Why do the West, trade with a country like China with an oppressive goverment and yet goes to war with Iraq ?

Question

they were very similar...
both had weapons of Mass Destruction
both had a screwed up dictator
both liked to toruture and murder its citizens



help me understand I just don't get it !!!!!!!!!!

Answer 1

Stop being cynical. I'm American. If you know about their history you'd see that we too are all to blame. The four superpowers in the west also has nuclear weapons(WMD). Even America. Have you forgotten the Hydrogen bomb we and the Russians developed and still posses

Answer 2

For West read America.
America wants Iraq's oil. It is also weak and therefore 'easy meat.'
With China, America prefers trade. It also prefers and uses China's cheap and efficient labour to produce what America wants.
In any case, China is too big to go to war with. It also has nearly six times America's population and also many times the US's armed forces. China's military, though not yet as mighty as America's, is by no means a weakling in terms of equipment and sophistication.
Now, your descriptions of both Iraq and China also fit America to a 't.' America has the greatest hoard of WMD and is still spending a lot of money to develop new and more powerful forms.
For a dictator, America has a screwed-up President who may have difficulty getting out of a paper bag.
America too likes nothing better than to torture and murder its own and also others besides also using others to do the job. Where torture and murder is concerned, at least the Chinese and Iraqis do their own dirity jobs whereas America employs others.
It is also a matter of public record that America in its brief 200- year history, has destabilised more countries than any other and are still at it. This is all conducted grandly in the name of promoting democracy, defending human rights and of course, protecting its own economic interests (meaning securing oil.)
Generally, Americans always believe the worse of and in others, thanks to the sort of 'free press' and government propaganda spewed out by every Administration. One may even call the man in the street in America the most gullible and also the least knowledgeable. His interest is totally parochial.
Where Iraq is concerned, the USA led some 25 other nations to invade the country under the most spurious of reasons. The underlying interest is Iraqi oil which of course is now in the hands of American conglomerates.
In the invasion and occupation process, America and its so-called allies have killed or caused the deaths of countless thousands and the wounded and maimed has exceeded half a million. Iraq is of course totally devastated.
Do you think the war justified Where is the WMD? To get rid of one so-called screwed-up dictator, is it justified to cause untold misery and suffering to a whole nation? Who gave anyone the right to do this? Human rights, democracy? How about just a small dose of the same for the miserable souls in Daufur and Somalia?
The asker can quite easily understand the situations raised by his own questions if he would surf the net more and to read newspaper coverages by other countries. More important, question what he reads or is being told in his own country.
Understand that America, in spite of all its own hype, is no better than Iraq and China, not by a long shot!

Answer 3

Most red blooded Americans are a living, breathing example of this...it's called GREED! They want cheap goods to squeeze the most profit out of them. The US doesnt care about who makes the goods or if the workers were treated like humans. Profit is the bottom line.

The US is in Iraq for the oil, the media doesnt cover it cuz it's state/corporate owned and controlled.

Dylan, you must not know very much about America's relationship with China. Only Fox News's spin on it. US know's it can't take on China. They will wipe the US off the map. There could have been a skirmish if you remember back around the spring/summer of 2001 when a Chinese fighter jet deliberately bumped into a AWACS survailance/spy plane causing it to decend into a emergency landing on a Chinese Island. The crew tried to destroy the equipment onboard to prevent the Chinese from learning the technology, but there wasn't enough time, the equipment was intact upon landing.

They held the plane for a few months, held the crew captive and went through the plane and copied it's technology all the while the US was powerless and Bush claimed spying on China from the air was perfectly legit, that it was international airspace. Later the plane and crew was all returned to the US and charged them something like $1 million rent for keeping the plane and crew on Chinese soil.

Why then didn't Bush threaten war or invasion? He treads lightly when he know's he's gonna get his *** kicked. And you Americans (for the most part) don't even know that it happened. How's that for spin?

China owns most of your debt and they're waiting for the right time to pull out their investment which means the US will go bankrupt over-night.

You Americans have no business invading Iraq or Afghanistan. Like every powerful and feared empire will come crashing down. No wonder the world hates you war mongers.

Answer 4

hey, china's not the same as iraq, we are not similar in my opinion. we don't do mass destruction and we're not 'screwed' up...as a chinese i feel rather offended by your question details:
"they were very similar...
both had weapons of Mass Destruction
both had a screwed up dictator
both liked to toruture and murder its citizens"

moreover, i think its a rather nation centered question as the west isn't china's only trade partner.

Answer 5

China is fast becoming the next great power and instead of having an economic and military stalemate (like during the cold war), the west want to "be in on the ground floor" when all the money and technology pours out of China. The educated migrant workforce is also a plus to western nations.

Answer 6

UK trades with China simply because we always have. They've got a lot of cheap goods which we all buy, esp. clothing. They also supply cut price electronic goods, PCs, TVs etc. Check out yours and see if any of it is made in China.

What do the Chinese take in return? Well, for the moment they have a big thing going on recycled waste and are taking ship loads of that from UK. Not sure what they're going to do with all that plastic. Maybe sell it back to us when we run out. Who knows.

Actually, Chinese is much less repressive than it used to be. Okay, so there are probably ten million political prisoners, most of whom are making all those cheap Chinese goods which we all buy. Isn't there an immorality there somewhere? I mean, buying goods made by 'slaves'? If you have a problem with that, don't buy Chinese.

Answer 7

how many of you know about american soldiers opened fire and killed students at Kent State University in Ohio during the Vietnam war protests , so China actually had no monopoly when it came to killing students . Also can we call Bush a screwed up dictator as he stopped people counting votes in a so-called democracy through the use of Supreme court ruling. Most important of all , we go into Iraq because we want to staeal their oil.

Answer 8

Because China didn't threaten us with their WMDs.

And even though China is a Commie Dictatorship, they still have a more stable Government than Iraq ever will. Unlike Iraq, China hasn't provoked the United States into Military action. And it would be downright stupid to invade a major world/military power solely on their form of government.

Answer 9

Actually, Iraq didnt have WMD. oh the irony. Its all George Dubyas fault. I think its all to do with tactical oil accumulation, and money. Someone said a good war does wonders for the economy.

To Wittmann (below) Yeah fair point mate, I dont know if they have them or not. I'm confusing that with the fact that the gov. lied by saying we had to attack iraq because they could nuke us within 45 mins, which I'm fairly sure (?) was disproved, conversely proving that the gov. are a bunch of sh1t sucking liars. So point accepted.

Answer 10

money, the US gave china special status in spite of the student killings in Tianamin ( sorry can't spell it) square, because it was good for trade. iraque had oil when the US need it, so they invented WMD
( which didn't exist) so they could try to justify the invasion, and our daft lot went along maybe blair was glory seeking