The USA keeps threatening my country; Canada.

I can say with a reasonable amount of confidence that going "but china" isn't going to help the US much going forward.

I'm in canada. I don't think the two are even comparable.

You're sort of right. What the US is doing in Canada right now is more comparable to what Russia was doing in Ukraine in the early 2010s[0]

The upcoming Alberta separatist referendum that is funded and boosted by foreign agitators isn't intended to succeed. It's intended to cause a festering wound in Canada to prevent it from growing in strength and independence from America.

As far as I'm concerned America has already lost the next impending major war. They've spent the past 25 years blowing trillions on purposefully unwinnable wars that serve to enrich American oligarchs. This has left the American military structurally weakened and mis-optimized to fight small groups of terrorists instead of fighting an enemy with comparable and perhaps superior ability.

We've also seen the decimation of the manufacturing base in America and with it the economic security that it provided the middle class and with it the power and skill set that comes from being able to design and build thing. Finally, the United States' recent choice to blow half their stockpile of numerous kinds of missiles all all at once while at the same time lacking the supply chain or even the manufacturing base to adequately restock their munitions as the nail in the coffin for the American empire.[2]

So what's going to happen in a world where America can't win a global conflict but is still protected from invasion by thousands of nuclear weapons? America is going to decline into a regional power that attacks its neighbours with impunity. You're already starting to see it and it won't be long until you see articles like this[1] about Alberta.

I don't want it to be this way, but it is.

[0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43487443

[1] https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-hit-with-demand-for-answ...

[2] https://www.csis.org/analysis/last-rounds-status-key-munitio...

The usa is also threatening my country. The orange dude wants to buy a part of Denmark that is not even ours to sell.

Well, to be fair, by “USA“ you mean one person who is frankly more ceremonial than an actual leader. Whereas I think China is doing much more to actually irreversibly change who has the real authority in Canada. Canada is also a uniquely bad case in governance. I don’t know if any western country has had so much decline in living standard so fast. That you could put Fidel Castro‘s bastard son in charge says a lot about who holds the cards there.

That's misattribution of the the why. The real why is US can't do the sensible thing and cede regional hegemony to growing PRC. There's always the normal solution of watching PRC bomb PH schoolgirls while buying their rare earth and selling them semi, like the rest of the world when US bombs school girls. The why is US leadership pathologically can't not fight, including the fights most of their pop don't want to fight.

And yet all sorts of people are advocating for using Chinese LLMs because they are less expensive. It seems like a very risky move to save a few dollars.

It'd be interesting to know how much of that is truly organic support versus what the CCP pushes out across the internet as agitation/propaganda.

Are they cheaper? They are open-weight, so in theory, they are cheaper to run and do with them as you wish.

The problem is that they come from a place with a long and storied history of attacking digital assets in the US and the West in general.

While true, China's threat has been going on for a long time and they've been running repeated exercises on how to do it, how to take US warships out, etc.

Additionally, US support for taking Greenland is virtually zero. Chinese support for taking Taiwan is frighteningly high.

China is not an irrational actor. They know that the most effective way to take Taiwan is slowly, through soft power and political subterfuge.

There is no need or advantage to a full frontal assault.

> There is no need or advantage to a full frontal assault.

Perhaps, but in the last year China did build these:

https://www.navalnews.com/naval-news/2025/03/stairway-to-tai...

Unless China has some very interesting new anti-drone tech, those look like nice big targets.

Rational or not, they're building warships and an invasion fleet, along with the ability to stifle any US attempt to stop them. This is not the action of someone hoping for a slow victory.

The person at the top of the chain was asking why everyone is preparing for war. This behavior from China is why. It predates any of the Greenland Trump idiocy, too.

There are undoubtedly elements within the state that advocate for war, just like the elements within our state that do the same. So far, chinas political leadership is shrewd enough to mollify them and still maintain power.

The downside of autocracy is ...autocracy. the upside is that you have a consistent hand at the helm, making predictions of behaviour simpler and more rational than the rotating cast of leadership we present.

China has consistently chosen soft power over military action. I suspect they will continue to do so.

They're exactly as rational as any other group of humans.

They've repeatedly stated that they'll use force to take Taiwan if necessary.

They are building the military power to make the full frontal assault.

I don't get why there's so much "oh, China's different" talk on here or on other online forums. I often wonder how much of that is organic versus something their propaganda/agitation ministries puts on.

The Europeans didn't think it was a bluff.

But more generally, when the foundation of your country's morality is "all men are created equal" you really have given up the space to object to others doing what you do.

If honour is a thing.

I don't think Trump is bluffing. However Americans in general are opposed to taking Greenland, and so if Trump does anything I expect Americans/Congress to raise up. Europe should be concerned because this will take months to play out.

Nobody said bluff but you, and honour is long gone.

That just leaves the facts. Which do you think is more credible and likely?

reflect on what? both things can be true at the same time.

When both are true at the same time, one might reflect on why "because China" is given as the pat answer.

When the subject is China, the reflection isn't "because China". What we are seeing here is "Because US", which is very different.

The subject of "Why is everyone preparing for war so hard" would seem to be "everyone", no?

The subject is critical minerals. China is therefore why here. Of course in the large picture everyone is preparing for war.