Wednesday 18 January 2017

WW3 - A Horrifying New Year Vision



2016 was a black swan year to many. Fortunately, “realism” (interchangeably aka “cynicism” in our brave new world) helped me to anticipate Brexit (http://guo-du.blogspot.hk/2015/10/her-majesty-and-commies.html) and Trump (http://guo-du.blogspot.hk/2016/03/trump-for-president.html), thereby sparing me a couple of unpleasant surprises.

Amidst happy wishes, 2017 begins noisily with more frantic beating of the war drum by — well, who else? Though nothing new, the rhythm has become desperate and erratic. Facing its own “regime change” phantasmagorically claimed to have been orchestrated by Russia, the pitifully vulnerable Empire seems even more irascible and capricious than usual, no longer bothering to dress up its contempt for fairness and rationality.


There are plenty of talks about a military showdown between the US and China, as if it were a much awaited new war-game app. Some analysts sound like desperate salesmen from the military industrial complex (MIC). Others, emboldened by the pivotal positions which they would soon hold, sound outright deranged. Happy New Year!


Nearly all of these propositions envisage a military conflict with China through a predominantly Western lens. This bias is understandable, since most wars in the past century had been choreographed by Western powers, according to their military traditions and objectives. But in a conflict with China, it would be prudent to include a little “common sense” with Chinese characteristics, in order to make the horrifying picture more complete.

First of all, why would there be a war? And what for? 


中美大戰:一個恐怖的新年臆想

 


2016年誕下幾只黑天鵝後,已隨時光溜走。幸而我思想逆行,一早對英國脫歐 (英女皇與共產黨 http://guo-du.blogspot.hk/2015/10/blog-post.html) 和特朗普當選 (我也來撐特朗普
http://guo-du.blogspot.hk/2016/03/blog-post.html) 的可能性做了心理準備,省卻了一份驚奇。但2017年的開始,並不顯得平靜。美國的戰鼓越擂越響,連聽慣了的人也覺心寒。而帝國的戰爭機器,似乎失了方向,姿態更急躁野蠻。

有關「中美決戰」 的文章和「智庫」報告突然多了起來。有些報告看似軍工業銷售部的建議書。有些狂言瘋語,更來自即將身負要職的帝國重臣。John Pilger 的紀錄片 The Coming War On China 「即將到來的對華戰爭」,是罕有的客觀警世之作(https://movie.douban.com/subject/26929113/)。不過大部分的分析,不論立場,都以西方軍事傳統來看這場潛在的災難性衝突,而忽略了中國人對戰爭的看法。

第一個基本問題是:中美無端端為何打仗呢?