China has it's client countries that it owns for the most part except for in name. Same with the USA.
China has it's client countries that it owns for the most part except for in name. Same with the USA.
I mean, Russia has been doing this in their own way with Ukraine and Crimea. They've just been doing it in an extremely intelligent way - they not using conventional military force, they're using a combination of propaganda, green men, dissidents, funded rebels, social media warfare, and public rhetoric to try and absorb land "peacefully". It proved extremely effective in Crimea, and less-so in Ukraine, but it looks like a new, evolving face of "conquering" to me.
In general, I don't think the USA - unless there is a massively radical shift in our foreign policy stance (which might happen under Trump, but seems unlikely), is not going to go out overtly conquering anybody. I guess you could maybe say we did that in Iraq, although it's not clear we've gotten any tangible benefit from it, or how much influence we actually possess within their government. It's just not part of our grand strategy, as muddled and confused as it is, to go around conquering smaller nations. Otherwise we would've done so with nations in our immediate sphere of influence that we do not have control over, such as the Caribbean.
It would be much more in character for a China or Russia to do something overt of that nature if they thought they could get away with it. Considering basically no-one in the west did anything over Crimea (that I can recall; was the embargo of Russia over that business?), it's no wonder they've gotten emboldened in that regard. China knows not to fuck with the very close US allies in their area (primarily South Korea and Japan), but could probably do some bullying of their own on others if they were similarly smart like Russia was with Crimea.
Considering basically no-one in the west did anything over Crimea (that I can recall; was the embargo of Russia over that business?),
yes and they still are
I was under the impression the embargo was basically done at this point; I didn't realize it was ongoing.
My impression is that it has had very serious economic repercussions for them, but that hasn't really stopped them any, from the looks of it.
I was under the impression the embargo was basically done at this point; I didn't realize it was ongoing.
Oh no, not by a long shot. The only one who said anything towards this has been Donald Trump during his campaigning. And well his relation with Russia is dodgy at best atm we can all see that. The EU and many other western Countries still back this measure firmly.
The ongoing civil war in Ukraine is a testament to this. (15 ppl killed at the front during shelling, during the eurovision festival held in Kiev as an example)
I was going to use Ukraine as an example. Unless there is a very large amount of oil or something found in some shitcountries, limited warfare in 3rd party nations is going to be the only way countries get occupied by major powers. Syria is probably safe for now because there are far too many factions fighting in the country for other powers to step in and take sides against each other. Crimea is more worrying to me though, because sanctions can only go on for so long without different measures being taken. If human rights issues were raised at some point, and there was a campaign to appeal to the public for military action in western countries, for example, it could turn bad quickly.
North Korea also falls into this category in my opinion. If the current leadership collapses, or some other factors combine to make the country collapse completely, China probably won't sit on the sidelines. Chinese occupied Korean territory could be a very tricky diplomatic issue.
I could see it happening under Trump. Makes a secret deal with Putin - "You get that half of the world, I get this half." They'd have to start WWIII as a pretext though and then only offer to help anybody if they joined the new union. America first and all that. Putin would need to be the first aggressor, although he'd claim it's in response to something America did. Then America responds in kind and so on.
I hope so. We need to expand and use our dwindling resources to push into space. The population bottleneck is coming.
A peaceful 2 government world would bring very little innovation. Innovation comes from competition. All that's required for space travel is a free market and an incentive.
Sometimes not even an incentive, outside of personal desire. People are willing to donate to things they believe are worthy causes - for many, space travel and exploration meets the criteria.
EDIT: Also I recall this other time we had a "peaceful two-government world", it was called the Cold War. :p
Not an exact analogy I know, but really, I don't see a ton of good coming from out of it even if you could do it completely peacefully; add in the terrible violence and destruction of war, and the ends do not justify the means, as they rarely do.
Well China would make some kind of move to expand I would think. While the earth is still easily inhabitable is the time to push for moon colonies and martian colonies. Edit: A war for the last of the resources would be much worse after we have thoroughly degraded the environment.
This will not happen unless there is a sudden big lack of a vital resource (water) or the USA goes full insane authoretharian dictatorship.
China and Russia are only doing this in their historical influence sphere (former Soviet union, Greater China). These regions also have large amounts of ethnic Russians/Chinese and hence a historic claim.
I don't see any of the superpowers just "take new lands" and fight a war on that reason (Try selling that to the general US public or even congress for example).
"Land, Power and Resources" come at way to high a price. (just look at the massive US buildup on their debt after iraq and Afghanistan under W. Bush) US also likes to wear it's "white hat" as protector of freedom. one war for "lebensraum" and you definatly are the bad guy and lose that symbolism. Don't forget that the US is largely dependent on it's allies on all kinds of things; Resources, knowledge, export markets, investments etc etc. Imagine an embargo like on Russia imposed on the US.... Imagine what would happen to the US economy if they can't trade with the EU (by far it's biggest partner/market) and China.
Remember Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq. Do you understand how hard it is to subdue a population of a small/medium country, that doesnt want to submit. How costly ($ and manpower), fragile and frustrating operations like this are? Imagine how you and your parents feel once draft or conscripts start and you get "the letter". Rather use intelligence agencies to coupe and place puppets (post WW2 US and Russian cold war tactics in Asia, S-America and Africa. They basically used the 3rd world as a chessboard) That way you/your companies have acces to resources and markets while you don't have blood on your hands or have to station an army to preserve order.