Editor’s note for Thursday, May 19, 2022

My thoughts today:

In an opinion piece for the Financial Times titled “Russia learns a hard lesson about the folly of war — Great powers usually come off worse when they invade smaller countries,” Gideon Rachman wrote:

One powerful country that has resisted the temptation to wage war over the past 40 years is China.

The Chinese got a bloody nose when they invaded Vietnam in 1979. Since then Beijing has wisely steered clear of war. By concentrating on economic development, China has transformed its economy and society and become the world’s most powerful country after the U.S.

In recent years, however, the Chinese government and people have displayed a certain yearning for the battlefield. China has poured money into its military. Threatening military exercises near Taiwan have been stepped up. War films have soared in popularity at the box office.

Russia’s experiences in Ukraine, however, suggest that it would be a disastrous error for China to succumb to the temptation to fight a short, glorious war. Once the shooting starts, things rarely go according to plan.

Historian Adam Tooze points out: “Other than wars of national liberation, one is hard pressed to name a single war of aggression since 1914 that has yielded clearly positive results for the first mover.”

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