TOKYO – It was all smiles and bonhomie at the US-Australia defense meetings in San Francisco this month. But Down Under, there are growing calls for Australia to scale back its reliance on America in favor of – you guessed it – China.
“Australia can no longer assume that we can continue to exist in a world where we can …
Wrapping up our discussion on China, we’re wondering if the U.S. has some innate compulsion to find a foe. If so, is it prudence or panic? We tackle the issue with Patrick Cronin, director of the Asia-Pacific Security Program at the Center for a New American Security, and David Finkelstein, director of China studies at the …
Continuing this week on Command Post, our tour of the national-security challenges associated with the Middle Kingdom. John Nagl, of the Center for a New American Security, and I ask if China, beginning to flex its military muscle, is readying to tell the Pentagon: the western Pacific is ours, so scram! We’re joined in the discussion …
Continuing our discussion this week on China, we’re tackling a corollary of Tom Friedman’s McDonald’s Rule — countries with McDonald’s restaurants generally don’t wage war on one another — as we weigh the impact of economic ties between Beijing and Washington. Does the immense commerce between the two nations reduce the …
TOKYO – Never mind natural resources or national pride.
China’s rapid military modernization and aggressive territorial claims are rooted in the calculus of nuclear deterrence, according to defense analysts in Japan.
Sumihiko Kawamura, deputy director of the conservative Okazaki Institute in Tokyo, says China has claimed …
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Even though the Obama Administration hasn’t officially declared Taiwan won’t be getting the new F-16s it craves, that hasn’t slowed down Taiwanese animators from commenting on the apparently crashed deal. In English, even. (h/t The Cable)
This week on Command Post, John Nagl of the Center for a New American Security and I probe the threat — or whatever it is — posed by China. We’re joined in the discussion by David Finkelstein, retired Army officer and director of China studies at the Pentagon-funded Center for Naval Analyses, and Patrick Cronin, CNAS’s director …
TOKYO – For the second time since taking office this month, Prime Minister Yoshihoko Noda has warned about China’s military ambitions in the Far East.
“I am concerned about their reinforcement of national defense power, which lacks transparency, and their acceleration of maritime activities,” Noda said during debate in the …
As the nation’s defense contractors pleaded with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta Tuesday against deeper budget cuts, senators were eying a proposed bill from two of their colleagues that would urge the Obama Administration to sell F-16 jet fighters to Taiwan for pretty much the same reason. Given the dire economy, it shouldn’t come as …
Interesting chart from the Economist. I fear for national security if McDonald’s eclipses what the Britmag terms the US Department of Defence.
As the commentaries, retrospectives and meditations pile up ten years after 9/11, expect quite a few in their closing paragraphs to look toward the next grand geo-political challenge facing the U.S. A decade of costly adventurism in the Middle East and Afghanistan, many will argue, distracted U.S. policy making from the new realities of …
Philip Stephens of the Financial Times recently pens a rather pessimistic piece on what Libya said about “Britain’s pretensions of influence.” Noting that the “campaign has stretched the armed forces to their limit,” he calls it a “last hurrah.” Now, the underlying tone of the piece is his criticism of PM David Cameron’s desire to …
OK — on Wednesday we posted some thoughts from an Air Force planner working for the Joint Chiefs of Staff about how to avoid the mistakes we made in Iraq when/if we invade Iran. Friday’s Iranian post is more optimistic. It’s an assessment of the Iranian nuclear threat from Cheryl M. Graham, a lecturer in international relations and …
