oh -my-god, check out the UK national dept clock

dept=debt

correction=debt

check out the usa debt clock

I do not think any country will ever pay off their national debt imo

Countries just pay the interest....if they cannot pay the interest they will be essentially bankrupt.

Their debt would spiral out of control

The national debt only matters when there is a Labour government.

Am I right in saying that governments only ever actually borrow from themselves?

the chinese will continue to lend us money to buy their goods

at some future point they will own us

the chinese have more debt than us

WHP, money is created as debt. The government's central bank issues gilts (Government backed bonds) which are sold to the market & pay interest annually for the bond duration. The debt is repaid at the end of the bond's term. The bonds have different terms from 1 year to at least 30 year. Some gilts are index linked (linked to inflation). The 10 year UK Gilt rate is 0.423, so it's very cheap to borrow right now. (0.423% paid for 10 years).

In fact, they go up to 50 year gilts.
http://www.worldgovernmentbonds.com/country/united-kingdom/

then central banks create money and buy alot of them themselves,thats going to end well