China can annihilate Taiwan if she chooses to do so– but she cannot occupy Taiwan, 200 miles of ocean will make it a treacherous task. The first and subsequent waves of a mere 31,000 troops will be sitting ducks for entrenched forces defending the island.
I doubt the US will intervene, since we do not have the stomach for another war and that too with China (our chief creditor) in their very own backyard.
If the PRC feels there is nothing to gain from getting absolute control of Taiwan, then why not just simply acknowledge formal independence from Taiwan? Face it, Taiwan is ALREADY independent in everything else, from the Taiwanese having their own foreign policies to their own athletes at the Olympics. Does the US allow Californians their own athletes at the Olympics?
Except for Viet Nam, US shield is what deterred communist China from all those countries listed.
There are two paths to assimilate a country: political consensus or military conquest. Even after the US withdrawal from Viet Nam, the Vietnamese did not consent to being a territory to China. That said...It was the threat of American military involvement that deterred China from militarily conquering the rest of Asia after Vietnam. Despite US withdrawal, the Soviets and the Chinese learned that the Vietnam War was costly to them in their own ways, hence the feared 'domino theory' did not came to pass, that they knew that withdrawal from Vietnam was no guarantee from further military involvement by the US.
There is no 'problem' and there is no 'trying'. We are there and we have allies. China stands alone and no, North Korea does not matter.
That is utterly absurd. Why should we 'threaten' China if Taiwan is formally recognized as an independent state? Taiwanese independence from China is what compelled US to be there in the first place with military emphasis. Without the military threat to Taiwanese independence, economic will be the primary justification for US to be involved with Taiwan. You are not making sense.
You must be living in an alternate universe. Taiwan is a 'fruitful development' TO THE REST OF THE WORLD so why should Taiwan placed China higher in priority, other than as a military threat to Taiwan's de facto independence?
More like the other way around. Taiwan was an economic success even before the Taiwanese got involved in mainland China. So even if the PRC rip everything on the mainland away from Taiwanese owners, Taiwan will recover.
Why? The PRC ruled mainland all this time? What is the point of gunning for an island that has been de facto independent for over fifty years? For US, Puerto Rico was a territory, then we gave the 'Ricans a chance to vote for themselves and they chose to remain with US, whereas the PI wanted US out so we left. So why not let the Taiwanese go their own way?
New Recruit
New Recruit
Give me a break. The island's name is Taiwan and it is governed by the Republic of China. But there is nothing wrong with, for ease of discussion, using Taiwan. If I want to be as pedantic, I could throw a hissy fit everytime someone use the word 'American' to denote a US citizen. Just in case you do not know, the word 'America' is supposed to include the northern and southern parts.
You are confused. None of them are violently opposing their territorial status. Add Puerto Rico to list. For any of these who possess a distinct culture and is not a US...er...I mean...an American state, if they can raise enough money to field their own Olympic team and if the USOC have no objections, they can represent themselves at the Olympics. My point is that since Taiwan...oh...excuse me...the ROC fielded its own Olympics team and so far has no desire to be unified with mainland China and if the PRC feels there is nothing to gain in militarily conquering Taiwan, then why not let the Taiwanese go their own way?
Becareful before you make that comment to someone.
New Recruit
The act by itself does not but what it does indicate is autonomy. In the case of Taiwan...oh...pardonez moi...the Republic of China, that autonomy was not granted but asserted. The US government granted the governments of US territories permissions to represent themselves at the Olympics, a global platform. For the RoC, the PRC was never consulted. The world does take notice of the significance of the difference. That and the fact that the RoC has a military whose mission is to defend the island against a possible PRC invasion. Neither Guam nor Puerto Rico has any such plans against the US. In 1993 the 'Ricans voted to remain a US territory. No one held any guns to the 'Ricans to compel them to vote that way. They assessed the pros and cons, did a cost/benefit analysis and found it was better in many ways to remain a US territory. For the Taiwanese, no doubt they performed similar analysis.
A lot of Americans and I wager Canadians as well do not understand how a government could institute the cruel one-child policy upon a culture that value males grossly over females that resulted in unknown abortions and killing of baby girls.
So if you are going to use male-to-female ratios you need to factor this in. 
You are speaking out of your arse! Do you know that there are good estimates on the number of abortions, and the preference of male over female fetuses is not as large as portrayed in Western-zio Media?
PLEASE, dude go to China and see for yourself. In nature, humans tend to have more baby boys than girls -- that's probably the effect of thousands of years of evolution. But females tend to outlive their male counter parts. That's just nature. You see this sex-ratio disparity in ALL human populations, be they black, white, yellow, brown, orange, red, green
Now, refrain from speaking out of your arse when you don't understand the ground reality!
Did not take me long to find that...er...Western-zio media Canadian source.
