Quote:
Originally Posted by Penn
Prediction: imo, Putin is going to invade, and even money on China acting on its long term goal. Two different AO, Two superpowers acting in concert, the world will change overnight and there is nothing that the west can do to prevent this strategic move.
Especially, after 20 years in SWA and the ME. The west is playing with fire and is about to get burnt.
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I hold a contrary view.
Russia will likely stay beneath the threshold of conventional war because going overtly kinetic is really bad for business.
Most Russian export earnings are from energy, and most Russian government income is from energy royalties.
Most Russian energy is exported to the EU.
Most of that is sold to NATO member states, with Germany reliant on Russia for 37% of its energy needs.
The mafia tend to view war, especially involving customers and cash flow, is bad for business.
Very early in Ronald Reagan’s first term was a battle to stop NATO from enriching its stated adversary with the proposed Soviet pipeline to Western Europe.
Reagan used up a lot of political capital to successfully disrupt it contributing to the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Unfortunately, Reagan didn’t win the war, just the battle. The pipeline was only delayed.
Putin is likely to successfully win a battle of a thousand cuts beneath the threshold of conventional war and once again gain primary influence over much of Eastern Europe.
Germany is sitting on the sidelines because they are dependent on Russian energy and were geopolitically dumb and nuke when they shut down their commercial nuclear reactors post Fukushima.
China can’t conduct a forcible entry in Taiwan without guaranteeing the destruction. of the Chinese economy, here’s why:
China’s biggest single import(more than energy or food) is semiconductors, mostly from Taiwan, with 100% of advanced semiconductors coming from one company in Taiwan, TSMC.
If PLA tried to seize TSMC chip fabs they could be easily and instantly sabotaged or vaporized by a single B2 strike.
They would be left with fabs that produce 0% yield out to infinity or smoking craters and the $350 billion of silicon imports would create at least 10X that in lost economic output, so economic depression.
That’s why China is investing $100B in silicon and approx the same is being invested in Arizona and Ohio.
For the US and China to eliminate their existential reliance on Taiwanese silicon will take the US 10 years, $500B, and 50K high educated folks with very special skillsets.
China will need twice as long, twice as much, and twice the skilled people(due to lack of semicon equipment ecosystem).
In both cases, Russia and China are likely to stay non-kinetic but keep the tension high beneath the threshold of war.
Beijing Olympic(next week) prestige matters to China, as does the international introduction of the Digital Yuan(at the Olympics).
I believe we are already at war, but warfare that will likely stay beneath the threshold of conventional war.