TRUMP 2020!

[Lachlan]

They also have a lot of outdated equipment and tech, and don't spend as much as we do on their military. Having a crap ton more soldiers is useful, but when a lot of them have hand-me-down equipment decades old, and inferior training, that greatly makes them a lot less useful.

That massive army of theirs is impossible to keep equipped with modern top of the line equipment. Even if they did spend the money needed to do that, a decade or 2 later and they are back to being equipped with outdated weapons and armor.

They still trail behind us in tech. Just because they are advancing doesn't mean we aren't as well.

Also, are all those warships they launching top of the line with tech and equipment? We also already HAVE a pretty massive navy-and at the moment not really using it. So why would we be launching more ships when we currently have no need for them? China is launching a bunch of ships because they could use a bigger fleet. Especially if they want to compete with the US.

Now I by no means think the US military is unbeatable, but I do think we have the best military overall at the moment. Russia would probably be 2nd, and China would be in the top 5 I would guess. Though I don't know how capable a lot of other European countries are, to be fair.

Edit-also I would say that we have a lot more allies then them. Just in their area alone we have Australia, Japan, South Korea, while the only ally of theirs would be Russia-now whether or not which allies would or would not help would probably depend on some factors, IE-who attacked who first, being a major one.

Edit2-oh they also have North Korea in the area forgot that one-a bit funny since I be talking to their leader

yes they are weaker because they have no friends. They actually reduced their army size though but total personnel is roughly the same as the US so I think modernisation could be achieved but they are not there yet and probably won't for another 2-3 decades. I'd also say China is second because I think it's slightly stronger than Russia and also Russia never had a good navy. Also to clarify catch up I mean be at the technological level of you guys but not have a significant technological advantage over you guys.

[Meliva]

just because it's rapidly growing now, doesn't mean it's going to keep growing at a rapid rate. Especially if many countries do the smart thing and hold them accountable for this virus we are all suffering from. Now I admit it's not entirely their fault, but because they were secretive about it, and didn't cooperate with foreign investigations it spread far more then it would have had they been more open.

Regardless, eventually their growth will slow. They don't have unlimited resources or people after all. Plus if lucky, many nations will stop using them for cheap labor and products, which will demolish their income. Or maybe the common people will rise up and take out that corrupt government of theirs.

Also, no china is not stronger then russia. Russia also doesn't have an amazing navy because they have little ports that can be used all year round. That's why they fought Japan all those years ago. Though in a war against eachother, a navy won't be of much use. Honestly a navy isn't much use against most of russia. It's largely landlocked, and again, a lot of their waters is frozen part of the time. Honestly navies are at their strongest against islands, and other areas largely surrounded by oceans. That's why Britain tries to keep a strong navy. I assume Austrlia is similar and focuses a lot of their budget to their navy, though I do remember you guys are rather anti-war.

Also no way is china going to continue rapid growth for 2-3 decades. Especially if many nations decide to start pulling trade and other business with them for how badly they mucked up the world.

[Most Lee Harmless]

They mucked up the world?

If Covid had broken out in Pensacola then the local authorities wouldn't have had a clue either. Its not Hollywood were the lab results come back after the ad-break. Especially when the lab does not know what it is actually looking for. Lab tests are quite specific. A test looks for one thing and its mostly yes/no. To run down a new disease needs thousands of those yes/no tests to isolate and prove that yep, its new.

Labs dont run to the needs of 24/7 rolling news channels. Even common tests can take weeks to be processed because labs are rarely well-funded enough to have spare techs sitting around drinking coffee.

But hey, 'they' should have told us before! And when 'they' did, guess what? Half the worlds politico's decided it wasnt a risk. Fair enough as lets face it, nobody knew sh*t about it. We still dont know heaps about it six months later. Why do some get 'long covid' : is that the same illness even? Does infection give later immunity? Why are there so many asymptomatics? Is that good or bad? How many of those in relation to overall infection rates?

Of course, maybe we can blame 'they' for that too. After all, 'they' should have known!

[Meliva]

Wanna know the difference as to what would have happened if it broken out in most other places?

The damn government most likely wouldn't censor anyone from talking about it.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-52573137

They reprimanded doctors from talking about it early on, and even said there had been no human to human transmissions. WHO also failed, since it didn't declare a national emergency early on.

I know that it's not entirely their fault. Though how they tried to keep silent about it even punishing people who were "spreading rumors", CERTAINLY did not help.

But hey maybe you're right, let's not be too hard on the authoritarian government that employs child labor, censors speech and various other horrible things. Yeah sorry, but how they handled this early on is just not excusable. I won't deny that other's failed too. Though had China been openly honest and not censored people from the start, maybe other folks would have been more informed and better prepared and this virus would be a lot less of an issue.

Edit- to quickly clarify, I am not saying that the chinese government itself uses child labor, but rather does very little to enforce children from being used as cheap labor. Since I'm fairly certain someone will call me out on that, when I admit should have been a bit more specific.

[Meliva]

I also won't excuse what folks in my own country do that I think is stupid, and that they should be held to some degree of blame as well. Like when the NY governor sent elderly folks with the virus back into their nursing homes, resulting in quite a few deaths.

This isn't a case of "us" and "them" mentality, a lot of folks need to be held responsible for this. China's government is very high up on that list.

[Lachlan]

just because it's rapidly growing now, doesn't mean it's going to keep growing at a rapid rate. Especially if many countries do the smart thing and hold them accountable for this virus we are all suffering from. Now I admit it's not entirely their fault, but because they were secretive about it, and didn't cooperate with foreign investigations it spread far more then it would have had they been more open.

Regardless, eventually their growth will slow. They don't have unlimited resources or people after all. Plus if lucky, many nations will stop using them for cheap labor and products, which will demolish their income. Or maybe the common people will rise up and take out that corrupt government of theirs.

Also, no china is not stronger then russia. Russia also doesn't have an amazing navy because they have little ports that can be used all year round. That's why they fought Japan all those years ago. Though in a war against eachother, a navy won't be of much use. Honestly a navy isn't much use against most of russia. It's largely landlocked, and again, a lot of their waters is frozen part of the time. Honestly navies are at their strongest against islands, and other areas largely surrounded by oceans. That's why Britain tries to keep a strong navy. I assume Austrlia is similar and focuses a lot of their budget to their navy, though I do remember you guys are rather anti-war.

Also no way is china going to continue rapid growth for 2-3 decades. Especially if many nations decide to start pulling trade and other business with them for how badly they mucked up the world.

That is a big if though. Their belt and road initiative is going to make a lot of small poor countries owe them although I do see how their economy would slow due to all you said. I don't think countries will stop using cheap labour though because most of them think of money and not where it comes from primarily. Russia and China though I'd say would be roughly equal with china having a slight edge because their economy is better and can therefore spend more money on upgrading. Australia is focusing more on the Navy and air force now. Like we are building I think it was 12 new submarines and Scott Morrison was getting new missiles for our F-18's with longer range. Personnel was being increased by 1500 too. I don't think we are anti war we just can't support a much larger defence force because we have so few people and the government focuses on quality and not quantity. There was this story I read somewhere that one of the new at the time ANZAC class frigates sat in the dry docks for like a year because there were not enough sailors to fully man it. I'd also say the average Australian soldier would be a bit better than the average American soldier simply because we have less people, vehicles, planes etc to modernize so we can modernize aging equipment relatively fast compared to American or chinese ones because both have more to modernize if that makes sense although my way of thinking is probably a bit off. Pretty sure we are better at fighting guerilla warfare than you guys too since our way of fighting is basically a combination of conventional and guerrilla warfare.

[Lachlan]

Wanna know the difference as to what would have happened if it broken out in most other places?

The damn government most likely wouldn't censor anyone from talking about it.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-52573137

They reprimanded doctors from talking about it early on, and even said there had been no human to human transmissions. WHO also failed, since it didn't declare a national emergency early on.

I know that it's not entirely their fault. Though how they tried to keep silent about it even punishing people who were "spreading rumors", CERTAINLY did not help.

But hey maybe you're right, let's not be too hard on the authoritarian government that employs child labor, censors speech and various other horrible things. Yeah sorry, but how they handled this early on is just not excusable. I won't deny that other's failed too. Though had China been openly honest and not censored people from the start, maybe other folks would have been more informed and better prepared and this virus would be a lot less of an issue.

Edit- to quickly clarify, I am not saying that the chinese government itself uses child labor, but rather does very little to enforce children from being used as cheap labor. Since I'm fairly certain someone will call me out on that, when I admit should have been a bit more specific.

yeah us Aussies tried to get I think it was an enquiry and then the WHO was like nope and then China gave us a tariff. I still wonder how the US economy is so much worse off compared to ours though like our economy was already slowing then we had half our country on fire, then we got hit by Covid, then we got hit by tariffs and our economy is still in better shape compared to the US economy. Although now you guys are on fire now just like we were! What a terrible year, I got to say since I was born I think this has been the most unstable and dangerous the world has been protests everywhere, border skirmishes, recession and stupid people like toilet paper hoarders (although that might just be in Australia I'm not quite sure) anti maskers and anti vaxxers.

[Meliva]

I'm honestly rather shocked that anyone would try to defend china and their response to the virus. I mean sure I might not like them in the first place, but I'm not just blaming them simply because the virus started there and it spread, or that I just don't like them, I'm putting a lot of blame on them because they've done a lot of shady crap in regards to it. If the virus started in Australia and they did the same crap China did, I'd be blaming them. And if it started here in my own backyard, and Kansas did the same crap they did, I wouldn't blame anyone for blaming Kansas.

Now again, I won't say they deserve all the blame. A fair number of folks have mucked up. But they damn well do deserve a good chunk of the blame.

[Lachlan]

I'm honestly rather shocked that anyone would try to defend china and their response to the virus. I mean sure I might not like them in the first place, but I'm not just blaming them simply because the virus started there and it spread, or that I just don't like them, I'm putting a lot of blame on them because they've done a lot of shady crap in regards to it. If the virus started in Australia and they did the same crap China did, I'd be blaming them. And if it started here in my own backyard, and Kansas did the same crap they did, I wouldn't blame anyone for blaming Kansas.

Now again, I won't say they deserve all the blame. A fair number of folks have mucked up. But they damn well do deserve a good chunk of the blame.

yeah a lot of Australians got pretty pissed over them slapping tariffs on us just because we wanted to investigate lol. Now nobody likes china which is both good and bad because it's good because they don't like the communist party but bad because people are being a bit racist to chinese people like myself even though I was born in Australia and some were born overseas.

[Meliva]

Folks who treat anyone badly due to their country of origin or race for any reason are crappy people, who honestly you're probably better off not associating with, but that's just my opinion. I don't blame any Chinese people for what their government does, most of them have no say in it. Sorry some folks treat you bad cause of it. Though, I doubt most folks treat Chinese people bad just because of it's government- that sounds more like an excuse to me to try to justify racist behavior. Though I also don't doubt some paranoid folks might see an Asian person and think they be a spy or something stupid. Lotta folks who are crazy and stupid honestly. Thankfully I'm just crazy

Well depending who you ask