269
submitted 5 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

Australia's defence minister Richard Marles has called on China to explain why it needs to have "such an extraordinary military build-up".

On Sunday morning, Marles asserted that "what we have seen from China is the single biggest increase in military capability and build up in conventional sense, by any country since the end of the Second World War".

It is not just the size of the military build-up that concerns other countries, he told reporters.

"It's the fact that it is happening without strategic reassurance. It's happening without a clear strategic intent on the part of China… what we want to see is strategic transparency and strategic reassurance be provided by China, and an understanding of why it is needed to have such an extraordinary military build-up."

top 36 comments
sorted by: hot top new old
[-] [email protected] 30 points 4 days ago

Isn’t it obvious? President Xi publicly ordered the Chinese military to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2026.

[-] [email protected] 35 points 4 days ago

They're...asking a country about this? What, do they expect China to say "we're preparing to invade Taiwan in 2026"? This is just fishing for bullshit answers so politicians can pretend like they buy it and ignore actually dealing with the military buildup by taking action.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 4 days ago

I'll tell you why, they see how close Russia is to being defeated and they're going to move in to take the territories in the East pretty much like Japan did with French Indochina once France was defeated in WW2

[-] [email protected] 8 points 4 days ago

Even without Taiwan. broadly gestures at everything

Russia has proved to be unreliable. USA are proving to be unreliable. Europe is building up its own armies. India is fighting Pakistan. Who knows how big Israel wants to be, they are already attacking neighbours.

No idea what's happening in Africa. I think most of them are still stuck fighting amongst themselves.

Maybe Australia is just asking the question so that they have an excuse to build up as well.

[-] [email protected] 7 points 4 days ago

It's quite simple the US is seen as politically willed at the moment so it's time to take a bite and see how much they can swallow.

[-] [email protected] 2 points 5 days ago

Every government is uncomfortable. News stories about "defence" spending are commonplace.

WWIII has already begun. The only questions now are how many will die and who will be the victors.

I would like to be wrong. If the world can be pulled back from the brink of the existing skirmishes, then what's happening right now won't get the WWIII label, but we sure have a lot of hard-headed megalomaniacs running world-affecting countries these days, don't we? That's never a good sign.

[-] [email protected] 14 points 5 days ago

What makes you so sure it's WWIII scale already?

[-] [email protected] 6 points 4 days ago

If the world can be pulled back from the brink of the existing skirmishes, then what's happening right now won't get the WWIII label

[-] [email protected] 3 points 4 days ago
[-] [email protected] 3 points 4 days ago

"Only thing we've ever learned from history is that we can't learn from history"

[-] [email protected] -3 points 4 days ago

Either delusional thinking or a serious misunderstanding of historical events

[-] [email protected] 45 points 4 days ago

Maybe step one of the protest is to stop buying from China

[-] [email protected] 9 points 4 days ago

Don't be silly. Big corporations would lose profits. We can't have that! /s

[-] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago

That’s right!

But if I stopped buying from AliExpress, I would have to purchase the exact same thing from Amazon or eBay at 10 times the price, and if I boycott the US companies as well, I would need to buy the exact same thing at 100 times the price from Bunnings!

(Meanwhile AliExpress sellers are reselling the exact same thing that can be purchased in bulk from AliBaba at 1/10th the price)

this post was submitted on 02 Jun 2025
269 points (99.3% liked)

World News

47165 readers
2508 users here now

A community for discussing events around the World

Rules:

Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.

We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.

All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.


Lemmy World Partners

News [email protected]

Politics [email protected]

World Politics [email protected]


Recommendations

For Firefox users, there is media bias / propaganda / fact check plugin.

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/media-bias-fact-check/

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS