"That's the problem........because nukes have grown in size, it wouldn't take a global, nuclear war to end up in a nuclear winter."
Not true. For the most part, typical yield has decreased considerably. There were much bigger bombs during the 1950s than exist today. Big bombs were fashionable because they had to be. Guidance systems meant that if you came within a mile of the target it was pure luck. So the bomb was scaled to still be able to kill the target. Better guidance meant that the bombs could be smaller and still "useful". Personally, I don't think nuclear weapons have much military value any way, even small ones are too big. It is like torture, you might come up with a contorted case where it/they might have some use, but the blowback is going to be painful...
I agree with your torture concept.
And I guess I was under the impression that nukes had gotten smaller in size but more powerful. I was wrong......which means a nuclear winter is more unlikely.
"Please, I don't even want to go there."
You better. China in essence doesn't have a financial system. Do you remember when Japan bellyflopped in the early 1990s? And has been trying to sit up, standing is not even a dream, ever since? China is walking down the same road. For the same reasons. Loans are not done by evaluating risks, they are done on the basis of personal contacts. And that means there is a huge, and growing, pile of debt that may or may not be paid off. Given the pace of construction, it is unlikely that much of it will ever be profitable. At some point, the house of cards is going to tumble and the government loses the mandate of heaven.
I don't know enough about China's financial condition to argue with you. However if what you say is true, any serious recession they experience would be catastrophic for this country on two levels........first, for the past few years, China has had a huge demand for American products. As just one small example, China just bought 50 more jets from Boeing. I bet they've been averaging about 50 jet orders per year between Boeing and Airbus. That demand for American products is what helped us out of recession three years ago and why that recession was fairly shallow.
Secondly, China has been buying up a lot of American financial 'paper'. If they get into trouble, they may well call that paper due and demand payment asap. That dam you mentioned..........the one that's the largest in the world and an environmental nightmare.........that's is enough to put China under. Very scary! |
