I’m sure Xi is beyond having his feelings hurt by Biden, but just look at Bilken’s reaction lmao.

Inviting a head of state to your country to publicly insult them is unacceptable anywhere, so this is only going to further tarnish the shitty reputation of American diplomacy.

  • heartheartbreak [fae/faer]@hexbear.netEnglish
    109·
    8 months ago

    Biden’s reason doesn’t even make any sense

    Well you see here jack he’s the leader of a country with a totally different style of government than ours

    Barely even paraphrasing lmfao this guy’s brain is swiss cheese

    • usernamesaredifficul [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
      45·
      8 months ago

      well Trump’s zero sum game everything is a negotiation attitude would genuinely help here.

      he might think Xi is a dictator but he also wouldn’t give a shit either way

      • EnsignRedshirt [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
        3·
        8 months ago

        The benefit of Trump over Biden as a president is that there’s always a chance that Trump accidentally does something good out of vanity or incompetence or laziness, whereas Biden will always follow the same playbook that continues to make everything terrible. Like, I could easily see Trump hearing about the pro-Palestinian protests and saying something off-the-cuff that criticizes Israel or is supportive of Palestine, because he doesn’t actually care either way except insofar as it affects what people say about him in the moment.

    • Tankiedesantski [he/him]@hexbear.netOPEnglish
      56·
      8 months ago

      The one thing they seemed to get was resumption of direct military to military hotlines. Not sure how useful that’s gonna be if they piss the Chinese side off though. Not hard to order the generals to pick up the phone, listen to the yank, then say “okay” and hang up.

      • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
        56·
        8 months ago

        It’s definitely useful for when the americans are doing their stupidly fucking dangerous freedom of navigation missions through chinese territory. During these missions the US ships have to turn off various monitoring equipment among other things. It’s so fucking easy for one or the other side to misinterpret one another if they ever do something they’re not expected to do in those situations, without communication they will default to assuming the worst and that’s where it gets hairy, everyone starts shooting, and then everyone else in the region starts shooting because everyone is shooting. Launch after launch will happen because there’s no de-escalation channel or way to just say “shit that was a mistake we’re sorry” when something actually goes wrong.

        Imagine when a ship gets spooked, does something unexpected, then some scrambled jets get shot down, then even more shit happens, and every single asset in the region just acts independently based on the information they have at hand (the ship/jets nearest to me just got blown up, we should release our payload into the target). It’s a huge cascade.

        Communication really matters to avoid this.

        • nat_turner_overdrive [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
          50·
          8 months ago

          Conversely, if you know China isn’t taking your calls, you have no choice but to avoid large provocations. I think refusing the back channels and forcing US foreign policy to be all out in the open was a good tactic.

          • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
            20·
            8 months ago

            You don’t need to do large provocations for this cascade to occur. Freedom of navigation operations have the potential to spiral out of control extremely easily.

            This video poses this scenario very well: https://youtu.be/vJXWJ-Px5tU

            I don’t necessarily agree with all the interpretations of effectiveness of weapons/missiles etc in this video, but as an example of how officers in charge of each of these assets will act independently on incomplete information about the situation it’s a very realistic example of how this shit could cascade on a complete misunderstanding. The particularly interesting part of this begins at 6:00 but the lead up is important in establishing the list of assets in the region in the scenario. An emergency phonecall in this situation would have resulted in the US knowing “this is a mock attack as an exercise, not a real one” and the spark that lights this cascade of events would not have happened. But without that phonecall, the training exercise jets are shot down, and what follows is a cascade of events leading to devastating losses of both sides as every existing asset interprets the nearby events as existential and releases their full capabilities. Whether the interpretations of the effect of these jets/missiles are correct is not really relevant compared to understanding how this cascade could easily happen from routine exercises that happen regularly without a line of communication.

            • AlyxMS [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
              16·
              8 months ago

              Can’t believe I watched the whole thing, god the entire video is so… masturbatory.

              • PL-15, literally the newest A2A missile ever fielded and a significant kinematic advantage over AIM-120. Nope, can barely score two hits with a 20 missile salvo. Also always launched from max range to minimize chance to hit I guess.

              • PL-12, estimated to be equal to AIM-120C. Scored like 1 hit after a 100 something missile salvo.

              • AIM-120D, don’t ever misses, downs dozens upon dozens of aircrafts while barely taking losses. “Once again proves the united states’s advantage in missile technology”.

              • Evasive maneuvers against modern A2A missiles: If the F-18s do it, it always works, 98% effectiveness against anything. If the flankers do it, it never works. They might as well be flying straight, would have the same results.

              • Missile salvo of 30 sea skimming cruise missile toward a carrier: All intercepted, no problem.

              • A small salvo of Harpoons, pretty much the most obsolete ship to ship missile still in service, okay the 054A made a valiant effort but can’t intercept them all. Also the CIWS can do nothing against a subsonic target.

              • DF-21D. From the late 2000s and highly experimental. Not perfected until DF-17 and 26 from recent years. Functions flawlessly at max range and we only lost the carrier due to this wunderwaffe.

              • Okay we lost but we are against overwhelming odds also we intentionally placed multiple handicaps on ourselves. And we still had an exchange ratio of like 1:50.

              • Everyone in comments: OMG this simulation is so accurate! But as a navy man here we would’ve never had those handicaps and we would’ve totally wreaked havoc on their obsolete military guys.

              This thing had the plot of a top gun movie but is presented like a simulation done to the last detail. Just… strange. Gives off a big “elite waffen SS against soviet human wave attacks” energy.

              • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
                14·
                8 months ago

                Yeah it’s absolutely masturbatory, I did warn about the estimates being off. It’s interesting in that it’s a pretty fair estimate of how these assets might react in such a situation though.

                • AlyxMS [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
                  10·
                  8 months ago

                  The video of course. CIWS is literally built for those. I don’t think it’s simulated at all in the video. But once again I think the 054A only had a single one of them? So maybe it wouldn’t have mattered much.

            • nat_turner_overdrive [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
              8·
              8 months ago

              I mean, isn’t the danger part of the point? If it’s very risky to do stupid shit like playing “i’m not touching you” with chinese waters because you can’t just call the chinese and say “hey this extremely threatening thing we’re doing is just for kicks, don’t worry”, you’re less likely to play dangerous games. Forcing the duplicitous Americans to show their cards publicly for any communications is the best deterrent.

        • zephyreks [none/use name]@hexbear.netEnglish
          32·
          8 months ago

          US FONOPS are actually insane. They broke the decades-old status quo that established the Taiwan Strait as Chinese territorial waters under the CPC-KMT consensus.

    • usernamesaredifficul [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
      26·
      8 months ago

      I heard they did get the Chinese to stop supplying the chemicals used to make fentanyl to Mexico. (as I understand it previously Chinese companies were selling chemicals that have legitimate and legal industrial uses in larger quantities than the legal market can support, similar to how American gun manufacturors make 40% more guns than the legal gun market can support)

  • egg1918 [she/her]@hexbear.net
    English
    67·
    8 months ago

    Really think they’re fucking up by reopening the military communications link. I guess China has to to show they’re the reasonable party, but the US is just going to do what they were already doing. That is, ratcheting up tensions as much as possible whenever it suits them (pelosi fucking off to Taiwan for personal gain, that whole weather balloon embarrassment) then privately calling the PLA to say don’t worry bro it’s no biggie we promise. And then a month later doing it all again. I just don’t see what China has to gain apart from the initial PR boost.

    • Yiazmat@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
      60·
      8 months ago

      that whole weather balloon embarrassment

      speaking of that, even though the US has openly admitted that the balloon wasn’t a surveillance device and didn’t collect any data, just yesterday my local news station was still calling it a “spy balloon” lol

      • Water Bowl Slime@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
        47·
        8 months ago

        Yeah I’ve noticed that here too. It seems like the final stage of disinfo is for people to repeat the lie on their own without any outside influence. It’s the same deal with the Uyghur thing - official government sources dropped the narrative ages ago, but you’ll still hear it repeated as if it were historical fact from journalists, influencers, redditors, etc.

        • porcupine@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
          44·
          8 months ago

          Russiagate was comprehensively debunked by years of bipartisan congressional investigations, and yet the idea that Vladimir Putin personally overthrew the United States government and will again unless militarily removed from power is still hegemonic among American liberals. 25 years of celebrating peaceful coexistence with the “triumph of liberal democracy” in Russia and overnight they’re all Joe McCarthy swearing an eternal crusade against the hated Muscovite.

          Rather than instant and comprehensive systems of brainwashing, I think this is better understood as licensing American settlers to unleash their preexisting white supremacist worldview onto a politically acceptable target. "Correcting the disinformation " doesn’t eliminate the bigotry, because the disinformation didn’t put it there. The “disinformation”, even when they know it’s bullshit, is just a social signal that they’ll no longer be stigmatized for saying what they’ve always wanted to believe.

          • egg1918 [she/her]@hexbear.net
            English
            27·
            8 months ago

            I couldn’t agree more with that second paragraph. I think you’ll enjoy this article very much https://redsails.org/masses-elites-and-rebels/. All this propaganda just gives the settlers a veil to spew their hate from behind. Chuds don’t really need it because they’re chuds, but it gives the liberals an excuse to be just as disgusting - only they’ll dress it up in smug, condescending language.

            • porcupine@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
              19·
              8 months ago

              That article is what I’m shamelessly regurgitating here. It really resonated with me, and now I see it everywhere.

          • Water Bowl Slime@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
            13·
            8 months ago

            Ya I don’t think libs are brainwashed either. I read that red sails essay too and I agree with it but idk what better word there is to describe this. Bigotry permit? Hate pass?

              • Water Bowl Slime@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
                2·
                8 months ago

                I can’t see it catching on. I mean, have you ever seen anyone here use the term (other than to define it)?

                “The US is running a licensing campaign against Russia.”

                “These people have all been licensed.”

                “Dude shut it with the Uyghur shit, you’re super licensed.”

                It just doesn’t fit right in anything other than an academic context.

                • alicirce@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
                  5·
                  8 months ago

                  Accusing someone of being “brainwashed” isn’t, as far as I have seen, so rhetorically effective that I think we need a drop-in replacement like “hate-passed.” If “you’re super licensed” sounds silly it’s because “you’re super brainwashed” is also silly.

                  What about:

                  “Do you actually believe that nonsense or does it just give you license to discount the incredible social progress China has made?”

                  I think the post earlier in this thread used it well. They’re not defining the term, they’re explaining the phenomenon. Because it uses a familiar term, it is easy to understand and doesn’t read jargony:

                  I think this is better understood as licensing American settlers to unleash their preexisting white supremacist worldview onto a politically acceptable target.

                  Rejecting the term “brainwashing” means not only improving our understanding of how propaganda works but also improving our rhetoric.

      • NewAcctWhoDis [any]@hexbear.netEnglish
        18·
        8 months ago

        If I remember the articles correctly, they never denied it being a surveillance device, just that it transmitted (collected?) any data. So the running media story was “spy balloon that wasn’t actively spying”. That raises the question of “why?”, but libs never seemed to bother with that one.

  • Awoo [she/her]@hexbear.netEnglish
    58·
    8 months ago

    The way he says this makes me think there’s probably a whole school of thought in the establishment ghoul circles that revolves around wording things in specific ways that translators will soften or “interpret” in a way that makes them sound not as bad in alternate languages.

  • 小莱卡@lemmygrad.mlEnglish
    571·
    8 months ago

    “he is the leader of a communist country, anyways lets move on” thats what he said lmao, fucking children politics.

  • Mindfury [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    461·
    8 months ago

    begging Xi to clap back with “you could say the same about Biden, but you’d be wrong; he doesn’t even run his country, the CEOs are the dictators”