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Does anyone think the US would defend Taiwan at this point? I think that ship has sailed under the current administration.
by dageshi 2y ago
Does anyone think the US would defend Taiwan at this point?
I think that ship has sailed under the current administration.
- etiam 2y agoUnfortunately I have to agreed. Protection rackets seem to be pretty much the defining activity when Trump is allowed to run the show, but I doubt appeasement in itself is really going to buy Taiwan anything. What's to stop him from taking the bribes and then just fabricating some of his trademark bullshit about how the Taiwanese "have been very unfair" and Xi's people were actually totally in the right all along.
- Clubber 2y agoAre you willing to get drafted and fight to defend Taiwan and whatever comes as a result of that? Are you willing to die for Taiwan, or have your kids die for Taiwan? Honest question.
- ashoeafoot 2y agoYes, by now, yes.
- bilbo0s 2y agoI suspect there are not many outside your own acquaintances willing to have their children drafted to defend Taiwan. Just being realistic. Americans were committed to these things because leadership committed us to these things and would make it illegal for us to get out of it. Given an actual choice, not many Americans would have willingly gone to, say, Vietnam. Maybe a few brainwashed anti-communists, but the average American thought, "Hey, not my circus, not my monkeys." I suspect even fewer would be willing to go fight for Taiwan. The average American's attitude is, "Call me when they attack Hawaii." Until that point, most genuinely don't care. That's why Trump's current moves in Europe will be applauded by his base. Because people have severely overestimated the desire of the American every-man and -woman to defend foreign nations. You can't give people a choice. If given a choice, they'll always say no.
- ashoeafoot 2y agoYou either fight far away or you fight at home. The choice to fight though is not yours to make. Its the choice of the defectors of law, of Despots and murderers. You can fight them today, while they rob you with a stick or tomorrow, when they have a gun. But fight you must.
- bilbo0s 2y agoYou either fight far away or you fight at home. That's just the sort of macho thinking that has caused so many military endeavors to fail throughout history. Maybe the politics is about soundbites like that one? I don't know? I'm not a politician. But the actual prosecution of a military conflict is about outcomes. Not soundbites. Will there be a good outcome or not? I mean, if it makes you feel any better, you can think of it this way. Our past has taught us that, without question, it is best to fight far away, but only after an enemy has been weakened by others. I know how that sounds to many non-US citizens. But I'm just being honest about how the thinking in America has developed historically.
- mulmen 2y agoIt looks like the war in Ukraine should be beneficial to the United States. We send some surplus equipment and ramp up ammo production (jobs!) while weakening a prominent geopolitical adversary all without spilling American blood. Letting Ukraine fall will embolden Russia who will continue their march across Europe until it is necessary to spill American blood. Similarly we may not have a choice in Taiwan. Japan and The Philippines at least aren’t keen to have an emboldened imperialist China in their backyards. If they intervene US aid at least will be in our best interest. Isolationism is not a guaranteed ideal strategy in all situations. Looking only at boondoggles like Vietnam, Iraq 2, and Afghanistan doesn’t mean all US intervention is harmful to the national interest.
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- mulmen 2y agoYes.
- WinstonSmith84 2y agothat's I suppose the risk one is willing to take when enrolling into the army?.. You're raising though a very good point, the US army is really large and it's not clear anymore what its purpose is anymore (not against Russia anymore, not against China soon/anymore, then what for?)
- yks 2y agoAgainst internal dissent and against the enemy of the day in the Western hemisphere (seems to be the plan).
- mulmen 2y agoDeploying the US army on US soil against US citizens would essentially be the end of the country. Whatever the outcome is would be a fundamentally different place. The military is an effective mechanism for pacifying the masses through employment.
- pseudalopex 2y ago> Deploying the US army on US soil against US citizens would essentially be the end of the country. Whatever the outcome is would be a fundamentally different place. “And so I come full circle on this response and just want to encourage you with some substance that we are in the process of the second American Revolution, which will remain bloodless if the left allows it to be.”[1] [1] https://apnews.com/article/project-2025-trump-american-revolution-6e02a297fb91b55de01ba7e86615bb08 https://apnews.com/article/project-2025-trump-american-revol...
- bilbo0s 2y agoNot trying to be flip or anything, but why can't it just be to defend the US? From anyone who may come. Serious question.
- Clubber 2y ago>why can't it just be to defend the US? It was that way for most of our existence (and empire building). The whole world police thing came after WWII.
- dullcrisp 2y agoWe haven’t had a draft in decades, what makes you bring it up now? Are you implying that only people serving in the military should have a say in foreign policy?
- Clubber 2y agoBecause if we go to war with China, they have a lot more people to throw at us than we have active in the military. Any slightly protracted war will require a draft. I'm sure you filled out your draft card when you turned 18 like I did, even when there was no draft. That's so if and when they needed to reinstate it, it would pick up almost seamlessly where it left off. >Are you implying that only people serving in the military should have a say in foreign policy? No, I'm implying before people rah rah to defend Taiwan, they actually understand what that means; it probably won't mean sending only active duty and reserves after a year or two and that a draft will most likely occur. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_global_manpower_fit_for_military_service https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_global_manpower_fit_fo... Even with a full, aggressive draft, we'll need allies who are also willing to draft their citizens.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- dullcrisp 2y agoI do hope it wouldn’t come to that, but I also don’t think we can afford to immediately capitulate to any state with more manpower out of fear and still consider ourselves to be a world power. If China has us completely militarily outmatched then of course we can’t afford to provoke them, but it’s not my sense that we’re ready to accept that currently.
- Clubber 2y agoI agree. What's the point of a massive military if you can't scare people with it? All I'm saying is we need to be careful what we wish for and understand what we are getting into. If congress thinks the population is itching to go to war, they might just get us into one (again). Like you said, we haven't had a draft in decades. People might think we won't ever have one, and those people would be mistaken.
- gosub100 2y agoWe should have the troops wear Apple uniforms instead of green camo fatigues. Gotta make the ultimate sacrifice for our tech overlords.
- sirbutters 2y agoThe phrasing of your question makes it sound like you clearly do not think Taiwan is worth defending. Perhaps a more interesting question would be - where is the line for you to consider a war is worth fighting for? Is it only when your country is being attacked and you need to defend it? If so, take a guess what WW1 and WW2 would have looked like if everyone had that opinion.
- Clubber 2y agoYou didn't answer the question. It's easy to send other people's kids to war (see Iraq, Afghanistan). It's a different problem when you have your own skin in the game. >If so, take a guess what WW1 and WW2 would have looked like if everyone had that opinion. WWI Would have been merely a local conflict between Austria and Serbia. WWII would have been about the same as it was historically, if it happened at all, see previous answer on WWI. As an aside and ironically, both Wilson and FDR campaigned on not getting us into WWI and WWII.
- senordevnyc 2y agoI’m guessing you haven’t served in the military, and aren’t really familiar with the projections of how a Chinese invasion of Taiwan is likely to unfold. A draft is highly unlikely.
- aurareturn 2y agoA draft is highly unlikely. A draft is highly unlikely because the American people won't want to defend Asians that much.
- senordevnyc 2y agoThat’s true of every conflict we’ve fought in for decades. And yet we still fought in them, without a draft, somehow.
- scarface_74 2y agoWhen you sign up for the military, if you know anything about history, you know that you will probably not be fighting on US soil.
- anon291 2y agoMany people used to sign up for military service since their ancestors fought on American soil for American interests, and were actually raised under the presumption that this is the main purpose of the American army (or protecting American interests abroad, such as protecting American vessels on international waters). As it's become ever-more-apparent to the group most likely to enroll in the military (conservatives) that this is no longer the case, military enlistment has gone way down.
- scarface_74 2y agoNo people sign up for the military mostly because they are poor annd lower middle class and that’s their way out. The last war fought on American soil was in 1815 ignoring the civil war and fights against native Americans. Was Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan or either Iraq war about American interests?
- anon291 2y agoI honestly have concluded that the HN crowd is so far removed from normal America that they cannot understand it. If you think people sign up for the military due to poverty and not pride, you are deluded. The vast majority of recruits into the military do so out of sense of duty and pride in the country. Remove either of those, and it's no shock military enrollment has gone down. America has had much poorer times and has experienced periods of much stronger growth than today, and had not had the same recruitment crisis as it does today. > 1815 ignoring the civil war and fights against native Americans. Why would you ignore those? Also WWII was fought on American soil in the pacific. The various guano atolls, as well as the islands of the Phillipines.
- scarface_74 2y ago
- suraci 2y agoI guess the same question was raised before the Korean War and the Vietnam War and it was also get downvoted I have to say, americans love wars, it's some kind of american spirit wars made american great, wars will make american great again
- tiahura 2y agoBack then, the counter-culture hadn't completely hollowed out the nation's soul.
- ttul 2y agoSomeone seems to have crept your profile, @suraci, and it's not looking good: https://limewire.com/d/77690b9f-1ec3-4e43-a485-76c82bc67ddd#mfSURF78l9TEybnLlmnNZl9hIWw4pUPnJYy5F6t-K-c https://limewire.com/d/77690b9f-1ec3-4e43-a485-76c82bc67ddd#...
- suraci 2y agothat's awesome, but why "it's not looking good"? oh, because it 'strongly suggests' that i'm a 'Chinese State Actor' I'm a chinese living in china, i'm interest topics abt china, how strange instead of reading some 'analysis reports' by sponsored medias and think tanks, now you leant to read ones by LLMs, such a progress Do I look like a devil that tempts innocent Americans/Westerners to be corrupt to you? be vigilant, we're everywhere
- 3ahsGG17 2y agoPDF exploit? Do not click! Creepy indeed, these new McCarthyite tactics.
- dismalaf 2y agoWar to the west in the current year means airstrikes and drones.
- hommelix 2y agoLooking at current Ukraine situation, the drone pilots are a couple of kilometers behind the front. The radio range of the drones is not that big. Yes there are higher tech ones, but there are still people exposed at the front.
- WinstonSmith84 2y agoNope. The US is doing all it can to become irrelevant geopolitically in Europe, that's not to start a war with China with a very uncertain outcome. Economic ties is (was) the really last bastion that would have motivated the US to intervene.
- linotype 2y agoWild how quickly Europe has just given up on the US after all the money we’ve spent on them for decades. We need your help (a majority of sane Americans), not condemnation. If you don’t think Trump won’t do the same to you, you’re sorely mistaken.
- icegreentea2 2y agoWhat type of help are you expecting?
- linotype 2y agoI don’t know, just seems sad that allies are so fairweather.
- pixelpoet 2y agoMaybe they were never really allies to begin with, and have waited for Europe to become complacent enough to put down the hammer in our weakest moment. Only a fool would expect America to come to their aid now, and we'd better hide our oil/minerals lest we get a double dose of dictator-flavoured freedom...
- moltopoco 2y agoI'm not from or in the US, but I was mildly hopeful about the Taiwan situation when Marco Rubio was made part of the administration, as he seems to care more about the Pacific than Trump does. I think it's still a bit too early for defeatism.
- energy123 2y agoThe US right-wing has a large contingent that wants to pivot focus away from Europe and towards Asia. The US abandoning European allies can be perceived through the lens of general isolationism (or even an outright support for fascism) but it can also be perceived as part of this pivot to Asia. Time will tell. Elon Musk has so much of his net worth tied up in China, however, that I would bet more on abandonment. If Elon was out of the picture I'd bet more on support.
- dismalaf 2y agoHow could you? Trump declined to say he'd defend Poland or Lithuania, both NATO members, when asked by a reporter (obviously this was overshadowed by the Zelenskyy thing)...
- throwaway48476 2y agoBecause putin demanded NATO roll back to 1990 borders in exchange for a Ukraine peace deal. So of course he wouldn't defend Poland or Lithuania, they won't be in NATO anymore.
- bitsage 2y agoThe US is pivoting from Europe to the Pacific precisely to better protect the likes of Taiwan. The Trump admin is filled with China hawks. Taiwan doesn’t have trillions of dollars and hundreds of millions of people to fund its own defense, Europe does.