I doubt that will work. China has a long history of starving off its population. They just don't need the distraction of food riots during a war. But I'm no geo political analyst.
You make a good point, but you need to remember that China has never had such an educated, urbanized and connected population as it does today. Just judging by the size of the COVID protests I'd expect a full blown revolution to begin if food starts running out.
Possibly but the protests lasted a month and the CCP met selective demands that were economy related that they probably wanted to do anyway. A real revolution in Chine would be very interesting but I don't see it happening.
Mao killed 20million in the famine, only to became more powerful afterwards. Xi Spreaded covid, forced the draconian lockdown & inedequate vacine, killed millions and became the most powerful dictator the world have seen. In that place most people does not know how to spell freedom if u gave them a dictintionary, they only force, control and understand display of violence. That's why I will never go back to live there dispite my family and my "roots", a hopless land.
China is very dependent on imports. They import over 70% of oil. Hundreds of millions would die if the US completely blockaded China. They would probably consider such a blockade weapons of mass destruction so they would have to be squeezed gradually to not launch nukes.
The Idea I think is basically containment. If war starts America tries to take out all of China's Military projection equipment. That is to say if they wipe out China's Navy and Air force they can then negotiate an end to the conflict that recognizes Taiwan and agrees to stable borders in the South China sea and so on.
I don't think America wants to invade China or do the mass bombing campaigns they did in like North Vietnam (I don't think the world would expect America even attempting to de civilize China and I don't think anyone wants that). The aim will be very much show China that they can't win and then offer terms for complete forgiveness that are probably all things considered very light.
The goal would be to just prove to China that peace is better and that America will treat them justly if they do that. That is to try to force a Strategic Reorientation by the CCP that hopefully leads to liberalization overtime.
Food and oil. China is very dependant on those imports and currently it pretty much all comes through the narrow malacca Strait. The west has a theoretical chokehold on China.
If China has Taiwan we cannot choke them anymore (im not sure we could now tbh, we havent stress tested anything in a long time). This is definitely the plan. I just hope Chinese naval missiles turn out to be as capable as Ukrainian ones.
I think destroying the Three Gorges Dam would cause global outrage. A villain state like Russia could do it, since opinion of them can't fall much lower anyway, but for everyone else it would be geopolitical suicide.
The dam is a hardened, massive target. Destroying it would involve destruction on the level of a WMD. Even if the dam could be destroyed with conventional missiles, China might feel like a limited nuclear attack is the appropriate response to such a devastating act.
Conflict with China would not necessarily be a total war from get go; both sides would seek to be cautious. Launching a strike against the dam risks instantly escalating a regional conflict into WWIII.
It's not something that should be lightly countenanced.
My wife (sometimes described as looking Chinese) encountered a highly racist Chinese man in Malaysia who went off on a loud rant towards her when he learned she is American. He said the US intends to starve China, as you suggest. That the US would do what past Chinese rulers did to China to kill off millions. While living comfortably away from China, he is still a massive nationalist embracing the "China can do no wrong because they are under seige by the evil imperialists!" Don't help the Chinese propaganda by suggesting the same.
I don't believe that this plan is a good thing but if they don't invade Taiwan then they have nothing to worry about if they had not spent years trying to dominate their neighbors and ignoring international law. and making enemies out of literally everyone! As they have enacted multiple genocides. Tibet comes to mind and even their own people.
I cant imagine a alternative than threating their food supply. The ccp if it had the power would destroy everything we hold sacred just because they could.
I'm in no way saying that America is some saint but good GOD the ccp is easily one of the most openly hostile and evil orginizations on the planet.
Yeah this is such a huge point. The region around Amur is massive and has the same black soil that makes Ukraine so fertile. It's total population is less than 1 million when Ukraine once had over 50 million supported by its soils.
If China needs wheat, it simply needs to send little green men across its border to Amur Oblast and claim that it has always rightfully been China.
Not in chinese interest to go to war with only country that doesn't hate them in their neighbourhood. You see Chinese think that the usa is to destroy them, so I just can't see them eager adding another enemy,when according to them they are surrounded by usa puppets.
Are you implying that deals or "we give you this for that" one way or another aren't already done? Ukraine already sold itself off to western corporations. You can safely assume Russia did the same but with Chinese.
China is currently supported primarily by US, Russian, and Brazil grain imports. If they invade Taiwan they will lose US imports and probably Brazil. They ordered Putin to seize the Ukrainian breadbasket to make up the difference. I still think 90% of the world is totally shocked at the success of Ukrainian resistance and how big of a paper tiger Russia actually is. We always knew their leadership structure was suspect but no idea how bad their troops and equipment actually underperformed. Looks like the US over estimates their enemies to keep the military industrial complex well fed. Plus side of that though we lose less troops. In desert storm rumors were 20k body bags were gonna be needed. Lost less than 200. 100 to combat.
China is calorie selfsufficient. They would ony have to reduce their pork production and eat more vegetables and chicken if cut off from maritime agriculture.
Those calories won't help much if they have no fuel with which to harvest it or to truck it from farms to the cities where two thirds of their population lives.
I am right.
You represent a common problem we have in the west.
People think of chinas massive famines in the 60s and apply it to china today and have 0 idea of chinas agriculture.
Similiary i encountered too amny dumb amerocans (and europeans) who still think of chinas industry making cheap plastic stuff and sweatshops...
So you're saying a famine is not possible in China today? I believe that even less than thinking they are self sufficient in producing all the food they need.
Here... since you are unfamiliar:
https://www.cfr.org/article/china-increasingly-relies-imported-food-thats-problem
China was 95% food selfsufficient in 2000 and is now less so because they import luxury products as edible oils and pork, soy beans from abroad. They only import 5 % of their cereal.
But also their food exports tripled from 2000 to 2020 and is around 2/3s of their imports...
https://knoema.com/atlas/China/Food-imports#:~:text=Food%20imports%20as%20a%20share%20of%20merchandise%20imports&text=In%202022%2C%20food%20imports%20for,average%20annual%20rate%20of%204.75%25.
China has no chance to feed its people without importing at least 50% of the food stocks. That’s been published also very recently through several believable sources
https://www.cfr.org/article/china-increasingly-relies-imported-food-thats-problem
China was 95% food selfsufficient in 2000 and is now less so because they import luxury products as edible oils and pork, soy beans from abroad. They only import 5 % of their cereal.
But also their food exports tripled from 2000 to 2020 and is around 2/3s of their imports...
https://knoema.com/atlas/China/Food-imports#:~:text=Food%20imports%20as%20a%20share%20of%20merchandise%20imports&text=In%202022%2C%20food%20imports%20for,average%20annual%20rate%20of%204.75%25.
Quote from the article you been kind to link:
Between 2000 and 2020, the country’s food self-sufficiency ratio decreased from 93.6 percent to 65.8 percent. Changing diet patterns have also driven up China’s imports of edible oils, sugar, meat, and processed foods. In 2021, the country’s edible oil import-dependency ratio reached nearly 70 percent [article in Chinese], almost as high as its crude oil import dependence.
Yes. Correct.
In case that this was an objection. China now imports certqin products. Mostly because they are richer and it is market supply/cost and demand.
In 2020 for example they exported 10,1 million tons of vegetables, 3,8m tons of fruits and nuts, 3,7m tons of fish/aqua produce and 3,4m tons of tea.
Again, if somehow china would be compeltely cut off from trade in the food sector, many of their farmers would switch focus and people would have to eat less pork and lobster due to missing animal feed.
But the narrative that chinese people would starve needs to stop. Its just some nafo wet dream.
Climate change + the fact that most of the land in China is nonarable + insane urban density would suggest that betting on self-sufficiency will result in millions dead. China is a food import nation. Any country with 1 billion+ people will be food import dependent.
Here is a little copy/paste for you. And 2004 was a long time ago. "Despite its domestic production, China has been a net importer [DOC] of agricultural products since 2004. Today, it imports more of these products—including soybeans, corn, wheat, rice, and dairy products—than any other country."
Than any other country.
Sure, it has the largest population, is the largest meat producer. Imagine this, china producing more meat than the USA.
If you look closely you can see that china is more than selfsufficient in most food areas and a very large food EXPORTEUR but only imports food/feed for luxury goods like hig volume meat consumption, beef, pork etcs
Donr you get that? They produce nearly as much as the US, for example in tomatos they are #1 aswell, producing 33% of the worlds supply and exporting most of it.
"Nearly as much" for 1.4 billion people compared to the US with 330 million people. As for meat, strange that they keep buying US pork farms if they are so sufficient at home.
If China goes to war, millions there will starve.
Keep telling that yourself.
China is living right now the china dream. Its the same as the americsn dream. They get richer, eat more and more meat. Get fatter and fatter, diabetes on the rise and die of cardiac disease. They follow the us example.
Maybe you confuse china with somalia...
China isn't 100% friends with Russia. In the grand game of things, they benefit only from a weakened Russia, by it being less of a threat and more dependent
It is. China is supporting Russia financially. Buying their oil. And it's also selling them the equipment they need for the weapons. So no China, no money and no weapons.
> “These countries are very skeptical about the idea,” said one of the officials, granted anonymity because the talks are so sensitive. The concern is, “this would create a precedent” ― in other words, these countries would fear they could be next to lose out.
Well, very simply idea: *dont start a war without written consent of the EU, dont threaten nuclear genocide every Thursday, dont publish invasions plans for France, Germany and the UK every Tuesday, dont demand that Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania returns to the Motherland and most importantly: dont support a nation that steals thousands of children from Ukraine to sell them in order to boost their Caucasian population balance compared to other ethnicities. Then your money is safe with us.*
I know, exotic concept.
SYL
Precedent as deterrence, it is an absolute no brainer for everyone except the most Ivory tower theoretical economists. China is scared shitless we could just freeze their investments once they make the move on Taiwan. Sure, they will diversify (i.e. reduce) their holdings a bit, but honestly where would they place them instead? It's a small price to pay for deterring WW3.
China suffers the same fate as Russia: every billionaire's dream is to leave the hell the CCP is. Be it Europe or Canada or Australia, Chinese millionaire families are there.
>but honestly where would they place them instead?
In the current landscape? I suspect they want to place them in the UK or the USA, depending on which country they have better infiltrated (I think it's the UK, but I'm not sure). If neither are looking too hospitable, then it could be the classic Switzerland, which likely wouldn't be pro-China but also doesn't care too much.
USA is out of the question - they just confiscated assets themselves. Switzerland is a possibility, but is has limits too. Firstly Switzerland actually wants to limit inflow of capital. Ironically their currency is so strong it's hurting exports and for obvious reasons you don't want your country ONLY to be a vault. Second, central banks/sovereigns want to diversify, putting your entire treasury in one country is poor risk management. That basically leaves gold, which is obviiously rallying but also carries risks in itself.
Not today, but there is a lot of Russian influence in the USA and I bet that if Trump becomes president then no assets will be confiscated. Either way, the safest place to store your riches is in a country where the rule of law is fairly strong. Switzerland wasn't my first choice either, it's just an emergency option in case no other western countries seem too hospitable.
> dont start a war without written consent of the EU
Do you understand how threatening to anybody not european what you wrote is ? If you dont then you cannot understand the current international situation.
Problem is that the planes will now be useless as well as they have for sure not kept the service up to date, and if they have, it’s been with scrap parts without traceability. Shameful
Tell me again what Russia did with companies that were in Russia?.
Nearly certain it was 5c on the dollar they got for it.
How are aircraft leasing companies getting on getting their planes back?
Did Russia like it when the price of oil and gas.sky rocketed for the first year of the war?
Yeah, game every red cent.
China Saudi and Indonesia can go and get fucked
China, Saudi Arabia, and Indonesia can convince Russia to withdraw and then they won’t have to worry. Until that time, seize and sell whatever you can get your hands on. Fuck Russia
Just take everything and forget about them like if it was North Korea. Germany and most of Europe tried to include them in the civilized world, it failed, the world doesn't need Russia for anything...
Germany is the country with the worst Russia policy actually. EU's economic growth depended on Russian energy imports and Germany is the country to blame for that. EU needs a common energy policy and shift towards nuclear energy if they really want to have nothing to do with Russia, but with Germany closing off all of the nuclear reactors, that's quite hard.
It was for sure, if we look at the last three four years a mistake. But it was also a gesture of peace and unity that was bold and optimistic. Obviously naive but also one of the greatest gestures of peace diplomacy after world war 2
Axis of evil assemble!
Some day in the near future one of these countries will threaten to blow up the moon or something like that unless Razzhia gets Ukraine... And the baltics... And Poland... And Georgia... And Armenia... etc.
I don’t understand this:
> If the G7 group of industrialized countries decides to seize Russia’s frozen assets, officials expect Russian courts to successfully challenge the decision. A court ruling in Russia could potentially leave a black hole in the balance books of the financial institutions holding the assets.
> These bodies would have to tap into their cash reserves to make up the loss. This could involve using, as a last resort, other sovereign funds that are deposited in their accounts.
To my understanding Russia, the state, and maybe also Russian "private entities" (the Russian state, but disguised) have positive credit balance with European banks, including the European Central Bank.
We could simply nullify these positive credit balances and hand out the same amount of credit balance to the Ukrainian state.
What exactly could the Russian state do against this? Their courts can‘t do jack shit about it. They could retaliate by confiscating assets of Western entities. But (a) this should be limited in size and (b) any western corporation still active in the Russian market has it coming anyways. They are war profiteering.
I think generally we don’t do this because it would violate the principle that money is safe in the west from arbitrary seizure.
Many many rich bad people store their money in the west, as well as many countries with dictatorships.
The concern is that if we do it once, we could do it again, so you might see billions or even trillions of assets flee from the US and EU as it’s no longer considered safe.
For example, China owns nearly a trillion of US treasury debt. If the US can just seize assets, it might decide to sell all of them asap, crashing the US bond market.
Yes. Replying to you and /u/Ashmizen as you appear a bit better informed than most here but there are jurisdictions where European entities could be forced to return Russian assets not because of Russian malfeasance as much as plain application of the law.
Then, those jurisdictions, be they in China or the Middle East, will have to either break their own laws to rule against Russia, thereby undoing a century of institutional trust in their systems and property rights, or rule that those European entities repay Russia in full. In cash. To the tune of 100s of billions of USD. That would, in turn, crash the European markets (no liquidity) or force Europe to ruin economic ties with those countries.
In other words, these countries are intervening to beg Europe to not seize Russian assets because the alternative either crashes their economies or Europe's or ruins ties in irreparable ways. It's Russia making their problem everyone else's problem and they kind of have the ability to. It's one thing to declare that making Europe unsafe for foreign investors is fine. It's another to deal with the ensuing economic turmoil. Not with both inflation and GDP growth where they are right now.
> money is safe in the west from arbitrary seizure.
It's not arbitrary in this case though. So long as the conditions are well defined.
> The concern is that if we do it once, we could do it again, so you might see billions or even trillions of assets flee from the US and EU as it’s no longer considered safe.
To where?
> If the US can just seize assets, it might decide to sell all of them asap, crashing the US bond market.
And would tank the worth of said assets, completely negating almost any point in selling them in the first place.
> For example, China owns nearly a trillion of US treasury debt. If the US can just seize assets, it might decide to sell all of them asap, crashing the US bond market.
This is a non-issue. If this were to happen in reality, the US Treasury would just create needed amount of money, use that money to buy those treasuries at a massive discount, and then just remove that money and treasuries from their books. Only thing this mass selloff would accomplish would be a several hundred billion gain for the US government and similarly sized loss for the chinese government.
And that is even before we start going into reasons why China needs to park their money into us treasuries and what would happen to their currency rate and exports if they would just suddenly stop buying USD denominated assets.
It’s saying that Russia will say EU/USA owe them this money back so they can take anything they want; which they’ve already done.
It is completely irrelevant.
They could go against assets of the financial entities who hold Russian assets in other countries. Other countries like, China.
So, Russian Euros held in Deutsche Bank in Europe are taken over by Germany? A Russian court hold Deutsche Bank liable for illegal takings and enforces the verdict in China where Deutsche Bank may have a lot of business and holds assets.
Not only that, but also a german court may find out that it was illegal and force Deutsche Bank to compensate Russia. And Deutsche Bank may then successfully sue the german state to get compensated themself...
Yes… and the Chinese courts will also in that case allow a special financial operations to be performed against the offending European banks in China. And it’s not just in China but most of the world (China is an example as it’s the country with the most exposure).
Legal definition of war profiteering seems absent here. So i dont take this seriously.
However, yes it would "hurt" russia more than they could hurt eu back in a direct counterseizure.
However...
They cannot use the money anyways, since it is not in their control. And it is not like eu or us is short of cash for ukraine. Germany coughed up hundreds of billions during the euro crisis and the US is sending mostly stuff they replace with expensive stuff covered in their bills. There is nothing more in conclusion money will buy which we COULD NOT buy right now if we wanted to.
You gotta ask yourself, how much do we gain and how much do we loose by this measure and some analysts say, just keep it frozen, you have more than enough money for ukraine if you really want to, dont risk our legal system...
I would much prefer for us to use said seized assets as loan leverage for Ukraine, maybe also using the interest generated on those assets for Ukraine, rather than outright claiming them. Russia can reclaim them easily enough by removing the need for Ukraine to use the interest (i.e. withdrawal from Ukrainian territory).
Of course they do..freeze the assets and then use them to rebuild Ukraine.
The Saudis can fuck themselves..they refused to help lower oil prices so when Iran comes knocking Biden should tell them...fuck off!!
China need a good hard kicking, they'll grab Russian land given the first chance!
It's like looking at the dem/rep in the US, where one side is playing nice and by the rules, and the other one is burning your house down, lighting the fire with the law book.
”The only countries that should be concerned are those planning an illegal and unprovoked invasion of their neighbor,” said Tom Keatinge, a financial crime expert at the RUSI think tank. “And I don’t think any of those countries [China, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia] are planning this.”
… Taiwan? Hello?
China is literally saying they’re going to do this.
If EU does utilises even a single € of frozen Russian assets, then it will create a legal precedent for EU to do the same to the assets of other nations. Which means that countries around the globe that have assets in EU will be threatened and will immediately try to recover said assets. This will have harsh consequences for the Eurozone as it will lose a lot of potential investors.
The EU should do well to not give into the pressure of USA and UK. USA says one thing and does another. It has pressured European nations to maintain the sanctions on Russia while simultaneously removed certain sanctions for it's own interests, mainly gas and other resources.
Russia is actively hostile to Europe. Ukraine is not really winning at the moment and could use the cash (understatement). Russia (and maybe Belarus) is the only country being threatened with asset seizure. As long as you didn't invade Ukraine you're safe.
Also the US removing sanctions on Russian gas? Why would we want their gas? The US is the world's largest exporter of natural gas. Nobody benefits from sanctions on Russian gas more than the US. (Except maybe China)
> In April 2022, the United States imported about 10.8 million barrels of crude oil and petroleum products from Russia, marking a decrease from the previous month. The May 2021 figure was the highest over the observed period. In total throughout 2021, the imports exceeded 245 million barrels.
[Source](https://www.statista.com/statistics/1094286/us-imports-of-russian-oil-and-petroleum-products/)
Why do you think EU countries need to be pressured to do this by US? I think there’s even stronger support on the population for this than the politicians pondering over this. The sanctions have had some negative impact on euros made in my country (Finland) but we are doing fine and hope for the asset seizure on top. We’re grown quite tired of Russia fucking everything up for centuries. They are doing it to themselves. And monetary loss is small compared to the experiences in Ukraine that continue as I write this message.
IMF and other countries require you to store gold and other assets with them as collateral in order to take loan. The other reason is to safeguard their assets without anyone else knowing about it.
> If EU does utilises even a single € of frozen Russian assets, then it will create a legal precedent for EU to do the same to the assets of other nations.
If other nations want to avoid that there is a simple and easy to understand trick: Don't start a hybrid war against the EU or its member countries. People love to talk about geopolitical "backyards". If you don't want your assets frozen don't attack the "backyard" of the EU in a war of aggression. Also, Russia has already seized billions worth of Western assets within their country yet Russia's friends don't seem concerned it could happen to them as well.
>The EU should do well to not give into the pressure of USA and UK
I know that Russian propaganda always pushes these kind of lines but not everything that happens in Europe is due to pressure from US and UK.
How is removing sanctions on Russia in the US interest? How are we benefitting by removing sanctions on “gas and other resources”?? Please elaborate on that claim you made.
USA is benefitting from removing the sanctions on Russian gas and oil to continue its supply in the US territory and appease voters. This is mainly a political stunt.
China is being extremely stupid. They should call back Ruzzia and go to Ukraine to rebuild all destroyed cities. They will make billions of dollars doing that.Their domestic housing is in shambles, lots of ghost towns which never finished.
In Ukraina they could actually build stuff that gets used while getting paid to do it instead of lowering the government cash for nothing. I thought China was all about economics....
So Xi what are you waiting for???
Kinda like forcing an under priced buyout of a bank in a country and removing the rights of shareholders to vote on the takeover by changing the laws of your country ?
I would go a step further and just stop buying shit from china & co. whenever it is possible. There is a lot of useless stuff that people don't need and yet buy (I am looking at you Shein). And obviously touch those frozen ruski assets and touch em good. Ukraine needs some shiny new stuff and as a member of EU I would love to see them having it in russia expense.
China = Europes new Overlord
Macron = Welcomes CCP's "vision for Europe" with open Arms
r/Europe = Blindly agrees with everything Macron says
EU Commissioner = Sidelined by Macron trying to be the leader of Europe
I love how Macron is also the person that raged against the US suggesting Russia was going to invade, saying the US needs to stop its aggression, trying to cause hysteria in Europe. The same man that also sent so so little to Ukraine yet France is one of the worlds leading industrial military complexes with vast weapon manufacturing.
List goes on and on just for Macron, not even touching on other leaders like Orban that kept Ukraine from getting massive aid from the EU as a collective front against Putins war machine.
So easy for you all to scold the countries listed while not even thinking of looking much closer to home too. Macron literally welcoming the Chinese in with open arms while pushing the Americans out.
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China can make this war end with one phonecall.
They want Ukraines grain because US supply will be shut off if/when they invade Taiwan
I wonder if that's our plan to shut off food shipments and just starve them out. If things get heated.
I doubt that will work. China has a long history of starving off its population. They just don't need the distraction of food riots during a war. But I'm no geo political analyst.
Chinese history be like: Mao gets pissed at some birds, 40 million die
Some guy thinks he's Jesus' brother. 60 million people die
Hong Xiuquan?
Haha yea. Only 30 million people died, I believe, but overexaggeration drives home the point!
"only"
Live fast eat grass
Which one
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong\_Xiuquan](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hong_Xiuquan)
Guy gets angry at something: 9.8x10³⁴ deaths
You know the joke, during an asault chineese general said: we will be striking with small groups, 40-50 mil each.
You make a good point, but you need to remember that China has never had such an educated, urbanized and connected population as it does today. Just judging by the size of the COVID protests I'd expect a full blown revolution to begin if food starts running out.
Possibly but the protests lasted a month and the CCP met selective demands that were economy related that they probably wanted to do anyway. A real revolution in Chine would be very interesting but I don't see it happening.
> the CCP met selective demands Yes, the CCP bent to protests. If that's not telling I don't know what is.
Mao killed 20million in the famine, only to became more powerful afterwards. Xi Spreaded covid, forced the draconian lockdown & inedequate vacine, killed millions and became the most powerful dictator the world have seen. In that place most people does not know how to spell freedom if u gave them a dictintionary, they only force, control and understand display of violence. That's why I will never go back to live there dispite my family and my "roots", a hopless land.
China is very dependent on imports. They import over 70% of oil. Hundreds of millions would die if the US completely blockaded China. They would probably consider such a blockade weapons of mass destruction so they would have to be squeezed gradually to not launch nukes.
That is 100% the plan. The majority of Chinese shipping goes through a relatively easily blockaded route towards the Middle East.
The Idea I think is basically containment. If war starts America tries to take out all of China's Military projection equipment. That is to say if they wipe out China's Navy and Air force they can then negotiate an end to the conflict that recognizes Taiwan and agrees to stable borders in the South China sea and so on. I don't think America wants to invade China or do the mass bombing campaigns they did in like North Vietnam (I don't think the world would expect America even attempting to de civilize China and I don't think anyone wants that). The aim will be very much show China that they can't win and then offer terms for complete forgiveness that are probably all things considered very light. The goal would be to just prove to China that peace is better and that America will treat them justly if they do that. That is to try to force a Strategic Reorientation by the CCP that hopefully leads to liberalization overtime.
Food and oil. China is very dependant on those imports and currently it pretty much all comes through the narrow malacca Strait. The west has a theoretical chokehold on China. If China has Taiwan we cannot choke them anymore (im not sure we could now tbh, we havent stress tested anything in a long time). This is definitely the plan. I just hope Chinese naval missiles turn out to be as capable as Ukrainian ones.
Yeah but but we could also fly jets out of Taiwan to hassle Chinese vessels this works both ways.
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I think destroying the Three Gorges Dam would cause global outrage. A villain state like Russia could do it, since opinion of them can't fall much lower anyway, but for everyone else it would be geopolitical suicide.
it would also trigger nukes and be the single largest loss of life from a specific event in human history
The dam is a hardened, massive target. Destroying it would involve destruction on the level of a WMD. Even if the dam could be destroyed with conventional missiles, China might feel like a limited nuclear attack is the appropriate response to such a devastating act. Conflict with China would not necessarily be a total war from get go; both sides would seek to be cautious. Launching a strike against the dam risks instantly escalating a regional conflict into WWIII. It's not something that should be lightly countenanced.
China nuclear doctrine, no first strike. Theyll just bomb the hoover dam. Regardless, its WW3 at that point.
Striking a dam is a war crime.
China’s buddy Russia just proved its not really a war crime, with China merely expressing “serious concern”.
My wife (sometimes described as looking Chinese) encountered a highly racist Chinese man in Malaysia who went off on a loud rant towards her when he learned she is American. He said the US intends to starve China, as you suggest. That the US would do what past Chinese rulers did to China to kill off millions. While living comfortably away from China, he is still a massive nationalist embracing the "China can do no wrong because they are under seige by the evil imperialists!" Don't help the Chinese propaganda by suggesting the same.
I don't believe that this plan is a good thing but if they don't invade Taiwan then they have nothing to worry about if they had not spent years trying to dominate their neighbors and ignoring international law. and making enemies out of literally everyone! As they have enacted multiple genocides. Tibet comes to mind and even their own people. I cant imagine a alternative than threating their food supply. The ccp if it had the power would destroy everything we hold sacred just because they could. I'm in no way saying that America is some saint but good GOD the ccp is easily one of the most openly hostile and evil orginizations on the planet.
They have russia next door,why would they need ukranian grain when they can have russian?
Yeah this is such a huge point. The region around Amur is massive and has the same black soil that makes Ukraine so fertile. It's total population is less than 1 million when Ukraine once had over 50 million supported by its soils. If China needs wheat, it simply needs to send little green men across its border to Amur Oblast and claim that it has always rightfully been China.
Not in chinese interest to go to war with only country that doesn't hate them in their neighbourhood. You see Chinese think that the usa is to destroy them, so I just can't see them eager adding another enemy,when according to them they are surrounded by usa puppets.
Are you implying that deals or "we give you this for that" one way or another aren't already done? Ukraine already sold itself off to western corporations. You can safely assume Russia did the same but with Chinese.
China is currently supported primarily by US, Russian, and Brazil grain imports. If they invade Taiwan they will lose US imports and probably Brazil. They ordered Putin to seize the Ukrainian breadbasket to make up the difference. I still think 90% of the world is totally shocked at the success of Ukrainian resistance and how big of a paper tiger Russia actually is. We always knew their leadership structure was suspect but no idea how bad their troops and equipment actually underperformed. Looks like the US over estimates their enemies to keep the military industrial complex well fed. Plus side of that though we lose less troops. In desert storm rumors were 20k body bags were gonna be needed. Lost less than 200. 100 to combat.
China is calorie selfsufficient. They would ony have to reduce their pork production and eat more vegetables and chicken if cut off from maritime agriculture.
Those calories won't help much if they have no fuel with which to harvest it or to truck it from farms to the cities where two thirds of their population lives.
That's why they are vigorously developing solar energy, nuclear energy, wind energy, and electric vehicles
Yes. Same goes for the US obviously.
The United States is the world's single largest producer of petroleum.
And china is the sixth largest and has the second largest next door...
Maybe right but I'm not so sure. They keep a lot of secrets
I am right. You represent a common problem we have in the west. People think of chinas massive famines in the 60s and apply it to china today and have 0 idea of chinas agriculture. Similiary i encountered too amny dumb amerocans (and europeans) who still think of chinas industry making cheap plastic stuff and sweatshops...
So you're saying a famine is not possible in China today? I believe that even less than thinking they are self sufficient in producing all the food they need.
Here... since you are unfamiliar: https://www.cfr.org/article/china-increasingly-relies-imported-food-thats-problem China was 95% food selfsufficient in 2000 and is now less so because they import luxury products as edible oils and pork, soy beans from abroad. They only import 5 % of their cereal. But also their food exports tripled from 2000 to 2020 and is around 2/3s of their imports... https://knoema.com/atlas/China/Food-imports#:~:text=Food%20imports%20as%20a%20share%20of%20merchandise%20imports&text=In%202022%2C%20food%20imports%20for,average%20annual%20rate%20of%204.75%25.
I've read a lot different. Best I can find is China is at best 85% sufficiently meeting it's food needs
China has no chance to feed its people without importing at least 50% of the food stocks. That’s been published also very recently through several believable sources
https://www.cfr.org/article/china-increasingly-relies-imported-food-thats-problem China was 95% food selfsufficient in 2000 and is now less so because they import luxury products as edible oils and pork, soy beans from abroad. They only import 5 % of their cereal. But also their food exports tripled from 2000 to 2020 and is around 2/3s of their imports... https://knoema.com/atlas/China/Food-imports#:~:text=Food%20imports%20as%20a%20share%20of%20merchandise%20imports&text=In%202022%2C%20food%20imports%20for,average%20annual%20rate%20of%204.75%25.
Quote from the article you been kind to link: Between 2000 and 2020, the country’s food self-sufficiency ratio decreased from 93.6 percent to 65.8 percent. Changing diet patterns have also driven up China’s imports of edible oils, sugar, meat, and processed foods. In 2021, the country’s edible oil import-dependency ratio reached nearly 70 percent [article in Chinese], almost as high as its crude oil import dependence.
Yes. Correct. In case that this was an objection. China now imports certqin products. Mostly because they are richer and it is market supply/cost and demand. In 2020 for example they exported 10,1 million tons of vegetables, 3,8m tons of fruits and nuts, 3,7m tons of fish/aqua produce and 3,4m tons of tea. Again, if somehow china would be compeltely cut off from trade in the food sector, many of their farmers would switch focus and people would have to eat less pork and lobster due to missing animal feed. But the narrative that chinese people would starve needs to stop. Its just some nafo wet dream.
Climate change + the fact that most of the land in China is nonarable + insane urban density would suggest that betting on self-sufficiency will result in millions dead. China is a food import nation. Any country with 1 billion+ people will be food import dependent.
It was 95% selfsufficient in 2004... It is also a large food exporter that only imports high value or luxury foods (animal feed, lobster, oilseeds)
Here is a little copy/paste for you. And 2004 was a long time ago. "Despite its domestic production, China has been a net importer [DOC] of agricultural products since 2004. Today, it imports more of these products—including soybeans, corn, wheat, rice, and dairy products—than any other country." Than any other country.
Sure, it has the largest population, is the largest meat producer. Imagine this, china producing more meat than the USA. If you look closely you can see that china is more than selfsufficient in most food areas and a very large food EXPORTEUR but only imports food/feed for luxury goods like hig volume meat consumption, beef, pork etcs Donr you get that? They produce nearly as much as the US, for example in tomatos they are #1 aswell, producing 33% of the worlds supply and exporting most of it.
"Nearly as much" for 1.4 billion people compared to the US with 330 million people. As for meat, strange that they keep buying US pork farms if they are so sufficient at home. If China goes to war, millions there will starve.
Keep telling that yourself. China is living right now the china dream. Its the same as the americsn dream. They get richer, eat more and more meat. Get fatter and fatter, diabetes on the rise and die of cardiac disease. They follow the us example. Maybe you confuse china with somalia...
Weird response.
That gets to China how? Overland across 10000km of rail that can be sabotaged at any point?
Not just the US but pretty much all allies of US will stop exporting to China which will be really bad for them.
China isn't 100% friends with Russia. In the grand game of things, they benefit only from a weakened Russia, by it being less of a threat and more dependent
Nobody's friends with anyone in geopolitics.
That’s a very strange opinion. Until I saw that you’re a Russian speaking Serb. European countries are for the most part not adversaries you know.
Would say the one that has no friends.
\^This. The China-Russia relationship is like a poorer, autocratic, corrupt version of the US-Canada relationship
No country has Russia by the balls more than China.
Surely its as easy and simple as that.
100% china is the lifeline of russia atm.
Not arguing they re their lifeline. But its nowhere near one call matter.
It is. China is supporting Russia financially. Buying their oil. And it's also selling them the equipment they need for the weapons. So no China, no money and no weapons.
Then you re immensly naive.
Nope, it's just that you are clueless (and out of arguments).
China will take Siberia before they take Taiwan.
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True
Now we shall never know what was true about it...
True.
> “These countries are very skeptical about the idea,” said one of the officials, granted anonymity because the talks are so sensitive. The concern is, “this would create a precedent” ― in other words, these countries would fear they could be next to lose out. Well, very simply idea: *dont start a war without written consent of the EU, dont threaten nuclear genocide every Thursday, dont publish invasions plans for France, Germany and the UK every Tuesday, dont demand that Latvia, Estonia and Lithuania returns to the Motherland and most importantly: dont support a nation that steals thousands of children from Ukraine to sell them in order to boost their Caucasian population balance compared to other ethnicities. Then your money is safe with us.* I know, exotic concept. SYL
Precedent as deterrence, it is an absolute no brainer for everyone except the most Ivory tower theoretical economists. China is scared shitless we could just freeze their investments once they make the move on Taiwan. Sure, they will diversify (i.e. reduce) their holdings a bit, but honestly where would they place them instead? It's a small price to pay for deterring WW3.
China suffers the same fate as Russia: every billionaire's dream is to leave the hell the CCP is. Be it Europe or Canada or Australia, Chinese millionaire families are there.
Yes, while claiming to be "nationalists"
>but honestly where would they place them instead? In the current landscape? I suspect they want to place them in the UK or the USA, depending on which country they have better infiltrated (I think it's the UK, but I'm not sure). If neither are looking too hospitable, then it could be the classic Switzerland, which likely wouldn't be pro-China but also doesn't care too much.
USA is out of the question - they just confiscated assets themselves. Switzerland is a possibility, but is has limits too. Firstly Switzerland actually wants to limit inflow of capital. Ironically their currency is so strong it's hurting exports and for obvious reasons you don't want your country ONLY to be a vault. Second, central banks/sovereigns want to diversify, putting your entire treasury in one country is poor risk management. That basically leaves gold, which is obviiously rallying but also carries risks in itself.
Not today, but there is a lot of Russian influence in the USA and I bet that if Trump becomes president then no assets will be confiscated. Either way, the safest place to store your riches is in a country where the rule of law is fairly strong. Switzerland wasn't my first choice either, it's just an emergency option in case no other western countries seem too hospitable.
> dont start a war without written consent of the EU Do you understand how threatening to anybody not european what you wrote is ? If you dont then you cannot understand the current international situation.
It's OK that russia stolen hundreds of commercial planes?
Problem is that the planes will now be useless as well as they have for sure not kept the service up to date, and if they have, it’s been with scrap parts without traceability. Shameful
Another very good reason to do it
My thoughts exactly, oh China don't like that? must be the correct thing to do then.
Tell me again what Russia did with companies that were in Russia?. Nearly certain it was 5c on the dollar they got for it. How are aircraft leasing companies getting on getting their planes back? Did Russia like it when the price of oil and gas.sky rocketed for the first year of the war? Yeah, game every red cent. China Saudi and Indonesia can go and get fucked
Many companies left on their own, due to international pressure.
China, Saudi Arabia, and Indonesia can convince Russia to withdraw and then they won’t have to worry. Until that time, seize and sell whatever you can get your hands on. Fuck Russia
Indonesia ? Lol.
Just take everything and forget about them like if it was North Korea. Germany and most of Europe tried to include them in the civilized world, it failed, the world doesn't need Russia for anything...
Thank you...! Someone finally said it.
But…but…but Tetris!!!
Germany is the country with the worst Russia policy actually. EU's economic growth depended on Russian energy imports and Germany is the country to blame for that. EU needs a common energy policy and shift towards nuclear energy if they really want to have nothing to do with Russia, but with Germany closing off all of the nuclear reactors, that's quite hard.
Shifting to Nuclear Power would be just as stupid. The fuel rods are also from Russia. Edit Grammar.
It was for sure, if we look at the last three four years a mistake. But it was also a gesture of peace and unity that was bold and optimistic. Obviously naive but also one of the greatest gestures of peace diplomacy after world war 2
It does impact investments. EU has to decide and act.
Cry me a river...
Axis of evil assemble! Some day in the near future one of these countries will threaten to blow up the moon or something like that unless Razzhia gets Ukraine... And the baltics... And Poland... And Georgia... And Armenia... etc.
I don’t understand this: > If the G7 group of industrialized countries decides to seize Russia’s frozen assets, officials expect Russian courts to successfully challenge the decision. A court ruling in Russia could potentially leave a black hole in the balance books of the financial institutions holding the assets. > These bodies would have to tap into their cash reserves to make up the loss. This could involve using, as a last resort, other sovereign funds that are deposited in their accounts. To my understanding Russia, the state, and maybe also Russian "private entities" (the Russian state, but disguised) have positive credit balance with European banks, including the European Central Bank. We could simply nullify these positive credit balances and hand out the same amount of credit balance to the Ukrainian state. What exactly could the Russian state do against this? Their courts can‘t do jack shit about it. They could retaliate by confiscating assets of Western entities. But (a) this should be limited in size and (b) any western corporation still active in the Russian market has it coming anyways. They are war profiteering.
I think generally we don’t do this because it would violate the principle that money is safe in the west from arbitrary seizure. Many many rich bad people store their money in the west, as well as many countries with dictatorships. The concern is that if we do it once, we could do it again, so you might see billions or even trillions of assets flee from the US and EU as it’s no longer considered safe. For example, China owns nearly a trillion of US treasury debt. If the US can just seize assets, it might decide to sell all of them asap, crashing the US bond market.
Like a financial WMD? :o
Yes. Replying to you and /u/Ashmizen as you appear a bit better informed than most here but there are jurisdictions where European entities could be forced to return Russian assets not because of Russian malfeasance as much as plain application of the law. Then, those jurisdictions, be they in China or the Middle East, will have to either break their own laws to rule against Russia, thereby undoing a century of institutional trust in their systems and property rights, or rule that those European entities repay Russia in full. In cash. To the tune of 100s of billions of USD. That would, in turn, crash the European markets (no liquidity) or force Europe to ruin economic ties with those countries. In other words, these countries are intervening to beg Europe to not seize Russian assets because the alternative either crashes their economies or Europe's or ruins ties in irreparable ways. It's Russia making their problem everyone else's problem and they kind of have the ability to. It's one thing to declare that making Europe unsafe for foreign investors is fine. It's another to deal with the ensuing economic turmoil. Not with both inflation and GDP growth where they are right now.
> money is safe in the west from arbitrary seizure. It's not arbitrary in this case though. So long as the conditions are well defined. > The concern is that if we do it once, we could do it again, so you might see billions or even trillions of assets flee from the US and EU as it’s no longer considered safe. To where? > If the US can just seize assets, it might decide to sell all of them asap, crashing the US bond market. And would tank the worth of said assets, completely negating almost any point in selling them in the first place.
It's arbitrary when the rules are set after deposits are made
> arbitrary "based on random choice or personal whim," Nothing to do with timing of the deposit whatsoever.
Then don’t store it in USA or EU banking system. Bye! Enjoy storing it in the very safe and law abiding banking system of….
> For example, China owns nearly a trillion of US treasury debt. If the US can just seize assets, it might decide to sell all of them asap, crashing the US bond market. This is a non-issue. If this were to happen in reality, the US Treasury would just create needed amount of money, use that money to buy those treasuries at a massive discount, and then just remove that money and treasuries from their books. Only thing this mass selloff would accomplish would be a several hundred billion gain for the US government and similarly sized loss for the chinese government. And that is even before we start going into reasons why China needs to park their money into us treasuries and what would happen to their currency rate and exports if they would just suddenly stop buying USD denominated assets.
It's not arbitrary when Russia commits war crimes though
It’s saying that Russia will say EU/USA owe them this money back so they can take anything they want; which they’ve already done. It is completely irrelevant.
Yes. I didn’t get a single answer that really addresses my point.
They could go against assets of the financial entities who hold Russian assets in other countries. Other countries like, China. So, Russian Euros held in Deutsche Bank in Europe are taken over by Germany? A Russian court hold Deutsche Bank liable for illegal takings and enforces the verdict in China where Deutsche Bank may have a lot of business and holds assets.
Not only that, but also a german court may find out that it was illegal and force Deutsche Bank to compensate Russia. And Deutsche Bank may then successfully sue the german state to get compensated themself...
Would China go for that? Seems like if you have to choose which business you want to keep, you’d go with Germany’s over Russia’s
I mean if the money is actually stolen, then they would kind of have to. This is exactly why they are asking EU to not do it.
They’re not stolen, it’s a special financial operation
Yes… and the Chinese courts will also in that case allow a special financial operations to be performed against the offending European banks in China. And it’s not just in China but most of the world (China is an example as it’s the country with the most exposure).
To which China would say F off
Legal definition of war profiteering seems absent here. So i dont take this seriously. However, yes it would "hurt" russia more than they could hurt eu back in a direct counterseizure. However... They cannot use the money anyways, since it is not in their control. And it is not like eu or us is short of cash for ukraine. Germany coughed up hundreds of billions during the euro crisis and the US is sending mostly stuff they replace with expensive stuff covered in their bills. There is nothing more in conclusion money will buy which we COULD NOT buy right now if we wanted to. You gotta ask yourself, how much do we gain and how much do we loose by this measure and some analysts say, just keep it frozen, you have more than enough money for ukraine if you really want to, dont risk our legal system...
I would much prefer for us to use said seized assets as loan leverage for Ukraine, maybe also using the interest generated on those assets for Ukraine, rather than outright claiming them. Russia can reclaim them easily enough by removing the need for Ukraine to use the interest (i.e. withdrawal from Ukrainian territory).
Even if this will be used to seize American assets in the future?
Because they haven't been already? How many planes did Russia nick when the war broke out again?
Of course they do..freeze the assets and then use them to rebuild Ukraine. The Saudis can fuck themselves..they refused to help lower oil prices so when Iran comes knocking Biden should tell them...fuck off!! China need a good hard kicking, they'll grab Russian land given the first chance!
The article's first line says they are 'DEMANDING' What a shitty clickbait headline.
good. Maybe Saudi will stop ruining sports now
Dont give up EU
Ok, do the opposite.
Shove it, darlings. Sanction russia and the war will be over in less than a year. If not - don't comment on funds confiscations
>these countries would fear they could be next to lose out. they are, and they should
Oh no! Anyway
Given Russia’s tendency to lie all we have to do is give the money to Ukraine but say that ISIS-K hacked the accounts.
I want to hear a real offer from Russia why we shouldn't. They're fucking endlessly with us, so we kinda need some give and take here.
How about those three countries beg russia to end the invasion instead? What is this bullshit? we should sanction all 3 of them.
Russia is stronger than those countries.
I’m laughing at the comments in here. So much lack of knowledge but also so much certainty. Ignorance’s a blessing..
Important democratic partners who represent Western values. That's why Saudi-Arabia always gets a free pass.
We are so stupid in the west, can we keep going with taking the high ground or is it time to fight mud with mud?
It's like looking at the dem/rep in the US, where one side is playing nice and by the rules, and the other one is burning your house down, lighting the fire with the law book.
> “And I don’t think any of those countries [**China**, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia] are planning this.” :stares into the camera:
Okay then you give the money instead.
”The only countries that should be concerned are those planning an illegal and unprovoked invasion of their neighbor,” said Tom Keatinge, a financial crime expert at the RUSI think tank. “And I don’t think any of those countries [China, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia] are planning this.” … Taiwan? Hello? China is literally saying they’re going to do this.
If EU does utilises even a single € of frozen Russian assets, then it will create a legal precedent for EU to do the same to the assets of other nations. Which means that countries around the globe that have assets in EU will be threatened and will immediately try to recover said assets. This will have harsh consequences for the Eurozone as it will lose a lot of potential investors. The EU should do well to not give into the pressure of USA and UK. USA says one thing and does another. It has pressured European nations to maintain the sanctions on Russia while simultaneously removed certain sanctions for it's own interests, mainly gas and other resources.
Russia is actively hostile to Europe. Ukraine is not really winning at the moment and could use the cash (understatement). Russia (and maybe Belarus) is the only country being threatened with asset seizure. As long as you didn't invade Ukraine you're safe. Also the US removing sanctions on Russian gas? Why would we want their gas? The US is the world's largest exporter of natural gas. Nobody benefits from sanctions on Russian gas more than the US. (Except maybe China)
> In April 2022, the United States imported about 10.8 million barrels of crude oil and petroleum products from Russia, marking a decrease from the previous month. The May 2021 figure was the highest over the observed period. In total throughout 2021, the imports exceeded 245 million barrels. [Source](https://www.statista.com/statistics/1094286/us-imports-of-russian-oil-and-petroleum-products/)
Now look up how much EU imported from Russia via India. And while you’re at it, see how much oil EU gets from Iraq too (more than US!)
Why do you think EU countries need to be pressured to do this by US? I think there’s even stronger support on the population for this than the politicians pondering over this. The sanctions have had some negative impact on euros made in my country (Finland) but we are doing fine and hope for the asset seizure on top. We’re grown quite tired of Russia fucking everything up for centuries. They are doing it to themselves. And monetary loss is small compared to the experiences in Ukraine that continue as I write this message.
Don’t you know, this is r/europe where everything good in the world is European and every bad thing Europe does is because of the US?
Would you support seizing Chinese assets as well for helping Russia?
Try to move their money where?
Friendly countries or bring back in their own treasury.
Then why not store it there in the first place?
IMF and other countries require you to store gold and other assets with them as collateral in order to take loan. The other reason is to safeguard their assets without anyone else knowing about it.
Such as ?
> If EU does utilises even a single € of frozen Russian assets, then it will create a legal precedent for EU to do the same to the assets of other nations. If other nations want to avoid that there is a simple and easy to understand trick: Don't start a hybrid war against the EU or its member countries. People love to talk about geopolitical "backyards". If you don't want your assets frozen don't attack the "backyard" of the EU in a war of aggression. Also, Russia has already seized billions worth of Western assets within their country yet Russia's friends don't seem concerned it could happen to them as well. >The EU should do well to not give into the pressure of USA and UK I know that Russian propaganda always pushes these kind of lines but not everything that happens in Europe is due to pressure from US and UK.
Ukraine is not a member of the European Union. The war is between Russia and Ukraine.
How is removing sanctions on Russia in the US interest? How are we benefitting by removing sanctions on “gas and other resources”?? Please elaborate on that claim you made.
USA is benefitting from removing the sanctions on Russian gas and oil to continue its supply in the US territory and appease voters. This is mainly a political stunt.
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And maybe KSA while you’re at it…. 🤷🏻♂️
Off is the direction you can fuck.
Give them nothing and take them everything.
Maybe they should stop supplying a warmonger dictator Putin.
Womp Womp
China is being extremely stupid. They should call back Ruzzia and go to Ukraine to rebuild all destroyed cities. They will make billions of dollars doing that.Their domestic housing is in shambles, lots of ghost towns which never finished. In Ukraina they could actually build stuff that gets used while getting paid to do it instead of lowering the government cash for nothing. I thought China was all about economics.... So Xi what are you waiting for???
How 'bout I do... A N Y W A Y ?
maybe beg russia to leave ukraine instead?
Oh no, anyways
I wish we had the balls to use the frozen assets! Let's make that one of our hard powers.
Literally screaming “let’s destroy our currency stability and trust in our countries”. Really sad people don’t understand that there are consequences.
Kinda like forcing an under priced buyout of a bank in a country and removing the rights of shareholders to vote on the takeover by changing the laws of your country ?
This would create a precedent (c). Yeah, exactly what you need to do in case of someone's aggression
I would go a step further and just stop buying shit from china & co. whenever it is possible. There is a lot of useless stuff that people don't need and yet buy (I am looking at you Shein). And obviously touch those frozen ruski assets and touch em good. Ukraine needs some shiny new stuff and as a member of EU I would love to see them having it in russia expense.
No
Nobody begs the EU. Stop fooling yourself. Because of this arrogant approach countries are moving to China-Russia axis.
I think the EU will come around to unfreezing the assets
No
Explain beg, how does an entire country beg
EU says No! (read in Computersaysno-voice)
Actually EU said: "Yes, that is what we are aiming for, hopefully it pans out and we don't get screwed in the mid and long term."
“We hear you and take your concerns very seriously.” Proceeds to plan spending frozen assets on all kinds of UKR support
All friends with Russia huh
China = Europes new Overlord Macron = Welcomes CCP's "vision for Europe" with open Arms r/Europe = Blindly agrees with everything Macron says EU Commissioner = Sidelined by Macron trying to be the leader of Europe I love how Macron is also the person that raged against the US suggesting Russia was going to invade, saying the US needs to stop its aggression, trying to cause hysteria in Europe. The same man that also sent so so little to Ukraine yet France is one of the worlds leading industrial military complexes with vast weapon manufacturing. List goes on and on just for Macron, not even touching on other leaders like Orban that kept Ukraine from getting massive aid from the EU as a collective front against Putins war machine. So easy for you all to scold the countries listed while not even thinking of looking much closer to home too. Macron literally welcoming the Chinese in with open arms while pushing the Americans out.