A FRIEND WRITES: “Watch what’s going down now. We may be at war by the end of the week.”
If we are, it won’t go well. I can’t help but feel that we are being led through a dance by Iran. The Hamas massacres occurred on their timetable, the reactions have been predictable — the US one made moreso by the fact that so many leading lights in DC are on their payroll, and the spy ring we rolled up was certainly not the only one — and that their endgame is a war in which the Arab nations are split off from the U.S. and Israel, and the U.S. and Israel are defeated, a defeat that will then be used to split the U.S. from Israel.
This wouldn’t have worked with Trump, in part because of his unpredictability, and in part because he wouldn’t have allowed the Iranians to get this far (or paid them to do so, as the Biden Administration has.) But I have zero confidence in the Biden Administration to get this right.
Or maybe I’m too gloomy. I’ve been a bit gloomy about the world situation lately, not without reason, but that doesn’t guarantee that I’m right to be gloomy about this.
I also wonder if the Ukraine attack, Mideast war rumbles and perhaps an invasion or takeover of Taiwan were all programmed some time ago.
The United States has never had the capacity to wage three wars at once.
UPDATE: Just to stress, I said an invasion or takeover of Taiwan. Subversion is what this China does best, and that doesn’t require a big invasion fleet. A friend who just returned from Taipei reports that people there are cheerfully unconcerned and for the most part don’t seem to regard the mainland Chinese as an enemy. Some sort of coup might be easier to pull off than we think.
ANOTHER UPDATE: Mark Simon: An Unconvincing DPP Win is Fertile Group for Beijing’s Post Election Moves in Taiwan: A Weak President Lai is Beijing’s New Goal in Taiwan. “More interesting to Beijing as well as Tokyo and Washington were the reveals. If there was to be a fight with the mainland, 70% of Taiwanese between the ages of 20-29 say they are not fighting, 54% of all ages saying the same, and 46% of all Taiwanese believing the US will not come to save Taiwan. Not great news for Taiwan in foreign capitals, and very much a mood Beijing will seek to exploit.”