It'd obviously be a mistake to say that economic interconnectivity totally prevents war, but the fact that wars break out doesn't falsify the notion that it might make conflict less common on average. The west's relationship with Russia and China has certainly been less rocky over the past 30 years than its relationship with the Soviet Union ever was.
Uhm, this isn't the first time Russia invaded Ukraine in the past decade. Remember when they invaded and took Crimea?
Also, they've been fucking with elections in other countries, like with Brexit and Trump. There was also the Wirecard scandal that they've been associated with. They've done massive amounts of damage internationally.
Yes, I mentioned it. That was in 2014 - 22 years after the fall of the Soviet Union.
Russia's antics have been damaging but child's play compared to the cold war. The US and the Soviet Union were engaged in proxy wars, insurgencies, coups and counter coups across the globe pretty much non-stop for nearly 50 years, all the while pointing two order-of-magnitude larger nuclear arsenals at each other.
Economic interdependence obviously didn't stop Russia from eventually going off the deep end. But it probably helped keep relations cool for quite a while.
Sure, but this is much more low level than a war. The US also messes with other countries elections & politics, including Euromaidan in Ukraine.
20 years is actually not a long time for an idea like we're talking about. This isn't human-scale stuff.
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Double standards is not a good habit.
If countries giving into US demands is not something bad, then giving into "CCP demands" is not bad either.
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The doublespeak and 'everyone except us is evil" mentality in Anglosphere is amazing.
The country that claims that there is a genocide in Xinjiang is the country that lied for EIGHT years about nonexistent Iraqi WMDs. And its the US.
Every. Single. Muslim majority country backed China at the UN after sending representatives to Xinjiang. They said that there is no such thing as a 'genocide' there. Its the US State Dept. word versus every single muslim majority country and their parliamentarians.
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Today its easy to understand why people bought into the Iraqi WMDs lie back then: Because it makes them feel good, righteous, and the 'right side'.
As for the other Muslim-majority countries, I can’t find any news backing your statement, but that might be my own lack of Google-fu or perhaps an international underreporting by the media, so I’ll take your word for it. But still, that’s not evidence. All of those countries have little to gain from speaking out at the UN (it won’t actually directly help anyone), and they don’t necessarily feel much inter-Islam brotherhood since the genocide in Xinjiang is against a specific group of Muslims, not against Muslims in general. (Almost?) all of those countries on the other hand are receiving aid from China, which presumably is conditional on saying that there’s no genocide in Xinjiang.
Edit: nevermind, my Google-fu was weak. I found this article. Note that you’re actually simply wrong, since Qatar didn’t back China, rather abstaining. https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2021/05/04/why-do-so...
Just looking at Pakistan, for example: Pakistan has been given tens of billions of dollars by China and is owed billions more, China is a major trading of Pakistan, and China is investing in major infrastructure development there. I don’t think anything could get Pakistan to not support China in the UN.
No, we didn't. We had the word of every single insitution in the Angloamerican controlled part of the Western hemisphere. From NGOs to media. NYT was publishing dozens of articles talking about the WMDs, then one article 'questioning' whether we were "acting too fast", but inevitably concluding that the risks of 'not taking action' were far greater.
It was a TOTAL media propaganda just like now.
The French were even ridiculed for contesting the veracity of those claims. So much propaganda was done that they were able to smear an ENTIRE nation as 'surrender monkeys' and 'cowards' for persisting in questioning the claims.
> Just looking at Pakistan, for example: Pakistan has been given tens of billions of dollars by China and is owed billions more, China is a major trading of Pakistan, and China is investing in major infrastructure development there. I don’t think anything could get Pakistan to not support China in the UN.
This is a supremacist talk: "They are siding with the baddies for profit". Whereas on the other hand, the Western satellites that supported the US in the UN have absolutely no profit in backing the US. They just did it out of goodwill and morals. Nothing related to profit and foreign policy.
Qatar and Turkey abstained in order to not upset the US. Abstaining itself is already opposing since there is no way that any country in the Middle East can turn a blind eye to an actual genocide of muslims if it took place. Which makes it even more significant that every other country opposed it.
> since the genocide in Xinjiang is against a specific group of Muslims, not against Muslims in general
There is no such thing. I don't know where you pulled that out from. Xinjiang muslims are sunnis and the majority of the muslim world is sunni.
IMHO, that's a free market myth made "true" through constant repetition. It breaks down if one or more parties stops prioritizing things like a free marketer.
And "keeping tensions under control" could translate to "appease the CCP and give in to its demands." It controls the real (physical) assets, as well as most of the human capital. Its adversaries are democracies, which means they're often far too focused on the people's parochial, short-term whims (e.g. failing to take strategic action because they're afraid of losing votes if those actions make iPhones more expensive).
The CCP has also has the benefit of learning from several of Russia's mistakes. They'll probably force their demands more slowly and persistently, so as to not galvanize their opponents.