Sorry seems to be the hardest word.

[jaguar]

Invading China would not be that easy, the US has been selling them some real shiny toys and China still doesn't have a real blue-water naval capability, if the US moved in a couple of fleets the Chinese would essentially be fucked invasion-wise IMHO.

Even if the US doesn't directly get involved there would still be sanctions and the rest of it, there's no way the US could just say 'oh well' and get back to buying cheap chinese toys. No way, particularly considering Bush stupidly blurted out that the US WOULD intervene. If the world boycotted China cChina would colapse, end of story. Capitalism has made china as interdependant as everyone else but with far, far bigger social problems, China will be lucky to get though the next couple of decades without some serious unrest even without this kind of thing.

Of course, there's the nuclear factor. Noone can actually invade china however.