> US industry will be out of China by tomorrow

Yeah, I think you're under estimating the interconnectedness of the supply chain there. Would definitely make the pandemic disruption look small.

And you're assuming China won't retaliate. I wouldn't like to be a US national in China when that happened.

> Yeah, I think you're under estimating the interconnectedness of the supply chain there. Would definitely make the pandemic disruption look small.

Pandemic disruption is small. A disruption on this scale was nothing unheard of historically. Infectious diseases were taking millions of lives in the developed world before the advent of antibiotics, and to lesser extend until the bio-technological revolution of seventies.

What was unheard of was world's biggest power being rendered utterly impotent, and in complete stupor by such minor events.

I see a country like US being otherwise fully capable of dealing with a crisis on this scale easily.

> And you're assuming China won't retaliate. I wouldn't like to be a US national in China when that happened.

Of course they will! You will be cutting into personal coffers of their highest elites. It will be a very personal challenge to them. Having them eat watery gruel like lowly peasants will infuriate them.

That's exactly the POINT. You see a bad guy, you challenge him to beat him. You don't beat a bad guy by avoiding him.

So .. casualty projections? How far up the escalation do you want to go?

> How far up the escalation do you want to go?

Nobody wins a fight without fighting it to the end. Escalate until you win.

.. and you emerge from your nuclear bunker and look at the glowing rubble where Taiwan used to be?

The old Cold War was very clear that final victory involved civilian deaths in the millions. Be very clear: are you advocating for that?

Yes, I do!

I'm advocating for people to understand that not being ready for this will be their demise.

Tell me, what would've been a better solution for WW2.

Let Adolph, Stalin, Hirohito, or worse both of them together, have Europe, and then have their free way to use the completely overwhelming resource advantage to kill you, or go and fight to the bitter end before they have it?

The most logical action to do if you can't win, is to fight. One must be ready to fight, even if it is a completely hopeless battle.

Second, I want to make you guys understand that, for now, NATO has 100% genuine ability to do something about its adversaries. Wait just a few more years at the current pace, and it wouldn't.

Third, if you chicken out, your weakness will rile the beast(s) even more, and fire up its appetites. It's showing your back to the tiger, an invitation for disaster.

. . . So how many American and European cities has China bombed and invaded so far? No war was ever won with your mentality which makes the completely incorrect assumption that this is somehow a fight for survival or between good (uncle Sam) and evil (those commies). It's also putting the glory of battle over the survival of those that battle was supposedly done to protect. Maybe Hawaii and Puerto Rico should have fought to their last defending their shore from the American hordes by your logic?

Also, it's funny you bring up the Axis powers considering that America would have entirely sat out the entire war if it wasn't for Pearl Harbour and Japan constantly provoking a response with their actions in the pacific. I have also never seen the US ever go into a war where they did not have overwhelming power advantage over their enemies. By the time D-Day happened, the supply lines for the Axis were crippled beyond repair and the war was essentially already lost. It was just a matter of time before supplies ran out.

China has more than enough nuclear capability to cripple the entirety of NATO and they also are well aware that NATO has the capability to do likewise. Hence, neither parties are ever going to even contemplate an outright war with each other despite the wet dreams of war mongers from both sides.

> China has more than enough nuclear capability to cripple the entirety of NATO and they also are well aware that NATO has the capability to do likewise.

First, no it isn't. Second, in a few more years, China will be the only country in the world with material, and military capacity to take the second strike, and keep on offence.

Third, you haven't learned anything if you ever studied WWII. While Germany was running on vapours in the late war, it was still running. They had few years more of small arms supplies, and still some food, which was indeed better than what union's officers had even in reich's final days. Last reserves of fuel were enough for more than a year of low intensity warfare. And yes, Germany fought to the bitter end. Otherwise, where did you thing hundred of thousand American casualties came?

Please don't comment on this matter anymore. You don't know anything about war.

>First, no it isn't

What isn't? That China has enough nuclear capability to cripple the entirety of NATO or vice versa? I'd like to see you justify that tall claim. Your second "point" just sounds like fear mongering without substance. If any country could develop that capability, it is Russia with the largest land area of any country.

Also, my point about the Axis having essentially already lost the war thanks to crippled supplies was incorrect because "they had a few years more of small arms supplies, and still some food" and enough fuel to "last more than a year of low intensity warfare"? That's just an inevitable loss but with extra steps in between! I might not know anything about war but clearly you don't know anything about my argument if you thought this was an actual rebuttal.

Low intensity warfare? The Allies had enough bombers to collapse entire cities! Even the hundreds of thousand Americans dead were minor compared to the millions of Germans that perished.

That's kind of why we don't engage in these kinds of large scale ground invasion type wars anymore (at least without one side being completely overwhelmingly more powerful) - the costs are so astronomically high, both in money and in causalities.

> Lack of consumer goods would of course be upsetting, but people wouldn't die from lack of them.

Lack of consumer goods means lack of jobs for people who transport, warehouse, and sell consumer goods.

Lack of jobs means lack of money to pay for things like food, shelter, medical care, etc, only some of which the US has adequate safety nets for.

People will, indeed, die from lack of consumer goods.

Equivocation. Gp means lack of specific consumer goods, for a set time.

Your comment makes it seem like this would lead to catastrophe or collapse.

It would more likely lead to industry rotation and employment change.

Yes, you can reduce any macro factor to a death count, but those are always trading off in all directions. It's meaningless to categorically single out a particular scenario of swapping production as more deadly than the others.

It would take a generation to build an electronics industry equivalent to shenzhen, and would require state involvement/investment that we're not capable of.

I'd like to regain industrial capacity too but we're missing an entire population base of expertise and relationships.

Yes, it does. Run a political campaign on 'All the stuff you buy? I'm going to make it cost more,' and you will be slaughtered at the polls.

People barely making ends meet aren't very interested in those kinds of political statements.

You could, of course, try to lie to them about what the consequences of your policies are going to be.

You are correct, and this is America's, and West's predicament.

If you can't do this, you can't do this.

And you certainly wouldn't be able to do even more painful things which are truly needed for the West to have any chance to put the genie back into the bottle.

China, and Russia have effectively conditioned the NATO countries over the decades into "self-beneficial inaction." Now, seeing words like yours proves their strategy worked.

This is still a massive improvement over the Cold War, though.

Aside from the small detail that we appear to be losing, this time.

It's a funny kind of losing. It looks more like "not totally dominant" to me, which may be confused with losing by people who've not experienced that.

What has the US really lost? No territory, no people; there's no stream of refugees to the "winning" Chinese side.

We just got done dealing with four years of leadership by a (possibly unwitting) agent of a foreign power, installed with the help of holes in our IT infrastructure. Our sovereignty and capacity for effective self-governance are severely compromised, at this point. That's more important than loss of territory or people, in the long run.

>"We just got done dealing with four years of leadership by a (possibly unwitting) agent of a foreign power"

Trump was anything but. Your writing just makes no sense.

It's a matter of figuring out the process. You can swap sets of things based on how easy it is to achieve similar enough economics elsewhere or elsewise.

This isn't some insurmountable problem. Yes, there are scenarios where you go "too fast" and raise too many prices too quickly and piss people off. Or, you go slower and make it more palatable.