2004 4:22:27 PM
good post but US (or a part ) is aware of that.
 
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rikopotomous    RE: everyone   12/22/2004 9:38:01 PM
rofl. I read the article (of course) then the responses by displaced jim, cateyes, and Nanheyangrouchuan and was going to write what elcide said. were running a $120 billion per year trade defeceit with China. thats friggin absurd. no such thing as free trade unless its fair. we cant operate having 4 times more per year coming in than there is going out. Theres gotta be some kind of gr8 equalizer here.
 
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vok    offtopic   12/23/2004 9:49:08 AM
u.s. is running with a record deficit and yet we have a consumer spending boom. this is absurd. because we simply can't afford those importation, not without the help of foreign investors. u.s. government behaves exactly in the same way as an average u.s. consumer. it doesn't have a clue how to save and lives on borrowing. in the process, it sinks deeper and deeper into a debt black hole. when we say capital investment in the states, you don't see the money go to a new factory, or a new school. the money flow usually end up on the wall street, and what those people are buying? u.s. bond of course. it's endless cycle. foreign banks, who are the majority owners of u.s. assets, then subsidies their industries with american dollars, making those companies even more competitive. now they can invest in making better products and sells them right back to the states. while companies in the u.s. see their market share getting ever smaller. in desperation under wall street pressure (you have to answer to the shareholders), down sizing, lay off, and offshore sourcing seem inevitable. more u.s. workers lost their good paid jobs. whole sector of industries are disappearing. on the other end of the horizon, new players are rising, companies like wal-mart or dell computer, who do not make any of their products, reduce to nothing but marketing tool/sale channel for their oversea clients. welcome to the future. i agree that chicom is a threat, but not in nuke term. i am talking about we becoming a nation of discount stores and burger flippers. a big bonus: IBM sold its PC hardware business to a chinese firm. because it decided that making software (made in india of course) and IT service is it’s future. nobody cares. we don't need to friggin engineers or scientists. they are nerds anyway. we don't need manufacturing. service economy is the future, man. all we need is a ass-kicking military and more lawyers.
 
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