You claim I'm wrong but you don't dispute my contention that war would be very, very bad for the ruling party (family) in S.A. Israel is just itching to take on Iran and their nuclear ambitions. They are not afraid to defend themselves. If it wasn't for our money they would be taking out Iran's nuclear infrastructure just like they did with Iraq.
Saudi Arabia wouldn't consider that it had a choice in the matter. Previously, they've been able to depend upon a US shield, and so they haven't had to engage Iran for leadership of the ME. The Saudi's have made it abundantly clear that in the event of Iran developing a nuclear program, they will start to do so as well, kicking off a nuclear arms race in the region between shia and sunni. Withdrawal of US Forces would create a massive power vacuum in the region, and both would race to fill it. Ditto once we stopped supporting the military government in Pakistan.
They have nothing to gain by taking on Taiwan.
you need to stop right there. because the thing that the CCP has to gain by taking Taiwan is
survival.
this is the problem with libertarians - they tend to assume that around the world everyone shares their value set; that people will not willingly give up nationalism, pride, realpolitik, power and so forth for money. The Chinese government (and, more importantly, her people) consider the continued existence of an independent Taiwan to be a consant humiliation forced upon them by the Imperialist West. It is a sore, a wound that does not staunch, a fester in the mind. They look at Taiwan similarly to how Arabs look at Israel. What we would consider to be a rational balancing of interests does not come into play.
The #1 goal for China is not wealth. Wealth is just a means to an end. The primary Goal for the PRC is regional hegemony. The primary goal of the
CCP, however, is to maintain domestic power. Its' ruling legitimacy is founded upon two things: economic growth, and nationalism. economic growth is sitting on a bubble, which constrained US consumer spending will probably pop. In response, the CCP will have no option but to clamp down domestically and seek to clamp down abroad. They will need to rely near solely on Nationalism, and taking Taiwan would be the greatest possible victory for Chinese Nationalism that they could enact.
Yes, they wish they could just throw their weight around but now they have far too much at stake economically. Granted that may change as more and more allow China to own their debt but we would rather build more battleships than get our debt under control.
if we could ever balance our budgets, that debt becomes a weapon
for us. as long as we do not, however, that sword is pointed at
our throats, and the Chinese can nick us or shove it in at any time they wish.
and it turns out we would
not rather build battleships. instead we are going to protect social spending and give up on building battleships (that is, after all, the point of this thread). Unfortunately, no one in our higher levels of government seems able to understand or willing to articulate that since global trade depends on a modicum of global security, and since that global security is provided for by the US military, trying to "reduce the deficit" by dramatically slashing military spending is the equivalent of eating seed corn.
If they could, they would be.
and they
can't. because
we are there.
you can't score geopolitics statically any more accurately than you can score fiscal policy statically. when the US draws down, the rules and weights on the board changes, and everyone else shifts to maximize upon that.
Nobody has anything to gain here. There is nobody itching to block the trade routes.
indeed. there are no somali pirates, wahhabi terrorists, or twelfth imam extremists in the region. everyone loves America and the invasion of Western Culture into their lands via the oil trade. No one would
ever see trade with the West to be a degradation and a cancer within the Ummah and Islam.
Also, it's worth noting that China does not buy oil, has not been buying oil in exponentially increasing amounts, does not have a million Chinese extracting oil in East Africa, and does not believe in a mercantilist economic system in which raw resources are shunted from client states to China.
It's also worth noting that throughout human history and across the world, whenever nations have gone to war with each other (as is exceedingly likely to occur following US drawdown), there has never ever ever been a disruption of trade as a result of that war. nope never ever.
wait.......
aw
man......
Nobody is willing to cut off their livelyhoods.
see earlier piece on how it's interesting that you think their highest priority is more wealth for their individual citizens.
The Taliban wasn't bothering anyone outside of Afghanistan. 10 years later and the area is every bit if not more unstable.
not true - the Taliban served as a launching point for AQ. and 10 years later the region has the
possibility to become more stable.
if we are allowed to finish the job. otherwise, yes, half-efforts are often worse than no efforts at all.
Countries do not wish to remain fiscally valid because we have a strong army.
that doesn't make sense. right now the rest of the world engages in relatively free global trade because the US underwrites it. we do this because A) we believe in it and B) our economy is dependent upon it, and we make alot of money off of it.
remove the underwriting, and free global trade collapses. the world has not entered into Kant's paradise, it remains a self-centered ugly place full of brutal autocracies who would much rather rule in hell than serve in heaven.
Imagine a Mexican standoff, except that 3 of the 4 players are A) paranoid schizophrenics facing opponents they violently hate, B) convinced that death will be a net benefit for them, C) convinced that their souls are in peril if they don't shoot, and D) potentially armed with nukes (the 4th Player is the unfortunately-located Israel). I think everyone here can agree that that is not a "stable" situation, particularly when you add in E) these countries are not internally stable, but may feel forced into an external war in order to solidify internal support and F) at least two of the players (Iran and Saudi Arabia) are held hostage by their own extremists, who feel free to act without permission, are nearly impossible to stop, and are most desirous of the conflict. And I feel that A) deserves rementioning.
that's the Middle East after US withdrawal.