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Arnaud Bertrand Profile picture
@RnaudBertrand
Feb 8 โ€ข 3 tweets โ€ข 2 min read โ€ข Read on X
So the U.S. just decided to place US Army Special Forces "on a long term basis" right there ๐Ÿ‘‡, literally a few hundred feet away from the Chinese mainland, which is unbelievably provocative.

And then gaslight the whole world by "cautioning China against changing the status quo on Taiwan which is vital to maintaining peace".Image
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This is the view of Kinmen from the mainland Chinese city of Xiamen. U.S. special force troops will be stationed there.

What would the U.S. do in a similar situation, with PLA troops on an island this close to one of their major cities? Image
๐Ÿ‘‡

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More from @RnaudBertrand

Arnaud Bertrand Profile picture
Feb 2
This is quite something! This is John Lander - Australia's former ambassador to Iran and Deputy Ambassador to China - explaining what the "rules-based order" actually is.

In his words it's "a set of ever varying, constantly vacillating rules devised by the United States for the benefit of the United States and its Western allies." He points out that "one of the most difficult thing about the rules-based order is finding out what the rules are!"

Link to the whole interview at the end of the thread.
On this topic I've been making the point since the beginning of Israel's war on Gaza that if one takes a step back, it's really at heart a war of the "rules-based order" against international law ๐Ÿ‘‡. And I really believe that's a key prism to view the war.
In the same interview Lander also speaks about the war on Gaza from an international law perspective:

"The Palestinians don't have a state... [They're] under forceful occupation by Israel so the actions by Hamas - as horrendous as it was - is more in the character of a rebellion against the oppression of an occupying power than an invasion of one state by another. [It's] a paradox because [Israel] claim that Gaza and the West Bank do actually belong to Israel and that the Palestinians have no right to it, so on the one hand they say 'it is ours' and on the other hand they say 'we've been invaded' from within our own territory..."
Read 4 tweets
Arnaud Bertrand Profile picture
Jan 30
This is a absolutely fantastic example of data manipulation. Credit to @nikstankovic_ for spotting it (you can see his reply to @AgatheDemarais's post).

Not surprising coming from The Economist but the manipulation is still quite insane once you understand it.

Let me explain ๐Ÿงต
Image
So what you understand from The Economist's graph is exactly what @AgatheDemarais understood: "oh my god, Japan has been 'derisking' from China for years, their economic reliance on China is low, Germany is so behind!".

Right? Well, it's TOTALLY wrong.
As a matter of fact Japanese exports to China are 26% higher than German exports to China ๐Ÿ‘‡. 153B in exports to China from Japan in 2021 vs 121B from Germany.

Those are the actual numbers.
Image
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Read 9 tweets
Arnaud Bertrand Profile picture
Jan 30
This is one of the best talks I've heard in a while on China's economy, by Eric Li, a famous Chinese VC and political scientist.


I summarize the main points in a short ๐Ÿงต
First of all, he argues there was a fundamental misunderstanding of China by the US. The US convinced itself China would stay in the "peripheral" forever ๐Ÿ‘‡ whilst China's objective was always to move up and be part of the "core". Image
This is how he describes the "first phase of China's globalization", with the "3 pillars" of its market economy being real estate, consumer internet and industrial capacity & global supply chain (on top of infrastructure building handled by the state). Image
Read 18 tweets
Arnaud Bertrand Profile picture
Jan 29
"Democratic" Europe... where if you express a legitimate dissenting opinion as a country - and the interests of your citizens - a revengeful EU commission will cause your economic collapse.
Yup, not their first rodeo
More on this by @philippilk
Read 4 tweets
Arnaud Bertrand Profile picture
Jan 12
This is huge:

Top Israeli newspaper Yedioth Ahronoth confirms Israel used the "Hannibal directive" on Oct 7th, which calls to kill Israeli hostages along with their captors.

This is the exact quote from the paper:

"At midnight on October 7, the IDF ordered all of its combat units in practice to use the 'Hannibal Directive', although without clearly mentioning this explicit name. The order was to stop 'at all costs' any attempt by Hamas terrorists to return to Gaza, that is despite the fear that some of them have hostages.

It is estimated that about a thousand terrorists and infiltrators were killed in the area between the Otaf settlements and the Gaza Strip. It is not clear at this time how many of the hostages were killed due to the activation of this command. In the week after the attack, soldiers of elite units checked about 70 vehicles that were left in the area between the Otaf settlements and the Gaza Strip. These are vehicles that did not reach Gaza, because on the way they were shot by a combat helicopter, an anti-tank missile or a tank, and at least in some cases everyone in the vehicle was killed."ynet.co.il/news/article/yโ€ฆ
Not sure if you remember these photos of burned vehicles reported by all the media as "destroyed by Hamas" (here Reuters ๐Ÿ‘‡)? Well the Yedioth Ahronoth investigation now confirms they were in fact destroyed by the IDF... Image
Sorry, Google translation mistake apparently: this part should read "One of the revelations exposed in the investigation is that at noon on October 7th, the IDF instructed all its combat units in the field to implement 'Hannibal Directive'


This is because apparently the phrase "ืฉื‘ื—ืฆื•ืช ื”ื™ื•ื ืฉืœ 7" in Hebrew translates to "at the midnight of the 7th" or "at noon of the 7th," depending on the context.
Read 4 tweets
Arnaud Bertrand Profile picture
Jan 4
That's a pretty stunning illustration of the double standards at play when the US criticize China's 9-dash line, having effectively transformed the entire Pacific ocean into "the American lake". Image
Credit to @Bevin83994661
@Bevin83994661 ๐Ÿ‘‡
Read 5 tweets

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