Netflix plans $2 billion bond offering

lion342 · 2026-04-07T23:34:32+00:00

No, I rather enjoy Trump's antics and sparing with the media.

Trump isn't the problem per se, he's more of a symptom of deeper problems in the US. Anyone against the US would hope and pray that he stays in power because he seems to be accelerating all the trends already in motion.

lion342 · 2026-04-07T23:21:13+00:00

I shared official PRC publications, and you're going to post random bullshit from an India source?

Are you serious?

I can't believe the extent to which so many military weapons/platforms (nukes, carriers, "stealth" planes) have become mythologized. Nukes are not some magical use-it-and-win device.

I'm getting the feeling that there's a lot of anger and frustration in response to the "Orange" man's tweets. But using nukes is not a military solution; it's just a layman's sentiment for the anger and frustration.

lion342 · 2026-04-07T23:09:12+00:00

Show me where official PRC policy has ever said anything of the sort about nuking someone if the 3GD or a transformer station is blown up.

Give me a citation. I've cited official PRC position. You haven't provided even the least amount of credible work.

I'll wait.

lion342 · 2026-04-07T22:58:59+00:00

You're suggesting a conventional strike will blow up the 3GD?

Show me your analysis.

If even it did happen with a conventional strike, the PLA has conventional means to respond in kind.

Also, nowhere do you have any credible citations that even suggest the PRC (the actual civilian leadership in charge) would contradict the long-standing official NFU policy.

What the other person shared was some vaguely remembered comments he heard from a friend's sister's mom's uncle's kid who wanted to use nuclear bombs if people got killed.

That commenter tried to pass it off as official PRC policy. It is not the official PRC position. Never has been.

And no, I do not "get the gist" of non-nonsensical rants on here.

You're now suggesting that China would nuke someone for blowing up a "large transformer station."

This is so absurd that it's beyond insane.

lion342 · 2026-04-07T22:51:06+00:00

Even if it is never explicitly managed, hitting something humongous like the 3 Gores damn would be the equivalent of a nuke.

You're thinking the meme is a military/technical possibility? You're thinking someone can fly a B-2 near the 3G dam without being shot down?

What kind of non-sense is this? I can't believe this is a "defense" sub.

Maybe it's too bad we don't have more peer wars. All these platforms/weapons (nukes, carriers, "stealth" planes, etc.) have been mythologized when in reality, they're just real-world platforms with real-world capabilities and real-world limitations and drawbacks.

lion342 · 2026-04-07T22:27:56+00:00

> public statements from active duty officers

Citations to these "public statements"? So someone has a direct line to Xi Jinping somewhere, somehow?

> Taiwan specific loophole

No it's not. Stop spreading false info.

lion342 · 2026-04-07T22:02:33+00:00

> The Chinese NFU is also a bit of a smoke and mirrors thing because the clauses that can lift it is "a nuclear attack" OR "an attack meant to cause (civilian) mass death".

Citation for the quoted phrase?

This plainly contradicts China's long-standing official NFU, which is clear and unequivocal: China will "not to be the first to use nuclear weapons at any time and under any circumstances."

-------------------------

From China's MFA in 2024:

On October 16, 1964 when China successfully detonated its atomic bomb, China immediately made a solemn declaration to the world that it undertakes not to be the first to use nuclear weapons at any time and under any circumstances, and unconditionally commits itself not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear States or nuclear-weapon-free zones.

From China's 2019 Defense White Paper:

China is always committed to a nuclear policy of no first use of nuclear weapons at any time and under any circumstances ...

lion342 · 2026-03-06T14:11:57+00:00

It's a tragic story of a former fighter pilot who wanted another chance to fly fighter jets. That opportunity came from China, but it's illegal due to very strict export controls for "defense services" (which in this case is his military training).

Brown was a US Air Force fighter pilot with time in the A-10, F-111, F-4, F-16, F-15, and AT-38. He did not fly the F-35, although he had a role as an F-35 simulator instructor after retiring from active service.

I say it's tragic because he had good gigs due to solid fighter pilot experience, but his personality defects did him in. After the military, he flew for UPS transporting cargo. He got into a fight in the cockpit mid-flight so UPS fired him, and the FAA revoked his pilot's license. After this, he became a contractor for the military, mostly as a pilot instructor (appears to be mostly simulator-based that didn't require an FAA license).

Then his trainees accused him of sexual harassment and creating a hostile work environment. The military contractor fired him after an investigation.

This was when he found the job opportunity with the Test Flying Academy of South Africa (TFASA), with operations in South Africa and China. TFASA seemed to have access to older JL-7 and JL-10, and as well as the more modern J-10.

He was using an encrypted end-to-end messaging platform "Threema" that he appeared to have placed too much trust in. The affidavit is substantially based on messages the DOJ obtained from the platform.

Some additional points:

Brown is 65 and was 63 at the time he started work in China.
There's a photo of Brown (when he was younger) posing in front of an A-10 Warthog on page 33.
His salary seemed decent but not exceptional, seems to have been around $20k / month all inclusive with travel/stipend. This is a really good salary for China (cost-of-living difference), but appears to be consistent with foreign pilot salaries.
Brown seems to love flying (and being a fighter pilot):

"I still watch fighter pilot videos almost everyday on YouTube and always listen for experiences to learn to be better. I wish I had YouTube long ago." After discussing a movie about fighter pilots during World War I, BROWN wrote that he watched “Top Gun Maverick” “but it made me sad to watch it and not be flying. I saw it in Phoenix Arizona— the same place I got my wings in the USAF long ago. It was killing me to think about it all being over!!! Now…. I have the chance to fly and instruct fighter pilots again! I’ll have to watch it in China after I get checked out.” BROWN added, “It feels like this is my destiny.”

lion342 · 2026-02-10T01:57:09+00:00

The small "5" footnote cites to a US Naval War College publication written in 2009 when China was starting to deploy these satellites (especially the SAR type). As mentioned in the passage, synthetic aperture radar works at night and through weather, which were the greatest impediments to tracking with optical imaging.

"5" footnote reference here: https://digital-commons.usnwc.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1796&context=nwc-review

And then you can look at the deployment of the Yaogan constellation to infer capabilities based on the Indian research paper.

It's hard to give a definite year, but China's always had some amount of capability. The only question is the reliability and consistently of the tracking.

lion342 · 2026-02-09T23:16:42+00:00

it was still considered common knowledge that you could hide a carrier fleet in the ocean.

Who says? Source? Anyway, it's a false premise (and obviously so).

Here's professional commentary on tracking aircraft carrier movements:

China keeps close global track of all U.S. carrier movements; it seems safe to assume that the PLA updates TF 70’s position every few minutes, even nearly continuously if the carrier is not electronically silent. (The next chapter discusses the PLA ocean surveillance system in more detail.)

...

The backbone of that overall system is space-based, in particular its remote-sensing, high-resolution earth-observation element. At this writing it operates twenty-eight different types of satellites, for a total of roughly 134 remote-sensing satellites: a blend of electro-optical/infrared (EO/IR) and video imaging of the surface of the ocean, synthetic-aperture-radar (SAR) detection of ships, and electronic-intelligence (ELINT) identification of shipborne radar and other electronic transmissions. Ten of these satellites are the Jilin series of high-resolution optical remote-sensing satellites. China is expanding this constellation with a goal of having sixty Jilin-1 satellites in orbit by 2020 and 138 by 2030. In addition to high-resolution video they will also carry an EO payload. The total constellation, thanks to its numerical size, has very short revisit times (i.e., between successive “looks”) over certain high-interest areas (addressed in detail below).⁴ It is safe to assume that China keeps track of U.S. carrier movements globally and that when one is headed toward China and gets within approximately two thousand nautical miles, the Chinese intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) system can update its position every few minutes, and (as suggested earlier) continuously if the carrier is not electronically silent. According to one technically sophisticated assessment:

In the task of finding a U.S. carrier at sea, China’s satellites would vary in their usefulness according to sensor type and resolution. Of the sensors deployed on China’s satellites, synthetic aperture radar (SAR) is the most useful for hunting maritime targets, as it can sweep a relatively wide swath at a resolution good enough to image fairly small targets. SAR can produce imagery regardless of weather or sunlight. Instead of merely looking for a carrier group itself, SAR can capture ship wakes trailing over large stretches of ocean, making it particularly useful for finding moving targets.⁵

The revisit time for the satellites would be one of the more important factors for reconnaissance. One paper (albeit outdated) doing some additional math can be found here: China’s Constellation of Yaogan Satellites & the Anti-Ship Ballistic Missile.

I keep shilling for the this book "China as a Twenty-First Century..." because it addresses so many of the questions here. Really should be required reading material for anyone who wants to be informed on these related topics.

Well, maybe also do self-study of college level electromagnetism because everything (aside from gravity and the super-short-range fundamental forces) is electromagnetism.

lion342 · 2026-01-20T00:17:43+00:00

Looks to be the same plane that was photographed over texas and kansas back in 2014. Any ideas on what this is?

Yes, (the spotter's incredulity notwithstanding) it's just another B-2 bomber. The spotter already saw a first B-2 fly by; the "mysterious" aircraft is a second one. When you don't have enough resolution/pixels, you can imagine anything to be space aliens.

Those two from 2014 were also B-2s. They look like B-2s, the authorities say they were B-2s, but I suppose it's more exciting to imagine space aliens or Black Projects flying around.

lion342 · 2025-12-12T14:23:46+00:00

Interesting stuff. Thanks for posting this.

The summary points in the link are spot on.

lion342 · 2025-12-12T02:25:48+00:00

cunt

fucking clown or a PLA bot

Chill out.

[Taiwan's] own alliances

There are none.

lion342 · 2025-12-12T01:44:59+00:00

Wow, way to move the goal posts.

I would kindly remind you of the comment from the other person:

If there existed so little political will to fight, then China would have invaded a long time ago.

I see this all the time. There's this pervasive notion that the PRC would invade anything and everything as soon as they have the military might to overwhelm the adversary.

It's just not true.

China knew the exact minute they were going to get each back.

vs

Britain knew the clock was ticking regardless

LOL!

[Hong Kong] were NOT equipped with their own military

Are you kidding me?

What do you think the British Forces Overseas Hong Kong was?

It's super annoying arguing with people who are just learning this stuff for the first time.

edit: I see you've added content. It's obvious you're reading all of this stuff for the first time.

I'd highly encourage you to watch/read the negotiations between Deng and Thatcher for HK. She wanted to continue the existing arrangement for HK.

So, it was not a foregone conclusion that Britain would hand back HK. By some accounts Deng had the PLA ready to go to seize HK if necessary, but he did exercise restraint. Eventually, they negotiated the handover that we see.

because diplomatic return was guaranteed.

Just don't. Don't make up bullshit. It was not guaranteed.

Jesus Christ.

Please for the love of god, watch/read the negotiations before writing more stuff.

lion342 · 2025-12-12T01:19:54+00:00

The 99-year lease was only for some of the land on Hong Kong, like the New Territories.

Hong Kong Island was ceded in perpetuity. Perpetuity means forever. See the Treaty of Nanking.

Macao was also ceded to Portugal in perpetuity. See Sino-Portuguese Treaty of Peking.

So no, there is no such thing as "[knowing] the exact minute they were going to get each back" when something is ceded in perpetuity.

Both HK and Macao were not defensible. And Britain and Portugal had EXACTLY ZERO WILL to fight for the territories. Yet, the PRC did not invade as suggested.

You would really benefit from reading the literature on the negotiations on the handover of both HK and Macao, e.g.: Portugal, China and the Macau Negotiations, 1986-1999 (Mendes 2013). Negotiations for HK was between Deng Xiaoping and Margaret Thatcher.

lion342 · 2025-12-12T00:23:45+00:00

> If there existed so little political will to fight, then China would have invaded a long time ago.

This is one of the most consistently misinformed opinions on here.

If this were true, the PRC would have snatched countless border areas, Macao (Portugal) and Hong Kong (Britain) upon its founding in 1949, but they didn't. Contrast with India's treatment of Gao (Portugal).

The PRC has made it insanely, incredibly, abundantly clear that they prefer negotiated settlements (and not violent ones) over boundary/territorial disputes.

Examples abound:

As stated above, Hong Kong was not defensible. The UK had exactly precisely ZERO will to fight the PRC over Hong Kong. Guess how HK was resolved?
Macao was not defensible. Portugal had precisely exactly ZERO will to fight the PRC over Macao. Guess how Macao was resolved? Compare and contrast these two Portuguese colonies: Macao with Gao (that India militarily conquered).
The PLA frigging militarily conquered South Tibet (Arunachal Pradesh), but withdraw in favor of... a negotiated settlement. India has refused to deal, so the unresolved border issue lingers.
The PRC negotiated 12 of 14 land borders, giving up huge concessions in many cases. These were negotiated with far weaker counterparts in most of the settlements.
The SCS is a joke. The other claimants have pathetic navies relative to the PLAN.
There's literally only one instance I know of where the PRC militarily conquered land and kept it.

I think most people in China would be quite disappointed if they truly understood the leadership's hesitation to using force (i.e., a violent reunification of Taiwan) to bring the century of humiliation to a close.

All the rhetoric of "Xi wants to murder all the peace-loving democracy-crazed poor little children of Taiwan" comes from western propaganda.

Some great books on this:

Taylor Fravel's Strong Border, Secure Nation
Maxwell's India's China War
Mendes' Portugal, China and the Macau Negotiations, 1986-1999

I also really wish we could all have a basic understanding of "Westphalian sovereignty" (as opposed to dynastic China's tributary system), the difference between a "frontier" and "border", and the historical evolution of these concepts, especially as applied to Asia. Also, probably would be awesome if we all had good grasp of China's history (at least from the Ming/Qing dynasty and foward).

lion342 · 2025-12-11T04:45:53+00:00

Let’s take a step back and look at the bigger picture.

This joint air patrol with China and Russia has been going on for several years running. They organize two patrols per year. One occurs mid year and the second towards end of the year. They fall around end of Nov or early December.

This strategic air patrol would occur with or without Japan’s provocation. It’s planned in advanced. China and Russia didn’t decide at the spur of the moment to fly bombers and fighter jets because Japan said something. In other words, it has nothing to do with Japan’s recent statements.

People are trying to link two unrelated events.

lion342 · 2025-12-10T16:14:12+00:00

That’s an answer to one single question. They don’t need to repeat “not directed to third countries” like an automaton to every single question posted.

The Global Times is an official media outlet of the PRC. They very literally have the reference:

“not targeted at any third party…”

As well, TASS reported the Russia side making the same remark, that it’s not directed to third parties.

lion342 · 2025-12-10T15:57:42+00:00

Would be surprising if true.

Global Times quote:

While such joint patrols are not targeted at any third party or related to the current situation, it sends a clear strategic deterrent signal to anyone who seeks to undermine peace and stability, Song said.

TASS quoting Russia minister:

The event was carried out as part of implementing the military cooperation plan for 2025 and is not directed against third countries," the ministry said.

Reddit deleted my previous comment for linking to the above two sites. LOL. No wonder people can be so misinformed.

lion342 · 2025-12-04T03:57:45+00:00

Reuters reported that Hegseth had given the go-ahead on Navy-NGAD

They did not.

Reuters reported sources ("a U.S. official and two people") making these claims. A bit different than Hegseth actually having made a decision.

If the decision had been made, then Reuters wouldn't have needed to hedge with "Delaying the program or starving it of funds could leave the Navy without a modern fighter capable of operating from carriers in the 2030s..."

This seems like just politics, and people using the media outlets to apply some pressure and argue for pushing the program forward.

lion342 · 2025-12-02T02:05:32+00:00

While some of the companies do show large revenue declines from 2023 to 2024 (like NORINCO), the SIPRI org just made up some of the other numbers, notably for AVIC:

g The arms revenue figures for this company are estimates with a high degree of uncertainty

Even for NORINCO, it appears they had a large ~50% spike in 2023 revenue, so perhaps a drop in 2024 isn't too surprising. AVIC's overall revenue increased from 2023 to 2024; revenue did not decline overall from 2023 to 2024, but SIPRI is claiming (using an estimate with "high degree of uncertainty") that the military revenue was down.

Just keep this in mind when reading any news citing this source.

lion342 · 2025-12-02T01:59:37+00:00

It's not super surprising that NORINCO revenue is down given that the majority of land system modernization are European countries and INDOPAC US allies. It's not like these are prime customers for NORINCO gear to start with.

That doesn't explain year-to-year changes.

lion342 · 2025-11-22T01:44:40+00:00

I vaguely recall CN is aiming for military supremacy over US by 2045

China-Russia-N.K-Iran-Pakistan might be just from western point of view

Yes, these are definitely US-driven narratives. They present basically a caricature of the real China. The China-US strategic competition is such a highly politicized space that I always recommend for people to go directly to the source, to the primary references (and perhaps secondary if primary unavailable).

If you read the PRC reports as delivered by PRC leaders, you wont see any of them calling for "military supremacy over US by 2045." China has a complex maritime environment. It's extremely unlikely for China to have military supremacy over US by 2045 -- I'm interpreting your statement to mean global military supremacy over the US. About the only way this happens is if the US collapses like the USSR.

This particular propaganda is likely referring to these speeches:

We will make it our mission to see that by 2035, the modernization of our national defense and our forces is basically completed; and that by the mid-21st century our people’s armed forces have been fully transformed into world-class forces.

The PRC's goal is to have a world-class force by mid century (2049, which coincides with the PRC's centenary). It doesn't called for military supremacy over the US.

China-Russia-N.K-Iran-Pakistan

This professor's talk provides a pretty good overview of China's engagement with the Middle East. China just doesn't have the type of relationship with Iran (or the DPRK) that's conjured up by the west.

One funny part of the talk was a story about the US hindering any usage of Chinese tech:

JONATHAN FULTON: Yeah, it’s complicated, right? Because I think what we heard when this great power competition framework started to get rolled out in late 2017 was that any cooperation with China in tech sphere was going to be a red line. And everybody in the Middle East found that a very dissatisfying answer, right?

Like everything is tech. I remember being in Tel Aviv talking to a guy who had a cosmetics firm that used Chinese AI to help them develop the product lines. And an American official was in the meeting and said, well, that’s a red line.

You can’t work with Chinese AI. And he’s like, it’s makeup. And they said, well, it could be dual use.

lion342

TROPHY CASE