Originally Posted by
rube
"Who will stand up to them?"
Probably no one, as long as the shipping lanes stay open. The Chinese always act out of a playbook that chases policy objectives that won't reach fruition for decades, maybe a hundred years. I don't think they are stupid enough to want a shooting war that would quickly sweep up everyone in the region.
They want something. They can get it through diplomacy, but diplomacy is not an option if no one is afraid of you. They have a gun in one hand, and the other is beckoning everyone to be reasonable.
All true, especially the long-term view. They don't WANT an armed conflict, the question is how far are they going to push our military and economic allies in the region? Probably as far as they can get away with, which depends on the political climate in the west...and their ability to correctly assess where the red-lines lie (I'm talking about real red-lines, not the ones employed by the current administration which are simply points of debarkation for retreat).