The real thread it not Russia Russia Russia, but it is CHINA

This video of vice-president Pence is worth 43 minutes of your time:

 

That is self-evidently false. 40+ minutes of Pence is never worth it.

And, oh yeah, anyone still thinking Russia is not a threat is willingly dumb.

 

That's just me again peddling his "fake news" title again. Pence sucks ass, and I would not waste 45 minutes of my time watching that suck ass video of him. Russia is still first and foremost, to believe otherwise is just plain pendejo stupid!

 

Vice President Pence is right. The United State needs to keep its eye on the ball and not be distracted by noise.

China is the new rising military, geo-political and economic superpower, not Russia.

While the rest of the world unceasingly bleats their blind faith in "free-trade", China is more canny and is practicing what looks like old 17th century mercantilism. Their trade policies are very much a part of their national ascendancy strategy. They engineer huge trade surpluses with the US, draining hundreds of billions of dollars every year from this country to fund their own rise. Entire industries in the US shut down and outsource their manufacturing to China. It's even gotten so bad that the US military has become dependent on Chinese component suppliers for some of its weapons.

So what happens if we ever get into a war with China? The US was successful against Germany and Japan in WWII not because we had better soldiers. Germany and Japan had excellent soldiers. We prevailed because we flooded the world with ships, tanks and planes. So what happens in the next war if China has all the factories??

Meanwhile they allow a ring of neighboring countries to run trade surpluses with China. So money flows from China to these countries and their continued prosperity becomes a function of their access to the Chinese economy and their behaving like clients.

Not only that, China is running the world's biggest intelligence operation in the United States, trying to steal any intellectual property that they can get their hands on. The US spends years of effort and untold billions to develop new technology, and China skips all the hassle simply by stealing it. It isn't an accident that new Chinese military systems look a lot like US systems. Guess where they got the plans.

I don't see that Russia represents anything like the same challenge to the United States. They are more of an annoyance that a full-frontal threat to our nation's future. What's more, I think that longer-term, it might be possible to convince Russia that it's in their interest to tilt more towards the US, if the alternative is becoming just another of the Chinese clients, a protectorate supplying raw materials to the 'Middle Kingdom'. If it wants to remain a player on the world stage, Russia needs support from a strong ally that is less of a threat than a rising China on its southern border. (Not unlike the UK's post WW-II relationship with the United States.)

Of course, the size of the Russian threat might look different in Europe. But the Europeans are big boys, collectively the EU has a GDP as large as the United States. (Probably a bit smaller after the UK leaves, but still up there.) Far larger than Russia. If they perceive Russia as a bigger threat than we do, then the Europeans need to do something about it. Like increasing their own military forces and readiness.

So I basically support Hillary's and Obama's idea of the US "pivoting" from the Atlantic towards the Pacific, deemphasizing its focus on Europe and paying more attention to events in east Asia.

 

SteveFoerster, drain the swamp! You sound like you just came from a MAGA rally!