Tag Archives: foreign policy

China’s Nuclear Extortion

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The People’s Republic of China are publicizing both their capability of nuclear attack against us and the fact that their goal in such an attack is not so much to win a war as it is simply to visit as much destruction on us and to kill as many of us as they can—to eliminate us not merely as a nation, but as a society.

The PRC’s Global Times, for instance, talked freely about the destruction a Chinese nuclear attack, primarily from its submarine nuclear missile force, could inflict on the us.  Nominally, the paper was writing for its domestic readers, but it’s clear the government also was addressing our own leadership.

The GT article contained, among other things, a description of the destruction the PLA could inflict on Seattle, Los Angeles, and other western American cities, and of the radioactive fallout that would spread as far as Chicago.  It also contained this image of the reach of the destruction from their attack:

The shaded areas represent fallout spread 3, 7, and 30 days after the Chinese nuclear attack against our west coast.

The GT then got quite specific about PRC intentions:

Because the Midwest states of the US are sparsely populated, in order to increase the lethality, [our] nuclear attacks should mainly target the key cities on the West Coast of the United States, such as Seattle, Los Angeles, San Francisco, and San Diego.

The 12 JL-2 nuclear warheads carried by one single Type 094 SSBN can kill and wound 5 million to 12 million Americans.

If we launch our DF 31A ICBMs over the North Pole, we can easily destroy a whole list of metropolises on the East Coast and the New England region of the US, including Annapolis, Philadelphia, New York, Boston, Portland, Baltimore, and Norfolk, whose population accounts for about one-eighth of America’s total residents[.]

And

Our JL-2 SLBMs have become the fourth type of Chinese nuclear missiles that threaten the continental United States, after our DF-31A, DF-5A and DF-5B ICBMs[.]

China Central Television; the People’s Daily; the PLA Daily (the print outlet for the PRC’s military establishment, the People’s Liberation Army; the China Youth Daily, the Guangmin Daily all ran much the same stories in a coordinated delivery of the PRC’s message.

The timing of this is curious.  The PRC is moving actively to seize all of the South and East China seas, to the direct detriment of our allies, friends, and trading partners, and so to our own detriment.  It comes, also, after our “pivot” to Asia and the Pacific.  And it comes against the backdrop President Barack Obama’s demonstrated hesitancy vis-à-vis our other enemies.  Why so late after Obama’s reluctance to act on the world stage?  Probably because the Chinese have had trouble believing an American President could be so timid.

The result of our lack of response to this will not be pretty.

 

h/t Ricochet (Maybe behind a paywall.  This is a site well worth the subscription fee.)

A Thought on Foreign Policy

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The Obama administration’s…naiveté…would be cute if it weren’t so dangerous.

Against the backdrop of an Institute for Science and International Security report acknowledging that Iran is within weeks, not months, of being able to produce enough weapons-grade uranium to build a nuclear bomb, and Israel’s repeat of their widespread statement that they cannot allow Iran to get nuclear weapons—Israel’s own existence depends on it—the Obama administration

is asking Congress to hold off on enacting new sanctions against Iran, arguing that a pause in the push to impose new penalties would give negotiators flexibility in talks now underway to get Iran to comply with demands it prove its nuclear program is peaceful.

No, that would simply play into Iran’s standard use of “negotiations” to stall and to gain time.  It’s a major contributor to the progress the Iranians already have made toward getting nuclear weapons.

More to the point, this request for retreat lessens our flexibility.  What this would do would be to leave us, after the talks have failed, in the position of threatening to increase sanctions if the Iranians don’t comply.  The much stronger position—and strength is the only place from which flexibility can come—is to be able to offer to ease sanctions, to offer to not take military action, on concrete evidence of actual compliance.

Naïve?

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Brian Spegele wrote in The Wall Street Journal about an accord between Great Britain and the People’s Republic of China concerning the role of the yuan in the world, or at least in the British economy.

The UK and China unveiled plans to further bolster China’s long-restricted currency on the world stage, amid a number of other deals that signal that the two countries have reset relations following a visit to London by the Dalai Lama last year, which upset Beijing.

The deals unveiled Tuesday—which include allowing British investors to plow up to 80 billion yuan ($13.1 billion) in China’s heavily restricted capital markets—demonstrate how China’s wealth and its desire to go abroad often trump political differences and Beijing’s resentment of criticism over its human-rights record.

The deals are part of a series of steps China has taken with a number of countries to increase the yuan’s role.

And

…state-controlled Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd planned to issue a yuan-denominated bond in London, which would further encourage yuan use there.

This will be all well and good—until the PRC decides to “adjust,” again, the value of its yuan to match its convenience, as it’s done all along.  Keep in mind that the PRC tightly controls the exchange rate for—the value of—its yuan, the government’s rhetoric about “increasing flexibility,” or “setting more flexible exchange rate bands,” or … notwithstanding.

Nuclear Iran and Negotiations

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Iran has convinced the US to hold direct talks concerning Iran’s nuclear weapons program, and the administration put an optimistic face on the proceedings.  State Department spokeswoman Jennifer Psaki said this:

This is certainly…the first substantive step forward.  For the first time, we had…very detailed discussions.

There’s this, also:

Iran has hinted strongly in recent weeks that it is prepared to take significant steps in return for the US. and Europe rolling back expansive sanctions imposed on Tehran over the past decade.

Among these steps, said officials who have talked with Iranian diplomats, are a possible Iranian freeze on the production of near-weapons-grade fuel, which is uranium enriched to 20% purity.

Against this hope, though, we must place this:

The recognition of Israel as illegitimate is one of the principles of Iran’s 1979 Islamic Revolution, and even today the Islamic Republic believes Israel must be destroyed, a senior Iranian cleric close to the supreme leader said Saturday night.

Ayatollah Sayyid Ahmad Khatami, a member of the Assembly of Experts—the body that chooses the supreme leader—also condemned any effort for improved relations with America and warned that nothing is ruled out against the United States[.]

And

According to a source in the regime’s intelligence ministry—one who cannot be named for security purposes—the regime is unified in this new tactic of showing a moderate face in order to deceive the West into relieving some sanctions.

Toothless Resolutions

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A bit late, but the point remains valid, for all that.

President Barack Obama’s crack UN team was able to shepherd through the UN Security Council, under Russia’s tutelage, a resolution concerning Syria’s…obligation…to turn over its chemical weapons and production facilities for destruction [emphasis added]:

The draft resolution’s demands that Syria abandon its chemical stockpile and allow unfettered access to chemical weapons experts are legally binding.  But if Syria fails to comply, the council will need to adopt a second resolution to impose measures under Chapter 7 of the UN Charter, which allows for military and nonmilitary actions to promote peace and security.

Notice that.  The consequence that Russia has allowed for Syrian noncompliance is the passage of a second resolution.  Obama’s enforcement mechanism is “We’ll shake our finger very firmly at you.”