Answering Harley: China

I'm getting to think that answering Harley's questions may turn into a regular task here on Thus Saith The Fly; that's a good thing, though, because Harley asks good questions. Here's the latest:

OK lets go a bit further, lets say that the US and China get into a shooting war over [Taiwan], you can expect the moonbats to do their thing.
However, What a bout the T-bills that China has bought up? I know that Japan has more, but if China tries to sell them short,??? well crap I'm not to good at this Whole world macro economics. But they could defiantly put us in a Wringer.

I hope you are right about the Average American knowing that China is areal threat.
Maybe that will get some people more supportive of a missile defense system.

I also wonder, IF the EU drops the Weapons sale ban on China, and some time down the line a US ship catches another Exeocet or French made missiles in its side.... what would the eventual reaction be?

Now, I'll be the first to admit that my knowledge of international economics is lousy; mostly, it consists of knowing that the Chinese government is buying dollars like it's going out of style, knowing a little bit about why the dollar has taken a hit in the past couple of years, and having experience with changing money when I lived and travelled in Europe.

I'm not real worried about China actually using a nuclear weapon against us, or even Taiwan. They want Taiwan intact; to the Chinese, nuking Taiwan would be about like President Bush giving the order to nuke Alaska. The missile defense system is less about the Chinese or Russians firing on us, and more about a rogue Russian general, terrorists, or (most likely) a rogue nation like North Korea.

If another Exocet missile hit an American ship, I think the reaction would have a lot to do with how the president at the time phrased his remarks of reaction. A good president would give all of the facts: the American government attempted diplomatically to prevent E.U. nations from selling advanced weapons to China, but that those nations were not directly responsible for the hit. Of course, this is all based on an assumed shooting war with China over Taiwan; the best bet the Chinese have is to completely circumvent the United States in such an endeavour and try to pass it off as A) completely legal due to Taiwan's illegal status (which is absolute nonsense) and B) within their sphere of influence as a sovereign state (which is also absolute nonsense).

If China attempted an invasion of Taiwan, it would be a very high profile situation, and the news media would give it a lot of coverage; it would probably be similar to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990. I think you'd have a much higher probability of overwhelming international support (like you had for Gulf War I, with the exception of Senator Kerry).

And, as you pointed out, China has more to lose from a war with us than we have to lose from one with them.