

You are right in a sense. For example, Russia literally forced that situation. However, there simply isn’t enough RMB globally for it to work. China would have to take on a lot more debt for that amount to be possible. China can choose not to as they’ve consistently shown. However, if globally the world decides in unison to ignore this, they’ll deflate the Chinese yuan considerably forcing China to take on the debt. In many ways that’s already happening to China’s chagrin. However, I believe since China really doesn’t want this they’ll figure out a way to enforce currency swaps. I could be wrong obviously, but that’s clearly the direction China wants to go.
Not really. They even mention in the article that they did this twice last year. It’s literally what they do year in and year out. It would almost be stranger if they didn’t do it. However, this is all testing waters. Every year they do it to see how the international community responds. It lets them know how much power they have in negotiations.
Now what you just pointed out. The lack of any real response this time may very well encourage them to do more. But as of right now, it’s business as usual. I mean unless you think shooting rockets this time instead of ballistics is an escalation.