Also: anybody have any recommendations for pundits/analysis sources to follow on the Taiwan situation? (there’s Sentinel but I’d like something more in-depth and specifically Taiwan-related)
Phillip Tetlock pretty convingingly showed that most geopolitics experts are no such thing.
The inherent irreducible uncertainty is just quite high.
On Taiwan specifically you should know that the number of Westerners that can read Chinese at a high enough level that they can actually co. Chinese is incredibly difficult. Most China experts you see on the news will struggle with reading the newspaper unassisted (learning Chinese is that hard. I know this is surprising; I was very surprised when I realized this during an attempt to learn chinese).
I did my best on writing down some of the key military facts on the Taiwan situation that can be reasonably inferred recently. You can find it in my recent shortforms.
Even when confining too concrete questions like how many missiles, how much shipbuilding capacity, how well would an amphibious landing go, how would US allies be able to assist, how vulnerable/obsolete are aircraft carriers etc the net aggregated uncertainty on the balance of power is still quite large.
Also: anybody have any recommendations for pundits/analysis sources to follow on the Taiwan situation? (there’s Sentinel but I’d like something more in-depth and specifically Taiwan-related)
I don’t have any. I’m also wary of soothsayers.
Phillip Tetlock pretty convingingly showed that most geopolitics experts are no such thing. The inherent irreducible uncertainty is just quite high.
On Taiwan specifically you should know that the number of Westerners that can read Chinese at a high enough level that they can actually co. Chinese is incredibly difficult. Most China experts you see on the news will struggle with reading the newspaper unassisted (learning Chinese is that hard. I know this is surprising; I was very surprised when I realized this during an attempt to learn chinese).
I did my best on writing down some of the key military facts on the Taiwan situation that can be reasonably inferred recently. You can find it in my recent shortforms.
Even when confining too concrete questions like how many missiles, how much shipbuilding capacity, how well would an amphibious landing go, how would US allies be able to assist, how vulnerable/obsolete are aircraft carriers etc the net aggregated uncertainty on the balance of power is still quite large.