These are cases where the West did _not_ want to escalate. Too small and at the end of the day the only consequences for the West are the refugees and terrorism. Both can be "handled" by closing borders and turning up the surveillance state.

If China decides to shoot back, all bets are off. It would be exactly the error the Japanese made when they attacked Pearl Harbor and thought they can get away with it. That would directly affect the West and our leaders could not say anymore "will be fine, we're taking the high road here" unless they want to be lynched by a mob.

There's a huge difference between a village in the middle of nowhere in a country Westerners don't care about and a major city in a developed country being attacked. And I say that as someone from about 500 km away from Transnistria, not as a Westerner.

Also everyone knows that the US is both highly militaristic and highly jingoistic.

> Also everyone knows that the US is both highly militaristic and highly jingoistic.

That was certainly true up through the early 2000s, but this stereotype is by now out of date. On the left, America is self-loathing, and on the right it's become quite isolationist.

i don't think so, a clear military attack on American soil by a foreign nation would mean lines around the block at local military recruitment offices in every city/town across the nation. Congress would have a full declaration of war signed in an hour.

Terrorist attacks like 9/11 leave doubt about who to go after and at what scale to retaliate but a clear attack on a city by a foreign state as an act of war is a different thing. Gloves would come off and the complete full force of every resource ( military, political, economic, etc ) would be brought to bear.

That's just a thin veneer. Do you think that if the US were attacked somehow, we wouldn't have a repeat of 2003?

No, I don't think so, not exactly.

It depends on the specifics, of course. If a specific country directly attacked the US, of course I'd expect (and even demand) a military response. But these days, I wouldn't expect a non-state's terrorist attack to lead to the sort of misguided, ill-informed adventurism that ultimately led us to invade Iraq.

You can't get elected to a minor office in the US without saluting the flag and supporting the troops.

This definitely goes in the TIL pile. I'm fairly well traveled E.g. I've visited most of the Balkans, Sarajevo, Mostar, but I had not heard of Transnistria.

Also ++ for the use of jingoistic. :)

The PRC has absolutely zero interest in taking over the DPRK. They just don't want it to fall in unfriendly/US-aligned hands.

See also: Korean War, where Chinese intervened to stop the US-allied South from winning against the North.

If they were, they would not have been trying to displace Kim themselves, and risking Kim risking his country to save his head.

You remember Kim's brother VXed in Malaysia? He was China's bid on NK throne. China was trying to launch a coup in NK.

China been trying to seize power in NK for decades.

NK-China relations are complicated ones. China wants NK, but is afraid of losing NK if their machinations flop, and push the NK towards the West.

Oh, China absolutely wants to control/exert influence in NK, I just don't see them being at all interested in military takeover of the country -- except perhaps if it falls into the "wrong" hands, in which case they might invade to install a compliant regime and then GTFO (see also: Korean War).

Afghanistan, Iraq, Somalia, Libya, Syria .. all set a very damning precedent of the West not quite having the terror-liberating forces it proclaims to have.

>A thinking that they can win

The only way to talk about war is to be prepared to understand 'the other side' of your argument. In this case, you're setting yourself up to have to answer the question: in the 21st century, which nation state has started the most wars, committed violent hostilities, and murdered innocent citizens at massive scales, the most?