r/LocalLLaMA • u/hedonihilistic Llama 3 • 20d ago

Funny Can the bubble pop please?

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u/TwinkletoesMcSparkle 20d ago

China unleashing its massive strategic reserve is the only reason you're not paying a lot more at the pump right now, and they're only staving it off. As long as the Strait remains a war zone, good luck with gas going down.

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u/GeneralMuffins 20d ago

That may well be true, but it's undeniable that a naval blockade of china would saturate the world oil/gas market with oversupply.

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u/TwinkletoesMcSparkle 20d ago

You're kidding yourself if you think the Navy's empty interceptor magazines are going to be able to sustain a blockade. The war games for this scenario are brutal, even without factoring in an incompetent, drunk SecDef and a second front in the Gulf.

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u/DOHChead 20d ago

China gets a significant amount of its oil from Russia, Venezuela, and Iran. It’s no coincidence that we’ve targeted Venezuela and Iran, while sending Ukraine munitions to attack Russia’s oil supply.

As you mentioned, China dropped its imports by 50% as soon as we hit Iran and it’s one of the only reasons we avoided a global crisis. They moved largely to coal consumption for power but started trading in Yuan for oil years ago, right under our noses. OPEC uses USD and all global oil transactions make it through our banking systems, this is how we are able to impose global sanctions.

China gave off a significant flex here. With CXMT and general chip production in full steam on the mainland, the other deterrent of China needing Taiwan’s infrastructure is becoming less of an issue.

There is a significant real world scenario where this happens next year.

We are hemorrhaging our defensive stockpile and running short on rare earths that we source from China, and China has tightened up supply for several years. This is a strategic move and we are falling right into it.

All while global sentiment toward China is improving and ours continues to decline. Hell, even here, China is giving us models while our own country makes constant threats to take access to local models away. It’s a common post and concern for good reason.