08-03-2023, 06:59 PM
(08-03-2023, 09:27 AM)Stewy Wrote: Note: That living in Houston with the constant threat of direct hits by unimpeded tropical storms and having lived through and experienced Harvey that had twice as much rain as what just hit Beijing in the same period of time, what this says to me is that the Chinese govt failed to prepare and protect their people. We have guidelines and rules here.
--Staggered Mandatory evacuations from the cost inward till the voluntary point.
--Constant updates of when to leave vs. when to stay because that last thing you want is to be in a flood zone during a hurricane, but the second to last thing you want is to be in your car during a hurricane. Buckle down or get out, but the key point is to be aware and prepared, and it is clear that Beijing was neither.
From my understanding, the mountains of Philippines and Taiwan usually interfere greatly with typhoons in that area, but this one shot the gap between the two islands, plus had near perfect conditions for re-intensification PAST the islands AND was large enough and powerful enough to not be disrupted much by the islands when shooting the gap. This "protection from the mountainous islands" mindset might have contributed to China's lack of preparedness for this scenario.
Outstanding info, I was not aware of a lot of this.
(08-03-2023, 05:58 PM)grampahol Wrote: China's a hot mess. Their population will be cut in half by 2050 if not sooner because of 40 years of one child policies, the tradition of culling baby girls in favor of having a son to take care of people in their old age and nobody is in a big hurry to imigrate to China. They have no realistic building standards so an ungodly amount of buildings built in the past 20 years are crumbling thanks to tofu dreg construction and that permeates throughout their entire system including the military. Western corporations are leaving the country and nobody really wants to do business there if they can avoid it. It's a one man show with Xi calling all the shots and he's shot the messenger so often nobody wants to tell him any bad news. Their entire system is a top down system completely vertical and nobody can question the person above him regardless of how stupid that person happens to be. They have twice as many people 45 and older than they have kids.
That's just the beginning of the problems. They have to import nearly all their food and energy so any fight with any navy anywhere near the Straights of Malacka and they go straight into 1970s style famine again and make no mistake about it, they're surrounded by enemies and anyone who isn't an enemy has an economy smaller than Colorado..
You couldn't have said it any better. Their economy is a house of cards and it won't take a whole lot to bring it down. The real worry is that they go down taking everyone else with them. I have zero confidence in them behaving like the USSR, who prevented war several times by being overly cautious. I honestly think the CCP would prefer the world to burn than to lose their power.
