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Strategies & Market Trends : 2026 TeoTwawKi ... 2032 Darkest Interregnum -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Secret_Agent_Man who wrote (198286)	4/20/2023 5:05:08 AM
From: maceng2	3 Recommendations Recommended By ggersh marcher Secret_Agent_Man Read Replies (3) \| Respond to of 217750

I remember Wolfowitz. He made a speech with significant timing. And some comments a few months later as well.

To: Secret_Agent_Man who wrote (198286)	4/20/2023 10:03:09 PM
From: TobagoJack	2 Recommendations Recommended By ggersh Secret_Agent_Man Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 217750

RE <<U.S. Can’t Boss the World>> sometimes I see much humour in everything, for example, re Cold War 2.0 per below ... finance.yahoo.com China is cementing its position as an Arctic superpower through Russia Thu, April 20, 2023 at 4:09 PM GMT+8 China is advancing its superpower status in the world’s coldest regions. And to get there faster, the country has built stronger ties to Russia to supply equipment in the Arctic, a new report by the Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS) reveals. Moscow initially opposed Beijing’s plans to explore its Arctic region through the northern sea route, which runs along the Arctic coast of Russia. This is because Russia operates its most sensitive security apparatus there, the CSIS report says, “ including ballistic missile submarines, strategic test sites, missile defense systems, and advanced radar arrays.” But the war in Ukraine has seemingly changed Russia’s view of China. Isolated by the rest of the world, China is now arguably Russia’s only friend, offering not just money for Russian oil but also investments in Russian tech and infrastructure. China is now a key defender of Russia, and has said it will not recognize the Arctic Council if it keeps shunning Russia for its invasion of Ukraine. Why is China so vested in the Arctic region? As the world’s second-biggest economy, China is looking for footholds in the polar region so that it can access the Arctic’s rich mineral deposits, shipping lanes, and energy stores. All of these resources are becoming increasingly available as Arctic ice melts. “[China has] a clear intent to not be excluded from Arctic developments as the region becomes more accessible,” Stephanie Pezard, a senior political scientist at the US policy think tank RAND, wrote last December. The Arctic region has been warming four times faster than anywhere else on the planet over the past four decades. China is taking advantage of the sea trade and fishing routes that have been opened by the changing climate. In its 2018 Arctic policy paper, China declared itself a “near-Arctic state,” claiming protection under the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea and the Spitsbergen Treaty. Like NATO members, China says it enjoys rights to freedom of navigation and overflight, scientific research, fishing, cable-laying, and resource development in the Arctic high seas. Now Chinese scholars have identified 13 Russian ports that can be used to access the Arctic, based on their natural conditions, infrastructure, operations, interior environment, and geographic location. Chinese companies have presences in most of the ports identified. An example is China Poly Group, which has injected some $300 million into a coal terminal in Murmansk and now plans to develop a deepwater port at Arkhangelsk, according to the CSIS report. China describes the Arctic as one of the world’s “new strategic frontiers,” as it targets to become a “polar great power” by 2030. It has sent high-level officials to the region 33 times in the past two decades, and has been expanding its icebreaker fleet and naval vessels in the region. China is expanding its presence in Antarctica After five years of relative inertia, China is also speeding up construction of its fifth research station in the Antarctic region. Imaging data shows that significant progress is being made for the first time since 2018. The CSIS report describes the base as a “5,000 square meter station” with a construction plan that includes “a scientific research and observation area, an energy facility, a main building, a logistics facility, and a wharf built for China’s Xuelong icebreakers.” A map shows the locations of existing Chinese Antarctic stations and the Inexpressible Island site of a new station in this handout image. The report calls the station, located on Inexpressible Island near the Ross Sea, as China’s “most significant expansion of its footprint there in a decade.” Though the US State Department found no ongoing military work there in 2020, the new station will have a dual-purpose ground satellite, CSIS said. The satellite will give the station the ability to monitor and collect intelligence signals from Australia and New Zealand, both US allies. It also allows China to collect telemetry and spatial data on rockets launching from newly established space facilities in both nations.

To: Secret_Agent_Man who wrote (198286)	4/22/2023 8:12:41 PM
From: TobagoJack	1 Recommendation Recommended By Secret_Agent_Man Respond to of 217750

Re <<If the U.S. Can’t Boss the World, It Will Spitefully Destroy It>> perhaps it is a bipartisan thing, certainly looking so, but let us wait for more clarity February 2024 - February 2025. I remain agnostic. Recommendation: continue to hold some gold on the one hand otoh ... thus explaining the very recent Russian Far East naval exercise foreignaffairs.com What’s Really Going on Between Russia and China Behind the Scenes, They Are Deepening Their Defense Partnership By Alexander Gabuev April 12, 2023 Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin at the Kremlin in Moscow, March 2023 Pavel Byrkin / Sputnik / Kremlin “There are changes happening, the likes of which we haven’t seen for 100 years,” Chinese leader Xi Jinping said to Russian President Vladimir Putin last month at the end of a state visit to Russia. “Let’s drive those changes together.” To this, the Russian leader responded, “I agree.” asiatimes.com China, Russia circle wagons in Asia-Pacific Beijing and Moscow visualize that the US, having failed to ‘erase’ Russia, is turning attention to the Asia-Pacific Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and President Vladimir Putin, shown here attending the Kavkaz-2020 military drills at the Kapustin Yar training ground in Astrakhan region, also attended Vostok 2022. Photo: Sputnik / Mikhail Klimentyev The official visit by Chinese Defense Minister Li Shangfu to Russia on April 16-19 prima facie underscored the two countries’ emergent need to deepen their military trust and close coordination against the backdrop of worsening geopolitical tensions and the imperative to maintain the global strategic balance. The visit carries forward the pivotal decisions made at the intensive one-on-one talks between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping in Moscow through March 20-21. In a break with protocol, General Li’s four-day visit was front-loaded with a “working meeting” with Putin, to quote Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov ( here and here). Li is no stranger to Moscow, having previously held charge of the Equipment Development Department of the Central Military Commission, and who was sanctioned by the US in 2018 for purchasing Russian weapons, including Su-35 combat aircraft and S-400 surface-to-air missile systems. Song Zhongping, a prominent Chinese military expert and TV commentator, forecast that Li’s trip would signal the high level of bilateral military ties with Russia, and lead to “more mutually beneficial exchanges in many fields, including defense technologies and military exercises.” On April 12, the US Commerce Department announced the imposition of export controls on a dozen Chinese companies for “supporting Russia’s military and defense industries.” The Global Times hit back defiantly that “as China is an independent major power, so is Russia. It’s our right to decide with whom we will carry out normal economic and trade cooperation. We cannot accept the US’ finger-pointing or even economic coercion.” Putin said at the meeting with Li last Sunday that military cooperation plays an important role in Russia-China relations. Chinese analysts said Li’s visit is also a signal jointly sent by China and Russia that their military cooperation will not be impacted by US pressure. Putin had disclosed in October 2019 that Russia was helping China create an early missile warning system that would drastically enhance the defensive capacity of China. Chinese observers noted that Russia was more experienced in developing and operating such a system, which is capable of identifying and sending warnings immediately after intercontinental ballistic missiles are launched. Such cooperation demonstrates a high level of trust and requires a possible integration of Russian and Chinese systems. The system integration will be mutually beneficial; stations located in the north and west of Russia could provide China with warning data and, in turn, China could provide Russia with data collected at its eastern and southern stations. That is to say, the two countries could create their own global missile defense network. These systems are among the most sophisticated and sensitive areas of defense technology. The US and Russia are the only countries that have been able to develop, build and maintain such systems. Certainly, close coordination and cooperation between Russia and China, two nuclear-armed powers, will profoundly contribute to world peace in the present circumstances by containing and deterring US hegemony. It cannot be a coincidence that Moscow ordered a sudden check of the forces of its Pacific Fleet on April 14-18, which overlapped Li’s visit. The inspection took place against the background of the aggravation of the situation around Taiwan. Indeed, in early April, it became known that the American aircraft carrier USS Nimitz had approached Taiwan; on April 11, the US began a 17-day military exercise in the Philippines involving more than 12,000 troops; on April 17, news appeared about the dispatch of 200 American military advisers to Taiwan. The US Global Thunder 23 strategic exercises at Minot Air Base in North Dakota (which is the US Air Force Global Strikes Command) began last week, where training was conducted to load cruise missiles with nuclear warheads on to bombers. The images showed B-52H Stratofortress strategic bombers being equipped by the flight technical personnel of the base with AGM-86B cruise missiles capable of carrying nuclear warheads on the underwing pylons. Again, exercises of US aviation and fleet forces have been increasingly noticed in the immediate vicinity of Russian borders or in regions where Russia has geopolitical interests. On April 5, a B-52 Stratofortress circled over the Korean Peninsula allegedly “in response to nuclear and missile threats from North Korea.” At the same time, South Korea, the US and Japan conducted trilateral naval exercises in the waters of the Sea of Japan with the participation of the USS Nimitz. Russian Security Council secretary Nikolai Patrushev recently drew attention to Japan’s growing capability to conduct offensive operations, which, he said, constituted “a gross violation of one of the most important outcomes of the Second World War.” Japan plans to purchase around 500 Tomahawk cruise missiles from the US, which can directly threaten most of the territory of the Russian Far East. Mitsubishi Heavy Industries is working on developing Type 12 land-based anti-ship missiles “in order to protect the remote islands of Japan.” Japan is also developing hypersonic weapons designed to conduct combat operations “on remote islands,” which Russians see as options for Japan’s possible seizure of the Southern Kurils. For 2023, Japan will have a military budget exceeding US$51 billion (on par with Russia’s), which is slated to increase to $73 billion. Actually, during the latest surprise inspection, the ships and submarines of Russia’s Pacific Fleet made the transition from their bases to the Seas of Japan and Okhotsk and the Bering Sea. Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said, “In practice, it is necessary to work out ways to prevent the deployment of enemy forces to the operationally important area of the Pacific Ocean – the southern part of the Sea of Okhotsk and to repel its landing on the Southern Kuril Islands and Sakhalin Island.” ‘Loudly on the quiet …’Surveying the regional alignments, Yuri Lyamin, a Russian military expert and senior fellow at the Center for Analysis of Strategies and Technologies, a leading think-tank of the military-industrial complex, told Izvestia newspaper: “Considering that we have not settled the territorial issue, Japan lays claim to our South Kurils. In this regard, checks are very necessary. It is necessary to increase the readiness of our forces in the Far East.… “In the context of the current situation, we need to further strengthen defense cooperation with China. In fact, an axis is being formed against Russia, North Korea and China: the USA, Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, and then it goes to Australia. Great Britain is also actively trying to participate.… “All this must be taken into account and cooperation should be established with China and North Korea, which are, one might say, our natural allies.” In highly significant remarks at a Kremlin meeting with Shoigu on April 17 – while Li was in Moscow – Putin noted that the current priorities of Russia’s armed forces are “primarily focusing on the Ukrainian track … [but] the Pacific theater of operations remains relevant” and it must be borne in mind that “the forces of the [Pacific] fleet in its individual components can certainly be used in conflicts in any direction.” The next day, Shoigu told General Li, “In the spirit of unbreakable friendship between the nations, peoples, and the armed forces of China and Russia, I look forward to the closest and most successful cooperation with you.…” The Russian Ministry of Defense readout said: “Sergei Shoigu stressed that Russia and China could stabilize the global situation and lessen the potential for conflict by coordinating their actions on the global stage. ‘It is important that our countries share the same view on the ongoing transformation of the global geopolitical landscape.…’ “The meeting we have today will, in my opinion, help to further solidify the Russia-China strategic partnership in the defense sphere and enable an open discussion of regional and global security issues.” Beijing and Moscow visualize that the US, having failed to “erase” Russia, is turning attention to the Asia-Pacific theater. Suffice to say, Li’s visit shows that the reality of Russia-China defense cooperation is complicated. Russia-China military-technical cooperation has always been rather secretive, and the level of secrecy has increased as both countries engage in more direct confrontation with the US. The political meaning of Putin’s 2019 statement on jointly developing a ballistic-missile early warning system extended far beyond its technical and military significance. It demonstrated to the world that Russia and China were on the brink of a formal military alliance, which could be triggered if US pressure went too far. In October 2020, Putin suggested the possibility of a military alliance with China. The Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ reaction was positive, although Beijing refrained from using the word “alliance.” A working and effective military alliance could be formed quickly if the need arises but their respective foreign-policy strategies rendered such a move unlikely. However, real and imminent danger of military conflict with the US could trigger a paradigm shift. This article was produced in partnership by Indian Punchline and Globetrotter, which provided it to Asia Times. MK Bhadrakumar is a former Indian diplomat. Follow him on Twitter @BhadraPunchline.