Quote:
Originally Posted by lio45
To me, it's not inconceivable that the CCP could eventually lose its grip on power, and when the day comes when the Mainland Chinese population wants to move forward to something else, Taiwan and the mainland could reunite under the democratic RoC government of present-day Taiwan.
I find that already more likely than the scenario of a CCP conquest of a fortified, rich, high-tech, heavily armed, hostile island.
i.e. if you told me that in the late 21st century, Taiwan and Mainland China are again one single country, I would probably bet on "the CCP has collapsed and the Chinese have switched to democracy".
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I don't think Taiwan has any interest in being subsumed into a country of 1+ billion facing demographic and economic crises of existential proportions, and one that is basically committing every crime against humanity possible. Okay, they're not shoving Uyghurs into gas chambers and ovens, but what they're doing to them is an atrocity that the world is quite frankly not doing enough in response. Taiwan believes they are the "true China," but I think they'd rather just be called "Taiwan" and drop the "Republic of China." Taiwan is much better off being what Austria is to Germany.
What is troubling about China is that the CCP is developing a surveillance-based espionage system against its own people, where each citizen's every move is recorded to form a personal profile whose "social credit" score measures how much dissident risk they present. That "political report card" in turn determines what jobs a person can/can't have and whether or not they can leave the country. As a result, organizing peaceful protests is becoming increasingly more difficult.
If the CCP is to ever meet is demise (fingers crossed), it will be because of the decimation of China's economy. The tacit "social contract" between the CCP and Chinese citizens has always been reduced personal freedoms in exchange for economic prosperity. That's why China has built underutilized HSR lines, roads to (literally) nowhere, invested in foreign countries, etc. All of that inflates GDP, and as long as GDP rises, the CCP can tout "economic growth." Meanwhile, Xi Jinping has told the people of China to "eat bitterness" in face of forecasted hardship because adversity builds character. We'll see how long that lasts.
What's next? Banning people from speaking Cantonese, Min, Wu, and all the other dialects that aren't mutually intelligible with Mandarin because doing so is "subversive"?