Simon1
Gold Member
- Jun 11, 2015
- 12,192
- 56,929
- Primary Interest:
- Other
Maybe he was a "Vegetarian"
Follow along with the video below to see how to install our site as a web app on your home screen.
Note: This feature may not be available in some browsers.
Tintin Treasure wrote (snip)
There are very good reasons why China has never quite gotten the nerve to get their feet wet crossing the strait to invade Taiwan. According to a recent study by a respected group, the best scenario (for China) has them able to put one million men ashore in Taiwan, assuming zero US, Japanese, Philippino etc intervention on behalf of Taiwan. They would then face the 2.5 million men Taiwan can call up on short notice. The Chinese invasion fleet would also have to slip by the Taiwanese submarines, anti ship missiles and thread their way through the belts of mines the Taiwanese have laid which are in some places ten layers thick. At the shore, the fun just begins because Taiwan has been preparing against this day for decades and can make Iwo Jima look like a cake walk. The biggest threat to the defense of Taiwan is the morale of their own troops, which has been suffering some due to the constant drumbeat of "inevitability" of China invading and conquering the small island nation. If they but stop to consider what their own defenses can do, they would be far more confident of their ability to make any such crossing extremely costly and apt to end disastrously for China.
Side thing but China has also to worry about the various parts of 'China' like Xinjiang and Tibet, Inner Mongolia and of course Hong Kong, any of which could suddenly erupt in rebellion against the Communist dictatorship. In fact China could literally fall apart like the Soviet Union because it is an empire including a number of conquered states full of non-Chinese people longing to be free of the Chinese yoke. Anyway there are very considerable reasons why China has not been loading the troops onto the merchant ships to cross to Taiwan (they don't have enough actual landing craft and would need to requisition some or most of their fleet of merchant shipping to do the job) even if the USA were not supporting Taiwan at all.
Please do continue,
TT yes I agree with you but one thing I have learned you cannot let those possibilities impede your goals and ambitions. They will happen come what may if the winds of fate do so decide. Is is beyond our powers to change things......Until then Amigos all ya need is a horizon to look to and a fair wind to steer by.....
How down ya escape a storm sail close to wind and sail strait and hard.... Learned that with Kanacki down in the roaring forties.
Crow
Sorry tintin, that was Oroblanco that posted.
I knew the China when they defected to Formosa, in fact they offered me a job with the Chinese National Airlines. In those days Peking was considered a non - Chinese males paradise, everything was for sale, even a girl's virtue. I wonder whatever happened to Tony Brovchenko ? I often ate my lunch under the tree on Coal Hill, where the last of thr Mings hung himself. I spent quite a bit of time in the forbidden City alone, I could ramble on for hours about pre-communist China, I loved it
Crow, I used to stay at the Wagonlita hotel on the central Plaza. I believe that it is called the Tinian square now. I remember the first time I checked in. They had an open elevator to the second floor. There were an unusual no of easy chairs all looking in at the elevator. when I asked the clerk at the desk, why ?, he smirkingly told me to wait until about 5 then and I would see for myself.. Come about 5 all of the easy chairs were occupied by retired planters. They would sit there while the Chinese girls with their split skirts went up in the Elevator. They would follow them with their eyes., you could easily imagine what they were seeing / thinking. When I checked into my room, a busboy carried my suitcase, then proceeded to lay out my uniforms, then casually asked me if I wanted a . Blond, Brunette, or a red-headed girl. When I turned his offer down, then he asked "perhaps I would prefer a young, fat boy? ugh! This was an accepted way of life then, I took a jinrickshaw to a restaurant for an exquisite shrimp dinner. Wth a full tummy I then had second thoughts on the busboy's offer , For me it was an easy life, but for the Chinese, it was a nightmare, with the Cummunixfs literally at the front gates. I understand things went very badly about a week later.
buy I waa back in Tsingtao then.
Hello TT
Its an amazing quirk of history. Its like today Japan sailing with USA, Australia, Canada as allies in the the Pacific Rimpac exercises there mainly to counter Chinese ambitions.
Crow