>Military-industrial complex emerges and captures politicians (US 1950s)
So far China has completely avoided this. The military is very firmly under Party control.
>Military interventionalism shows its flaws through failed post-intervention nation-building
Germany, Japan and South Korea have been fantastic successes in nation building. Sure there have been failures too, most recently in Afghanistan.
For China, their annexation of Tibet is going fine as is their ethnic hegemonisation there and in other regions. North Korea is an embarrassment, but eh.
Dictatorships must continuously work to maintain their legitimacy. This means they need to justify denying freedoms and opportunities to their own population enjoyed in other nations. They can do that by painting foreign nations as being horrible failures but with international travel and many citizens having friends or family living in those nations, that's not viable long term.
You're quite right. That leaves external threats which require such measures, with the added bonus of painting internal dissatisfaction with the government as disloyalty and betrayal. So for Russia, utter nowheres like Ukraine and Georgia have to be dire threats to Russia's security, so intervention can stop them succeeding where Russia failed. The Taiwan situation has to be escalated, and territorial claims in the South China Sea pushed in order to manufacture tensions that justify internal repression.
> The [Chinese] military is very firmly under Party control.
The point about the military-industrial complex capturing politicians isn't about control, but rather excess procurement.
On the one hand, China has a long way to reach parity with the US. On the other hand, they're building extremely quickly, and that means lots of government money going to corporations.
Subsequent restrictions to that funding flow tend to be when the system pushes back.
> Germany, Japan and South Korea have been fantastic successes in nation building.
These are all nation re-building efforts: they existed as economically and politically strong entities before the respective wars.
> The Taiwan situation has to be escalated, and territorial claims in the South China Sea pushed in order to manufacture tensions that justify internal repression.
I don't pretend to understand China's calculus with either.
With enough shore-based facilities, they can counter the US Navy.
But as soon as there's a shooting war over either, China is the aggressor to international order (Taiwan's sovereignity and maritime law), Chinese international trade evaporates (in terms of both exports and raw material imports), and their economy crashes.
So the only Chinese winning move, to me, looks like saber rattling right up to the brink, but making sure it never boils over.
Which was always the China-in-the-WTO argument -- addict them to the benefits of international trade, such that offending the global order would mean slitting their own economic throat.
So long as China knows that's their only winning move that's fine, but especially given Xi's tendency to shoot the messenger and pack his administration with barely competent yes men we have no idea what he 'knows'.
So far China has completely avoided this. The military is very firmly under Party control.
>Military interventionalism shows its flaws through failed post-intervention nation-building
Germany, Japan and South Korea have been fantastic successes in nation building. Sure there have been failures too, most recently in Afghanistan.
For China, their annexation of Tibet is going fine as is their ethnic hegemonisation there and in other regions. North Korea is an embarrassment, but eh.
Dictatorships must continuously work to maintain their legitimacy. This means they need to justify denying freedoms and opportunities to their own population enjoyed in other nations. They can do that by painting foreign nations as being horrible failures but with international travel and many citizens having friends or family living in those nations, that's not viable long term.
You're quite right. That leaves external threats which require such measures, with the added bonus of painting internal dissatisfaction with the government as disloyalty and betrayal. So for Russia, utter nowheres like Ukraine and Georgia have to be dire threats to Russia's security, so intervention can stop them succeeding where Russia failed. The Taiwan situation has to be escalated, and territorial claims in the South China Sea pushed in order to manufacture tensions that justify internal repression.