After Marawi, where will Islamic State strike?
WITH the Marawi conflict in southern Philippines coming to an end, what next for Islam-driven extremists in Southeast Asia?
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WITH the Marawi conflict in southern Philippines coming to an end, what next for Islam-driven extremists in Southeast Asia?
IT may never happen, but what South China Sea nations fearful of China can forge is an alliance among them.
America is adamant: North Korea must not be allowed to have intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) with nuclear warheads capable of hitting the continental United States.
Don’t look now, but some meaningful discussion might ring out at the Asean Regional Forum (ARF). Little more than posturing usually happens at ARF, the Asean’s annual security meeting among its foreign ministers and those of America, Australia, Canada, China, India, Japan, New Zealand, North and South Korea, Russia and the European Union. But it just might.
No one actually expects any major breakthroughs at the annual discussions among foreign ministers of Asean and its dialogue partners: Australia, Canada, China, the European Union, India, Japan, New Zealand, Russia, South Korea and the United States.
IT is Asia’s battle of the coming decade. The Philippines fights for its future as a functioning, law-abiding state against enemies foreign and domestic. And if it loses—make no mistake about it—so does the region.
Half-empty or half-full. That’s one way of looking at how things have gone since the Philippines won a favorable decision from the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) in The Hague in its case asserting sovereign rights under the UN Convention of the Law of the Sea (Unclos) against China’s “nine-dash line” claim over most of the South China Sea.
With the so-called bromance between Presidents Vladimir Putin of Russia and Donald J. Trump of the United States at last week’s G20 summit of industrialized nations, relations between the superpowers have certainly come a long, long way since the October 1960 shoe-banging at the United Nations General Assembly by then-Soviet President Nikita Khruschev, triggered by Philippine delegate Lorenzo Sumulong.
Just imagine: What if the Islamic State (IS) were not crumbling under Iraqi and Syrian attacks, backed by Western and Russian warplanes, but have established a caliphate with the most powerful military in the Middle East? And what if IS then moved most of its navy to the region, to support Islamic separatists in Mindanao?
The Middle East has been the arena of empire-builders for millennia, and so it is in our time. The latest twist pits the West, led by the United States, and its Arab allies against Russia, Iran and, lately—though not clearly—one independent-minded Arab state, Qatar.
IF you think the answer is obvious, you’re not thinking, but letting heart or gut get the better of gray matter.
The Trump administration’s confusing statements and actions say it all. In the latest dissonance last Friday, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson urged the Riyadh-led coalition of Arab Sunni-majority states to relax its land, sea and air “blockade” of Qatar. It was constricting food supplies, he said, and hampering the war on Islamic State (IS).
Let’s call some spades.
Before the end, we recall the beginning. Seven decades ago the road to US dominance in global affairs began in the mind of George Catlett Marshall Jr., the US Army’s wartime chief of staff (1939-1945) and the nation’s 50th Secretary of State (1947-1949) and third secretary of defense (1950-1951).
Before and during the 30th summit of the Asean last Saturday, pressures were aplenty. The objective: To include in or exclude from both the Chairman’s statement and the Summit Declaration statements taking China to task for its actions in the South China Sea.
Everyone wants peace, of course, even Kim Jong Un, despite the North Korean despot’s war-baiting threats to develop missiles that can nuke Uncle Sam. Nothing tickles the fancy of founding father Kim Il Sung’s grandson than Washington, Tokyo and Seoul joining Beijing in showering aid on Pyongyang, just to keep its guns quiet.
Bad news sells. So, expect most reports and commentary about last week’s banner news out of Syria and Florida to highlight the worrisome stuff, not the cheery.
One president said we will defend Recto Bank like Recto Avenue. His successor admits we can do nothing to stop China doing as it wishes in the South China Sea.
This writer’s strategic research firm CenSEI was approached last week by a Los Angeles app developer about his group’s planned software for detecting fake news.
WITH war very clearly on the table of possible responses to North Korea’s continued development of nuclear arms, including intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBM) able to hit the United States, will blood flow in the peninsula?
Maybe it’s good-cop, bad-cop diplomacy.
THE $54-billion, 9.4-percent increase in American defense spending, trumpeted by President Donald J. Trump and his aides last week, including his speech atop the USS Gerald Ford, the most technologically advanced aircraft carrier on the planet, is sure to keep generals, admirals and accountants, too, worldwide up nights doing sums.
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