Philippines sides with Vietnam in South China Sea dispute, hoping it will ‘return the favour’

Analysts believe that while Vietnam appreciates the gesture, it is unlikely to influence Hanoi’s strategy in the disputed waters.

Philippines sides with Vietnam in South China Sea dispute, hoping it will ‘return the favour’

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BowerGroupAsia: Dr. Prashanth Parameswaran

Prashanth is concurrently a fellow at the Wilson Center, a senior columnist at The Diplomat magazine and an instructor for institutions including the U.S. State Department. He is the founder of the twice-weekly ASEAN Wonk newsletter, which offers research insights and analysis on the geopolitics and geoeconomics of Southeast Asia and the Indo-Pacific region. 

Stratbase ADR Institute Non-Resident Fellow: Dr. Prashanth Parameswaran

Dr. Parameswaran has held various roles across think tanks, governments, media and companies, including the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Singapore’s Ministry of Trade and Industry and the Associated Press. In those capacities, he worked on various issues including geopolitical and geoeconomic statecraft, Southeast Asia foreign and security policy, regional institutions, major power engagement in the Indo-Pacific as well as alliances and partnerships.   

Dr. Parameswaran holds a Ph.D. and MA focused on international business, international relations, Asian affairs, and U.S. foreign policy from the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. He earned a BA from the University of Virginia, where he studied foreign affairs and peace and conflict studies with a focus on Asia. He regularly advises groups and individuals seeking to advance conversations on Indo-Pacific affairs and serves on the board of several institutions.  

Global Times: China and Vietnam capable to handle law enforcement conflict in S.China Sea properly; Philippines’ intention to stigmatize China ‘won’t work’

SeaLight document

Neocons are panicking over another possible Trump presidency

The Atlantic: Two Men Running to Stay Out of Prison

Liz Cheney warns US ‘sleepwalking into dictatorship

Robert Kagan: A Trump dictatorship is increasingly inevitable. We should stop pretending.

…We can expect more of this when the war against the “deep state” begins in earnest. According to Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.), there is a whole cabal determined to undermine American security, a “Uniparty” of elites made up of “neoconservatives on the right” and “liberal globalists on the left” who are not true Americans and therefore do not have the true interests of America at heart. Can such “anti-American” behavior be criminalized? It has in the past and can be again.

So, the Trump administration will have many avenues to persecute its enemies, real and perceived. Think of all the laws now on the books that give the federal government enormous power to surveil people for possible links to terrorism, a dangerously flexible term, not to mention all the usual opportunities to investigate people for alleged tax evasion or violation of foreign agent registration laws. The IRS under both parties has occasionally looked at depriving think tanks of their tax-exempt status because they espouse policies that align with the views of the political parties. What will happen to the think-tanker in a second Trump term who argues that the United States should ease pressure on China? Or the government official rash enough to commit such thoughts to official paper? It didn’t take more than that to ruin careers in the 1950s.

Their panic just shows how out of touch they are with the working class! As for Kagan, there’s so much more that I could say, but for now I’ll just roll my eyes! 🙄

China faces an increase in extremist threats in central Asia, US panel is told

China faces an increase in extremist threats in central Asia, US panel is told

Raffaello Pantucci, a senior fellow at Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies, said that the Islamic State Khorasan (Isis-K) had identified the perpetrator of the suicide bomb attack on worshippers in a mosque in the Afghan city of Kunduz in October as a Uygur.

US policymakers are paying more attention to the growth of China’s geopolitical influence through programmes like the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) – which includes the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) – as Washington’s relationship with Beijing has frayed on multiple fronts.

“It used to be the Uygur militants that tended to be responsible for attacks on Chinese diplomats or Chinese businessmen in Kyrgyzstan,” Pantucci added. “Increasingly we see Kyrgyz in general being quite angry towards the Chinese … and we can see similar narratives in Kazakhstan.”

Still, anger against Chinese does not mean that Americans are welcome, Jennifer Brick Murtazashvili, founding director at the University of Pittsburgh’s Centre for Governance and Markets, said.

“The US lost so much credibility because of the way it left Afghanistan,” she said. “Regardless of how you may feel about the intervention, regardless of how you may feel about the withdrawal of decision to withdraw the way the US left, I think it left a very bitter taste in the mouth of many people in the region.”

After all that work, instigating terrorists, they’re still not welcome back! Wonder why?! 🙄