China & Russia

[Thumpalumpacus]

The reason why we perceive China as the aggressor is because we believe it is right and proper for us to be able to assert to China what is right and proper for something 100 miles from China and 6000 miles from the U.S, and it is not right and proper for China to tell us to go fuck ourselves.

It should be noted that China has pissed off both Vietnam and the Philippines with their assertion of illegal sovereign waters around the Spratleys and other South China Sea archipelagoes. Building an island and then claiming sovereign dominance is aggressive, especially in a space where much of the world's trade sails.

If the Chinese don't understand how that might sit in foreign halls, then they should perhaps give that some consideration. If they do understand how that affects other nations and choose to go forward anyway, then it is meet for those smaller and weaker countries to ask for assistance. And assuring free lines of trade benefits all nations.

In a globally-interconnected market, appealing to 100 vs 6000 miles is pretty much an irrelevancy, because all nations benefit from the Malacca Straits not being dominated by one power. This idea that only America is sore about China's actions in the SCS is misleading.

[Anomalocaris]

Cuban missile crisis was hardly a prestige issue.    At stake there is whether the U.S. will gets to continue to unilaterally enjoy the geographic advantage, gained through assiduous diplomacy, dirty tricks, as well as economic give and take, of surrounding the adversary at close range with bases from which a nuclear attack on the adversary could be launched,  thus putting adversary at the grave disadvantage of having build a vast and vastly expensive air defence force which then has to be dispersed to all four corners of its territoryn.     If Soviet missiles in Cuba were to stay, that would mean the Soviet Union sudden wiped out at comparatively little cost the hitherto unilateral and dearly bought U.S. advantage ,  and gained the Soviet Union a near parity in the ability to suddenly launch an nearly unanswerable nuclear attack on the core of the adversary, that requires disproportionately costly homeland defensive investment to counter.

As it turns out, this advantage that the U.S. enjoyed was soon to be side steped by the advant of large fleet of MIRV equipped ICBMs,  but in 1963 it was not yet clear the entire favorable balance the Cuban blockade was intended safeguard would be rendered obsolete in 5 years.

[Thumpalumpacus]

Way to miss the point with your pedantry.