Behind closed doors, new US leader Donald Trump is thinking about pulling naval troops out of the South China Seas.
Washington is considering making an offer to remove the large number of American military forces lurking around China's coast, and in turn asking Beijing to drop the number of Chinese coast guard vessels in the area, according to a report in Bloomberg.
"Removing American military forces nearby, in exchange for fewer Beijing-owned coast guards patrolling the area is currently under proposal…" the news agency said.
GOOD FOR PEACE, BAD FOR BONGBONG
The step would be good news for those who want peace between the two superpowers.
But it would be a huge embarrassment for pliant Philippines leader "Bongbong" Marcos, who the US has been using to create conflict in the waters, which the Western mainstream media then reports as if it was China creating conflict.
The push to ratchet down the tension comes from John Andrew Byers, a history professor who has been appointed deputy assistant secretary of defense for South and Southeast Asia.
Byers has long been known as an advocate for moving away from the prepare-for-war-with-China attitude of the Biden Administration, and supported by many on the Republican side.
'A LEADER OF HIS TIME'
In a co-written essay in The American Conservative last September, Byers argued that it would be smarter to move away from such a war, even if it could be won.
"But this 'fact' of U.S. superiority does not mean that it can or should attempt to militarily conquer its weaker rival," he wrote. "We live in a nuclear world. Secure second-strike capabilities make great-power conquest impossible without global annihilation.
"A second Trump administration should embrace a Cold Peace with China, exercising foreign policy restraint—one guided by a narrow definition of the national interest, economic nationalism, and penchant for viewing world politics in geoeconomic rather than geostrategic terms. If he remains true to his instincts, he will be a leader of his time."
It is that last statement – that Trump could be 'a leader of his time', taking his place in history, for removing the US from its warring proclivities - that has apparently caused the unpredictable leader to give ear to a peace-mongering academic.
HOSTILE TO PEACE
Yet Byers may have an uphill battle to halt a war that the US has spent years preparing. Many Trump officials have been anxious to attack China, including national security adviser Mike Waltz, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, the President's choice for Defense Secretary, Pete Hegseth, and advisor Elbridge Colby, who had advocated for a conflict centred on Taiwan to be used as a tool to weaken China.
The hawkish, right-wing Lowy Institute said last week that the move towards peaceful engagement in the South China Seas was "troubling".
Bloomberg writer Karishma Vaswani also seems oddly dismayed by the idea of less confrontation in Asia, and urges Trump to convene a summit "to build partnerships that deter China's expansionist ambitions". This point of view harks back to the discredited argument that China wants to take over Asia-Pacific, and suggests a lack of understanding of how the Chinese think.
A more insightful view comes from writer Jacob Dreyer, who told this reporter that he thinks the US is "headed to a Monroe doctrine style 'zones of influence'." In that scenario, the USA maintains "hegemony over its backyard" but generally leaves China and Russia to do their own thing on their side of the Pacific, which the US sees as “near abroad”.
That rings true—and provides hope. For people in East Asia, tired of the endless demonization of China and general warmongering of the western media, Trump, for all his hostile bluster, is at least thinking about moving in the right direction.
by Nury Vittachi
Lai See(利是)
** The blog article is the sole responsibility of the author and does not represent the position of our company. **
In the latest international upheaval, Europe is taking the hardest hit. After 300 years of modern civilization and the churn of imperial powers, that era is gone, and a better tomorrow is nowhere in sight.
Europe has one problem: it cannot take care of itself. “No one really knows whether Europe would still be able to produce toothpaste if it weren’t for China,” the EU Chamber of Commerce said.
Europe doesn’t make toothpaste; it sells luxury brands. Fine — look at the latest news. Reuters reports that the U.S.-Israel-Iran war has delivered a blow to European luxury labels. Sales at Dubai’s upscale malls, packed with wealthy shoppers, have fallen 50 percent, and LVMH, France’s largest luxury group, says wealthy Middle Eastern customers have paused spending in Europe because of the conflict in the Gulf region.
The New York Times, in a piece headlined “Europe Is Done With Appeasing Trump”, lays out several of Europe’s current pains.
“The barrage of tariffs that opened the second Trump administration, aimed indiscriminately at friend and foe; the brazen demands that Denmark cede Greenland to the United States, and now the absence of any consultation with European allies before joining Israel in an attack on Iran that has affected the entire world, have erased any illusion among most Europeans that Mr. Trump is anything but an unpredictable, vindictive and uncontrollable danger,” it wrote.
Trump’s latest move is to impose a blockade on all Iranian ports from Monday, adding another barrier in the Strait of Hormuz. The U.S. president has repeatedly said, with obvious satisfaction, that America has oil and natural gas, and that oil shipping blockage cannot bring the United States to its knees. In other words, if Iran wants a war of attrition, the White House is ready to go all the way. America’s NATO allies, meanwhile, make clear they will “decline to join in.” Europe’s oil supply is already under pressure: Russian oil and gas are cut off, and Middle Eastern shipping now faces a second lock. So is Trump punishing Iran, or Europe?
“Last year, export controls imposed by Beijing on seven rare earth elements and the magnets made from them had especially severe consequences. China is a global leader in the production of these critical raw materials, which are widely used in electric motors, smartphones, and numerous everyday electronic devices,” Deutsche Welle reported. “The EU Chamber of Commerce said nearly one-third of its member companies indicated in a questionnaire survey at the beginning of this year that their business had been affected by China’s export control measures.”
The EU Chamber of Commerce knows perfectly well that China-EU relations have been pulled off course by the United States, and that Europe has not shaped its foreign and trade policy around its own interests. It has even had to tear out 5G networks built by Huawei and ZTE, while Chinese electric vehicles face restrictions. That has only made China-EU ties more tangled. Europe can hardly be called arrogant now. Energy supplies are unstable, and rare earth constraints have turned it into an industrial power with nothing usable to work with. So what now?
Although calls to “de-risk” economic ties with China have persisted for years, many European companies continue to bet on the Chinese market. Over the past year, EU figures show that 26% of companies said they were relocating their supply chains to China, “a proportion twice that of companies choosing to move their supply chains out of China or establish a second hub overseas.” The trend is clearly still going strong.
Europe’s major powers, including France, Italy and Germany, all feel the need to break free from the manipulation and humiliation imposed by the United States, especially the Trump team. Europe has finally woken up and is now pushing for independence and autonomy, placing its national destiny firmly in its own hands.
Nothing in the world is difficult if you are willing to scale the heights. Europe becoming strong again is no dream, but starting over takes patience. I would say 300 years is enough for you to turn things around.
