Tag Archives: foreign policy

Of Course They Can

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President Xi Jinping of the People’s Republic of China increased pressure on the Republic of China to surrender and be “unified” with the PRC.

Mr Xi said differences in political systems can’t be used as an excuse to resist unification.

Of course they can. Those differences are what makes the two nations separate from each other.  Never mind that the two have been independent of each other ever since the mainland under Mao Tse-tung won then-China’s civil war and drove the Kuomintang off the mainland onto the island of Taiwan, with Mao then creating the PRC.  The reason for the civil war was precisely those differences, differences over which the Communists were willing to kill those who opposed them.

Xi went on.

He promised Taiwanese people a peaceful and prosperous future with the mainland….

Right.  Just ask the folks on Hong Kong, who were the victims of the same promise and who now see their freedoms eroded and in many cases outright eliminated.  They’re not even allowed to elect their own political leaders; they must choose from a list the Communist Party of China provides them.

Xi’s word is worthless, and the citizens of the RoC, along with their government, know that full well.  RoC President Tsai Ing-wen: Xi’s

framework would place the island under China’s rule with limited autonomy, as has been done in Hong Kong.
…
“Taiwan will never accept ‘one country, two systems,'” Ms Tsai said. “The vast majority of Taiwanese public opinion also firmly opposes ‘one country, two systems.'”
…
“China must face the reality of the existence of the Republic of China, Taiwan,” she said…. She said [that] Beijing must “not reject the democratic system that the Taiwanese people have built.”

We need to stand loudly, overtly, and practically with the RoC.  We need to increase naval patrols of the Taiwan Strait, set up a naval basing right agreement for Kaohsiung City along with an Air Force basing agreement for Ching Chuan Kang and Tainan Air Bases.  We need to increase sales of modern air and naval weapons systems to the RoC.  We need to increase our trade ties with the nation, and we need to more actively support it diplomatically.

That’s just a start.

Brexit and a Pan-European Military Establishment

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Recall the year-old EU effort with PESCO (the EU’s carefully euphemistically named Permanent Structured Cooperation), the bloc’s effort to form an EU army that would represent and act in the (sovereign) name of the European Union in defending Europe from outside incursions.  Oh, and be less dependent on us and our nuclear umbrella, our treasure, and our blood for their defense.

We’re seeing yet another example of the too-broad effort to unite all of Europe under one political flag, as this PESCO effort continues to lag.  More importantly, we’re seeing the cost to the EU of Brexit.  As Handelsblatt Today observed, the current situation is one of military failure:

The German Council on Foreign Relations (Deutsche Gesellschaft für Auswärtige Politik, DGAP) and the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) recently reported that the EU at best has only a third of the resources needed for its ambitions to intervene in armed conflicts in Europe or neighboring regions, provide humanitarian aid in catastrophes, help in rebuilding programs, and to free hostages and evacuate civilians.
The EU does not have enough ships, planes, aircraft carriers, or even reconnaissance equipment to accomplish these goals, especially after the UK leaves the EU.

Notice that last.  Aside from the minor detail that the Brits will take with them half the EU’s carrier complement (France has the other one), they’re taking with them manpower, equipment, a serious (by European standards) defense budget, and a strong innovative capacity.

Prime Minister Theresa May is badly missing another strong bet in her series of missed bets as she “negotiates” Great Britain’s departure from the EU.

Afghanistan and A World’s Policeman

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The US currently supplies 14,000 of the 16,000 foreign soldiers in Afghanistan trying to shore up the government and rid the nation of Taliban, al Qaeda, and Daesh terrorists.  President Donald Trump is thinking about cutting our contingent in half over the coming year.  Trump’s rationale is that we shouldn’t continue to be the world’s policeman—unless and until other nations start picking up some of the costs of that role (or, in Trump’s terms, pay us something).

Germany objects.

I disagree with Trump on the world’s cop bit; there is a great deal of national security flowing from our being the cop on the beat rather than one or more of our enemies (as Russia already is demonstrating in Europe, the People’s Republic of China throughout Asia and associated Seas, Iran in the Middle East), regardless of the cost, even if all of that is borne by us.

Germany’s hypocrisy is instructive.  As is Deutsche Welle‘s careful omission of that “unless and until” continuation of Trump’s statement on being world policeman.

Germany has a contingent in Afghanistan, too—in a support role.  It’s a highly useful support role, but Germany demands its soldiers—soldiers!—be protected from risk by our soldiers.  Consequently, if we reduce our presence, Germany may well withdraw altogether.

And:

Norbert Röttgen, chairman of the German parliament’s foreign policy committee, expressed his concern at the development on Thursday. The US was “irreplaceable” as power for maintaining world order, he told public broadcaster ARD.
By withdrawing from this role, the US would make the world “less safe, more unstable, and more egotistical,” he added, before dismissing the term “world policeman” as outdated. “This is much more about world order, stability, balance, and diplomacy[.]”

Yet Germany declined to play any serious role in an order and stability exercise in Iraq.  Germany demands to play only that minor role in the order and stability exercise in Afghanistan.  Germany and most of the rest of European NATO, for decades, has been freeloading off American weal and soldiers for protection from Russia, not even keeping their own voluntarily entered into promise to commit 2% of their national GDPs to supporting NATO with soldiers and equipment—until publicly shamed into it over the last couple of years.  And even now, the majority of those nations continue to refuse even to try to honor their word.

The US [is] “irreplaceable” as power for maintaining world order[.]

But expose their troops to actual danger, even only in support?  Nah—you Americans do that.  We’ll hold your coats.

This Sallah-ian attitude—this timidity—makes it difficult, indeed, to sell the need for us to continue as world policeman (because I choose not to hide behind Röttgen’s meekly wordy euphemism) to our domestic audience—the very folks who are abandoned left to pay the cost in blood and treasure.

What We Can Look Forward To

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Former Acting ICE Director Tom Homan called out California’s sanctuary laws after the murder of a Newman police officer by a suspect who is in the US illegally.

That murdered cop, by the way, was himself an immigrant—a legal one from Fiji.

I’ve mentioned before that House Speaker-to-Be Nancy Pelosi (D, CA) and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D, NY) refuse at all to negotiate.

Here’s another example.  Congressman Jim McGovern (D, MA), rather than making a reasoned argument for his claimed bipartisan proposal, rather than offering a rational explanation for President Donald Trump’s rejection of it (if McGovern’s proposal existed), simply said that Trump had gone off his meds.  Not only do Progressive-Democrats refuse to negotiate the wall, they refuse any sort of serious discourse about it—preferring, instead, their tactic of ad hominem smear.

Are they incapable of forming coherent arguments on the matter, or are they simply refusing to do so?  Your call.

Here’s another example.  Trump, apart from a trip to visit the troops in Iraq, has been in DC all along.  The Progressive-Democrats, though, went home to enjoy their Christmas vacation.  They’re home enjoying their vacation instead of staying in DC to negotiate a deal.  They’re home enjoying their vacation even as they shed copious crocodile tears over the Federal workers whose paychecks will be delayed as a result of this Schumer Shutdown Redux.

In any event, increasing violence and murders by illegal aliens can only be an inevitable outcome of the Progressive-Democrats’ no border barriers, no open borders, disband ICE and curtail CBP position.

It’s absolutely true, as the Progressive-Democrats constantly assert, that only a small minority of aliens who enter our country illegally are violent and will continue their violence.

But what those Progressive-Democrats also know full well but carefully, deliberately omit as they wail and rip their bodices is that that small minority is capable of massive destruction.  Just look at the butchery inflicted by MS-13 and M-18—who represent only a small number of the aliens who entered our country illegally.  Individual examples abound, too, from Kate Steinle’s murder by an illegal alien to that just committed murder of a northern California cop by an illegal alien and gang member.

Too Much Retrenchment

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Christian Whiton, in an op-ed for Fox News‘ online outlet, espoused a large retrenchment and withdrawal of the US (he couched it in terms of withdrawal of our troops only) from Europe and the Middle East.  In one region, though, he’s badly mistaken and goes much too far (he’s mistaken in the other areas, too, but this really stands out).

The president should turn our military bases in Europe over to our NATO allies and withdraw most US troops.
We have kept troops in Europe since World War II, and that war ended 73 years ago. Our European bases have been obsolete since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, and they’ve been of no use to us in the conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria.
Why should US troops defend Germany, for example, where polls show only 30% of Germans have a favorable view of America? On top of that, Germany treats us unfairly on trade, fabricates anti-American news, and is rich enough to defend itself.

No, we should not withdraw most of our troops from Europe.

It’s certainly true that many of those bases have been useless to our efforts in Afghanistan, Iraq, or Syria, but the claim ignores two simple facts: NATO never was designed—or repurposed—to support anything other than a Warsaw Pact (actually, a Soviet Union) invasion of Western Europe.  Secondly the purpose mismatch would disappear if Whiton got his wish and we withdrew our troops from Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria.

However, it’s also true (though elided in the op-ed) that many of those bases have been used as staging areas for operations in the Middle East and Afghanistan, many of our NATO allies have, and are, participating in those efforts—including a NATO contingent in Afghanistan—and several of those bases have been critical in dealing with combat casualties on their evacuations from the combat zones (Landstuhl comes to mind).

To an extent, though, the bases have become obsolete, although not necessarily in the Trumpian economic sense (and the NATO allies are moving more effectively to redress that than they did with the prior administration’s efforts).  No, with modern war capabilities, especially including missile and cyber war, the bases have become targets—as have the (too few) locations for forward basing of replacement equipment and ammunition.

The premise that Germany treats us unfairly in trade is arguably true (though we would do well to get rid of LBJ’s chicken war tariff on German light trucks), but it’s irrelevant.  Defense isn’t about international trade; it’s about a nation’s or a region’s physical security.  That Germany engages in anti-American fake news also is irrelevant: all journalist industries have their liars and fakers; this, too, has nothing to do with defense.

Germany, and several of the other countries in European NATO, certainly are rich enough to contribute more to their own and to the common effort (on which, see above), but as the last centuries’ wars demonstrated, Germany is not ” rich enough to defend itself.”  They don’t have the population to man the numbers of equipment—tanks, heavy guns, infantry—to face down the currently resurgent Russian threat—which is actively tactical, nuclear, and cyber.  To face that down requires a coalition effort.

It’s also true, though, as Whiton pointed out, that Germans don’t want us there anymore.  Absent hard data, I speculate that several of the other NATO member nations think we’ve outstayed our welcome, also.

Works for me.

But rather than withdrawing from Europe altogether, we should reallocate.

Keep in mind that at violently acquisitive and heavily armed Russia is actively threatening non-Russian Europe: it already has partitioned and occupied Georgia, and it’s in the process of doing the same with Ukraine (it has occupied Crimea, and it’s moving actively to consolidate its occupation of eastern Ukraine and to expand those holdings).  It has engaged in cyber war with each of the Baltic State nations, and it is stirring up the Russian populations in those nations, potentially prelude to a modern-day Anschluss.  It has abrogated the Intermediate Range Missile Treaty, an action that led President Donald Trump to formally withdraw us from it, and it as moved other tactical nuclear weapons close to its western border and into Kaliningrad, from which it can strike with nuclear strength most of western Europe.  It is in late-stage development of hypersonic nuclear weapons as it moves to vastly upgrade all of its nuclear forces.  It has begun harassing and interfering with civilian shipment into the Sea of Azov and the Baltic Sea (and with Ukrainian military shipments into the former).  And on and on.

Reallocation.

Reallocate our politics as well as our defense forces.  Eastern European nations are only newly freed from the Soviet Union’s yoke, and they remember well the nature of Soviet boots on their necks.  They do clearly understand the threat actively presented by Russia today as it seeks—in Russian President Vladimir Putin’s own words—to restore the old Soviet Union empire.

Without walking away from NATO—it still has its uses—we should form a new mutual defense alliance with those eastern European nations: Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Ukraine, Poland, Romania, Moldova.  It would be useful to see if Finland, Sweden, and Norway would be interested, along with Denmark and Great Britain.  Then we should withdraw most of our troops from European NATO—which is, generally, western Europe, and which nations have forgotten what it’s like to live under rapacious tyranny—and shift them to those eastern European nations.  And base them in a much more dispersed manner, as well as thoroughly dispersing the forward based resupply facilities.