# China Conquers US. Do you fight back? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [June 17, 2021, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493 "2021-06-17T22:03:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![oldoaktree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ccd318/32.png) [@oldoaktree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oldoaktree)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/21 "2021-06-17T23:23:56Z")
> [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](#): > > And that’s not counting Jewish Space lasers. That’s how they got them. Stole intellectual property. Sure its an impossible hypothetical. Play along ---
**Author:** ![Noelq](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/noelq/32/16438_2.png) [@Noelq](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Noelq)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/22 "2021-06-17T23:29:54Z")
Yes. From the moment that the government even considers giving up, I’ll be joining the fight. ---
**Author:** ![oldoaktree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ccd318/32.png) [@oldoaktree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oldoaktree)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/23 "2021-06-17T23:33:20Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#): > > I’m not convinced that a bunch of wannabe Wolverines are going to have a better chance of winning than the entire military might of the former United States. Glad George Washington didn’t have that view of the British Empire. ---
**Author:** ![Chingon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chingon/32/17645_2.png) [@Chingon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chingon)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/24 "2021-06-17T23:36:45Z")
What answer does the OP want? ---
**Author:** ![oldoaktree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ccd318/32.png) [@oldoaktree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oldoaktree)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/25 "2021-06-17T23:41:20Z")
Your opinion on whether you would you join the armed resistance. with justification ---
**Author:** ![Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/ba9def/32.png) [@Just\_Asking\_Questions](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Just_Asking_Questions)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/26 "2021-06-17T23:42:29Z")
> [@Chingon](#): > > What answer does the OP want? Obviously not the one that, even with fantastical space lasers that somehow wouldn’t somehow be destroyed the first day by US antisat weapons, that the Chinese couldn’t manage a land invasion of the US mainland without incurring 90-100% losses. Or that we wouldn’t nuke Beijing. Or that we wouldn’t just stop buying their cheap consumer products, which is the real weapon of the 21st century. I guess the one that reveals that Americans, despite having 2.5 guns per household, really are wimps when the shit hits the fan. ---
**Author:** ![Delayed\_Reflex](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/delayed_reflex/32/3172_2.png) [@Delayed\_Reflex](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Delayed_Reflex)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/27 "2021-06-17T23:49:27Z")
What kind of “boots on the ground” presence does China have in this situation? Is it just the US federal government that has agreed to become a vassal state to China and run itself as a branch of the Chinese government? So is the armed resistance fighting the current US army? Or in your hypothetical is there a civil war ongoing with a nominally China-supporting government in power but also a rebel government with substantial resources from the original federal US government fighting it across America? I’m not American, but if I was in this situation I’d probably just try to leave the country than fight. Unless China has used these space lasers to achieve global domination. ---
**Author:** ![Darren\_Garrison](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/darren_garrison/32/92_2.png) [@Darren\_Garrison](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darren_Garrison)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/28 "2021-06-17T23:50:15Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > Doing nothing would be suicide. I couldn’t live under an authoritarian system. I don’t know what an old fart like me could do, but I’d definitely fight back. As a college professor of mine used to say every opportunity he could, bad breath is better than no breath. Or to put it another way, better red than dead. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/29 "2021-06-17T23:54:06Z")
> [@oldoaktree](#): > > Glad George Washington didn’t have that view of the British Empire. Did King George have space lasers? ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/30 "2021-06-17T23:55:09Z")
I’m going to use my orbiting spider-bots to latch onto the Chinese space lasers and redirect them to fire on Chinese military assets and observation satellites, and then deorbit them to rain down and destroy the Peoples Liberation Army Rocket Forces while I use my power armor to fly into Beijing, grab Xi Jinping, and drop him in a remote Uyghur village with a quip: “He’s all yours.” I mean, if we’re positing ridiculous hypotheticals I might as well go full Tony Stark, right? Wake me up when the aliens start flooding through the wormhole. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![oldoaktree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ccd318/32.png) [@oldoaktree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oldoaktree)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/31 "2021-06-17T23:55:29Z")
No he had the largest most advanced military of its time. ---
**Author:** ![oldoaktree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ccd318/32.png) [@oldoaktree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oldoaktree)\ **Post date:** [June 17, 2021, 11:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/32 "2021-06-17T23:59:57Z")
If you don’t like my crazy space laser hypothetical OP, just ignore it. ---
**Author:** ![Ranch\_Dip](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranch_dip/32/5238_2.png) [@Ranch\_Dip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranch_Dip)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/33 "2021-06-18T00:00:36Z")
> [@oldoaktree](#): > > Do you join the armed resistance? Against space lasers? What with pocket mirrors? Also, can they do much worse than our current government has? ---
**Author:** ![oldoaktree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ccd318/32.png) [@oldoaktree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oldoaktree)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/34 "2021-06-18T00:02:20Z")
> [@Ranch\_Dip](#): > > Also, can they do much worse than our current government has? you would equate our somewhat flawed democracy with the Chinese Communist party? ---
**Author:** ![Ranch\_Dip](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ranch_dip/32/5238_2.png) [@Ranch\_Dip](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ranch_Dip)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/35 "2021-06-18T00:10:43Z")
I would equate what we have now, which is hardly a somewhat flawed democracy. At least the Chinese don’t hide what they are about. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/36 "2021-06-18T00:11:38Z")
> [@oldoaktree](#): > > No he had the largest most advanced military of its time. He never had more than 20,000 soldiers in North America concentrated in a few cities with reinforcements weeks away. He only lasted as long as he did because a huge chunk of colonists and most native Americans hated Washington more than they hated him. BTW, aren’t we talking about the same British Empire that was booted from an entire sub-continent by acts of civil disobedience? ---
**Author:** ![oldoaktree](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/ccd318/32.png) [@oldoaktree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/oldoaktree)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/37 "2021-06-18T00:17:12Z")
So despite your attempts to avoid the question, your answer to the OP would be, no i would not join the armed resistance, i would practice non-violent civil disobedience ala Gandhi, and that will solve the problem. ---
**Author:** ![Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/elmer_j.fudd/32/1211_2.png) [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elmer_J.Fudd)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:18am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/38 "2021-06-18T00:18:40Z")
If I had a space laser, that would solve the problem, but apparently the US military neglected to ask to borrow mine. ---
**Author:** ![Chingon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chingon/32/17645_2.png) [@Chingon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chingon)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/39 "2021-06-18T00:19:16Z")
Is there anything I can do to oppose the occupation that won’t end with me getting killed? Or is your real question “are you willing to commit certain suicide for the idea of freedom?” ---
**Author:** ![Velocity](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/velocity/32/18006_2.png) [@Velocity](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Velocity)\ **Post date:** [June 18, 2021, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493/40 "2021-06-18T00:21:14Z")
For some clarifying questions: “Resistance” is only meaningful if the resisters stand a reasonable chance of surviving. Otherwise, this is like asking if the bacteria on my skin will “fight back” if I apply a dollop of alcoholic hand sanitizer to them. They could “resist” all they want, but they’re going to die. Your thread question - asking if China took over America and set up a tyranny here - still presumes that we can meaningfully resist and stand some decent chance of survival. So you’re going to have to give us some parameters here. Are we talking a North Korea level of resistance? (I’d presume that, in a place like North Korea, there actually still is a slim chance of survival for dissidents.) Or more like Vichy France, in which the chance of survival was even higher, and the French resistance actually did make some meaningful impact? Just how good are those space lasers? [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/china-conquers-us-do-you-fight-back/944493.md?page=3)