You may also wish to consider that China possessing ownership of a large amount of the US debt is not conducive to China opening up an open war. There is enough historical evidence to show that financial penalties applied to losing countries as well sanctions as well other financial measures would provide the US a way to throw their entire debt into such a thing as wartime reparations resulting in an insta-fix to the US economy.

Given that all economies are ultimately linked, it is not really feasible for such a major world-wide economy such as America’s to simply be destroyed flat-out by a single nation (other than by America itself). That just can’t happen in a short time, though it is possible over a long period, slowly. But over that period America would have enough time to fight back and raise its economy by itself.

You have misinterpreted what I meant which is most likely my fault. I tend to be cryptic at times. What I meant by my statement is not that China would destroy America's economy, but rather that they would be providing an opportunity for America to repair its own economy (by means such as suggested above) if they (China) chose to engage in an armed conflict.

edit: of course the implication being that China utlimately lost said conflict

You have misinterpreted what I meant which is most likely my fault. I tend to be cryptic at times. What I meant by my statement is not that China would destroy America's economy, but rather that they would be providing an opportunity for America to repair its own economy (by means such as suggested above) if they (China) chose to engage in an armed conflict.

I was actually replying to samoth on that point. Both of you took the same founding idea and went in opposite directions with it. I tend to agree with your side more.


L. Spiro

I was actually replying to samoth on that point. Both of you took the same founding idea and went in opposite directions with it. I tend to agree with your side more.

My apologies went back and re-read your post and saw the link sentence of yours.

There is enough historical evidence to show that financial penalties applied to losing countries as well sanctions as well other financial measures would provide the US a way to throw their entire debt into such a thing as wartime reparations...

Depends, when the US finally realized that they could not the Vietnam war, they promised billions in reparations in order to bring it to an end... but then never paid a cent, and instead seized Vietnamese assets and ended up "winning" via economic means instead of military means.

That's not a good historical precedent for them to have set... but yes, I guess if you're just cancelling debts instead of demanding something, there's not much the other side can do but start another war

Depends, when the US finally realized that they could not the Vietnam war, they promised billions in reparations in order to bring it to an end... but then never paid a cent, and instead seized Vietnamese assets and ended up "winning" via economic means instead of military means.

That's not a good historical precedent for them to have set... but yes, I guess if you're just cancelling debts instead of demanding something, there's not much the other side can do but start another war

Sadly America does have a history of not honouring treaties unfavourable to them whilst enforcing treaties unfavourable to others. I must admit though I was thinking more in terms of the Treaty of Versailles...which indeed did lead to another war as you mention.

Look, if China sells those bonds, then China's going right down with the US and the rest of the world economy. There will be turmoil in the world market. It's not as if this is a one way thing. Who will the Chinese sell those cheap manufactured goods to?

You can look at it from another angle: Right now, they're selling their goods to someone who is never going to pay them. It is impossible to be ignorant of this. Nothing on the world is worth less than a piece of US money or an US cheque. Well, maybe an US credit card.

The only reason why these things are nevertheless "worth something" is because a) the USA are bullying everyone with wars and embargos (but a country the size of China needs not be afraid of that) and b) because there is a silly notion of "trust" and "handing off debts" in this world. Meaning that if someone tells you that they promise to pay, you pretend to trust their word, because there is likely some bigger fool who will believe you and give you money (which, itself, isn't backed by much but a promise) in return for a bond on those debts.

Who would buy the bonds/certificates if China threw them at the market? Nobody, this isn't necessary at all. Assume China throws a billion US dollars (or two) on the market. US dollar rate will go down to zero in 10-20 seconds. Automated traders will catch up a significant drop and immediately sell everything they have to avoid being the last fool to sell, amplifying the effect further and finally causing a crash that nobody can absorb (this happened in March 2000, although on a much smaller scale). The USA will be incapacitated within minutes. There's not enough money in the world to stop such an avalanche, so dollars and anything related to them will be toilet paper in minutes.

People will revolt in the streets. But also, institutions like law enforcement and the military are paid in dollars, and they wouldn't risk their butts knowing it's just toilet paper they work for. It's hard to start a war when your soldiers no longer follow you, when there's burning cars in the streets, and when your people are knocking at your door wielding pitchforks. It is also a very unlucky condition when the people who drive the heavy tanks and wield the machine guns are unhappy. You really want to be able to pay them, because when you can't you're totally fucked.

Would this affect the rest of the world? Certainly. Would this destroy a few other countries? Probably, at the very least it would destroy every major bank in Europe (who have significant enough dollar investments so they wouldn't recover). Would this destroy China? Unlikely. It would certainly be "uncomfortable", but not necessarily much more.
There's this saying "I care as much as if someone topples a sack of rice in China". This is reciprocal. They're big enough so they need not care, and unlike everyone else, they have production lines for everything. We can't do without China, but they can do without us. And they know that.

Heck, you wouldn't even be able to buy a T-shirt if China wasn't making them. Everything you need for your daily life comes from China. Including 95% of the parts in the computer you're using to read this (the other 5% are probably from Taiwan...).

Without them, we're simply unable to survive as it is. But that's not true for them.

Nobody will want to risk this. Nobody.

And that's why I'm sure there will be no war. The USA may shake an angry fist and maybe they call back their ambassadors (oh how very sorry the Chinese will be about this serious punishment!) but in the end, if China chooses to take those isles, then that will just be it.

words words...

Would you care to modify that comment? I find it rather rude and not on topic at all. Many Europeans, Canadians and USA citizens are Asian people, you do know this right?

The major powers will never engage in direct conflict esp over some small islands whose economic value is dwarfed by the value of the trading and potential future revenue of the nations lost in any direct war ( ie nuclear war ). China wants to flex its power projection and will play a game of brinkmanship, Japan wants to asserts its territorial rights ( in its mind ) and also is weary of an every increasingly powerful China, the US both fears, needs China and is conflicted since it has no direct involvement in the dispute other than being an ally of Japan.

If Japan attacks China it will be on its own, the US will not engage in a nuclear war over islands worth less than a trillion dollars in potential value on the side of the aggressor in a local territorial dispute. Now if China attacks Japan that is quite different.. bound by its own treaties it will have to intervene and it will probably escalate to a nuclear war. For that to happen China has to think it can win, which no one in China leadership is that dumb ( US has 10x more nukes than China ). So most likely outcome is Japan either cedes the islands or engages in in a single sided war which it will lose the island either way .. ie like the Falklands. If the US plays it right and forces both China and Japan to enter into some sort of arbitration or shared management of the island that is possible too, probably best case for Japan. Depends if the US has a strong leadership and China blinks.. we'll see..

Would you care to modify that comment?

No, I'm pretty sure the majority of the people here know what I meant. Like most Americans, Canadians, Eurabians, and the like, I don't know enough about the people to wager on a war or not.

Note: the last time America thought they knew the people of that region, it walked into another world war and a nuclear bomb being dropped. Both events(War with Japan) were completely avoidable. (Plus let's not forget how our ally in that region at the time was Mao)

I find it rather rude and not on topic at all.

Rude/Off topic??? Do you really mean this or is this just fake PC outrage?

Many Europeans, Canadians and USA citizens are Asian people, you do know this right?z

In the context of our conversation I wasn't talking about assimilated people. I also wasn't saying they were actually insane or that they were actually aliens. I apologize to anyone who thought I was.