Can someone in the UK give me context for what is going on? (Political)

Whatever helps you sleep better at night.

 

Clearly you say?

Let's bring in my pal, ChatGPT (yes I know that it can make errors, but so can humans).

My prompt:
Is China, as a potential superpower, on the rise or decline?

ChatGPT's response:

China’s trajectory as a potential superpower is complex, and whether it is “on the rise or decline” depends heavily on which factors you prioritize—economic, military, technological, demographic, or geopolitical. Let’s break it down systematically:

1. Economic Factors

• Rise: China remains the world’s second-largest economy, with a huge manufacturing base, major export strength, and growing technological capabilities. Belt and Road Initiative investments expand its global influence.
  
  
• Challenges: Economic growth is slowing. Debt levels, real estate instability, and declining productivity growth are significant concerns. Demographic pressures (aging population, shrinking workforce) may constrain long-term growth.
  

Verdict: Rising in absolute size and global influence, but growth rate is slowing, making sustainability uncertain.

2. Military Power

• Rise: China has modernized its military rapidly—expanding its navy, missile capabilities, and cyber/space operations. It can project power regionally (South China Sea, Taiwan) and potentially globally in the next decade.
  
  
• Challenges: While regional strength is impressive, global expeditionary capability still lags behind the U.S. Some technologies are still catching up, and strategic logistics for long-range operations are complex.
  

Verdict: Strong regional rise; global projection still developing.

3. Technological Capabilities

• Rise: China leads in certain areas (5G, renewable energy, AI research, high-speed rail, some quantum tech). It is investing heavily in self-reliance due to geopolitical tensions.
  
  
• Challenges: Reliant on foreign semiconductors and advanced chips, which limits cutting-edge tech independence. Export controls by the U.S. and allies slow some progress.
  

Verdict: Rapid rise, but bottlenecks remain in high-end tech.

4. Geopolitical Influence

• Rise: China exerts influence via trade, loans, diplomacy, and soft power projects (media, Confucius Institutes). Growing role in international institutions.
  
  
• Challenges: Tensions with U.S., EU, India, and neighbors could isolate it. Hard power projection is mostly regional, and aggressive posture (Taiwan, South China Sea) may provoke pushback.
  

Verdict: Rising influence globally, but strategic overreach could provoke resistance.

5. Demographics and Internal Stability

• Challenges: Aging population, declining birth rates, and potential social unrest threaten long-term sustainability. Rising inequality and environmental degradation also pose risks.
  
  
• No clear rise: These factors are structural headwinds that could slow or even reverse gains.
  

Overall Assessment

• Short-to-medium term (next 10–20 years): China is still on the rise—economically, militarily, and technologically—albeit with slowing growth and increasing geopolitical friction.
  
  
• Long-term (30+ years): Structural challenges (demographics, debt, environmental limits) and geopolitical pushback may limit superpower status or even trigger relative decline if not managed.
  

Bottom line: China is rising, but the pace is slowing, and its trajectory is fragile. Unlike the U.S., which has structural advantages in demography, alliances, and innovation, China’s ascent faces more internal and external constraints.

 

A strong contender.

My prompt:
Hypothetically, if the USA were to fall as the world's superpower in the next 10-20 years, compile a list (with percent chance) of the most likely countries to become the next global superpower.

ChatGPT's response:

Got it. Let’s think through this carefully. I’ll base the assessment on a combination of economic size, military capability, technological innovation, geopolitical influence, population, natural resources, and strategic position—the key elements that historically define a global superpower. I’ll assign rough probabilities, keeping in mind this is speculative.

Most Likely Contenders to Become the Next Global Superpower (if the USA declines in 10–20 years)
Rank Country Approx. Chance Notes

1 China 40% Already the closest rival; massive population, economic growth, technological advancements, and military expansion. Challenges: debt, aging population, environmental issues, internal unrest.

2 India 20% Huge population (soon to surpass China), fast-growing economy, emerging tech and defense sectors. Challenges: infrastructure gaps, political fragmentation, social inequality, regional tensions.

3 European Union (as a bloc) 15% Economic strength and technological base are significant, but fragmented political decision-making and slow defense integration weaken global projection. Could emerge as a “collective superpower.”

4 Russia 10% Strong military, nuclear arsenal, energy exports. Limitations: economic stagnation, demographic decline, over-reliance on hydrocarbons, limited global soft power.

5 Brazil 5% Resource-rich, large population, regional dominance in South America. Challenges: political instability, infrastructure gaps, economic volatility.

6 Japan 4% Advanced technology, strong economy, strategic alliances (esp. with USA). Limitations: small population, limited military autonomy, geographic constraints.

7 Indonesia 3% Emerging economic giant in Southeast Asia, young and growing population, strategic maritime location. Challenges: infrastructure, governance, regional competition.

8 United Kingdom 2% Global financial hub, soft power, strategic alliances. Limited by size, demographics, and military constraints.

9 Turkey 1% Regional military power, bridging Europe and Asia, growing economy. Limitations: domestic politics, economic instability, limited global influence.

Observations:

• China is the clear frontrunner, but the path isn’t guaranteed; internal pressures could slow its rise.
  
  
• India has high long-term potential because of demographics and IT/innovation capacity.
  
  
• The EU could collectively act as a superpower, but only if political cohesion strengthens.
  
  
• Countries like Brazil, Indonesia, Japan, Turkey are more “regional to global aspirants” rather than full global superpowers.
  

 

That's true.

What major gripe do you have with the information presented, besides the slightly out of date population data (negligible effect on the analysis)?

India might overtake China as a superpower candidate (we can speculate), but as of today it's still China in the lead by a pretty substantial margin. China's economy is larger. China's military is stronger. China's technological innovation sector is greater. If the USA disappeared today, China would be king (at least for the time being). The further we go into the future, the less accurate our predictions become.

With all due respect, I think you're a little too close to the situation. Your hatred/dislike/opposition blinds you.

 

That's quite the pickle you've gotten yourself into. Any new information provided to you is automatically filed in under CCP lies and propaganda. Sounds like a head in the sand scenario. Confirmation bias is a powerful thing.

The evidence is readily available. Here are just a few tidbits to consider:

• China is one of the leading contenders to be the first nation to put a man on Mars. If it weren't for Musk, China very well might have been the leading contender. They also successfully, built, launched and operate the Tiangong space station in Earth's orbit. China has also landed an unmanned rover (Zhurong) on Mars. Space exploration isn't cheap... or easy.
• BYD has surpassed Tesla as the largest EV producer in the world. (despite being massively tariffed; you can't buy one in Canada for instance)
• in terms of recent Olympic performance, overall China only really trails the USA.
• China's TikTok (despite being a plague on western society) is immensely influential among the younger generation. The most influential outside of the American social media giants.
• As of right now, Ne Zha 2 is currently the worldwide box office leading movie of 2025. As of writing, it's sitting at $1,996,112,023.

Those are just a few off the top of my head. I'm not presenting these as all encompassing absolute markers of a superpower, but they are indicators to various degrees (especially the first one).

Last piece of evidence. If China weren't a potential emerging superpower, and were on the brink of collapse as you suggest ("I expect they will be defunct within 20 years."), then you probably wouldn't be so obsessively fixated on them. Why don't you focus on Russia, North Korea or Iran; all of whom are worse actors on the global stage. Because China has power which makes them a threat in your mind.


We don't know what the future holds, but as @Killer Angel pointed out, they are one of the current day global superpowers.

 

That's true. That one is a self inflicted wound.

A lot of European countries are having similar issues right now, and I truly hope that one of them absolutely crashes and burns in the near future. But I didn't want it to be the UK. I have fond memories of my time in England.

 

As I've mentioned above in this thread, the UK isn't 'crashing and burning'. Yes, there are some issues right now, but, as with any nation, they only occur in some parts of the country and not others. Some places may be shitholes, but there are lots of places in other nations that are shitholes too (and after seeing excerpts of a TV programme on Detroit recently, I can safely say that nowhere in the UK is as bad as a place riven with shells of houses burnt down by gangs and abandoned by their fleeing inhabitants, and households of drug dealers around every corner). Britain as a whole is not the vision of a hellscape riddled with knife-wielding teens that the sensationalist media and unpatriotic moaners have been promoting.

Though at least you've had the common sense to acknowledge that similar problems are happening elsewhere in the West (though I hope you remain aware that Western nations outside of Europe also have significant issues), I'd have still thought you'd have the respect for us over in Europe to want us to free ourselves out of these problems rather than at least one nation 'crashing and burning'.

Can't speak for London because I don't live there, apart from the fact that Khan as mayor is filling it with foreigners, but around here in the South nothing so ridiculous has happened as in the quoted Short, partly because we've thankfully remained Conservative. London's problems don't reflect the rest of the country.

All in all, I can't understand why you all continue to listen to random moaning idiots in the political echo-chamber that is YouTube, when I've clearly stated in previous posts that the country I live in, though it has issues, is not 'broken', 'failed' or in any way worse off than anyone else, no more than anywhere else in Europe or the US.

Funnily enough an article in a recent issue of 'The Week' magazine covering this whole palava (a politically unbiased publication over here covering global issues) includes the following passage from The Times,",... the figures don't back [the view of a 'failed', 'lawless' Britain] up. Britain is far safer than it was 30 years ago. Over a period of huge inward migration, most crime had fallen by about 90%. NHS data indicates that violent assaults requiring hospital treatment are down by nearly a half. The trouble is, some very visible crimes, such as shoplifting, have surged. Meanwhile, on social media, where most people get their news, many accounts are doing very good business by reporting extensively on a few particularly horrible crimes. So though people feel safer on their own streets, they still think things are going to the dogs". The Times itself is a politically central and comparatively unbiased paper, and I'm inclined to agree with it. Social media posters are very much overexaggerating and generalising a few serious and/or especially visible incidents (which every country gets), and this is capitalised on by Farage, Reform and other so-called 'right-wingers' who (ironically, like Labour did before they got into power) are playing up the fallacy of 'broken Britain' to attract voters into seeing them as the only solution to imaginary problems. These people are in fact traitors to disrespect their country in such ways, and should not be listened to.

Trust me, I live here in Britain, and unlike these moaners, I love my country - if anything really bad does happen, I'll be sure to give you all my sane (more so than these YouTuber half-wits, some of whom, for all we know, are probably being paid by Russia to damage national morale here) opinion on it... but as it is, things are still fine here... and would you rather trust the word of a friend who has shared your love of Warhammer across the years, or some goon on YouTube spouting hyperbole and misinformation?

 

Yeah, this also is increasingly becoming a Western issue as a whole - social media being as unpoliced as it is allows misinformation to spread like wildfire, and with these posters being so vocal, it is easy to be convinced that their views are indeed true, and that they apply everywhere across the country. AI bots are also adding further fuel to the fire by masquerading as human posters and spreading even more misinformation. I don't get my news from social media, but if the aforementioned Times article is true and a lot of people do these days, and wilfully digest it all without question, then that very much explains the recent increase in tensions on both sides of the political spectrum.

In this day and age, if you want to see the state of your nation, then the best I can recommend is just to look around you and see what your neighbourhood and different places you visit are like, and how people behave - that will show you the real state of the nation. Generally here in Hampshire, life is still pretty peaceful and normal as it always has been - most people are just getting on with their lives and living normal, comfortable existences, aside from a few moaners on either side protesting politically but peacefully... and thus I'm content to know that, certainly around here, things are fine, proving that any words of generalised doom and gloom are just nonsense.

Trust your own views and experiences, rather than rumours perpetrated by others .

 

Detroit is a hellscape shithole. But that is a different discussion.

I never once claimed that all regions of the UK were "crashing and burning". I'm sure there are very lovely spots that, at least from now, have remained untouched. And I truly hope that these areas continue to remain untarnished. I'm not cheering against you (UK), I'm cheering for you. We're on the same side. Like I said, I spent ten months in London about a decade and a half back, and have very fond memories of my time there. So when I see videos of the things going on in London, it genuinely makes me sad... and then angry. It doesn't look like how it did back then. It's slipped very badly over a relatively short time.

I don't dispute your observations on how the trouble is localized. Currently, the UK is probably dealing with problematic spots. But you know what happens when you see a spot of mold on a piece of food, come back a little later and it has spread. So the problems in London might well be knocking on your door in a few years time (but I sincerely hope it doesn't).

It's happening all over the place. Europe, USA, Canada and Australia are all suffering from variations of the same thing. It's not a competition, but a warning for our mutual wellbeing.

You misinterpret my motives. Let me use an analogy. Sometimes a doctor has to amputate a limb to save the patient. The loss of the limb is a terrible price to pay, but it's better than the patient dying. The limb in this case is the country that I'm hoping will crash and burn. Let me explain.

The west and western values are under attack. We're literally allowing ourselves to be invaded. I don't care about where someone is from or the pigment of their skin, that stuff is irrelevant. What I do care about is someone's culture, values and principles. My parents immigrated (legally) to Canada and they happily accepted the customs of this country, share its values and became productive citizens. They love this country and are proud to be here. They didn't come here to change this place and they made successful efforts to integrate into their new home. However, when you let people in who hold values that are diametrically opposed to your own, bad things will happen. A while back I saw a video of a Muslim preacher/agitator somewhere on the streets in the UK speaking loudly into a megaphone. He openly said to his assembled followers that the UK will eventually fall under sharia law. That they will outbreed (yes I know you guys don't like that word, but it was his point) the local population. When Britons have one child, they will have six or seven. In a generation or two, they will outvote you. This was not some sort of secret plan, he was shouting it for all to hear, with no fear or remorse. I wish I could link the video for you, but I watched it months ago and wouldn't know where to find it now. Make no mistiake, the numbers are shifting faster than we might like to admit and there is an impeding inflection point on the horizon. So we are left with a problem that could have been solved very easily ten years ago, is problematic to solve now, will require bloodshed to solve in the near future and soon after that it will be unsolvable.

The trajectory seems clear as day, but our governments are running headlong into it. They (and enough of the voting block) don't see the reality of it. And this takes us to my "crash and burn" strategy. Should a major European country go completely under (an accelerated version of what I just laid out), then maybe, just maybe it might wake the others up. The same thing would happen if Canada crashed and burned, but of course, since I live here, I'd rather it be France or Germany rather than it happening to us. (we've all got our loyalties)

The best case scenario would be that no country needed to go under, but without it, I don't people will come to realize the danger until it is too late. So yeah, I would very much sacrifice European country "X", in order to save Canada, USA, Hungary and the UK. Speaking of Hungary, Victor Orban was the first to see it. Hungary is one of the few European countries that is not to be suffering from this. He shut down the border right away and told the EU to fuck off. But, election after election his adversaries grow. It only takes one bad election for all that work to be undone. But if major European country "X" were to fall, then the Hungarian voters might take notice and say "hmmm.... look what happened to those guys, maybe we shouldn't go down that path". And the Canadians, Americans and Brits might take notice too.

I fear that the alternative to the light bulb moment of seeing a major country falling, is that we all cross that point of no return together, and we all crash and burn together. So no, the ideal scenario in my mind is not for a European country to fall, it's just better than the (more probable) worst case scenario that may come to pass in its stead.

 

Glad to hear it . I was just concerned by your phrasing here:

The usage of the past sense suggested to me you might have already adopted the conclusion that Britain already is "crashing and burning"... but I'm pleased to see that that is not the case.

Fair enough... save the many at the expense of the few and all... though I hope it won't come to that and politicians finally realise that the current mindset is well and truly wrong.

Absolutely, as seen in previous posts of mine, I also share these views. Glad to hear your parents were the right sort of immigrant that should be welcomed and respected - arriving legally, and adopting their new host country's own customs and values... and of course there are many others in all Western countries that do the same, but as we know there are also the dangerous illegals who have no interest in integrating and just bring crime and evil to the land.

That would explain a lot of the doomsaying on the Internet... and it is true that some Muslim families will certainly breed like rabbits. However, those are the words of one fanatic (I'm surprised he wasn't arrested as a potential terrorist), which are also pretty generalised. There are probably also Muslims here who are willing to integrate, don't identify with these propagandists, don't follow Sharia law and just have one or two children as White British families do.

It's all a difficult mess to solve, precisely because it's not as generalised as rumourmongers and YouTube moaners try to peddle - deporting all illegals would be the first step and could easily be done if someone had the backbone to do it, but what then? There are legal migrants (of some subcultures a lot more than others) who also don't try to conform to our culture or our beliefs, but those that manage to not commit crime cannot be deported for that reason either. As you say, it is certainly problematic to deal with this right now even without leftists trying to block any way to do so, at least without straying into the aspiring dictator territory that we need to avoid, as elaborated below.

Certainly I agree the problem could have been avoided many years ago... in the UK specifically it would have meant simply not voting for Tony Blair in 1997 (or, in the case of a time traveller, assassinating him to prevent him motivating voters into electing New Labour into power)... in our case the whole mess started with him opening up our borders to the EU's Freedom of Movement rules (which was even worse as it allowed so many more people to arrive here perfectly legally even if they were of the sort of dubious background that prompts them to try to arrive illegally now).

The thing is, while Viktor Orban has some ideas that do make sense (another of his was to encourage specifically native white Hungarians to have more children to be able to allow the population to more easily absorb migrant genetics), on the other hand he is an admirer of Putin and isn't a critic of the genocidal war in Ukraine. In these particularly volatile times, it is a difficult balance to be able to have that initiative to restore pride in one's country, look to protecting our own values and culture, and also avoiding slipping down the populist slide that has led America to Trump and Russia to Putin. What Western nations need are genuinely patriotic right-wing leaders that just want to restore the country's core values, have the agency to get on and do it and bypass any corrupt left-wing institutions that try and block the process, that also don't have the desire to become or emulate the aspiring dictators that are giving the right-wing movements a bad name.

To be honest we in the UK did have that for a while in the form of the Conservatives, and Rishi Sunak's government did have the great idea of the Rwanda Plan (which was already working, as many illegal migrants were starting to flee to Ireland on similar small boats to escape being deported to Rwanda), but the Conservatives were too slow to get onto it - indeed the whole concept should have been pioneered before Brexit was fully arranged, before everything was signed and we escaped the EU's Freedom of Movement disaster. But on the other hand, Labour were more keen than anyone to block the Plan when it did actually surface, alongside the European Court of Anti-British Rights. I do sometimes wonder why the previous Conservative government didn't just ignore both and just get on and do it, but that's democracy for you - freedom is good, but it also gives people the freedom to make the wrong choices as well as the right ones. And not that long after the Plan finally got through, Rishi made the mistake of calling an election, when he should have waited for at least a year to show how it was working.

To be honest over here I think a lot of the people do see the reality of it (only 20% of people in England voted for the current Labour government, and it was only the massive majority in Scotland that got the percentage of the vote to over 30% because people there were fed up with the Scottish Nazi Party failing to deliver), but lately there is just nobody out there we can vote for who really seem to be able to deliver on fixing this genuine issue. As mentioned above the Conservatives did try (albeit far too late), but they're currently floundering under the incompetent Kemi Badenoch and whether they'd be any more agent over the situation if they returned to power is unclear. Ed Davey and the Liberal Democrats just haven't a clue and only care about throwing more money into the bottomless pit that is Social Care. The Greens are clueless and degenerate Leftist eco-warriors that will waste money on the fallacies that are Solar and Wind power. Aside from fringe parties, that just leaves Reform, who are some of the most vocal in damaging national morale with their misinformed slogans, and it is sceptical as to whether Farage really cares about dealing with the problem or if he's just taking the believers for a ride just so that he can become Prime Minister.

 

Fair enough. The UK is heading there, but so are the rest of us. No telling who will hit that mark first. Thankfully, none of us are there yet; things can still be turned around. But tick tock, tick tock.

They are text book cases how it should be done. They went through full health screenings, background checks, educational/skill evaluation and even sponsorship from family living here. They both learned English (speaking, reading and writing). They made friends and acquaintances outside of their cultural bubble. They broke no laws, respected their new home and didn't try to change it. They started with literally $20 in their pockets and worked hard to now have a fully paid off house and cottage. Canada at the time made the evaluation that they would be a net positive for the country, and that determination was proven correct. They love this country and consider themselves (and are) Canadians.

Absolutely, all the criticisms that I previously laid out do not apply to them. These people are good additions to a country. If someone wants to truly integrate, respect the country and become a valuable citizen, then welcome aboard.

In fact, I genuinely feel sorry for this group of people because they often get unfairly lumped in with the bad actors.

Hungary has a long and sorted history with Russia. They were under Soviet rule for a long time. They only got truly free of them not too long ago, and that memory is still in the hearts and minds of the people. Also, a lot of the energy resources the country relies on is coming from Russia. Hungary is a small place, not very powerful and aren't looking for trouble. They don't want to get involved. Orban is looking out for national interests, as he should.

But credit where credit is due, among all the European leaders, he was the first to see the impeding danger facing Europe. He made a strong stance against it, and stood up to the more powerful countries of the EU. Hungary is still Hungary. It has a very small population, less than 10 million but it has a proud and storied history. Orban acted to protect and preserve that culture and her people. I hope the other European nations follow suit.