Posted on 05/13/2005 6:42:23 PM PDT by CHARLITE
LOL. I think they should finance the next ABBA album.
From this article it sounds like their current navy and air force could very likely defeat the PRC without any US help:
http://www.strategypage.com/dls/articles/2005512213835.asp
Of course, their constitutional emphasis upon "self-defense" means they would be very unlikely at present to help defend Taiwan or South Korea, but if the threat from the PRC keeps growing (and it will) that may change perceptions and politics in Japan quite a bit.
"The Chinese are on a big upswing. It would be very painful at this point economically to cut their funding off, because we have engrained our own economy so much into theirs...but that pain will pale compared to what may well eventually come in terms of open conflict...anbother World War"
That's why I thought it was insane for us to embrace the PRC's economy as we have in the past 15 years - we never should have allowed them to move toward greater economic integration (MFN, WTO, etc.) without fundamental political change there first. The rationale (in addition to drooling greed) seems to be that opening up their economy would change their politics over time. But that was always implausible in less than a 30-50 year time frame, and we do not live a half century from now - we have to survive the next couple of decades first!
Amen...well said.
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