The “button” can morph into a perverse temptation for an unstable leader. In 1974, during his impeachment proceedings, President Richard M. Nixon said to reporters: “I can go into my office and pick up the telephone, and in 25 minutes, 70 million people will be dead.”
“Sleepwalking Into a Nuclear Arms Race with Russia” Chuck Spinney and Pierre Sprey write for Moyers’ online (and Spinney’s Blaster blog) with a warning about a new nuclear arms race, one where ‘the nuclear issue boils down to a question of understanding how America’s spending decisions and actions impact patriotic Russians’
China ‘to provide aid, enhance military training’ in Syria …. China, Iran and Russia make significant new steps in alliance … Entangling Alliances Move to the Next Level … Turkish Tanks Cross Border in US Supported Offensive …
AFP blip on the news screen today. Take notice. The arrival of a China-Iran container-carrier train is a first, inaugerating cross continental railway trade between China and Europe with Iran at the center of the New (old) Silk Road. Billions in development
A meeting at the Shangri-la… China’s President Xi Jinping and Taiwanese counterpart Ma Ying-jeou meet on Nov 7th in Singapore, the first meeting between Chinese and Taiwanese leaders since 1949, over 66 years now
On October 27, 2015, the USS Lassen transited within 12 nautical miles of Subi Reef, one of China’s artificially-built features in the South China Sea. Officially referred to as a “freedom of navigation” (FON) operation, the US destroyer was accompanied by two maritime surveillance aircraft, a P-8A Poseidon and a P-3 Orion
“For nearly 30 years, China has bulked up by digesting tons of commodities from the world’s emerging markets and turned them into exports, and in the process has become a key creditor to the world’s largest consumer economy, the United States. All of that is changing now… how will it play out?”
As Presidents Obama and Putin meet in New York … the UN meets this week under a supermoon to talk of the state of the world. In DC and NYC the signs are ominous as the Pope returns from the U.S. to the Vatican and throughout the Mid East, catastrophe escalates as millions of refugees […]
The debate over the #IranDeal swirls abetted by multi-million dollar donations and unprecedented lobbying. One issue is rarely mentioned even though the commencement of another war — an extended Middle East/Near East war — involves entangling alliances, economic/domestic consequences, and multi-dimension, multi-year costs
Rising tensions between the US and Russia, and the US and China, are producing a gauntlet of consequences. New nuclear arms escalation, oil/gas and energy agreements, new alliances and old rivalries take on added dimension as a “Grand Strategy” in Eurasia gathers force
#OccupyCentral? It seems the U.S. Occupy has been exported to China. The Chinese government reacts by banning Instagram (having already banned Twitter, Facebook, Google, et al.) StratDem: In the mid- and long-term, the technology of open data and social media is delivering a global political challenge. All governments now face a tech-enabled open gov movement […]
