NST Leader: Of US and diplomacy
US President Joe Biden addresses the 76th Session of the UN General Assembly in New York. - AFP pic
PLUS ça change, plus c'est la même chose. The French are right. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
On Tuesday, United States President Joe Biden, speaking at the 76th United Nations General Assembly in New York, gave all the reasons why the world will be more of the same.
True, he talked of trading in "relentless war" for "relentless diplomacy". True, too, he spoke about leading "the world towards a more peaceful, prosperous future for all people". But in the same breath, Biden was talking of using the power of development aid to "invest in new ways of lifting people up around the world" and to "renew and defend democracy".
And "human rights" weren't far behind. Here is a president who withdraws the US from Afghanistan promising to create more Afghanistans around the world. Never mind that Kabul was a failed experiment of 20 years. When Biden took office, he promised the world that his US will be all about "power of example", not about "example of power".
Today, hardly a year into his presidency, he is talking of leading America "not just with the example of our power but, God willing, with the power of our example". Note the order. What a switch. Moments earlier, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned of the world being on the edge of an abyss.
Biden has just told us that the US and its allies will make sure the world stays there.
Biden's "relentless diplomacy" is war by another name. Make no mistake. Bombs and bullets will be there on flimsiest of excuses, like threats to "our interests and security".
Not just those of the interests and security of the US, but also its allies and partners. If the threats aren't there, they will be said to be "imminent".
Or they will be "made" to be there. Like Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Presidents and prime ministers will do the forum circuit speaking of clash of values as invasion preliminaries.
The so-called "liberal" media will fill their column inches with "them versus us" op-eds and guest essays. And how they are failing their women. Never mind if the "civilised" treat their women less honourably.
The invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were preceded by weeks of such yarns.
Nowhere will the world be more la même chose than in the Middle East. Biden himself provided the reason: "The commitment of the United States to Israel's security is without question. And our support for an independent, Jewish state is unequivocal."
Is Biden hinting at an unfinished Greater Israel Zionist project? How could a nuclear-powered Goliath of a regime be threatened by Palestinians in an open prison? If the "US opposes attempts by stronger countries to dominate weaker ones through changes to territories by force", as he said in New York, then why isn't Biden stopping Israel's settlement colonisation of Palestine?
America can't speak of supporting a two-state solution while secretly nudging the Zionist regime to erect illegal settlements on Palestinian land.
We put it to Biden that if America indeed believes in "the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family as the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world", as he says it does, then why deny freedom, justice and peace to the Palestinians?
Because Biden chooses to deny them freedom, justice and peace, though he has the power and capacity to not spurn them thus.
PLUS ça change, plus c'est la même chose. The French are right. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
On Tuesday, United States President Joe Biden, speaking at the 76th United Nations General Assembly in New York, gave all the reasons why the world will be more of the same.
True, he talked of trading in "relentless war" for "relentless diplomacy". True, too, he spoke about leading "the world towards a more peaceful, prosperous future for all people". But in the same breath, Biden was talking of using the power of development aid to "invest in new ways of lifting people up around the world" and to "renew and defend democracy".
And "human rights" weren't far behind. Here is a president who withdraws the US from Afghanistan promising to create more Afghanistans around the world. Never mind that Kabul was a failed experiment of 20 years. When Biden took office, he promised the world that his US will be all about "power of example", not about "example of power".
Today, hardly a year into his presidency, he is talking of leading America "not just with the example of our power but, God willing, with the power of our example". Note the order. What a switch. Moments earlier, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres warned of the world being on the edge of an abyss.
Biden has just told us that the US and its allies will make sure the world stays there.
Biden's "relentless diplomacy" is war by another name. Make no mistake. Bombs and bullets will be there on flimsiest of excuses, like threats to "our interests and security".
Not just those of the interests and security of the US, but also its allies and partners. If the threats aren't there, they will be said to be "imminent".
Or they will be "made" to be there. Like Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. Presidents and prime ministers will do the forum circuit speaking of clash of values as invasion preliminaries.
The so-called "liberal" media will fill their column inches with "them versus us" op-eds and guest essays. And how they are failing their women. Never mind if the "civilised" treat their women less honourably.
The invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were preceded by weeks of such yarns.
Nowhere will the world be more la même chose than in the Middle East. Biden himself provided the reason: "The commitment of the United States to Israel's security is without question. And our support for an independent, Jewish state is unequivocal."
Is Biden hinting at an unfinished Greater Israel Zionist project? How could a nuclear-powered Goliath of a regime be threatened by Palestinians in an open prison? If the "US opposes attempts by stronger countries to dominate weaker ones through changes to territories by force", as he said in New York, then why isn't Biden stopping Israel's settlement colonisation of Palestine?
America can't speak of supporting a two-state solution while secretly nudging the Zionist regime to erect illegal settlements on Palestinian land.
We put it to Biden that if America indeed believes in "the equal and inalienable rights of all members of the human family as the foundation of freedom, justice and peace in the world", as he says it does, then why deny freedom, justice and peace to the Palestinians?
Because Biden chooses to deny them freedom, justice and peace, though he has the power and capacity to not spurn them thus.
Telly-ban oso want to Address the UN General Assembly, but here is what Germany has to say...
ReplyDeleteQUOTE
German foreign minister against Taliban speech at UN General Assembly
Sep 23, 2021
Bernd von Jutrczenka/dpa
New York (dpa) - German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas is not happy about the prospect of the Taliban speaking at the United Nations General Assembly, as the Islamist militants have requested to represent Afghanistan there following their takeover of the country.
"I don't think performances at the United Nations are helpful," Maas said Wednesday in New York, where the world body's 76th General Debate is currently taking place.
In a letter to UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres, parts of which were obtained by dpa, Taliban Foreign Minister Amir Khan Muttaqi requested the right to speak at the event.
In the letter, the Taliban argues that Afghanistan president Ashraf Ghani had been "ousted" and that other countries no longer recognize him as head of state.
Maas said the important thing now was for the Taliban to respect human rights, especially women's rights, to clearly distinguish themselves from terrorist groups, and to form an inclusive government.
These things would decide how future communication with the militant Islamist rulers would be conducted, Maas said. "In my view, an address at the United Nations General Assembly is not ... the appropriate framework for making real progress on the issue," he stressed.
After the withdrawal of NATO and US troops, the Taliban seized power of Afghanistan last month and re-established its "Islamic Emirate" after nearly 20 years.
The Taliban are seen now as the de facto rulers of Afghanistan by the US, Germany and other countries - but they do not yet recognize them as a legitimate government.
The UN Secretariat has forwarded the letter to its credentials committee for consideration.
UNQUOTE
So Germany objects!
DeleteThen what about Qatar's voiced support?
Is UN a pact of demoNcratic dickheads?
In a court of right, even the most hated criminal is allowed for a voice to be heard!
Old Joe appears lucid at the recent UNGA, perhaps pumped up with massive drugs to stop his rambling mind going haywire. But just as lucid is his hypocrisy talking about AUKUS as a tool for peace.
ReplyDeleteThis short interview by Liu Xin with Prof Peter Kuznick reveals the danger of the TYPE of nuclear-powered subs to be given to Australia, using highly enriched uranium, which is easily converted to nuclear weapon use. Now what's to stop Iran, South Korea, Japan to use their stock of highly enriched uranium for potential nuclear bomb development.
Prof Kuznick has also eloquently highlighted the danger of this Anglophone Troika to isolate and contain China, reminding us that Biden's cabinet is staffed with those hardline cold war warmongers like Blinken, Sullivan and Victoria Newland, the same old faces from the Obama administration, who initiated the Pivot to Asia.
Watch this short take by the good Prof in The Point : What drives the U.S to wage wars ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtBzmBMegK8
Orientals Modern Mao and Tributary Rocket Man oredy have Nuklear Boms. Do they have Sole Rights but not others?
DeleteEven Yindia and Pakistan have it too.
So, u support Iran's nuclear plan?
DeleteDitto with all those irrational zealot zombieic cults of fatalistic suicidal dogma?
Blurred mfer, if yr 'sole rights' were to be universally applied, u would have to start digging a deepest hole to hide - not that it helps!
NST is the mouthpiece of the Malaysian political establishment.
ReplyDeleteThis piece lambasting Biden is unwise.
One of these days, Malaysia WILL need the Yanks help.
At that point, having a track record of friendly engagement helps, and a record of fiery statements against them will not be well received.
There is no need to point out that Millions of Malaysian jobs are directly or indirectly linked to friendly economic ties with the Yanks.
Wakakakaka…
DeleteOz's pow-wow pact with Yankee in aukus DIDN'T earn Scottie a trade concession from Biden!
What a f*cking thought of "friendly economic ties with the Yanks" from a Yankee asslicker.
There's a very apt cartoon making the rounds : A kangaroo being pushed forward, blindfolded, by an American from behind that wretched animal. Right in front of the roo, there's a huge pile of shit. wa ka ka ka
DeleteIn Penang, every corner you turn are Yankee corporations employing hundreds of thousands of people, directly and indirectly through SMEs and the entire supply chain.
DeleteIt's a fact of life, no matter how hard you scream and rave and rant against the Evil Yankee bastards.
Old moneyed mfer, u AGAIN confuse USofA as a bullying nation vis-a-vis the ordinary Yankee/Yankee corporations!
DeleteU r blurry evil but I would definitely not reserving that tag for yr children!
Old monster balls is so decrepit that his thinking is as murky as mud and his research ability is even worse....coming up with ridiculous crap comments. Even a 3rd Pfizer booster shot won't save him, wa ka ka ka...oops, maybe it might, if the shot is given at his forehead directly into his borvine otak cells, wa ka ka ka again
DeleteIt is delusional for the Malaysian political establishment to think they can play hostile rhetoric against the USA as a nation and still sustain long term the high level of benefits it accrues from trade with USA.
DeleteAUKUS : One step closer towards war with China, by Brian Berletic
ReplyDeleteThe following are some excerpts from Brian who was an American ex-Marine
(please see the following posts...)
As for the region AUKUS claims it exists to protect and promote security for, few voices spoke up positively in favor of it.
ReplyDeleteThe South China Morning Post in a recent article reported that the Indonesian and Malaysian governments both feared the move would trigger an escalation and perhaps even an arms race. The article stated:
[Malaysian Prime Minister] Ismail Sabri told Morrison he was concerned AUKUS could provoke other powers to act more aggressively in the region.
The article also noted:
Indonesia earlier said it was “deeply concerned over the continuing arms race and power projection in the region”, and called on Australia to meet its nuclear non-proliferation obligations and to uphold the rule of law as set out in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea 1982, or UNCLOS.
Dr. Mahathir Mohamad
Veteran Malaysian politician Dr. Mahathir Mohamad was interviewed by The Australian Financial Review in an article titled, “‘You have escalated the threat’: Mahathir blasts Australia on subs.” The article would report:
“This agreement indicates you openly regard China as a possible enemy and that, if it comes to the crunch, you might even go to war. Just imagine what war would do to south-east Asia,” Dr Mahathir said.
What is Being Used to Justify AUKUS?
ReplyDeleteWhile AUKUS was announced without singling out any specific nation, the Western media was more than eager to cite China as the primary threat AUKUS was supposedly created to counter.
In a CNN segment featuring retired US Air Force Colonel Cedric Leighton, when asked what had prompted the US, UK, and Australia to “reassert” defense ties and “push back” against Chinese “aggressions,” Colonel Leighton would cite the South China Sea, claiming:
What you have is an area that’s been claimed by China, by the People’s Republic of China for really since they took over mainland China in the late 1940s. And what those claims are, are based on natural resources or perceived natural resources in those areas. So it’s between Vietnam, the Philippines, Brunei, Malaysia, of course, China and Taiwan. So that’s the first part of it.
So what we’re talking about here is making sure that what we call the sea lanes of communication are open. So, what does that mean? That means that the trade routes that we use on the open seas need to be protected and in the US, the Australian, and UK view, they need to be protected by our collective forces in order to make sure that no other navy can interfere with the trade routes as they exist right now. So, that means any oil, for example, it comes from the Middle East, any raw materials that come from Africa, things that China depends on a great deal…
Before Colonel Leighton could finish what was quickly becoming a paradoxical statement in which he was suggesting AUKUS was to protect China’s own shipping lanes from China, he was asked if China had been impeding trade along these supposedly threatened routes.
Colonel Leighton admitted, “Not yet.”
The ultimate irony of suggesting AUKUS would “protect” shipping lanes in the South China Sea is highlighted by the fact that the US and its allies are really the primary threat to international commerce around the globe. The US and its allies regularly impose unilateral sanctions on nations and through a combination of physical force and legal threats, seizing ships and their cargo, effectively strangling free trade over the open seas. Nations targeted by this this modern day global piracy include Venezuela, Iran, Cuba, and Syria. Undoubtedly, AUKUS is clearly poised to add China to that list.
Revealed by Colonel Leighton’s comments is an all but openly admitted fact that AUKUS and other alliances before it, are merely iterations of a long-standing US-led strategy of containment of China. AUKUS in particular is meant to threaten and possibly disrupt shipping lanes China above all other nations depends on, not “protect” them.
The Southeast Asian front today consists of an arc of instability created by US-backed anti-Chinese opposition groups trying to seize power in respective Southeast Asian states. Dubbed the “Milk Tea Alliance,” the common denominator besides their anti-China agenda is their US government funding funnelled through the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and adjacent corporate-funded foundations including Open Society.
ReplyDeleteIn addition to this arc of instability, the US has been busy cultivating tensions in the South China Sea where the US accuses China of “bullying” other nations by making “excessive” maritime claims.
To counter this “bullying,” the US regularly conducts “Freedom of Navigation Operations” (FNOPs) in which it sails US Navy warships through waters claimed by China.
The official US Navy website in a statement titled, “7th Fleet conducts Freedom of Navigation Operation” (July 12, 2021), for example, would claim:
The United States challenges excessive maritime claims around the world regardless of the identity of the claimant. The international law of the sea as reflected in the 1982 Law of the Sea Convention provides for certain rights and freedoms and other lawful uses of the sea to all nations.
Not mentioned is the fact that the US itself is not actually a signatory of the 1982 Law of the Sea of Conventions and is in fact one of only a few nations not to sign it.
The US Navy also makes another telling admission when it claimed:
“China, Taiwan, and Vietnam each claim sovereignty over the Paracel Islands.”
According to the US Navy’s own official website, it is not China “bullying” nations in the region over the South China Sea, but rather a series of overlapping claims.
Nations in the region have disputes not only with China, but also with each other as revealed in headlines like the Wall Street Journal’s 2016 article, “Indonesia Blows Up 23 Foreign Fishing Boats to Send a Message,” in which the Indonesian government destroyed captured Malaysian and Vietnamese fishing boats, or an article from Vietnamese news portal Binh Duong News, “Malaysian Navy seizes Vietnamese fishing boats,” or Bangkok Post’s article, “3 Malaysian trawlers seized near Satun.”
It is abundantly clear that the South China Sea hosts a multitude of overlapping claims and disputes which result in sometimes theatrical posturing – not just between China and other states in the region, but between these other claimants as well. These disputes never approach becoming an actual conflict and are almost always resolved bilaterally.
(to continue below...)
continue from previous ....
ReplyDeleteSimilar disputes take place everywhere else in the world, including in Europe, where just this year the New York Times reported on the mobilization of British and French warships over contested fishing waters near Jersey island. Despite the theatrical mobilization of military vessels, this row too was resolved peacefully. Likewise, in their incessant bid to maintain tensions between Ukraine, Russia and Europe, the US and UK have been involved in a series of blatant provocations over the last few years in the Black Sea which temporarily disrupt sea lanes.
It is clear the US is inserting itself into otherwise ordinary and long-standing disputes in the South China Sea to justify America’s large and growing naval presence in the region and to recruit nations into belligerent alliances precisely like the Quad and AUKUS. The idea is to escalate ordinary disputes into a regional or global conflict to help advance US foreign policy and in this case, encircle and contain China.
The extensive propaganda campaign the US is engaged in to achieve this goal is underpinned by moves such as a tribunal it organized at the Permanent Court of Arbitration (PCA) at the Hague, the Netherlands in 2016 – allegedly on behalf of the Philippines. It was American lawyer Paul Reichler and the Western law firm Foley Hoag – not Filipino lawyers – who led the effort.
The non-binding politically-motivated ruling was never capitalized on by the Philippines who opted instead for bilateral talks with Beijing, establishing a mechanism to ease tensions in the South China Sea and even cooperate together, according to the Philippines’ own Department of Foreign Affairs website.
Ironically, after the PCA’s 2016 ruling, not only did Beijing reject it, Taiwan did too. According to a 2016 New York Times article, Taiwan also then sent a patrol ship to the contested waters. Rarely mentioned is that Taiwan’s claims over the South China Sea are almost identical to mainland China’s.
An article from Taipei Times titled, “Tsai to avoid ‘U-shaped line’: source,” admits:
The U-shaped line — also known as the “11-dash line” — was featured in the “Location Map of the South China Sea Islands” drawn up by the Republic of China (ROC) government in 1947. After the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lost the Chinese Civil War and fled to Taiwan, the Chinese Communist Party changed it to a “nine-dash line.”
Washington’s silence over Taiwan’s identical claims amid a simultaneous propaganda campaign to depict China as the sole “bully” of the South China Sea punches further holes in AUKUS’ pretext for existence.
Taiwan, where the current US-backed ruling government in Taipei continues to inch toward independence – is in fact – another pressure point being used by Washington against Beijing. It should be remembered that Taiwan is recognized by virtually all nations (including the United States itself) as part of China under the “One China” policy.
To illustrate this, the US itself does not have an official embassy in Taipei. But while the US officially recognizes Taiwan’s status under international law, it has unofficially and consistently undermined it by supporting pro-independence political groups in Taiwan and incrementally building up Taiwan’s military vis-a-vis the mainland.
Together with the South China Sea issue, these two pressure points are clearly artificial, kept in motion by a constant investment in US-driven political pressure and propaganda as well as a steady stream of military provocations including the recent announcement of AUKUS and vows to provide Australia with nuclear-powered submarines.
A 2016 RAND Corporation paper (PDF) commissioned by the US Army and titled, “War with China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable,” presents a compelling argument for the preservation of American hegemony through a limited conventional war confined to East Asia.
ReplyDeleteThe paper notes:
We postulate that a war would be regional and conventional. It would be waged mainly by ships on and beneath the sea, by aircraft and missiles of many sorts, and in space (against satellites) and cyberspace (against computer systems). We assume that fighting would start and remain in East Asia, where potential Sino-U.S. flash points and nearly all Chinese forces are located.
It’s worth emphasizing that US planners admit that China’s forces are confined to Chinese territory. They also admit all “potential Sino-US flash points” are also located near the Chinese mainland, e.g. the South China Sea and Taiwan.
The paper notes that the time frame studied stretched from 2015 to 2025, representing a closing window of opportunity where the US and its allies could still potentially fight and benefit from a limited conflict with China. Beyond 2025, these chances diminish and eventually China will irreversibly surpass the US economically and militarily, with any conflict fought thereafter against China done so at the expense of the US.
The paper describes the obvious benefits of, and thus the motive for the US provoking a limited conflict with China. It states (emphasis added):
The prospect of a military standoff means that war could eventually be decided by nonmilitary factors. These should favor the United States now and in the future. Although war would harm both economies, damage to China’s could be catastrophic and lasting: on the order of a 25–35 percent reduction in Chinese gross domestic product (GDP) in a yearlong war, compared with a reduction in U.S. GDP on the order of 5–10 percent. Even a mild conflict, unless ended promptly, could weaken China’s economy. A long and severe war could ravage China’s economy, stall its hard-earned development, and cause widespread hardship and dislocation.
Such economic damage could in turn aggravate political turmoil and embolden separatists in China.
The US is clearly preparing the grounds for this conflict, cultivating the very “separatists” the paper notes the conflict would “embolden,” while attacking and attempting to block China’s BRI which is currently diversifying away from China’s dependency on vulnerable Asia-Pacific maritime trade routes.
(to continue...)
Already mentioned were US-backed separatists in Baluchistan, Pakistan attacking CPEC. CPEC is designed to move hydrocarbons travelling from the Middle East to China overland from Gwadar Port in southwest Pakistan into China, circumventing the Malacca Strait and the South China Sea where AUKUS would seek to contain and constrict Chinese commerce during any potential conflict.
ReplyDeleteIn addition to this, Washington’s and the western mainstream media’s continued obsession with China’s western region of Xinjiang also “coincidentally” overlaps a crucial juncture of China’s BRI.
A similar BRI project was created in Myanmar to move hydrocarbons across the Southeast Asian country into Kunming, China, circumventing the Malacca Strait. US-backed opposition groups in Myanmar have – this year – carried out attacks on security forces protecting the pipeline moving these hydrocarbons overland into China.
The Irrawaddy, a US NED-funded media platform focused on Myanmar, in an article titled, “Deadly Attack on Pipeline Station Spotlights China’s High Stakes in Myanmar,” helps illustrate the multitude of ways the US is directly and indirectly preparing the ground for conflict with China by preventing Beijing from resolving vulnerabilities the US seeks to exploit during such a conflict.
More directly, it was announced this year that the US plans to construct a network of missiles along the first island chain which includes Japan, Taiwan, the Philippines, and Indonesia.
The US State Department’s Radio Free Asia in an article titled, “U.S. Indo-Pacific Command Proposes New Missile Capabilities to Deter China,” would report:
The assessment calls for “the fielding of an Integrated Joint Force with precision-strike networks” along the so-called first island chain — referring to missile strike capabilities — and integrated air missile defense in the second island chain, USNI News reported. The document also calls for “a distributed force posture that provides the ability to preserve stability, and if needed, dispense and sustain combat operations for extended periods.”
Clearly, the US creating rings of military installations around China, thousands of miles from America’s own shores, seeks precisely the opposite of maintaining stability and instead, is solely intended to help “dispense and sustain combat operations for extended periods,” as per plans drawn up within the pages of the 2016 RAND paper.
Washington’s economic strategy of “decoupling” from China could, in the context of a coming war the US is preparing with China, be interpreted instead as tying off a limb before amputation rather than any sort of serious effort to establish a healthy, sustainable, self-sufficient US economy.
AUKUS’ announcement is very clearly a political “capstone” of these combined military and economic preparations for a limited conflict the US seeks to provoke with China either in the South China Sea or over Taiwan, or any of the other many flash points the US is deliberately creating and pressuring China over.
The goal is not to militarily defeat China but to instead set it back economically by decades, creating the possible conditions for internal instability the US can exploit toward regime change.
ReplyDeleteThe US, representing only 4% of the global population, yet presuming dominion over the entire planet as self-proclaimed leader of an “international rules-based order,” can only achieve and maintain primacy by artificially arresting development of nations around the globe, and knocking them down militarily when they overcome these artificial constraints.
While it would indeed be unprecedented for the US to provoke an armed conflict directly with a peer competitor like China, China’s otherwise inevitable surpassing of the US is also unprecedented, inviting unpredictable, dangerous, and likewise unprecedented methods by Washington to approach and attempt to delay or deny China’s rise.
The status quo all but guarantees China’s economy along with its military and political influence will irreversibly surpass the US’ within a decade. The closing window of opportunity the US has to prevent China’s as well as Asia’s rise and the unprecedented transfer of primacy from West to East is almost certainly the impetus behind the announcement of “AUKUS” and all the ground preparations that preceded it.
Time will tell whether China, the rest of Asia, and indeed the rest of the world, will escape the perpetual conflict trap which the US continually lays, and whether multi-polarism will continue to emerge and become the dominant paradigm of geopolitics going forward, or if the US will manage to artificially maintain its unipolar order for decades to come – at the cost of unprecedented death and destruction in East Asia and possibly beyond.