News and Commentary by Dave Maxwell. Edited and Published by Riley Murray.
1. China hits back after US expresses 'deep concerns' over WHO Covid-19 report
2. China and Indo-Pacific in US military sights as Pentagon takes fresh look at forces
3. How to rein in China without risking war is the issue Biden must address
4. Sharp Power and Democratic Resilience Series | China’s Global Media Footprint
5. Can the US enlist the Philippines to help contain China in the Indo-Pacific?
6. China has already won Asia's arms race
7. US-educated foreign soldiers learn ‘democratic values,’ study shows – though America also trains future dictators
8. Pacific Gambit: The Role of Irregular Warfare in Australia’s Great Strategic Shift
9. CNN Exclusive: WHO Wuhan mission finds possible signs of wider original outbreak in 2019
10. The FBI warned about far-right attacks. Agents arrested a leftist ex-soldier.
11. Book Review - The CIA War in Kurdistan | SOF News
1. China hits back after US expresses 'deep concerns' over WHO Covid-19 report
The Guardian · by NewsOpinionSportCultureLifestyle · February 14, 2021
Admit nothing, deny everything, and make counter accusations.
2. China and Indo-Pacific in US military sights as Pentagon takes fresh look at forces
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3121693/china-and-indo-pacific-us-military-sights-pentagon-takes-fresh - by Wendy Wu
Here are our recommendations and considerations for the force posture review.
Defending Forward: Securing America by Projecting Military Power Abroad
https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2020/12/15/defending-forward/
3. How to rein in China without risking war is the issue Biden must address
The Guardian · by Simon Tisdall · February 14, 2021
Interesting analysis.
Excerpt:
Xi is still busy developing China’s economic, hi-tech, military and regional strengths. He is not yet in a position to challenge the US in a definitive way – though that day may come. All the same, he told Biden to keep his nose out of China’s “domestic affairs”. Hence his grim warning about “misunderstandings” and “misjudgments”.
Yet for Biden, enhanced bilateral cooperation that fails to change China’s behaviour in controversial areas such as commerce and Xinjiang amounts to a trap. He accepts the consensus view that the US and China are now engaged in an intense strategic competition. Electorally, he cannot afford to look weak.
So the question he must answer is: how to rein in China, and robustly assert US interests, without risking war?
That’s what makes Biden’s decision to call India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, before speaking to Xi especially intriguing. The two discussed closer strategic and military collaboration. Maybe it’s no coincidence Indian forces recently fought China along their shared Himalayan border, where Chinese troops are now said to be pulling back.
4. Sharp Power and Democratic Resilience Series | China’s Global Media Footprint
ned.org - by Sarah Cook
The 24 page report can be downloaded at this link: https://www.ned.org/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/Chinas-Global-Media-Footprint-Democratic-Responses-to-Expanding-Authoritarian-Influence-Cook-Feb-2021.pdf?utm_source=forum&utm_medium=site&utm_campaign=media%20cook
5. Can the US enlist the Philippines to help contain China in the Indo-Pacific?
https://www.scmp.com/news/china/diplomacy/article/3121582/can-us-enlist-philippines-help-contain-china-indo-pacific - by Rachel Zhang and Teddy Ng
An interesting question.
Excerpts:
Some diplomatic observers said there was momentum in the Philippines to renew the deal, which covered the operation of US forces in the country, given China’s increasing dominance in the South China Sea – a resource-rich and strategically important waterway that is subject to numerous disputed claims.
China’s recent passage of a law giving its coastguard service explicit authority to fire on foreign vessels in its territory was seen in the Philippines as “a spear directed against us”, according to Renato Cruz De Castro, a professor of international relations at De La Salle University in Manila.
“Within the [Philippine] government, there is a pro-China faction and a pro-America faction. It seems now the pro-America faction has become dominant … mainly because of China’s recent action, the new law of China regarding the coastguard,” he said.
6. China has already won Asia's arms race
asia.nikkei.com – by Willaim Bratton
Excerpts:
China's regional military leadership is the result of its dramatic advances over the last three decades. The country's surging defense budget has allowed every aspect of the PLA to be transformed and modernized, with an impressive commitment to new technologies and equipment. These investments have allowed new doctrines based on regional force projection rather than China's territorial defense. This is particularly visible with the PLA Navy and its new aircraft carriers, destroyers, assault ships and submarines. But there have also been substantial increases in spending across all the PLA's branches, including the Air Force and Rocket Force.
In contrast to the PLA's advances, numerous militaries across Asia have been starved of funds and are facing relative obsolescence. True, regional defense budgets are expanding, but they frequently remain small by comparison with Gross Domestic Products and are often growing slower than underlying economies. Military spending has, in fact, shrunk over the last 10 years as a percentage of overall GDP across many of China's neighbors.
This trend is most pronounced in Southeast Asia, where the majority of countries have a seemingly entrenched reluctance to build credible defensive capabilities. Only Singapore, which by itself accounts for more than a quarter of the region's defense expenditure, appears committed to maintaining an advanced and comprehensively equipped military. By comparison, Indonesia, Malaysia and the Philippines all spend approximately 1% of their GDPs on defense. Their militaries are chronically underfunded with aging and often inoperable equipment. And when Southeast Asian countries do buy new weapons, it is often on such a small scale as to be almost irrelevant.
7. US-educated foreign soldiers learn ‘democratic values,’ study shows – though America also trains future dictators
theconversation.com · by Sandor Fabian
A fascinating read about a subject that is so difficult and complex. It is hard to quantify the effects of foreign military training. Some very interesting data in this article.
8. Pacific Gambit: The Role of Irregular Warfare in Australia’s Great Strategic Shift
mwi.usma.edu · Kyle Atwell and Andrew Milburn | 02.12.21 · February 12, 2021
Although this is focused on Australia but it goes much beyond. A lot of history balanced with the current and future threats.
The 48 minute podcast is at this link: https://mwi.usma.edu/pacific-gambit-the-role-of-irregular-warfare-in-australias-great-strategic-shift/
9. CNN Exclusive: WHO Wuhan mission finds possible signs of wider original outbreak in 2019
CNN · by Nick Paton Walsh
We heard reports from Taiwan last February that the outbreak began months before December 2019 in Wuhan.
10. The FBI warned about far-right attacks. Agents arrested a leftist ex-soldier.
The Washington Post – by Brittany Shammas and Gerrit De Vynck - February 14, 2021
Terrorists feed off each other:
But Baker represents the flip side of that threat: As a far-right extremist movement wages an assault on American government and institutions, experts say an unpredictable battle is brewing, fueling potentially legitimate threats of violence from the opposite fringe of the political spectrum.
“It is ratcheting up and then getting a response and a back-and-forth,” said Steven Chermak, a professor of criminal justice at Michigan State University.
Political violence remains far more common a feature of far-right groups than of those on the far left, according to law enforcement officials and data compiled by those who study extremist violence. Federal authorities have repeatedly described homegrown, right-wing extremists as the most urgent terrorism threat facing the nation.
But high-profile right-wing attacks could be spurring far-left extremists to respond in kind, Chermak said. And cases like Baker’s can have a snowball effect, he said: Articles about Baker have been circulated online by members of the Proud Boys, a far-right group with a history of violence, who cite his arrest as evidence that left-wing activists are plotting against them.
11. Book Review - The CIA War in Kurdistan | SOF News
sof.news · by John Friberg · January 26, 2021
"We rest our hopes too much upon constitutions, upon laws, and upon courts. These are false hopes; believe me, these are false hopes. Liberty lies in the hearts of men and women; when it dies there, no constitution, no law, no court can save it; no constitution, no law, no court can even do much to help it.”
- Judge Learned Hand
"It is no weakness for the wisest man to learn when he is wrong."
- Sophocles
“You must allow everyone the right to exist in accordance with the character he has, whatever it turns out to be: and all you should strive to do is to make use of this character in such a way as its kind of nature permits, rather than to hope for any alteration in it, or to condemn it offhand for what it is. This is the true sense of the maxim—Live and let live…. To become indignant at [people’s] conduct is as foolish as to be angry with a stone because it rolls into your path. And with many people the wisest thing you can do, is to resolve to make use of those whom you cannot alter."
- Arthur Schopenhauer