Category: international affairs

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international affairs

Bye-​Bye Iraq?

Briar Patch, flag, Iran, war, Iraq,

We may soon be at war with Iran. Wait, in this day and age of endless conflicts without so much as a decent declaration, are we not already at war with Iran?

Clearly, the drone-​strike killing of Iranian Maj. Gen. Qassim Suleimani, described by The New York Times as “the architect of nearly every significant operation by Iranian intelligence and military forces over the past two decades,” was an act of war. The Trump Administration predicated the U.S. assault on previous Iranian acts of war — including involvement in the recent storming of parts of the sprawling 104-​acre U.S. embassy in Baghdad and, moreover, deadly attacks on U.S. forces in Iraq.

Iran vows revenge. I want to bring U.S. troops home from the Middle East. And so did President Obama and so does President Trump, no? But several thousand more U.S. soldiers are now headed to the region.

The world’s policemen.

But, then, miraculously, a possible way out. News reports announced that Iraq’s legislative body, the Council of Representatives, would take up a resolution on expelling U.S. troops — er, well, asking U.S. troops to leave.

Please, Iraqi legislators, please: don’t throw us in that briar patch! 

The vote was held. The measure asking all foreign troops to leave … passed. 

It is an understandable request, one that we can only presume the U.S. will respect … once the legislation is signed.

Oops! The prime minister has resigned; there’s no one to sign it.

Plus, the resolution is “non-​binding.”

Training the Iraqi army has been difficult, but how proud our nation-​builders must be to see Iraqi politicians show a professional understanding of political sleight-of-hand.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Briar Patch, flag, Iran, war, Iraq,

Photo by incidencematrix

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general freedom international affairs

Totalitarianized

Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, democracy, freedom,

Legislation introduced last April to allow the extradition of criminal suspects from Hong Kong to mainland China motivated millions into the streets in protests that have not yet ended … 

… including a major pro-​democracy rally scheduled for tomorrow in Causeway Bay.

Traveling to Hong Kong and Taiwan months ago, the glimpse I caught of Hongkongers’ courageous struggle spurs me to applaud George Will’s judgment in Sunday’s Washington Post: “Nothing more momentous happened” in 2019. 

The extradition bill has been withdrawn, sure, but Hongkongers know well that without real democracy they have no long-​term hope of avoiding the repressive rule of the Chinese Communist Party … which may no longer be “communist,” but remains totally totalitarian.

Ask a million Uighurs. 

Carrie Lam, the city’s Beijing-​installed chief executive, has long labeled the protesters “selfish rioters.” But new pro-​democracy candidates won nearly 90 percent of seats in last month’s local elections, demonstrating which side the public is on. 

This year began with newly un-​term-​limited Chinese President Xi Jinping threatening military action against Taiwan. The island nation of 24 million, some 100 miles off the coast of the mainland, has been offered the same “one country, two systems” arrangement China has with Hong Kong … what Mr. Will dubbed “a formula for the incremental suffocation of freedom.”

Taiwan’s president, Tsai Ing-​wen, is “loathed by Beijing,” reports the South China Morning Post, “because her party refuses to accept the idea that Taiwan is part of the so-​called one-​China principle which denies the island’s independence.” 

Her opponent in the upcoming national election on the 11th, like some in the NBA, “favours much warmer relations with mainland China.”

The Taiwanese, however — like Hongkongers — appear increasingly resistant to being totalitarianized.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

2019 Commentaries on Hong Kong and Taiwan

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Hong Kong, China, Taiwan, democracy, freedom,

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international affairs national politics & policies too much government

The New Arms Race

Space Force, war, foreign policy,

We who grew up in the time of the Apollo missions are more than aware of the arms-​race angle to the Soviet and American forays into Earth orbit and beyond. 

Now, we must recognize that the space race is no longer mere ornamentation over earthly military competition.

“The United States and China are rapidly building space warfare capabilities,” writes Bill Gertz in the Washington Examiner, “as part of a race to dominate the zone outside Earth’s atmosphere.”

Of course, much of this remains ground support. WHNT News 19 in Alabama quotes the Commander of the U.S. Space and Missile Defense Command at Redstone Arsenal — a Lieutenant General who “will soon become Deputy Commander of the U.S. Space Command in Colorado” — explaining that current space resources must be ever-​ready in support of “the war fighter, the soldier on the ground.”

But the “satellites in space” he refers to, the ones with “very unique capabilities,” are not just about ground support. For when Donald Trump proposed a new Space Force military division last year, he wasn’t blowing smoke.

Billions of future dollars, maybe, but not smoke. 

In the works?

  • “AI for space war to stop anti-​satellite weapons”;
  • Capabilities to treat “Space [a]s a warfighting domain similar to air, land and sea”;
  • Space planes, such as the in-​dev X‑37B;

and much more.

The Chinese are looking for “space superiority,” says American intelligence, and of course “you know what this means,” as Bugs Bunny liked to say.

War?

At least war profits.

Even France is talking about militarizing space.

Brave new world? Or more of the same, just higher up?

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Space Force, war, foreign policy,

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international affairs Popular

Beacon of Liberty

handshake, China, US, foreign policy, China, Hong Kong,

What part should we play in terror, torture, oppression?

Asking for a friend. 

Well, friends … some three-​hundred-​and-​thirty million of them.

Egypt. The government of President Abdel Fattah el-​Sisi just stormed the newsroom of one of Egypt’s few remaining independent media outlets, Mada Masr. 

“Mada has shown nothing but courage in reporting the news against all odds,” a representative of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) offered bitterly, “and in the face of brutal repression.” 

According to the CPJ, Egypt is the world’s top jailer of journalists. And that repression is not just well-​documented, it is also well-​funded. By … well … Sisi’s state receives roughly $1.5 billion in annual U.S. military and economic assistance, while Egyptians must “forgo democratic liberties” as “authorities” maintain “a constant crackdown … encompassing anyone criticizing the government,” informs a Congressional Research Service report updated last week. 

Iraq. Anti-​government protests are in full swing, with Iraqis “demanding an end to corruption, more jobs and better public services,” the BBC informs. More than 300 people have been killed by the government the American military set up, and nearly 15,000 injured as Iraqi Security forces have used tear gas and live bullets against protesters.

Hong Kong. The smashing victory for pro-​democracy candidates in the former British colony, who “won almost 90 percent of the seats” in local elections, was the weekend’s bright spot. Voters sent an unequivocal message.

Now on President Trump’s desk is the Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act (H.R.3289), which puts the territory’s special trading status at risk should China impinge on its autonomy.

Will our president sign the legislation or exchange it with Chinese leader Xi Jinping for a better trade deal?

Funding, facilitating oppression is no way to serve as a beacon of liberty to the world.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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handshake, China, US, foreign policy, China, Hong Kong,

Photo: Studio Incendo /​ Photo: Flazingo Photos

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insider corruption international affairs national politics & policies too much government

Mrs. Clinton’s Fevered Nightmare

Hillary Clinton, Tulsi Gabbard, Russia, conspiracy,

Hillary Clinton’s recent statements linking Representative Tulsi Gabbard (D‑Hawaii) to the Russians — Mrs. Clinton’s current favorite enemy — provided Rep. Gabbard with an opportunity for a return volley, dubbing Mrs. Clinton “the queen of warmongers, embodiment of corruption, and personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party for so long.”

But what was shocking was Clinton’s confidence in making such a charge sans evidence. 

Or not, considering her long history of “vast rightwing conspiracy”-mongering.

Should we wonder about projection, here? Could Clinton see conspiracies everywhere because she is herself at base a conspirator?

Ask Julian Assange.

His Wikileaks site provided evidence of Clinton campaign malfeasance and sheer creepy weirdness before the 2016 election, and also, more famously, evidence of U.S. military war crimes. No wonder he earned the ire of Clinton and the superstate within which she has worked.

Assange is now in a British court, trying to resist extradition, a wounded man. “I can’t think,” he lamented. “I can’t research anything, I can’t access any of my writing. It’s very difficult where I am.”

What his barrister said is even more chill-​inducing: “This is part of an avowed war on whistleblowers to include investigative journalists and publishers. The American state has been actively engaged in intruding on privileged discussions between Mr. Assange and his lawyer.”

Though we know little for certain, between a “sunlight” publisher and the dark, secretive Deep State, I trust the journalist at least a bit more. After all, the Deep State has Hillary Clinton on its side, along with known liars like James Clapper — who just had the temerity to call Trump’s lies “Orwellian”!

And no wonder Mrs. Clinton hates Rep. Gabbard, for the Hawaii congresswoman would halt the prosecution of Assange.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

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Hillary Clinton, Tulsi Gabbard, Russia, conspiracy,

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international affairs

Superpower Blues

soldiers, world police, war, peace, Syria, Kurds,

I don’t want the Turkish military to wipe out the Kurds.

I also don’t want the Taliban to return to power in Afghanistan.

Nor do I want the Chinese totalitarians to violate the rights of Hongkongers.

Or for the Spanish government to slap long prison terms on peaceful Catalonian separatists.

Or tyrants in Nicaragua and Venezuela to torture and kill the people of those countries.

At the same time, I don’t want U.S. Marines landing on the beaches of Venezuela or Nicaragua or parachuting into Madrid or Kowloon … or for our military to endlessly occupy turf in Afghanistan and Syria.

There are limits even to superpower status. We cannot re-​make the world in our image. By force. Everywhere at all times.

Except to some degree, by example. And regime change wars have not set a very good example.

The Iraq War destabilized the Middle East and handed Iran a major strategic victory. Leading from behind to help NATO overthrow the government of Libya has produced more chaos for northern Africa and Europe. Efforts at regime change in Syria have only worsened the suffering of millions of people.

U.S. troops remain in Iraq. After 17 years, we still have soldiers dying in Afghanistan. We can never leave. At least, not without any “gains” evaporating in a hurry. 

And the president who finally ends military involvement in these “endless war” will get endless grief for abandoning allies* and ceding ground to Russia or some other bad actor. That’s what happened after 28 soldiers were pulled out of Syria.

Being a superpower isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. 

Beacon of freedom seems a better gig.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* This is not an argument for being a bad ally ourselves. For starters, I think we ought to welcome Kurdish refugees who wish to immigrate to the U.S.

soldiers, world police, war, peace, Syria, Kurds,

From a photo by: Lance Cpl. Christian Cachola

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