Tag Archives: foreign policy

Sovereignty

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Regarding the People’s Republic of China’s attempted seizure of the East, and in particular, the South China Sea and the associated PRC seizure of seabed minerals, below the seabed oil and gas deposits, and surface fishing rights,

The US said it doesn’t take a position on sovereignty over the South China Sea but insists on freedom of navigation and overflight. About 30 percent of global trade passes through the South China Sea, which also has rich fishing grounds and a potential wealth of undersea mineral deposits.

We need to take a position on sovereignty over the South China Sea, exactly for sovereignty, that international trade, those fishing rights, and those minerals and oil and gas deposits.

We say we’re for freedom of the seas, but that begins with recognition of what are international waters and what are not. The South China Sea, and the East China Sea, are international waters, not internal lakes of this or that country.

Various nations’ Exclusive Economic Zones extend far into the Seas. Various nations have far more legitimate territorial claims to a number of the islands in those Seas.

We should be working with those nations—Brunei, the Philippines, Vietnam, Japan, Malaysia, et al.—to help them resolve their disagreements over whose territory those islands are, we should be working with those nations to help them resolve their disputes over Economic Zone overlaps.

Given the PRC’s open lawlessness regarding those waters and those islands, we should be working these dispute resolutions with the explicit exclusion of the PRC in those talks.

A Destroyer Sailed

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Lu Kang, Director-General of the People’s Republic of China Foreign Affairs Ministry’s Department of Information, complained about the USS Lassen’s passage through the waters surrounding the Spratly Islands in the southern part of the South China Sea.

The warship, USS Lassen, illegally entered waters near relevant islands and reefs within China’s Nansha Islands without permission from the Chinese government. To this the Chinese side expresses its strong discontentment and resolute opposition.

No, no permission was necessary for an American naval vessel—or any other nation’s vessels, military or civilian—to sail through the international waters surrounding the Spratlys.

To this the Eric Hines side expresses its strong contempt and resolute opposition to the PRC’s naked sea grab. After all, those islands and their surrounding international waters do lie within Brunei’s Exclusive Economic Zone.

The Chinese side strongly urges the US side to negotiate seriously with China, immediately rectify its mistakes, and not to undertake any risky and provocative actions that threaten Chinese sovereignty and security interests.

Sure. When will the PRC begin to negotiate seriously, immediately rectify its mistakes, desist from its ongoing risky and provocative actions that threaten the sovereignty and security interests of the Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam, and the other nations around the South China Sea?

Oh, and withdraw its military equipment from those international waters and return them to PRC territory?

Lies of the Democrat

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Or of the proud Progressive who wants to be President.

From the just concluded Benghazi hearing interview of Democratic Party Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, we learned this:

At 11:12 pm on the night of the attack, Sept 11, 2012, Mrs Clinton emailed her daughter Chelsea that, “Two of our officers were killed in Benghazi by an Al-Qaeda-like group: the Ambassador, whom I handpicked and a young communications officer on temporary duty w[ith] a wife and two young children. Very hard day and I fear more of the same tomorrow.”

And this:

…a State Department summary of Mrs Clinton’s call the next day, Sept 12, with Egypt’s Prime Minister. “We know that the attack in Libya had nothing to do with the film. It was a planned attack—not a protest,” Mrs. Clinton said. The call summary then blocks out a comment by the Egyptian, to which Mrs. Clinton replies, “Your [sic] not kidding. Based on the information we saw today we believe the group that claimed responsibility for this was affiliated with al Qaeda.”

Compare that with her public statements in the immediate aftermath that it was a YouTube video that was responsible, and compare that with her statements on meeting the coffins of the murdered Ambassador and three of those who tried to protect him, repeating her claim that it was a YouTube video that was responsible.

Remember that display of Clintonian…integrity…in a year and a month.

What Obama Hath Wrought

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Syrian pro-regime forces backed by Russian airstrikes have expanded their ground offensive to the strategic city of Aleppo…. But with the backing of Russian warplanes, Iranian forces, and the Lebanese militia Hezbollah, Mr Assad’s forces could now be in position to regain large parts of the city and the surrounding countryside.

Notice that: in addition to Assad’s military, the Russians are there attacking, the terrorist organization Hezbollah is there attacking, the Iranians are there attacking.

And President Barack Obama continues to do nothing but Obamatalk about getting rid of Bashar al Assad, as he…said…he would do all those years ago. Before he drew his red line regarding al Assad’s use of chemical weapons and then let al Assad use those weapons with impunity.

Obama’s timidity passivity has invited these in, to the detriment of the rebels, to the detriment of the Syrian people, to the detriment of Israel, to the detriment of Jordan, to the detriment of the Middle East in general.

We Welcome Every Drop of Blood Spilled in Jerusalem

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That’s what President Barack Obama’s and Secretary of State John Kerry’s favorite peacemaker is saying about the Palestinian knife and gun attacks against Jewish citizens currently going on in Jerusalem.

Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas was talking about Palestinian blood spilled as Israeli police and soldiers defended those citizens; he had not a word about the Jewish blood shed—that’s beneath his notice. Jews, after all, in Abbas’ terrorist mind, are but “barbaric monkeys” and “wretched pigs.” Abbas went on:

This is pure blood, clean blood, blood on its way to Allah. With the help of Allah, every martyr will be in heaven, and every wounded will get his reward.

This is what those two American administration persons say must be balanced by Israeli efforts to tamp down their own “violence.”

This is what President Barack Obama and Secretary of State John Kerry say is the moral equivalent of Israel defending itself against such terrorists.