China and Turkey

[casual shooter]

The way China and Turkey are arming Pakistan. Don't they fall under the enemy of state category? Is it wise to promote or purchase goods from these countries, even if they are cheaper and so-called "imported"?
Even though China was an ardent enemy of America and the greed for profit and cheap manufacturing costs of American corporates created this monster which they are trying to dismantle now... won't this affect India as well?
We hardly buy anything from Turkey except for furniture or handguns... But still, thats what came to my mind.
points to ponder...

[timmy]

They aren't the only countries who have been willing to take Pakistan's money.

Whether India is affected by recent events will depend on how tariffs are negotiated, and this will take quite some time to settle, if ever.

There's stuff that I don't buy because of where its origin. This is a personal decision, just as there would be many opinions here on whether purchasing or not purchasing something due to its effect on India. What someone may view as negative, another might not view so seriously.

i doubt whether our collective purchases or boycotts are likely to affect global trade, but still, I won't buy anything from someone I percieve as spitting in my eye, whether or not they even care about my actions.

[casual shooter]

True, Timmy, strong men carry strong opinions. Absolutely right, I also do not like buying things from China unless there is no other option.

[shooter50]

Same, here. Turkish products should be banned immediately.

[Grok47]

We are just buying "Better" than Local made. Nothing else. They day american or other companies will start selling weapons. No one will buy turkish chinese or russian

[casual shooter]

https://www.msn.com/en-in/money/topstor ... 0591&ei=13
on turkey...

[singhfp]

Modern India relies on Chinese goods—think phones, electronics, and defense parts—because they’re cheap and reliable. Giving them up would mean higher prices and supply chain chaos, and most people care more about value than geopolitics. As for making stuff here, "Make in India" is progress, but we’re not yet matching global contenders in many areas. It’s a long haul—decades, not years—to get there. For now, pragmatism rules: we buy what works, even if it stings strategically.

And Yes My Question is do we have a choice? Will Modern India be ready to give up their stuff that is made in China? Do we have the capabilities to make the products in India that are at par with their global contenders ? We have been buying STAR .30 made in CHINA since ages. And finally, if companies like Syndicate Innovations have come up with pistols like Kiehberg 1911 which are rebranded versions of Turkish Girsan and way better than their Indian counterparts are we really willing to boycott them ? We simply don't have choices.

[timmy]

We are just buying "Better" than Local made. Nothing else. They day american or other companies will start selling weapons. No one will buy turkish chinese or russian

The point regarding nobody buying Turkish or Russian weapons is good, as far as it goes, but the problem here is that it doesn't go far enough. Double barrel shotgun production (both side x side and over/under) gun production in the USA has long gone away -- the primary over / under maker was Browning and they were made in Belgium, and then Japan took over. Side x sides were offshored when Parker, Ithaca, LC Smith/Marlin, Winchester, et al, went away with the American craftsmanship companies and Turkey is now a major supplier to brands such as Charles Daly and Weatherby for shotguns. Even rifles and handguns made in Turkey are marketed in the USA. Like the Japanese, Taiwanese, Chinese, and Koreans before them, the Turks have paid attention to their products and mastered them. The USA doesn't even begin to compete in so many gun markets.

My historical theory is that USA history follows thaat of the British Empire in many ways. Just as the cream of British car and motorcycle makers are now foreign-owned (think Tata and Bullets, for instance), Colts, including the iconic Pythons, are now Czech-made guns.

There are many European gun labels who have migrated manufacture to the USA, like Wather and Sig, among others, but part of this is a tariff issue, and part of it is the size of the market -- the USA gun market dwarfs all others, giving it an advantageous factor for location of factories that other nations don't have. Look at Brazilian made Taurus and check out gun ownership laws in Brazil, for instance.

https://www.msn.com/en-in/money/topstor ... 0591&ei=13
on turkey...

The article certainly lays out a discouraging situation, doesn't it? But it is by no means unprecedented. For instance, read Planning Armageddon: British Economic Warfare and the First World War by Nicholas Lambert. The gist of this book is that Great Britain's Admiral "jacky" Fisher worked out a plan that really would have defeated Germany by Christmas, but the Foreign Office and the Board of Trade (Grey adn Runciman, among others) convinced Asquith not to implement Fisher's total clamp-down on Germany by blockading Rotterdam, which was Germany's "import lung" because of Dutch neutrality. Fisher's blockade would have thrown world trade into chaos, true, but Britain was still the gobal financial leader and would have weathered the storm in fine shape, knocked Germany out of the War, and preserved 100s of thousands of British and Empire -- especially Indian -- young men. But the British and colonial financiers who made money importing raw materials into Rotterdam -- and then on to Germany -- would have been ruined. You can see who won that argument, and what won the argument.

So much stuff has been sourced in China now that a total meltdown of world financials would be strongly effected around the globe, were the gate to be slammed shut of Chinese goods. This is not something that took place in a day. It took place over decades, and it was a Chinese long-term strategy. Populations, politicians, and businessmen cry out, "not today," and each year that passes means the nation grows further and further away from the shores of independence, and decisions get more and more entangled in "other considerations." Businessmen who make the large profits increasingly become able to buy more politicians who will ensure their positions at the output end of the money-printing press.

Sure, it's not in our interests to continue these things, but it is so easy to look at the short term results, rather than the long term effects. Who is going to stop this? Is it reasonable to assume anyone will, given that it will take at least as long to correct the problem as it did to bring it about?

That's exactly the point made here:

Modern India relies on Chinese goods—think phones, electronics, and defense parts—because they’re cheap and reliable. Giving them up would mean higher prices and supply chain chaos, and most people care more about value than geopolitics. As for making stuff here, "Make in India" is progress, but we’re not yet matching global contenders in many areas. It’s a long haul—decades, not years—to get there. For now, pragmatism rules: we buy what works, even if it stings strategically.

And Yes My Question is do we have a choice? Will Modern India be ready to give up their stuff that is made in China? Do we have the capabilities to make the products in India that are at par with their global contenders ? We have been buying STAR .30 made in CHINA since ages. And finally, if companies like Syndicate Innovations have come up with pistols like Kiehberg 1911 which are rebranded versions of Turkish Girsan and way better than their Indian counterparts are we really willing to boycott them ? We simply don't have choices.

This is the question -- partly. Consider the high price of ammunition, which is a necessary part of this question, as well as the guns themselves. Where does the copper, tin, and zinc come from? The nitrocellulose to make powder -- where does it come from? For that matter, even if we were to get millions of legal guns into the hands of citizens, where would the powder be made? Consider this: Despite having the most guns and the most guns per capita, and having the largest firearms market in the world, where does the powder in the USA come from? Did you know that there are only two factories making smokeless powder there? One of them, Alliant (which was part of the old Hercules company) has shut down all sales to the commercial market and dedicated its output to the Lake City ammunition plant, which only makes military ammunition. So, in all of the USA, despite all of its guns, there's only one plant that sells to the commercial market: St. Mark's in Florida. All the other powders come from foreign sources.

Do we elect politicians who will look out for such strategic issues?

We may agree or disagree on whether someone should buy a gun that's made in a given country. But is our purchase or not the biggest issue, or is the issue much larger, such as who we elect and where all of the other stuff we buy is made -- and not just what we buy, but what a large part of the population buys?

And, as Brother singhfp points out, is our threat to not buy backed up by an alternative, or is it just loud talk with little to back up such a threat, in the sense of bringing a force to the problem that will solve it?

My point here is that this whole business, as singhfp, casual shooter, and Grok47 bring up, is a very big issue with many considerations and ramifications. it's not one where a solution will come from just a simple "I'll show you" action, especially when our neighbors, friends, and family aren't likely to accept our points.