This was hands down my favorite bit from the article:
Some even maintain that every dollar spent on Ukraine is a waste of taxpayer money that could be better used on domestic priorities, such as combating the spread of fentanyl.
These arguments are misguided and dangerous.
How dare they suggest that money would be better spent addressing domestic problems than on a proxy war half way across the world. That’s misguided and dangerous thinking.
I also love how the article takes it for granted that US must prop up puppet regimes in Asia as if that’s somehow in the interest of the people living in US.
No the Taiwanese aren’t. I lived abroad in Taiwan a while back for some time and even then their opinions on China are a lot more nuanced than Americans seem to think. The ones I still talk to are more concerned about the US instigating something that makes it harder for them to live their lives.
Could you elaborate on those nuanced opinions? That sounds like a dig but I’m actually just interested, especially since every time I see someone report on their experiences in Taiwan they represent the opinions they encountered wildly differently from the other accounts.
Not them but I can provide some nuance. Most importantly I think, the peoples of the mainland and Taiwan island aren’t a separate people. Folks in Taiwan island have family and friends in the mainland and vice versa. This was the case in the Korean peninsula as well, so fair question to ask the difference, which is that there was never really a wall of separation between Taiwan island and the rest of China. Taiwan’s main trade partner is the PRC and it’s easy to travel, meaning whatever propoganda might be thrown at these people cannot work as it has in occupied Korea.
On top of these ties, the political relationship here also isn’t as the western MSM portrays it. The CPC generally isn’t sabre-rattling the way the US or even the EU are, there are few threats being thrown around and that’s usually threats towards the west for trying to drive a wegde, not the people on the island. Similarly, despite their declarations to the west, even the DPP aren’t working to completely sever ties. They’ll posture and try to hurt the PRC but they know they can’t survive without the mainland.
The economic co-dependence, cultural co-dependence, and freedom of movement clearly aren’t enough. Clearly.
We won’t abandon the south vietnamese, Kurds, Central Americans, Afghanistan allies or Ukrainians until it’s damn good and convenient for the us.
As long as it takes for the oligarchs to fill their coffers.
Author works for CSIS. Let’s take a look at a list of their major corporate donors:
Contributions of $250,000 and up
Amazon Inc. Aramco Bank of America Corporation Chevron Corporation Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu LLC Exxon Mobil Corporation FedEx General Atomics GSK plc HII Leonardo S.p.A Lockheed Martin Corporation Microsoft Northrop Grumman Pratt Industries, Inc. SAIC (Science Applications International Corporation)While we’re at it, let’s look at government donors:
Contributions $250,000 and up
Government of the United States Government of Japan Government of the Republic of Korea Government of the United Arab Emirates Taiwan:shockedpikachu:
But for sponsors of shitty think tanks.
this shows clearly that US is a death cult with a country attached. Putting children in harms way in factories, butcheries, mines and bars and invest that money to kill people overseas and let people in homeland dies from numerous causes
The US is a mafia state coercing all of its citizens, vassals, and slaves to participate in its criminal enterprise.
“Person dating a known abuser worried they may be abused.”
where leaders told me this month that a major decline in U.S. military assistance to Kyiv would embolden Beijing and weaken deterrence in Asia.
I don’t think that is a common fear shared by the people, WSJ should have reported that Taiwanese leadership are worried. There is not a single mention of what the people of Taiwan want. I have many friends from uni there now, and that is not an express concern of any of them. More than anything they want to be left alone with things the way they are, not dragged into an armed conflict for American interests.
I mean, western media thinking of colonised Asians as a hive mind completely enthralled by usian ubermenschen is not unexpected, it is their standard mode.
If the US just bails on Taiwan, the CPC just pushes them out of power or they get elected out of office. Do even the die hard one china policy people want any harm to befall the Kumintang leaders?
I wouldn’t mind those cockroaches known as the Kuomintang being taken out (that’s an unfair insult to cockroaches), but I almost always prefer for conflicts to be solved peacefully at all possible.
This is 2023. The DPP is far worse than the KMT.
I don’t know much about the DPP, admittedly, so I’ll try to not talk out of my ass. I read that they are even more resolute in their Taiwanese identity than the Kuomintang are, and they seem like stuckup blue MAGAs.
DPP are ‘social democrats’ of taiwan, but they’re insanely hawkish and war-mongering. Even the Kuomintang doesn’t have the same rabid anti-chinese sentiment as the DPP. In fact the KMT has even called for closer collaboration for the mainland government, so these guys have now fallen out of favour from the western imperialists, and the DPP is also edging closer to fascist apologia and ultranationalism. In short they’re nothing but a puppet party who’ll only dance to the US’s tunes. At least the KMT have some common sense to them.
They are the next to be fed into the grinder.
USAmerican capital demands their blood.
Ah, I misunderstood this title. I thought it was “Taiwanese are worried the US will abandon Ukraine (and turn Taiwan into the next warzone)”
Not “They support the US’s every action abroad, like a good little compliant puppet, so you should too.”
I’m pretty sure when the article talks about Taiwanese it’s not referring to the actual public, but rather to the ruling regime US managed to install there.
Is there any evidence the US installed the DPP? I figured it sort of just happened once people were sick of the KMT.
There’s quite a bit of evidence to suggest that actually. It’s also worth noting that the whole Sunflower Movement happened right as KMT were about to negotiate peaceful repatriation with the mainland.
NED has been working closely with DPP and with Tsai Ing-Wen in particular
- https://www.ned.org/taiwan-president-tsai-ing-wen-honors-ned-human-rights-day/
- https://www.ned.org/taiwans-destiny/
Sunflower Movement leader Lin Fei-fan has documented associations with the NED as well
- https://www.taipeitimes.com/News/taiwan/archives/2013/03/02/2003556088
- http://web.archive.org/web/20140411235449/https://thediplomat.com/2014/04/sunflowers-end-occupation-of-taiwans-legislature/
- https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/3744833
Wikileaks also revealed DPP regular Reporting to AIT
- Wikileaks - TSAI ING-WEN COMMENTS ON DPP TURMOIL (2005): https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/05TAIPEI4870_a.html
- Wikileaks - DPP CHAIRPERSON TSAI ING-WEN ON CHALLENGES FACING PARTY AND U.S. ARMS SALES (2008): https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/08TAIPEI892_a.html
- Wikileaks - DIRECTOR’S FAREWELL CALL ON DPP CHAIR TSAI ING-WEN (2009): https://wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/09TAIPEI754_a.html
US has poured countless millions into shaping the opinions of the people in Taiwan through orgs like NED, it directly grooms US politicians such as Tsai Ing-Wen.
I also love how the article takes it for granted that US must prop up puppet regimes in Asia as if that’s somehow in the interest of the people living in US.
I mean, that’s probably not entirely false, working class life in the USA would probably be even more unbearable without access to artificially cheap commodities courtesy of imperialism. The treats must flow.
There are actually direct negative impacts on the working class due to imperialism because it’s moving jobs out of US and driving wages down. Increased profits that companies get through cheap labour in other countries isn’t passed on to consumers either. Sneakers that cost 50 bucks when they were made in US by workers who were getting paid 10 bucks an hour still cost 50 bucks when they’re made by workers in Indonesia making a few cents an hour. The real winners are the shareholders.
Yeah that makes sense, but at this point, losing control over its colonies isn’t going to cause wages in the US to increase, will it? If they’re not exploiting the global south, doesn’t that just mean they have to exploit people at home even harder to try to make up the losses?
Losing control over the colonies will put a lot more power into the hands of the workers in US. The whole scheme with globalization is that you move production out of the country and then people in that country have no say over the working conditions and pay where things are produced. However, when production happens domestically then workers can strike, protest, and so on.
Yes, though a hot war with China probably means the US being completely cut off from Chinese imports. We saw what the COVID supply shocks were like, imagine that but much much worse.
Our determination has nothing to do with Ukraine. If the United States wants a world war, they will get it. The only thing that affects ccp’s ruling position is not ‘’ unify Taiwan Province’', but ‘‘not to unify Taiwan Province’’.
