"Also, I would prefer a back seater over the extra gas any day. I would have 80 pounds of flesh to eat and a pair of glasses to start a fire." --F/A-18 Hornet pilot
And as far as "scary reality" goes, I really don't buy it. The perfect time for China to have been hostile and invade Taiwan would have been during the COVID lockdowns when the West was preoccupied and almost paralyzed dealing with that mess. China is just doing the tried and true "saber rattling" that so many other countries have done.
I have learned from experience that a modicum of snuff can be most efficacious - Baron Munchausen