Tag Archives: Foreign Policy - Page 2

Why is the president letting America’s nukes rust?

Posted by on April 25, 2013 Comments Off

Development of a new nuclear submarine and the planned replacement for the nuclear air-launched cruise missile has been delayed by at least two years. We don’t know if the next generation of strategic bomber will be qualified for nuclear missions at the outset, if ever. No decision has been made to replace the Minuteman ICBM. The life extension programs for the B-61 nuclear bomb and the W-78 and W-88 nuclear warheads have slipped by at least two years.

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As the gap between what was promised for modernization and what is provided continues to grow, it becomes increasingly difficult to achieve the responsive nuclear infrastructure that even the president acknowledges is essential for nuclear reductions and the continuing credibility of our nuclear deterrent.

Off to a Bad Start – By Sen. Jim Inhofe and Sen. Bob Corker | Foreign Policy

Apparently, the senators don’t believe the president when he talks about a nuclear-free world. The US will lead the way forward – unilaterally if that’s what it takes. All the president has to do is nothing. If he does nothing (or very little) then the aging US nuclear arsenal will have to be retired and replaced with nothing. Sorry, but there is no money in the budget for new nuclear weapons.

On China’s Rising Hatred Of The Japanese

Posted by on April 25, 2013 Comments Off

It is becoming increasingly evident that Japan is attempting to use monetary policy to paper over the cracks of imploding foreign policy decisions. The ‘storm in a teacup’ that has brought China and Japan into fierce rhetorical battles over the Senkaku (or Diaoyu) Islands is having far more deep-seated impacts on the people of the two nations – and implicitly their buying habits. Unfortunately for the embattled Japanese – they are the ones in need far more than vice versa. As Bloomberg reports, discrimination against Japanese is increasingly common in China, as the head of China’s Honda plant notes, he’s “never worked in a more hostile place.” The dispute over the islands is raising resentment with bars and restaurants showings signs at the door saying, ‘Japanese are barred from entering.’ “Wherever I go, like department stores or in taxis, people ask me whether I am Japanese,” and the reaction can be frosty. Simply put, no matter how cheap the Japanese make their cars by explicitly devaluing their currency, the largest auto market in the world (that of the Chinese) will not be buying; summed up rather bleakly, “I don’t really care about [car] brands,… but there are cars I won’t buy — the Japanese ones. The reason is simple: Diaoyu.”

On China’s Rising Hatred Of The Japanese, And Why The BoJ Just Doesn’t Get It | Zero Hedge

Do you think the Chinese government can back-down over Senkaku/Diaoyu Islands?

If the only way is forward then doesn’t that imply serious bad news about the future since the Japanese won’t back-down either?

The Biggest Threat to South Korea Could Come from Within

Posted by on April 17, 2013 Comments Off

Once again, North Korea is grabbing global headlines by threatening aggression against its neighbor to the south and the United States. And once again, South Koreans are largely shrugging off the rhetoric from the north.

This nonchalance gives South Koreans the chance to focus on another existential threat — one that’s not so easily dismissed as bluster. South Korea’s economic success — the growth formula that brought forth the “miracle on the Han,” set records for development, and is a model for other emerging economies — is no longer working for a great many Koreans. The nation is beset by a deep middle-class malaise that could limit the consumer spending needed to create a more balanced economy and might eventually limit gross domestic product growth itself.

Stalled Miracle – By Richard Dobbs and Dongrok Suh | Foreign Policy

Boston Marathon Bombing: “Innocent” Saudi has ties to several Al-Qaeda Terrorists | Walid Shoebat

Posted by on April 17, 2013 Comments Off

A couple of weeks ago we warned America about the very serious problem of Saudi infiltration; many of these Saudi nationals criminals and terrorists.

After the bombings, a Saudi by the name of Abdul Rahman Ali Al-Harbi was hospitalized and became a ‘suspect’, then a ‘person of interest’. His apartment was searched by federal and local authorities. No confirmation has been given so far to his involvement. The Media were quick to claim his innocence, of course.

This brings us to the Boston marathon bombings. Foreign Policy is reporting that he’s ‘no longer a person of interest’, which means he’s “innocent”, right?

Perhaps a quick look at the Arabic sources should raise the eyebrows of every American relative to the extent of the problem at hand. Many from Al-Harbi’s clan are steeped in terrorism and are members of Al-Qaeda. Out of a list of 85 terrorists listed by the Saudi government shows several of Al-Harbi clan to have been active fighters in Al-Qaeda:

“Innocent” Saudi has ties to several Al-Qaeda Terrorists | Walid Shoebat

Nightmare side to China dream

Posted by on April 16, 2013 Comments Off

The global business elite flocked to China’s Boao forum last week and thrilled to the President’s promises of growth and prosperity. But as they flew home enraptured, they might not have noticed what their host did next.

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But as the crowd flew home with those words ringing happily in their ears, Xi made a visit to another part of Hainan island, the site of China’s big new naval base, including an underground port to protect Beijing’s growing fleet of submarines from US spy satellites and, potentially, missiles.

It is the symbol and the reality of China’s growing power to challenge US hegemony over the high seas.

Xi was broadcast on China’s news inspecting the fleet. It was his first visit to a military installation since his formal ascension to the presidency.

Nightmare side to China dream

Xi is telling everybody what they want to hear, but the reality is far different. China’s economy is starting to slow just like the rest of the world. For Chinese leaders that could spell big trouble. It needs a relatively high growth rate to keep the people reasonably happy, or at least not caring so much about all the problems that are building up inside the country. If the economy won’t redirect the people’s attention, then perhaps an aggressive foreign policy will. And that is a policy that cannot accept failure, especially from Japan and the US. Xi’s visit to the Chinese naval base on Hainan Island is perhaps a hint of things that Chinese leaders aren’t telling us.

The idiot and hapless American administration is not helping the situation by continuing to disarm its nuclear arsenal. Thinking that by disarming they are making the country safer. Instead, they are setting up the country to be defeated. Yet, even the vast majority of conservative leaders don’t seem to be alarmed. Why are they not sounding the alarm? I’m wondering if they are caught up in this delusion too?

Clueless on North Korea, paralyzed on Iran

Posted by on April 9, 2013 Comments Off

To recap: 1) We facing a growth threat from North Korea both in aggression against the South and in proliferating nuclear weapons material; 2) The White House has no effective policy for dealing with that; 3) The White House’s effort to stop Iran’s nuclear program through a combinations of sanctions and diplomacy is a complete failure; and 4) In the midst of this they sent a political flak, a know-nothing on foreign policy, out to stumble through TV appearances.

The result is the appearance of confusion and fickleness. Sitting in Pyongyang and Tehran, the rogue dictators must think we are exceptionally indecisive and disinclined to challenge them. And on his they would be right. (There is bipartisan failure here, certainly. The Bush administration did no better with Iran and North Korea than its successors.)

Clueless on North Korea, paralyzed on Iran

The Next Korean War: Tell Me How This Starts – By Patrick M. Cronin | Foreign Policy

Posted by on April 4, 2013 Comments Off

The regime feels safe in striking out along the maritime boundary because the two sides have repeatedly skirmished in the area in the past 15 years. But President Park, determined to show backbone, dispatches on-alert F-15K fighter aircraft armed with AGM-84E SLAM-Expanded Response air-to-ground missiles to destroy the North Korean installations responsible for the latest assault. For good measure, they also bomb a North Korean mini-submarine pier as belated payback for the sinking of Cheonan. North Korean soldiers and military officers are killed in the attack. Pyongyang vows a merciless response and launches a risky salvo of rockets into downtown Seoul, in hope of shocking the Blue House into seeking an immediate cessation of fighting. But far from ending the tit-for-tat attacks, North Korean actions have now triggered the Second Korean War.

Tell Me How This Starts – By Patrick M. Cronin | Foreign Policy

Is This a Pandemic Being Born? – By Laurie Garrett | Foreign Policy

Posted by on April 2, 2013 Comments Off

China’s mysterious pig, duck, and people deaths could be connected. And that should worry us.

Here’s how it would happen. Children playing along an urban river bank would spot hundreds of grotesque, bloated pig carcasses bobbing downstream. Hundreds of miles away, angry citizens would protest the rising stench from piles of dead ducks and swans, their rotting bodies collecting by the thousands along river banks. And three unrelated individuals would stagger into three different hospitals, gasping for air. Two would quickly die of severe pneumonia and the third would lay in critical condition in an intensive care unit for many days. Government officials would announce that a previously unknown virus had sickened three people, at least, and killed two of them. And while the world was left to wonder how the pigs, ducks, swans, and people might be connected, the World Health Organization would release deliberately terse statements, offering little insight.

Is This a Pandemic Being Born? – By Laurie Garrett | Foreign Policy

When It Comes to Russia, We Told You So

Posted by on March 24, 2013 Comments Off

We’ve begun doing that.  Writing in Foreign Policy earlier this month, Leon Aron of the American Enterprise Institute led the charge with a piece which chronicled “Russia’s quest to rebuild the Soviet state.”  It’s a devastating read for those who loudly proclaimed that Russia could “never go back” to the dark days Soviet repression.  If I were they, I’d want to crawl into an equally dark little hole someplace and, Saddam-like, never emerge.  It’s time the world began calling them to account for their misjudgments (at best) and their lies.

Aron highlights aggressive neo-Soviet Russian foreign policy, including the determined support for dictatorship and terrorism in the Middle East and the export of nuclear technology and weapons throughout the Third World.  Russia is hell-bent on achieving the same regional hegemony that it enjoyed in Soviet times, and is spending vast sums on expanding its military capacity while ignoring critical support for its anemic population.  And Russia aggressively portrays itself as a “besieged fortress” to its citizens, justifying these neo-Soviet policies through the same type of paranoia and xenophobia that Soviet propagandists relied on.

Articles: When It Comes to Russia, We Told You So

FPI Bulletin: As Obama Visits Israel, Iran’s Nuclear Threat Grows | Foreign Policy Initiative

Posted by on March 24, 2013 Comments Off

In one of the more alarming scenarios, analysts estimate that Iran—using only declared nuclear material and declared sites for uranium enrichment—already has the technical potential to produce nuclear explosive material for its first nuclear weapon in a matter of a few months.  What’s worse, if Iran has undeclared sites for uranium enrichment, analysts worry that Iran’s possible timeline for breaking out overtly—or sneaking out covertly—of the international inspections regime and building its first nuclear bomb could further shorten.

FPI Bulletin: As Obama Visits Israel, Iran’s Nuclear Threat Grows | Foreign Policy Initiative