China's Emergence as a Superpower (till 2014)

[Dayuhan]

Nope. I don't buy it. As I have said before, we have never threatened to blockade or deny access to any sea to the Chinese, even when they were shooting at us. That has not happened and will not happen, unless, unless the Chinese were to try something hard on another country in the area. Then we would. So why would they be concerned about maintaining access to the sea in the face of the U.S. Navy unless they wanted to maintain access if they did try something hard. There is no extant threat to them. I am concerned they are thinking there will be in a few years because of what they might be planning to do.

What "will not happen" is not always clear to everyone. What we will not do may be as unclear to them as what they will do is unclear to us. What they know is that as of now we could shut their country down, top to bottom, in very little time and there's very little, if anything, they could do about it. That would reasonably make them nervous. Lots of other factors involved, of course, but we should never discount fear as a driver of aggressive behaviour, and it's worth working out what people are likely to be afraid of.

The reason the Taiwanese would have to capitulate if we cut them loose is apparent with just a quick glance at the map and a thought to the relative size of the PRC and Taiwan economies. Taiwan's independence is entirely dependent on sea power. If you ain't got it, the island is untenable. Without us, there is not sufficient sea power to counter that of the mainland, hence Taiwan would have to surrender. If they resisted, it would be suicide. They could be blockaded unto starvation and that would be it.

By that logic Cuba should have had to capitulate to the US the moment Russia cut them loose.

In any event, since nobody's seriously discussing cutting Taiwan loose and there's no immediate threat, it all seems like asking how many angels can foxtrot on a pinhead.

The likely alternative? You have provided no evidence that what you state is the likely alternative. Can you?

The likely alternative - or one likely alternative, if it sounds better - to a fall of China's current government would be a PLA takeover, with generals calling the shots instead of businessmen. That is not a certainty, of course: the future never is. There's even an outside long-shot chance that pro-democracy forces might prevail. But think about the possible consequences of a military takeover, and compare the strength of the PLA vs the pro-democracy forces... you want to place bets on that? The status quo is not ideal, but it's adequate. Given the potential for adverse unintended consequence, I wouldn't want to go rocking that boat at this point. It'll rock son enough of its own accord; the Chines economy is not nearly as strong as the uninformed make it out to be.