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Essay by Eric Worrall
China’s suspension of climate cooperation, in response to Nanci Pelosi’s Taiwan visit, is giving climate change worriers a taste of the thuggish geopolitical bullying Taiwan has endured over the years.
China suspends climate change cooperation with US and sanctions Nancy Pelosi in retaliation for Taiwan visit
Lawrence Chung in Taipei Teddy Ng in Hong Kong and Amber Wang in Beijing
Published: 11:56pm, 5 Aug, 2022China has suspended cooperation with the United States in the fight against climate change as part of a range of measures in response to Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan, which also included sanctions on the House Speaker and her family.
Regular dialogues between the world’s two most powerful armed forces have also been cancelled, making it harder for them to prevent accidental conflicts. Beijing also said it would stop cooperating in tackling the drugs trade, fighting crime and repatriating illegal immigrants.
Pelosi, second in the presidential line of succession, is the most senior US politician to have been sanctioned by China after she became the first house speaker to visit the island in 25 years.
…
Shi Yinhong, an international relations professor at Renmin University, called the latest measures “unprecedentedly severe” and said China-US relations have now sunk to rock bottom.
“The sanctions against Pelosi show how angry Beijing is,” he said.
But Shi noted that Beijing used the word “suspension” regarding climate change and other areas of cooperation, leaving the door open for the two sides to normalise their ties “if Washington takes the first step”.
…
Read more: https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3187927/china-suspends-climate-change-cooperation-us-and-sanctions
I can’t help thinking China has miscalculated by issuing this threat.
China is forcing the Biden Administration to choose between competing values, US support for liberal democracies vs the Biden administration’s obsession with climate change. Democrats will have to admit that climate change is a secondary priority.
The unthinkable alternative, the possibility of the USA delivering a close friend and ally into the jaws of a monster, just to restore climate cooperation, would shatter the USA’s international reputation.
There is something strangely clumsy about this latest Chinese provocation. In my opinion there have been hints over the years that some influential voices in the current Chinese regime might be struggling to understand the US political system, that they might be attempting to interpret US politics through the lens of assuming Biden is an absolute tyrant like Xi Jinping. They must have seen and puzzled over Pelosi’s open defiance of Biden, when she made her Taiwan visit. Perhaps they are worried that if Biden falls, Pelosi, whom they must think of as a Taiwan hawk, might replace him – a genuine possibility under US law.
Obviously this is very speculative, but the Chinese regime might even hope this climate ultimatum will help Biden reassert his authority over Congress, and in return deliver China a clear path to attack Taiwan.
Correction (EW): h/t Tom Halla – The order of Presidential succession is controlled by US law, not the constitution.
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The succession to President beyond the Vice President is a matter of legislation, not the Constitution. The backups have varied over time.
Pooh was looking for cover on climate change, so this is just a clear pretext for the Chinese Communist Party to do what it was going to do anyway, with a thin layer of hypocrisy overlaid.
Thanks Tom. IMO Pooh never had any intention of fulfilling climate commitments, but that is not the same as actually announcing he won’t.
No need for an IMO: the huge coal consumption by China and Xi Jinping’s Paris climate commitment ‘dates’ in the future are cold facts. He offered the Western CO2 religion a fake sacrifice.
China’s weak promise at COP26 was a fig leaf for the credibility of the alarmist programme. Now it’s removed we can all relax and give up ‘decarbonisation’ as being pointless. Hurrah Bad mistake by China?
I have 2 rhoids…
The one on the left I have named Vladimir Putin
The one on the right I have named Xi Jinping
Joe Biden is the A-hole between them.
Thanks for that image, its lunchtime in Australia… 🙂
It must be five o’clock somewhere.
What climate cooperation? Drug trade interdiction? Etc. all empty threats, because they’re not doing anything on any of those fronts anyway.
Maybe they’ll refuse to sell us solar panels and wind turbines. We can hope, can’t we? Of course, then we might not proceed with the destruction of our energy grid, so I expect Xi’s threat does not include cutting off the supply of useless crap.
Now that China is familiar with capitalism, they’ll probably add tariffs so that the Chinese solar panels and windmills are just slightly cheaper than their competitors. The companies interested in their ESG scores will still buy them because they will still be cheaper than the competition.
Xi isn’t done milking the green loony cows yet.
The Biden family was bought and paid for by China while Biden was out of office. Xi can’t figure out why Biden isn’t responding to their requests even though the threats should make it clear and easy for him to do so. As you suggest, Biden’s hands are somewhat tied so he is unable to do what China demands. A Republic is structured so no one person has the final word and with the three branches of government, the executive is surprisingly toothless when the constitution is followed. Granted, the constitution has been ignored a lot lately but still the president can’t tell congress or the courts what to do.
The best way to counter this threat is to imminently return all of China’s students in the U.S. and suspend all vistas with the exception of major diplomatic staff. Next would be too block as many imports as possible and exports such as food would be cash and carry.
Naturally the green program would have to be put on the far back burner, maybe this isn’t as bad as we think.
“The Biden family was bought and paid for by China while Biden was out of office.”
Probably. But according to the T Carlson interview with Tony Bobulinski [Hunter Biden’s business partner] the dealings also occurred during Biden’s term as Vice President as well.
The fact that he is not doing everything the CCP wants [just most of what they want?]
reminded me of an old joke on the definition of an “honest politician”:
“A honest politician is one that stays bought.”
And here in central Arizona we had another beautiful, if hot [101 F], day which is completely
consistent with “climate change”.
I didn’t notice the temperature today but that sound about right. The monsoon has cooled things off a bit but don’t worry, it will warm up and get more comfortable. I am in the south west valley and it seems that the rest of the valley gets about twice the rain that we do.
I realize after the edits timed out that I should have said while Biden was Vice President. Riding the Dragon The Biden’s Chine’s Secrets does a good job of documenting these years.
On the back burner would saves us tons of money
China got what it wanted and no longer needs to put up a facade of caring about CO2 induced climate change. They clearly took advantage of the developed world’s obsession and now that they’ve been weakened enough by green foolishness reinforced by inept American leadership, China can step in and take over, especially once they fully blockade Taiwan to starve them into submission as they accelerate the west’s recession into a depression by drying up the supply of chips.
If they attempt that, they may find it more difficult than they think. We just station several attack sub around Taiwan and if China starts something, they will soon find their navy at the bottom of the pacific. They probably don’t have the detection equipment to find a sub that wants to be invisible and the subs will be able to come and go as they please. Overflights will spot ship movement and the subs signaled with Ultra low frequency radio. Not going to be fun for the crews to be underwater for 3 months at a time but they are trained for it.
That scenario assumes a great deal not in evidence about the Biden Administration.
Sinking Chinese chips would start WW3. Much easier to just embargo any oil tankers from the Middle East heading to China. That would cripple China and probably not start WW3.
If we shoot at China, it’s because they have already started shooting at other ships. Just knowing that there are subs somewhere down there will make China think twice about starting something. Often a show of force is enough to keep thing from progressing to the next stage.
This isn’t a totally original thought. We used subs during the Cuban missile crisis along with surface ships. Granted, there was a point were the Russians almost turned it into a shooting war but cooler heads prevailed and we were able to block any more missiles from going to Cuba. In the end, Russia withdrew their missiles in exchange for us removing some obsolete missiles in Turkey.
I don’t ever want it to get that close again because we were living on pins and needles for a few weeks but it managed to cool down the potential for war.
It seems that Russia and China don’t have much in the way of under sea military anymore. It takes special people to operate subs and they may not have the ability in their population. It’s also out of sight, out of mind and they may no longer realize that control of he seas means under water. The last possibility is we have the ability to monitor undersea activity anywhere in the world. Because stealth isn’t possible for them, they may feel that isn’t the best place to put their money.
You’re a violent one. You think deep, I can see.
“Is time long, or is it wide?”
Now get your head above the water, and think about everything without the pressure of drowning in a cesspool of Bolshevik propaganda.
And for goodness sake, swim for shore, it is humanity-shaped, just look in people’s eyes, without fear or hate.
Stop dreaming of death, boy, life is beautiful once you start living it.
The oceans can hide a lot of things.
https://nailheadtom.blogspot.com/2022/03/whats-next-in-usinternational-drama.html
That would also be an act of war.
An alternative scenario much loved on “conspiracy theorist” websites.
NB : This could only happen if both the US administration and the “war-mongering neo-con” subset of their advisers were not subject to overconfidence and/or stupidity … now just how likely do you (plural) think those particular conditions could ever be met ?
One defining characteristic of (professional / career) politicians is that they have to be seen to be “doing something“.
The Commander-in-Chief (CiC) insists on sending two carrier battle groups (CVBGs) into the “bottleneck” of the Taiwan Straits (probably over the objections of the Pentagon).
The PLA uses the opportunity for “live fire testing” of their DF-21D and DF-26 anti-ship missiles under the following two “use cases” :
1a) Fire one missile at a time to check not just that their “terminal manoeuvring” and “counter-measure evasion” specifications are respected, but also how long it takes for the “screening elements” of the first CVBG to run out of (anti-missile) ammunition.
1b) Find out how many “hits” it actually takes to sink a Nimitz-class carrier, and how many need to be allocated for each escort ship type in the CVBG.
2) Confirm the (newly calculated) minimum number of missiles required to blow a “fully prepared / on high alert CVBG” out of the water in a single salvo (/ a sequence of carefully sized and timed salvos ?) is correct.
– – – – –
Which “navy” ends up “at the bottom of the Pacific Ocean” here ?
At what point in the above process would the CiC be “pressured” into hitting the nuclear button against Beijing ?
Warships, including aircraft carriers, were and are designed to fight other warships and achieve quick decisive victories, like at Trafalgar and Midway. They fare poorly against shore batteries that can shoot back with weapons that are equal in quality to what the ship mounts but more numerous, simply because a ship is inherently at risk of destruction from accumulated hits. It eventually exhausts its ammunition and endurance while the shore base is resupplied by land, with manual labour if it comes to that. The shore guns and missile launchers have to suffer direct hits for the weapons to be neutralized, or on individual trucks doing fire control and carrying reloads, while the warship is vulnerable to hits anywhere along its great length. Sometimes even a single lucky hit will do it, mission-killing if not sinking the warship. The farther out to sea the warship stands for protection, the more fuel and the less ordnance its strike aircraft have to carry, and the less time they can spend over the land looking for targets.
Submarines would be another matter but committing surface and air elements of the U.S. or Royal Navies into a shooting war against the PLA in its home waters would be folly.
A carrier with a hole in its flight deck is 85,000 tons of floating junk until it can be repaired. And any of its planes that were aloft would have to ditch if there was nowhere else for them to land on. Damaged carriers in WW2 were rapidly repaired and able to resume flight ops. No catapults in those days. Could the Gerald Ford keep fighting with that damage? Or even a Nimitz?
I agree, making a decision like that would be completely insane.
Now, is the probability zero that Liz Truss’s and/or Joe Biden’s “military expert advisers” will not make such suggestions this autumn (or later) ?
What is the likelihood that either of those “world leaders” would have the intelligence to say “NO ! ! ! … FFS, that could well spark WW-III !” if that sort of “option” was included amongst those put before them for “consideration” ?
Not really. Straight is lined with 1000s of sonobouys, and is less than 500 ft deep. China has many resources in that area, and we are not going nuclear over Taiwan.
China was a major beneficiary of the United Nations Lima Protocol signed by member nations during 1975 agreeing over time to gradually assist the transfer of many or most manufacturing industry businesses to “developing nations” as identified by the UN.
UN Agenda 21 – Sustainability, others, and including Kyoto and Paris agreements on emissions reduction, have assisted China’s economic growth to rival the USA and others.
yeah Lima protocols were the start of a downhill slide for autonomy and sanity , gave them stupid powers to do things like tax rainwater on your roof etc
Taiwan should ASAP move its chip factories to other nations! It should have done this years ago- perhaps not doing it to ensure support from America et. al.
From the article: “Shi Yinhong, an international relations professor at Renmin University, called the latest measures “unprecedentedly severe” and said China-US relations have now sunk to rock bottom.
“The sanctions against Pelosi show how angry Beijing is,” he said.”
Did you ever think that maybe the Chicoms are just pretending to be angry as a means of gaining what they want? They want you to blow their reaction out of proportion, and from what I hear, there are plenty of nervous nellies wringing their hands over possibly making the Chicoms angry.
It’s kind of pathetic, really.
I’m seeing a lot of nervous nellie Republicans, too. That’s pathetic, too. They’ve been listening to Tucker too much.
The Chicoms are at war with the United States. Any “cooperation” is one way, all in favor of the Chicoms.
The Chicoms are on a war footing. They are attacking every aspect of our lives right now. It’s about time the United States put a stop to the Chicom war.
I hear Biden visited with Chinese businessmen, Hunter’s pals, in the White House 15 times while Biden was Vice President.
It appears Biden owes the Chicoms Big Time. What’s the Chicom’s price, Joe? The total destruction of the United States? They couldn’t have made a better choice with you leading the charge.
See you in January, Joe.
Google Rosemount Seneca. That was a structure created so China could “invest” and Hunter could control the money. As far as I know. China hasn’t pulled any of the money out of there.
The woke U.S. is like a big fish on a hook, which China will try to land in the future
There is no escape, or “help”, because woke Europe is doomed
Russia is on the winning side, as are Turkey, Iran, Iraq, Brazil, Argentina, India, etc., after BRICS has been expanded, and trades, not in petro-dollars, but in a new currency.
“this climate ultimatum will help Biden reassert his authority over Congress”
That will change with midterms in November when China ends up facing a formidable opponent next year. This is a wise move as the option will be taken and the new administration will not object.
Considering the Biden administration’s general psychosis, I would not rule out it favoring climate above everything else, or even it taking this as a great opportunity to throw Taiwan under the bus.
So in other words, China will dispense with the charade that Climate Change is nothing more that a carrot they dangle for gullible Progressives. Just as well. The honesty would be refreshing.
I tell progressives that “gullible” is not a word and that it’s not in any dictionary. They always pull out a dictionary and look it up. Then they tell me I was wrong. They just don’t get it.
🤣 👍 👍
Only a foolish person would believe that China and the other developing nations would be free to build hundreds of new coal fired power stations and to increase emissions, for example Australia produces about one per cent of global emissions and China increases emissions every year by more than Australia’s total emissions, if climate warming was the emergency the deceivers claim it is.
You’d be amazed at how quickly coal fired plants are being destroyed in the US. We’re done. In the meantime can only find chinese junk on store shelves. Kill your power plants, hand over the money to the international cartel and wait and see what happens next. I predict it won’t end well if you happen to live in North America.
Send Griff and all the XR stupids to China immediately to save us.
Greens learned the hard way not to protest in Eastern countries, when they got arrested by Russia and thrown into a Siberian prison in 2013. Having said that the Russians did treat them gently by Russian standards, the Greenpeace activists were kept separate from the other prisoners. Word was the Siberian prison population were very eager to meet the activists, to discuss the attack on their friends on the oil rigs. The activists were released without charge a few months later from memory.
Shhhh don’t tell them …. I had a win win lined up.
What’s not to like?
Support free Taiwan.
More* plant food to green the planet.
“The Big Guy” gets stiffed for his “10 percent.”**
.
.
*Theoretically, that is (China is pumping out as much CO2 as it can NOW)
**Assuming: “Chi-coms angry” = no cut for their front man.
They have suspended a fight they were never in, uh huh.
CCPing is about as lethal as his chief export, COVID. They don’t want WWIII because they’d get their asses kicked. Ignore Soy Boy.
At present. How about ten years time?
In 10 years, they will be in even worse shape.
Thanks to Xi’s reintroduction of communism, their economy is struggling.
They are facing a demographic crisis as their population continues to age.
The demographic crisis is true for China and the rest of the world, the USA not so much, kind of a of a happy accident.
Surpise surprise. What, you thought China was going to honor it’s commitments to the west regarding climate change by 2030? What a laugh. People who trust communists get exactly what they deserve. It’s not a secret they are in it for the power and they will take advantage of fools who think they can negotiate with them each and every time.
Chinese communists have much in common with U.S. democrats. Same end goal.
Yes, and the British did their upper best to negotiate a democratic future for Hong Kong.
This is the relevant point.
If Taiwan wasn’t the excuse, Hong Kong or Tibet or trade would be.
China was always playing false over climate change. The Western governments were willing to be fooled as the alternative was to say that the science was unpersuasive in China, Russia, India etc.
Our priority must be the freedom of Taiwan. We got beaten in Hong Kong. The line must be drawn somewhere.
When Iran collapses back into secular Persia we will need to support on that border too.
Who are “we?”
I doubt Xi is confused or concerned about anything. He simply understands that all the voodoo in the world won’t change the climate equation and when the world doesn’t end in ten years (or whenever AOC and her merry band of high school science teacher warriors promise), he wants to take credit for it.
He woofs about Taiwan every now and then. But he knows his economy collapses (and ours with it) if he does more than woof. He’d rather we destroy our own economy on our own by depending on Chinese materials and manufacturing.
He’s not worried about Pelosi or trying to figure out who has power in the US. He knows perfectly well things are a mess here and his best strategy is to play along and pretend to care.
Meanwhile, his puppet in Moscow (or a bunker somewhere nearby) continues to screw with Europe, with the EU soon in tatters after a couple of years of energy poverty.
Xi still wants the western world to continue on the Green agenda. Like Sun Tzu said, when the enemy is making a mistake, don’t interfere with their progress.
Thought it was Wellington.
My mistake, seems to have been either Napoleon or Nelson. Not Tsung Tsu.
Or indeed, Napoleon.
Yes, it appears I was incorrect in attributing the quote to Sun Tzu when it seems likely that it was uttered by Napoleon in 1805.
Regardless of who made the statement, the tenet is well recognized in war, social, and business interactions and should be heeded. Xi probably is.
He’d rather we destroy our own economy on our own by depending on Chinese materials and manufacturing….BINGO! I think we already did that did we not?
The only people in the world who are stupid enough to believe that the Chinese give a rat’s patootie about climate change are Brandon and John F***wad Kerry.
Please don’t underestimate how many members of the green lemon cult there are – over in the U.K. one of the arch loons is now advocating giving up on agriculture and stewing rats turds and proteins mush as allegedly green compliant food for the masses. Sound familiar?
Big green – giving stupidity a bad name.
Unfortunately the United States will protect Taiwan’s freedom in the same manner they protected Hong Kong’s freedom.
Hong Kong was British. Britain signed a 99 year lease in 1898. At the end of the lease the owners wanted it back.
Australia and Britain helped, they made it easy for HK citizens to relocate.
Hong Kong was always China, the “lease” was gunboat robbery.
Taiwan was always China, both the PRC and ROC both agree, not British nor American.
“helped” meant trying a color revolution in Hong Kong after reunification.
Communist good
British/American evil
Got it.
Eh? Hong Kong predates Mao.
I think you are looking at the wrong end of the gun barrel!
We can only hope.
Joe Biden just cancelled a Minute Man III missile test yesterday from Vandenburg AFB so the Chinese Communists wouldn’t get huffy. Atta boy, Joe. Peace for our time.
The Left has always pushed the belief that weakness in the west equals peace.
Showing Weakness emboldens bully dictators. Leftwing appeasers, and appeasers of every political stripe, don’t understand that. They think playing nice and being unthreatening will placate bullies. It doesn’t work that way. It’s just the opposite. If you give the bully the idea he can take your lunch money, then he will take your lunch money. Don’t give bullies the wrong idea. Give them the idea that they will suffer greatly if they try to take your lunch money.
Joe Biden does not strike fear in the hearts of the bullies and tyrants of the world. It easy to see why. The bullies see Biden clearly. They have sized him up and found him wanting.
Now we have military action breaking out in Israel. Are the Mad Mullahs of Iran feeling emboldened watching Biden tuck his tail between his legs and run away from confrontation? More than likely. Next thing we know, Kim will want some attention, too. He has no fear of Biden.
Weakness invites Disaster. Strength, stronger than your opponents, invites murderous Dictators to watch their step, or pay a high price for failing to do so.
Joe Biden being president presents a great danger to the United States. His obvious weakness is not being missed by the bad guys of the world. No doubt, the bad guys could not ask for a weaker United States than the one Joe Biden is in charge of.
The next president won’t be nearly so weak, so the Bad Guys have to figure if they are going to do something drastic, they should do it before Biden leaves office because he will probably let them get away with it.
Biden is a walking disaster for the United States and the Free World.
Voters in the United States better open their eyes and vote right, because the window of freedom is closng quickly. If the Democrats prevail, you can kiss your personal freedoms and prosperity goodbye. Our current situation was given to us by the radical Democrats. You want more of this? I certainly do not.
The latest announced development from the establishment of AUKUS during 2020/21 (AUstraliaUnitedKingdomUnitedStates) defence is the integration into US Forces of The Australian Defence Force. Of course there has been close cooperation in past decades but the new strategy effectively places the ADF as part of US Forces and the bases in Australia will become even more important.
This includes long range missiles and USAF stealth bombers and other aircraft using RAAF airfields and facilities. The Northern Territory, south of Darwin near Katherine RAAF base is being improved with lengthened runways and substantially expanded fuel storage and refuelling facilities.
Add to this the QUAD defence arrangements between Australia, United States, India and Japan.
oh great really makes us a bigger target
explains Xis dig at aus today for being a stirring buddy of usa
Then why has Taiwan spent so much money on defence force assets and personnel, if disarming was better for peace?
China threatening to pull out of the charade is like Cleavon Little announcing himself as the new sheriff in Blazing Saddles.
Has the Biden administration taken any strong action to stop China’s abusive trade practices, spying activities, the infiltration of American institutions, and intellectual property theft… and the encouragement of corruption? Plus the fentanyl that comes from China and it does nothing to stop.
No.
Don’t let your eye off the above abuses… that’t the ball to keep your eye on.
Other things are meant to distract you.
Or the >1 million Americans murdered by China’s biowarfare over the last 2 1/2 years, with no hint of remorse or reparations. That alone was a signal to pull out of China and MAGA.
Chi-com climate threats are a red herring. No serious thinker ever believed China has the remotest concern about climate, other than political gamesmanship.
So, China is going to refuse to sell cheap useless green energy crap to the USA?
Can we send Trudeau to Taiwan and get the same consideration?
This could be wonderful
So what does lack of cooperation mean?
The exact same thing as cooperation on this graph.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/03/13/charting-the-outcome-of-the-obama-china-climate-deal-by-2030/
COP26 aims to banish coal. Asia is building hundreds of power plants to burn it
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/cop26-aims-banish-coal-asia-is-building-hundreds-power-plants-burn-it-2021-10-29/
Naturally airbus Albo will be off to the Pacific Islands to garner all their support for climate changing and wagging a stern finger at China in the naughty corner. The Pacific Islanders will no doubt be falling all over themselves to ingratiate themselves with enlightened Australia and rebuff any sea level rise Chinese overtures. Off you go Albo.