Absolutely China. Sorry to say, folks. But they have this:

And you know what? They’re not afraid to lose them.

America has a lot more military might, and the ability to project it. They’ll take the war to the Chinese homeland in a month, and China would not be able to do anything about it except close down their deliveries of cheap electronic toys to America. But America also have transparency and democracy and freedom and stuff, so there would be an increasing uproar when soldiers began returning in body bags.

After a few months of throwing rocks at each other, a conflict like that would, however, meet a standstill. How on Earth would America hold on to more than a few areas of China in the long run? America would be occupiers, there is no desire in China to repeat the battle (or, rather, sacking) of Peking in year 1900. Americans would not be liberators, and sooner or later they’d have to go back home.

Notably, should China ever reach America soil, the same would happen; they would never be able to hold any of it.

So in the end, it would be a standstill. A devastating standstill, both sides would suffer tremendously, but a standstill nonetheless.

EDIT: someone suggested Russia and China teamed up; while I don’t believe Russia would change much here, there is one point: Russia has 12.000 tanks, not the newest but plentyful nonetheless, and quite functional. Add to that, some 900.000 soldiers. If they’re deployed strategically together with Chinese forces, America would have their hands full in case of invasion. In the end, it would just reinforce the outcome of a standstill, because they probably could not cross the Pacific either. Question is, if the war happened primarily on Chinese soil, would the Chinese be interested in letting in another army, capable of occupying a good part of China once the Americans were done shooting? That I doubt.

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