FINIAN CUNNINGHAM—The US, not China, is the aggressor, says the author. Christopher Black, a respected international lawyer, tells Finian Cunningham in an interview why the United States is actually the aggressor over Taiwan, not China.
-
-
A top US military officer pledged to support Taiwan militarily while warning Beijing to learn from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The remarks were made by General Mark Milley, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, during an event in New York on Wednesday. “The US is committed through the Taiwan Relations Act, and President Biden has said on many occasions recently that the United States will continue to support Taiwan,” Milley said. “We will support them militarily … We would try to help train them and equip them.” …”A lesson that comes out of Ukraine for China is that war on paper and real war are two different things. And what they have seen was a tremendous strategic miscalculation,” he said. “I think President Xi is taking a step back and … he’s evaluating the situation.” Milley said it would be hard for Beijing to carry out an amphibious attack across the Taiwan Strait. “That’s really difficult,” he said. “It’s really hard. And I think they’re coming to realise that and they’re probably evaluating the situation and recalculating what they might do.”
-
FINIAN CUNNINGHAM—The politicians do the bidding of the ruling class to serve their economic and political interests. This condition of permanent entrenched power accounts for why policies change little from one administration to another, whether Democrat or Republican. That’s why foreign policies change little, if at all. The unspoken foreign policy of the US is to serve the imperialist interests of its ruling class (Wall Street banks, commodity multinationals, overseas investors) and to maximize militarism for the financial benefit of the big and ancillary corporations that comprise the military-industrial complex.
-
PEPE ESCOBAR—Russia spans 11 time zones and sits atop as much as one third of the world’s natural resources. A natural symbiosis between Europe and Russia is like a fact of life. But the EU oligarchy blew it. It’s no wonder the Chinese leadership views the process with horror, because one of BRI’s essential planks is to facilitate seamless trade between China and Europe. As Russia’s connectivity corridor has been blocked by sanctions, China will be privileging corridors via West Asia. Meanwhile, Russia is completing its pivot to the east. Russia’s enormous resources, combined with the manufacturing capability of China and East Asia as a whole, project a trade/connectivity sphere that goes even beyond BRI. That’s at the heart of the Russian concept of Greater Eurasia Partnership.
-
PEPE ESCOBAR—Xi contends that in these past 5 years the CPC strategically advanced China while “correctly” (Party terminology) responding to all foreign challenges. Particularly key achievements include poverty alleviation, the normalization of Hong Kong, and progress in diplomacy and national defense.
