What’s the most fearful Christmas that you can imagine?

Something to do with the global pandemic? Perhaps evidence that the newly-discovered Omicron variant is more transmissible, more virulent and more resistant to current vaccines than all previous variants.

Something to do with weather, climate or geology? Perhaps something on the scale of the tsunami of Boxing Day 2004 which killed a quarter of a million people in 14 countries.

Let me offer you a different thought which was put to me in a recent conversation. A Russian invasion of Ukraine. A Chinese invasion of Taiwan. Simultaneously. Over the Christmas holiday when western governments are largely closed down.

Russia regards Ukraine as historically its territory which is highly contestable. China views Taiwan as historically its territory which it undoubtedly was.

The armed forces of the Ukraine could not resist a Russian invasion and there is little evidence that the West would do more than impose tighter sanctions. On the other hand, the Taiwanese would probably fight back against a wartime invasion but would only last a short while unless US bombers were deployed in force.

Biden’s rushed withdrawal of all American forces from Afghanistan has emboldened both Russian and China in their respective aspirations to regain ‘lost’ territory. If Russia succeeded in Ukraine, it might then turn to thinking of reoccupation of the Baltic States. If China succeeded in Taiwan, it would would then seek dominance of the South China Sea.

I am thoughtful of the remilitarisation of the Rhineland on 7 March 1936, when German military forces entered the region, which directly contravened international treaties. Neither France nor Britain was prepared for a military response, so they did not act. The rest is history …


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