How to Compete with Chinese Foreign Policy?

(h/t to Mitch)

How should the United States compete with Chinese foreign policy? From Economist.com, "The Monroe Doctrine is Dead."

Great question: "Whether you are Lula da Silva or Hugo Chavez, would you rather deal with China's "no-questions-asked" foreign policy or an anti-corruption, pro-transparency, pro-labour, environmentally conscious, human-rights-pushing American government?"

Having experience with Latin America, and a fairly good understanding of Chinese foreign policy, this question is intriguing. Whether interacting with countries in Latin America or Africa, China has a peculiar foreign policy which stands in stark contrast to that of the US and other prominent countries of the West. While many Americans may look down on the way in which the Chinese conduct their affairs abroad, it's clear that China is succeeding in regions where other "big players" are failing. And it can be argued that China is actually making a positive difference in those regions.

How will China's success affect US foreign policy? What say you?

- Marc

How would you respond?

Obama and Company

President Obama struggled to formulate a coherent response to the political crisis in Iran, yet he hasn't wasted any time in condemning the coup in Honduras. What happened to the President who said, when asked about the events in Iran:

It is up to Iranians to make decisions about who Iran's leaders will be. We respect Iranian sovereignty and want to avoid the United States being the issue inside of Iran.

Secretary of State, Hillary Clinton, also defined the Administration's desire for neutrality on the subject of Iran by saying this:

We are obviously waiting to see the outcome of the internal Iranian processes, but our intent is to pursue whatever opportunities might exist in the future with Iran.

Nevertheless, when Honduran president, Manuel Zelaya, was ousted from power, Obama's sense of neutrality quickly dissipated.

From SFgate:

President Obama strongly condemned the ouster of Honduras' president as an illegal coup that set a "terrible precedent" for the region, as the country's new government defied international calls Monday to return the toppled president to power and clashed with thousands of protesters in the streets.

"We do not want to go back to a dark past," in which in which military coups override elections, Obama said. "We always want to stand with democracy."

I think that Sen. Mel Martinez makes an excellent argument against Obama's decision to condemn the coup:

“The crisis in Honduras stems from the failure of its leaders to live within constitutional boundaries and from the earlier silence of the United States and international community regarding the abuse of power by the Honduran executive. Any disruption of the constitutional order is unacceptable, regardless of who commits it.“In the current crisis, neither the U.S. nor other countries in the region or the international community should be taking sides in a constitutional dispute, but rather encouraging a resolution through dialogue among Hondurans and by helping Honduras maintain its currently scheduled presidential elections.”

What happened to neutrality, Barry?

Ready to Love the Pacific

Yeah, I'm a little off topic now, but I am stoked for The Pacific.

Band of Brothers was absolutely phenomenal... and I expect good things from The Pacific.




I can hardly contain my excitement... too bad it comes out next year.

What is Kim Jong Il Thinking?

What is Kim Jong Il thinking? More and more, this two-bit dictator is reminding me of the Saddam Hussein of yesteryear.

From the Associated Press:

North Korea threatened Wednesday to wipe the United States off the map as Washington and its allies watched for signs the regime will launch a series of missiles in the coming days.

"If the U.S. imperialists start another war, the army and people of Korea will ... wipe out the aggressors on the globe once and for all," the official Korean Central News Agency said.

The warning came on the eve of the 59th anniversary of the start of the three-year Korean War, which ended in a truce in 1953, not a peace treaty, leaving the peninsula in state of war.

Jong Il, like Hussein, is overplaying his cards. And I wouldn't be surprised to see North Korea launch some form of attack on South Korea. Is Kim Jong Il crazy? Maybe, but the guy isn't stupid. For years, he has been known for baiting the international community and flagrantly defying international treaties and agreements. But should we shrug off a nation with nuclear capabilities?

Maybe Kim Jong Il has caught on that Obama is a pushover in the international arena, and is just playing along. Really, how would the international community respond to a nuclear attack from North Korea?

Whatever the case, this little video game from Germany is hilarious, and does an excellent job portraying the Korean dictator.

Let's Talk about Torture in Iran

Unlike the portrayal provided by the MSM in the US, torture is not simply an American phenomenon. In fact, it is quite prevalent in places like Iran, where even women, children and young adults face everyday the possibility of being tortured.

From an editor at Salon.com:

Salon has obtained an e-mail, written in Farsi, circulating among Iranian American activists that tells the story of a 17-year-old boy who says he was tortured by government agents in Tehran. The e-mail, with attached photos of the victim, was sent by a friend of the boy's after his release. Though it's unclear exactly when the events in the story happened, the e-mail arrived in the U.S. late last week. The activist who forwarded it to Salon wanted it published to show what's happening as Iran is gripped by ongoing protests and a harsh government crackdown. The message was translated by a different Salon source, who raised some questions about a few specific details in the narrative -- the boy says he was moved around more than seems to make sense; at times he seems to confuse the police with the Basij paramilitaries; and, especially, his belief that non-Iranians were assisting in the abuse, a rampant but unsubstantiated rumor in Iran and among exiles. But the translator said some confusion is understandable for a scared teenager in his situation: "It is obvious that he was tortured."

To protect the people involved and their friends and family in Iran, Salon is not identifying those who sent or translated the message. The first paragraph below is the introduction circulating with the story, and the rest is from the boy.

READ THE STORY HERE.


Here is a part of the boy's story...

"One of them asked me if Mr. Khatami would come save us, while they were breaking my fingers and cutting the finger webs. Although I swore a thousand times that I had not voted and had never participated in any demonstration, they didn't care and just kept beating me hard. I fainted once or twice but there were some of us who fainted every time their bones were broken, and as soon as they gained their consciousness, the riot police started beating them again. I was trying to contract my muscles to avoid further bone fracture."

It's important to understand how torture is viewed in other parts of the world, and how it is implemented by totalitarian regimes. Again, torture is not simply an American phenomenon, and unlike the US, not mainly utilized against terrorists.

In Memory of Neda Agha Soltan

The video of Neda's murder has circulated throughout the world, and everywhere, people are wanting to know more about this young martyr.


From the New York Times:

It was hot in the car, so the young woman and her singing instructor got out for a breath of fresh air on a quiet side street not far from the antigovernment protests they had ventured out to attend. A gunshot rang out, and the woman, Neda Agha-Soltan, fell to the ground. “It burned me,” she said before she died.

The bloody video of her death on Saturday, circulated in Iran and around the world, has made Ms. Agha-Soltan, a 26-year-old who relatives said was not political, an instant symbol of the antigovernment movement.

Watch video here.

A Great Post on Iran

I usually don't agree with Richard Warnick, from OneUtah.org, but I definitely appreciate his insight.

After coming home from a week-long vacation, I wanted to write some of my thoughts on the events taking place in Iran. Yet before I could do so, I read a great post by Warnick on the same subject, and thought I would provide a link on my blog instead.

As much as I would like to join with other conservatives in criticizing the President during this crisis, I agree with Warnick that how the President chooses to handle things now will greatly affect future relations with the region.

Read the post here.

While I think that Obama should be hesitant to commit himself completely to Mousavi's cause, he needs to at least show some more spine in supporting the majority of Iranians who are desiring change... and I must say, he has appeared weak on the issue.

Out of Context: Billy Crudup Should Play the Riddler

I know that this is terribly out of context, but today Tyler Riggs and I were discussing who should play the "Riddler" in the next Batman movie, and I think it should be Watchmen star, Billy Crudup.

And no, please don't ever suggest that it should be Johnny Depp.

How to Kill an Insurgency

As the great counterinsurgency theorist, David Galula, repeatedly argued, the most effective way to defeat an insurgency is to eliminate the support of the local population.

Unfortunately, the true importance of this tenet was little understood during the initial actions taken by the US in both Afghanistan and Iraq.

Over the past few years, the Taliban has been able to regain much of its control and influence and now poses a serious threat to American forces and the people of Afghanistan and Pakistan. Nevertheless, the power of the Taliban is currently being challenged because of its violation of one of the most important principles of insurgency.


From the New York Times:

A year ago, the Pakistani public was deeply divided over what to do about its spreading insurgency. Some saw the Taliban militants as fellow Muslims and native sons who simply wanted Islamic law, and many opposed direct military action against them.

But history moves quickly in Pakistan, and after months of televised Taliban cruelties, broken promises and suicide attacks, there is a spreading sense — apparent in the news media, among politicians and the public — that many Pakistanis are finally turning against the Taliban.

The shift is still tentative and difficult to quantify. But it seems especially profound among the millions of Pakistanis directly threatened by the Taliban advance from the tribal areas into more settled parts of Pakistan, like the Swat Valley. Their anger at the Taliban now outweighs even their frustration with the military campaign that has crushed their houses and killed their relatives.

“It’s the Taliban that’s responsible for our misery,” said Fakir Muhammed, a refugee from Swat, who, like many who had experienced Taliban rule firsthand, welcomed the military campaign to push the insurgents out.

The growing support for the fight against the Taliban could be an important turning point for Pakistan, whose divisions about its Islamic militancy seemed at times to imperil the state itself.

Interesting stuff.

The Meaning of Bloody Omaha

As June 6th approaches, the world should be reminded of the sacrifice made by thousands of American soldiers on faraway battlefields, such as D-Day's Omaha Beach.

If anything should symbolize the most noble aspects of what it means to be an American, it is the Allied invasion of Normandy in 1944. D-Day marked the day that the Allies took the war directly to the Nazis, and through tremendous loss of life, the Allies were able to gradually recapture Europe from the horror of fascism.

Occasionally I hear anti-Americans rail against the US, and I cannot help but cringe. Many of these critics have directly benefited from the sacrifices made by American soldiers fighting in foreign lands; WWII was not merely a war, it was a global liberation.

This article, therefore, perfectly sums up some of my feelings.


From Herbert London in the Wall Street Journal:

The skies over Normandy are invariably filled with dark rain clouds. But on one day in late April the sky was cloudless and the English Channel tranquil. Youngsters built sand castles on Omaha Beach and dogs romped in the surf. It was a vastly different scene from the bloodshed and violence that occurred on this same beach 65 years ago.

In an effort to understand what the GIs experienced on that fateful day of June 6, 1944, I climbed up a steep hill to the plain above the beach. Unlike the soldiers, I didn't carry an 80-pound pack on my back. And even though I observed German fortifications on my way, no one was firing at me.

These fortifications are a reminder that despite feints to Calais and bombing along the coast prior to the invasion, Nazi forces were well ensconced when the U.S. and its allies landed. Most of the bombs aimed at these German installations landed several kilometers inland -- a condition that distinguished Omaha Beach from Utah Beach. Omaha Beach was Bloody Omaha, a scene of so much death that it was unprecedented in American history. One soldier noted "there were body parts everywhere and the sea turned red with blood."

...

READ ENTIRE ARTICLE HERE.

Anyone Watching This?

US Special Forces are on a mission into Pakistan to find the "big three": Osama Bin Laden, Ayman al-Zawahiri, and Mullah Mohommad Omar.

From Indian Express.com:

The US Special Operations Forces have standing orders to enter Pakistan if they find any ‘conclusive’ evidence about the presence of the ‘big three’, which includes, Al Qaeda chief Osama bin Laden, his deputy Ayman al-Zawahiri and Taliban leader Mullah Mohammad Omar.

According to a ‘Washington Post’ report, the US Special Operation Forces have already established ground teams on the Pak-Afghanistan border, and would move into Pakistan if they receive any substantial information about the presence of any of the ‘big three’ in a particular area.

The US suspects that the top three extremists are hiding in Pakistan, the report says.

In 2008, the Bush administration authorized covert US ground raids inside Pakistan, but Pakistani outrage after a single attack led to their suspension, the Dawn reports.

So far, the Obama administration has not authorized any ground operations inside Pakistan.

Pakistan is becoming a batteground, and I expect to see the US remain in the region for at least another decade. It is impossible to properly deal with Al Qaeda and the Taliban without confronting Pakistan directly.

BOOM: Buchenwald and Barack

This is just priceless! Journalists can't resist reporting on the President as if he was a Hollywood celebrity, guessing his every thought and feeling. Well, Barack's trip to Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany is no exception.



From the Times Online:

President Obama is preparing to follow in the footsteps of his great-uncle, Charlie, with a visit to the Buchenwald concentration camp in Germany when he returns to Europe this summer.

The site is laden with historic and personal significance for the President. More than 50,000 people died at the camp before its liberation in April, 1945 by American soldiers, including Charlie Payne, the uncle of Mr Obama’s mother.

For the soldiers that stumbled over the corpses it was their first encounter with the Holocaust, and the horrors, relayed back home, helped to raise American consciousness of Nazi atrocities.

...

Thomas Steg, spokesman for the German Government, said that Mr Obama might visit “historical places that in the widest sense are related to the different aspects of World War Two — destruction and rebuilding, extermination and the breakdown of civilisation”, as well as places which have “biographical references” for his family.

During the election campaign Mr Obama sought regularly to deflect any suggestion that his exotic multinational background meant that he lacked patriotism by pointing out how his maternal grandfather, Stanley Dunham, had “marched with Patton’s army” after the Normandy landings.

However, a reference to Charlie Payne’s service in the 89th Infantry Division during the war, which showed that he was vague about some details of his family’s history, briefly threatened to embarrass him.

Mr Obama, speaking in May last year about the need to screen the US military for signs of post-traumatic stress disorder, said: “I had a uncle who was part of the first American troops to go into Auschwitz and liberate the concentration camps. And the story in my family is that when he came home, he went into the attic, and he didn’t leave the house for six months.

“Obviously something had affected him deeply but at the time there weren’t the kinds of facilities to help somebody work through that kind of pain.”

While the Times would love to paint a tapestry of "personal significance," Barack Obama's great-uncle, Charlie Payne, has a different perspective on the President's interest in family history.



From an interview on Spiegel Online:

SPIEGEL: Mr. Payne, early in June your great-nephew, President Barack Obama, will visit the former concentration camp Buchenwald, which you helped liberate at the end of the war. Will he be travelling in your footsteps?

Charles Payne: I don't buy that. I was quite surprised when the whole thing came up and Barack talked about my war experiences in Nazi Germany. We had never talked about that before. This is a trip that he chose, not because of me I'm sure, but for political reasons.

SPIEGEL: What do you think could be his motives for this trip?

Payne: First, I think he already had this trip in mind -- with Cairo on the one end and Normandy at the other, and time for Germany in between. Second, perhaps his visit also has something to do with improving his standing with Angela Merkel. She gave him a hard time during his campaign and also afterwards.

SPIEGEL: At first Mr. Obama claimed that one of his family members was involved in the liberation Auschwitz. How did this misunderstanding come about?

Payne: He couldn't have gotten it from me since we had never talked about this particular episode in the war. My sister and her husband were both great storytellers and sometimes made up the details to go along with it. They told him about my deployment with the 89th Infantry Division and apparently they mixed up a few details. Of course it came out immediately that he was wrong since there are enough people in America who know that Auschwitz is in the East and that the camp was liberated by the Red Army.

HAR HAR! Perhaps Charlie Payne didn't get the memo from Spiegel, but the purpose of the interview was to portray the exquisite "personal significance" of the trip for young Barack. Instead, Mr. Payne gave us a dose of reality.

BOOM: Mancow is a Fraud!

Mancow Muller would be suspected of fraud in any other circumstance, considering the details. Nevertheless, with the support of the MSM, he will mostly likely continue to be a fascination for people like Keith Olbermann.

But it seems that Mancow's little publicity stunt was nothing more than a "hoax" (exact words used by his publicist).

Read about the controversy in the Chicago Tribune.

Should We Be Cutting Missile Defense?

William Cohen, a former Secretary of Defense in the Clinton Administration, strongly argues that President Obama is wrong to cut our missile defense program, especially in light of North Korea's latest escapades.


From the Washington Times:

President Obama stood firm in his position that the North Korean launch was a violation of Security Council Resolutions 1718 and 1695. Together with Japan and South Korea, his administration has pressed hard for a Security Council resolution imposing new sanctions on North Korea for its missile launch. Speaking in Prague after the North Korean launch, President Obama declared: "Rules must be binding. Violations must be punished. Words must mean something." The president is right, of course, but unfortunately, China and Russia would agree only to a nonbinding "presidential statement."

Tough words, without tough action, means that Kim Jong-il can tell the world "tough luck" - which is precisely what he has done in recent weeks.

Since words have no impact upon North Korea's stratagems and actions, the U.S. should say little in response and give that country even less when it comes to economic assistance. Kim Jong-il has built a throne of swords; he should be made to sit on it.

It should be noted that the rationale for constructing a missile-defense system was not only to defend our homeland against the mad or messianic of limited means, but also to serve as a last resort against an accidental launch of an ICBM by a major power.

Reducing the funding commitment to our missile-defense system by $1.4 billion, as the Obama administration has done, sends the signal that we do not take the threats of rogue regimes seriously, and are willing to take the risk that current technologies are sufficient to prevent devastating accidents or miscalculations.

Given the disturbing geopolitical events that are now unfolding, it is imperative that we err on the side of safety. The consequences are too grave to allow our leadership to claim at some future time that they were taken by surprise.

Cutting missile-defense funding at this critical juncture sends the wrong signal to both our adversaries and our allies. It would embolden North Korea, Iran and other rogue states to pursue missiles of increasing range. It would also confuse our allies and undermine their trust in America's security guarantees. If the United States is vulnerable to the threat of a missile attack by a rogue state, allies could lose confidence in America's nuclear deterrent - which could lead nations such as Japan to pursue a nuclear deterrent of their own.

Some great stuff to ponder here. The United States, whether Americans like it or not, is essentially the "policeman of the world." For decades, world nations (especially European ones), have relied upon the military strength of the United States to protect them from both foreign and domestic threats. What happens when the power-paradigm dramatically shifts? Well, any student of international relations can answer that one. There is a disruption in the balance of power which forces other nations to attempt to fill the vacum. The result is almost always war. And in this day and age, without a strong global hegemon like the United States, nuclear war is an ever-growing possibility.

Scary: What About N. Korea?

While the nation is torn over the latest Supreme Court nominee, Sonia Sotomayor, North Korea is acting out aggressively and issuing threats to both South Korea and the United States.


From the New York Times:

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea threatened Wednesday to launch military strikes against South Korea if any of its ships were stopped or searched as part of an American-led operation to intercept vessels suspected of carrying weapons of mass destruction.

South Korea agreed to join the global interdiction program after North Korea tested a nuclear device on Monday — its second nuclear test in three years. The North had earlier warned the South not to participate in the effort, known as the Proliferation Security Initiative.

“We consider this a declaration of war against us,” an unidentified North Korean military spokesman said Wednesday in a statement carried by the North’s official news agency, KCNA. “Any hostile act against our peaceful vessels, including search and seizure, will be considered an unpardonable infringement on our sovereignty and we will immediately respond with a powerful military strike.”

The North Koreans also said in the statement that they “no longer feel bound by the armistice” that ended the fighting in the 1950-53 Korean War. Technically, the two Koreas have remained at war for more than 50 years, because the 1953 armistice never gave way to a final peace treaty. North Korea has previously called the armistice a “useless piece of paper.”

The North’s strident rhetoric is not unusual in statements released to the outside world, but the latest broadsides are likely to worsen tensions created by Monday’s nuclear test, which drew swift, angry and widespread condemnation from the international community. The United Nations Security Council is in the process of crafting a response, which may include additional economic sanctions; the North has said it would consider such sanctions a declaration of war.

“If North Korea stages a provocation, we will respond resolutely,” the South Korean military said in a statement, reacting to the North’s threats. Citing a “strong” military alliance with the United States, it said, “We advise our people to trust our military’s solid readiness and feel safe.”

Since inter-Korean relations began deteriorating a year ago, analysts in government-run and private policy institutes in South Korea have often warned of a possible naval skirmish. In interviews in recent weeks, they have said that if South Korea joined the global interdiction program, it would increase the chances of a North Korean provocation. But, they said, any clash between the two Koreas would be limited in scale.

They said North Korea may attempt a limited armed provocation along the border, especially along the disputed western sea border between the Koreas. It is where the two navies met in bloody skirmishes in 1999 and 2002 during the busy crab-catching season of June.

I don't like to sound apocalyptical, ever. But I honestly doubt the assumptions made by this article. The realist in me would like to believe that a potential action between North and South Korea would be limited to a naval conflict, or an "armed provocation along the border." Yet I cannot help but consider the possibility of a nuclear attack coming from North Korea.

What exactly does North Korea fear from "the international community?" This nation has shown that not only can it grapple with UN sanctions, but it is willing to openly defy them.

And what we should all think about is this: what keeps North Korea from utilizing its nuclear weapons capabilities? It isn't economic retaliation from the "international community." Does North Korea fear a military intervention? It doesn't take a rocket scientist to know that most of the Western world is fatigued with wars and conflicts; Iraq and Afghanistan have obviously sapped any enthusiasm the "international community" might have had for war. And Kim Jong Il is an intelligent man and probably understands how disorganized and noncommittal the "international community" can be.

Would Western nations ever retaliate against a nuclear attack from North Korea with nukes of their own? Never. Then what is keeping North Korea from launching nukes? It is frightening idea.