>>2458543Of course it has something to do with the US's fall, that's how the rise and fall of global empires works.
>>2459243Very impressive leaps in military technology going on, but while the focus is on the lasers and wingman drones, I would say the most important development here is the UUV. Considering it's able to be transported on a truck it's far smaller, cheaper and probably stealthier than a regular manned submarine. Mass production and deployment of such systems in the pacific could easily render the US navy incapacitated.
>>2462305>If you look at pictures of China by the end of the Deng eraStill had catastrophic traffic jams that would shut down entire cities had they continued. Very bad for lives, pollution and productivity. And they weren't even particularly urbanized nation with relatively low car ownership.
China ascended when they went ALL in on the HSR network. Which allowed lower income populace living on outskirts to work in cities and uplift their provinces. This activated the entire nation.
>Putin having Xi's ear makes me nervousI wouldn't worry about that. If anything Xi has Putin's ear. If not Putin's directly then the general Russian populace's attention. The average western loving liberal Muscovite is a dying species. This war woke up a lot of them that their western neoliberal aspirations are a dead end and many have turned east. Putin himself said, in multiple press conferences, that Russia is envious of Chinese system. I'm not saying there's a potential for a Soviet revival here but Putin hanging out with Xi, Kim and Lukashenko is more likely to infleunce him rather than vice versa.
>>2462491I hope China influences Russia positively.
I know this is probably going to get people mad at me, but I really don't like Russia, at least as it stands today. It's got a lot of the same cultural and economic problems as reactionary Western states like the US, and the only thing keeping it in check is its place in geopolitics.
https://archive.vn/Tw271>China’s ‘silent sanction’ on US semiconductors creates a weapons generation gap>Export controls on gallium nitride and other critical minerals hold back development while Chinese military technology surges>In addition to the spectacle of Wednesday’s military parade in Tiananmen Square, with its rows of never-before-seen weapons and equipment, was a less visible but highly consequential shift.>At its heart lies China’s growing dominance in gallium nitride (GaN) semiconductor technology, giving it a strategic advantage that is reshaping the global arms race, according to a report by the Chinese Academy of Sciences’ Institute of Physics.>“Behind this technological advancement lies a ‘hidden thread’ of semiconductor development: China’s GaN-based semiconductor technology has reached maturity,” it said in the report, which was also released on Wednesday.>Unlike Washington’s overt restrictions aimed at curbing China’s access to advanced chips, Beijing’s countermove has effectively become a silent sanction on the US semiconductor industry – particularly its defence capabilities.>Framed as measures to ensure national security and fair trade, China’s export controls on critical raw materials like gallium and germanium also exploit its near-monopoly on the production of essential materials for next-generation military electronics.>This strategic leverage has enabled China to deploy cutting-edge phased array radar systems across its armed forces at a pace and scale unmatched by the United States, according to the report.>From the KJ-500A airborne early warning aircraft to the new Type 100 tank equipped with multiple GaN-based radar units, these systems showcase a level of integration and miniaturisation once reserved for elite platforms.>Meanwhile, much of the US naval fleet still relies on older radar technologies, with the latest Arleigh Burke-class destroyers only recently fielding modern active electronically scanned array (AESA) systems.>The basic principle of phased array radar can be compared to two waves crossing in the same direction: where wave peaks align, they reinforce each other and the resulting combined wave changes in direction and shape.>By replacing each emission area on the radar with an individual transistor transmission unit and directly controlling the emission phase of each wave source in the array, the radar can rapidly steer and scan without physically moving.>This approach not only enables extremely fast scanning and the simultaneous formation of multiple beams but also offers significantly improved reliability and accuracy over conventional radar.>The key material for manufacturing each transistor transmitter is GaN, which is regarded as a third-generation semiconductor.>“Compared to traditional gallium arsenide (GaAs), GaN offers notable advantages: it supports power densities five to 10 times higher than GaAs, greatly enhancing radar detection range and resolution,” the report said.>“Radars made with GaN are more compact and efficient, with stronger reliability and longer service life in high-temperature environments, substantially reducing maintenance needs and costs.”>According to the report, phased array radar has long been associated with “high performance, high complexity, and high cost”. Despite the technology’s frequent appearance in the parade, it had not become more affordable and accessible, it said.>“To this day, a significant portion of the Russian Aerospace Forces’ Su-35S fighters still use passive electronically scanned array (PESA) radar, with avionics performance lagging noticeably behind that of China and the US,” the report said.>“The situation in the United States is also challenging: although it pioneered AESA technology and developed it rapidly, its mainstay destroyer, the Arleigh Burke-class, continues to widely use the SPY-1 PESA radar even in the latest Flight IIA variants,” it said.>The report also noted that it was “only recently that the first Flight III Burke-class destroyer entered service, finally equipped with the advanced SPY-6 AESA system”.>China appears to be the only country deploying phased array radar on a large scale. According to state broadcaster CCTV, the domestically developed radars seen on Wednesday are interconnected across ranges to form coordinated networks capable of detecting stealth aircraft, ballistic missiles and other targets.>Integral to this capability is China’s dominance in the GaN industry, achieved not by restricting technology flows but by leveraging advantages across the entire industrial chain, from production to application.>With its abundant raw materials and position as the world’s largest producer of alumina, China has a natural advantage in large-scale gallium extraction – a by-product that often occurs alongside bauxite and lead-zinc ores.>Data from the US Geological Survey shows that as of 2022, China accounted for about 68 per cent of the 279,300 tonnes of global proven reserves of gallium metal – the highest share worldwide.>China also has highly mature technologies for gallium refining and processing, accounting for more than 90 per cent of global refined gallium production in 2023. In July of that year, the Ministry of Commerce imposed export controls on gallium and germanium, reaffirming this policy in December 2024.>Commercial demand has driven GaN’s adoption – in smartphone chargers and 5G base stations, automotive radar in electric vehicles and DJI’s agricultural drones, along with rapidly expanding satellite communication networks – with its properties highly valued across electronics and communications.>GaN chips are more energy efficient than their silicon-based counterparts, paving the way for an energy revolution in AI data centres, with estimates that a fully upgraded site could reduce energy consumption by more than 30 per cent.>China has already achieved mass production of 8-inch GaN wafers, announcing the breakthrough in March.>According to the report, China’s global leadership in GaN-based phased array technology is “a vivid example of the ‘military-civilian fusion’ strategy” – a central pillar of its ambition to develop a modernised military by 2027 and world-class armed forces by 2049.>Under the strategy, military technology is first disseminated to civilian markets, where enormous demand drives rapid iteration in the industrial chain. This, in turn, leads to increased production capacity, lower costs, and continuously improving reliability. >>2462981SNLT labor time required to pick cotton has dropped
there for one cotton pickin' minute yields way more cotton than in prior times
>>2463166Yep. The same old cope they now chuck at lasers, flying wing drones, hypersonics, APS protection, autoloaders, stealth ship hulls, land drones, exoskeletons, IVAS headsets, ekranoplans, military cruiser ships, amphibious tanks, airborne APCs, coaxial helis, microwaves, dual seat 5th gen fighters and the list just goes on and on. Trump even shits on EMALS and wants to go back to steam catapults. Luddite.
If a war erupts in a decade it would be Americans with their 1980s Cold War era equipment, logistics and doctrine, hyped up on Top Gun Hollywood frenzy versus what might as well be Halo Spartans in comparison.
>>2463178I hate him so much it's unreal. He's full of shit. NAFO AIDS Moby has ten channels, spewing reddit headlines about any given topic.
>>2463222Ok but what's up with these hot, spindly looking women? I could break them!
I want warriors, not Hollywood. Xi, I demand you adjust your messaging! Or I am going over there and you won't like that.
I found this article interesting. This is from the hoover institute a right wing think tank that now is just trump shills but this article was written in 1998 back when they believed in le free trade. It's an article about sanctions, why they oppose them and why they don't work. Unfortunately any right winger who thinks like this today is 1. Powerless or 2. Has to pretend he does not have these views and adapt to protectionism to stay popular. I think it is well written for a right wing person
https://www.hoover.org/research/why-economic-sanctions-dont-workThis is the author
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_R._Henderson
>Why Economic Sanctions Don’t Work>Congress has gotten in the habit of imposing economic sanctions in order to punish foreign governments. It is a habit Congress should break. By Hoover fellow David R. Henderson.
>When I was a kid, the boy next door once played a nasty trick on my brother Paul: our neighbor held his cat in his arms, brought it within a few inches of Paul’s face, and pulled its tail. The suddenly angry cat bit Paul’s face. My brother and I were upset; the cat, we thought, should have bitten the perpetrator’s face. I think of that incident whenever I hear people call for economic sanctions against a whole country.
>When governments impose sanctions, the officials implementing the policy want to harm the dictator or bad guy heading the other country’s government. That’s the goal. What they do to achieve it is intentionally harm many innocent people in those countries by cutting them off—if the sanctions are effective—from food, medicine, and other goods that they need or value. The sanctions almost always work in a limited sense: they impose some harm on innocent people in the target country. But that’s not the goal. Nor is the goal to cut off the dictator from food, medicine, et cetera. You can be sure that Saddam Hussein and Fidel Castro are not hurting for antibiotics or high-quality food. No. The harm that the advocates of sanctions want to inflict on the bad guys is indirect. They are yanking innocent people’s tails so that those people, like our neighbor’s cat, will lash out at whoever’s face is right in front of them. They want those people to see their own government as the enemy and to try to overthrow it.
>But people are smarter than cats. When people suddenly find food, clothing, medicine, and other goods in short supply, when they find themselves a lot poorer and focusing desperately on day-to-day survival, they will take the time to find out who is responsible. And guess what? They do find out. Although governments in embargoed countries like Iran, Iraq, and Cuba strictly control what newspapers, radio, and television report, one piece of information that is sure not to be censored is the role of outside governments in the country’s economic distress.
>Of course, those governments will exaggerate the harm done by the sanctions. Although socialism is what’s killing poor people in Cuba, for example, Fidel Castro has, for almost forty years, blamed Cuba’s economic problems on the “blockade,” his word for the embargo imposed by the U.S. government in the early 1960s. But he can plausibly make this claim because the embargo exists. Likewise, although much of the Iraqis’ pain is caused by Saddam Hussein’s diversion of resources to his war machine, the pain caused by economic sanctions is quite real.
>What do people in embargoed countries do when they find out that foreign governments threaten their survival? They want to do what the cat wouldn’t do: bite the hand or face of the perpetrator. In fact, I can think of no case in history where as a result of sanctions imposed by government A on people in country B, country B’s people overthrew their own government. It’s the stuff of novels, and not very good novels.
>To understand how people in embargoed countries feel, you will have to use your imagination. Picture yourself back in 1974. President Nixon’s popularity has hit bottom. Many Americans want him out, but he holds on. Now imagine that the head of a freer country—say, Switzerland—thinks Nixon is a vicious leader and imposes sanctions on us. Because of these sanctions, we can’t get medicine and we can’t feed our families adequately. We spend our days scraping for the basics we need to survive. (Of course this is implausible in the United States, which is why I said you would have to use your imagination.) Now ask yourself: Is your first thought that you should organize and try to overthrow the president?
>You can be sure that Saddam Hussein and Fidel Castro are not hurting for antibiotics or high-quality food.
>I bet it’s not. For one thing, you don’t have much of a shot at succeeding. The Nixon administration is probably in charge of allocating the scarce medicine and food. But more important, you’re furious with the Swiss government. “Who are they to interfere in our country’s affairs?” you ask. So if Nixon offers you a war against the Swiss infidels, you’re likely to say, “Hell, yes,” and postpone thoughts of getting rid of your president until you’ve gotten those foreign bums off your back. And that’s probably how Iraqis are feeling right now about the United States and other governments that are participating in the embargo.
>THE CAPITALISM VIRUS>Economic sanctions simply won’t spark a revolution. History has proved this. But that doesn’t mean that things are hopeless. There’s an alternative way to undercut the power of dictators: kill them with kind capitalism. End the embargo. Let foreign goods flow into Cuba, Iraq, and Iran, so that the people there can see the fruits of a free society. Of course, Fidel Castro and other dictators won’t necessarily let those goods in, but then at least they’ll be the ones who are seen as the bad guys. In his book Dismantling Utopia: How Information Ended the Soviet Union, Scott Shane, who was the Baltimore Sun’s Moscow correspondent from 1988 to 1991, writes that in the late 1980s private entrepreneurs in Moscow with VCRs and reels of wire set up primitive cable systems. Needing content, they often used American movies like Harry and the Hendersons. The result: Soviet citizens saw average Americans with nice houses, refrigerators, cars, and high-quality food, and they said, “I want.”
>An especially important element of this strategy is unrestricted international sales of personal computers. The more PCs there are in unfree countries, the greater the number of people who will be able to log on to the Internet and discover what free speech and a fairly free economy are all about.
>It’s true that the Chinese government, for example, requires Internet users to register with it. But there are only two ways China’s government can enforce its rules on content over the Internet: monitor on-line users or use filtering software to block prohibited material. Both methods, notes the February 7 issue of The Economist, are losing battles. Monitoring becomes much more difficult as the number of users multiplies: More than 250,000 PCs in China are connected to the Internet, and the government expects the number to reach 4 million within two years. And the professionals needed to write sophisticated filtering software are being lured away to more productive uses by the private sector. Moreover, even if filtering and monitoring could work, many Chinese would still see a lot of things on the Internet that would undercut oppression in China. Although CNN and Time’s web sites are currently blocked, The Economist’s, for one, is accessible.
>The genie is out of the bottle. Let it out in Cuba, Iraq, and everywhere else too. Let’s end embargoes and allow free trade.https://www.hoover.org/research/why-economic-sanctions-dont-work>>2468225Russia was captive under Westernizers for a long time even after Yeltsin until the SVO. They never wanted real confrontation with the west, the only thing they cared about was having a bare minimum of national sovereignty and access to their City of London bank accounts. Only in the past few years has the tendency against that West worship has faded somewhat, but even now it lingers.
And China was playing a game they called, "lay low and buy time". They went along with many shameful western initiatives knowing that it would be only a matter of time until the PRC was able to flip over the whole table instead of giving all of the cards away before any of the real work to create an alternative was done. Of course, now that groundwork is laid out and China is the vanguard of the international movement to circumvent Western financial institutions and thus render sanctions as harmless and they can possibly be.
>>2468333This is idiocy, both countries want to limit nuclear proliferation because it's in their own interest to do so, this is why they sanctionned North Korea and Iran, it works at disuasion for others, it's only recently that Russia dropped them because they desperetaly need foreign support for their war more than they need efforts against proliferation. When their little military adventure finishes it will be back to the previous strategy.
>>2468558This is a vast operation to produce nukes, you can only hide it so long before it'ts out of the bag and even if you can magically keep that under wrap until you reveal it you'll still get sanctionned (unless you're Israel) at which point your economy will take a big hit. Therefore the sanctions make a nuke program only worth it in an existencial risk situation.
>>2414001I actually believe the charts, the localities in China are broke, and there has to be defaults and repossessions. However:
https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/a/202412/18/WS67621ea0a310f1265a1d37c2.htmlThe Chinese state has net wealth between 140-240% of GDP, that's even after 130% of GDP augmented debt is factored in.
The debt crisis is not about the Chinese state in general, but about Chinese localities and the accumulation of debt. The Chinese likely have 10 years to fix the debt crisis before it blows, and Chinese localities can be assumed to be broke for all intents and purposes, but the Chinese center and SOEs are rich.
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