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| China encircles South China Sea |
Click here for related story [Asia Maritime Reviews]
In an upcoming book [October 2017], award winning journalist Mike Faby --
"... with unprecedented access to the highest naval officers in America and
China and their ships and weapons, ... presents a chilling look at the
'warm war' over control of the South China Sea -- one that is threatening
to flare into full scale conflict".
"The Chinese regard the Pacific, and especially the South China Sea,
as their ocean, and they’re ready to defend it. Each day the heat
between the two countries increases as the Chinese try to claim
the South China Sea for their own, and the United States insists
on asserting freedom of navigation. Throughout Southern Asia,
countries such as Vietnam, Malaysia, the Philippines, Singapore,
and South Korea respond with outrage and growing fear as China
turns coral reefs into manmade islands capable of supporting airstrips
and then attempts to enforce twelve-mile-radius, shoot-down zones.
The immediate danger is that the five trillion dollars in international
trade that passes through the area will grind to a standstill.
"The ultimate danger is that the US and China will be drawn into all-out war."
We've been following this WW3 scenario for for a number of years as China flexes its muscles in the Pacific. It's not a new enterprise, nor is it a sea-based alone threat.
China's design is to control the entire Pacific region, and the strategy is called "Wei Chi" [AKA: GO in Japan], developed more than 2,500 years ago. Although simple on the surface, Wei Chi is actually more complex than Chess, and has been successfully used by military leaders in China -- and Japan, for centuries.
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| Chinese strategy game of encirclement: Wei Chi |
The basis of the game is encirclement of the opponent/enemy, in successively greater steps. Encirclement comes in stages of small maneuvers, each becoming part of a larger maneuver in which the smaller encirclements are part of a greater encirclement until the opponent/enemy pieces/property are completely encircled on the playing board. The victor has encircled the entire property of his opponent.
For Western powers, there are indicators of this strategy now, but in fact, it's been going on for nearly 50 years in the near term, but in reality, the strategy is centuries old. The West has little concept of the Chinese strategy which has no definable time limit, and is generational rather than measurable.
The end game of the Chinese is to dominate and control the entire Pacific, and not simply the South China Sea which the West presumes is the sole goal of China. China has dominated small areas separately, but, standing back from the map, we see it is encircling many small areas which are encompassed by the very wide area known as the Pacific.
But, let's start at a visible beginning point, i.e., the Vietnam War.
China's involvement was initially limited to providing weapons and political philosophy to North Vietnam, whose leadership despised and distrusted the Chinese, but accepted their military largesse, along with arms and material and advisors also provided by the USSR.
In the end, however, the Soviets withdrew when it was evident the North Vietnamese had lost the war and lacked the manpower to continue fighting. China, however, recognized their regional opportunity and, still supplying North Vietnam with equipment, coveted all of Southeast Asia and sent their operatives into Laos, Thailand, and Burma to subvert these countries through insurgencies, and conversion to Communism.
It made no difference that the North Vietnamese had been defeated in Laos, and they had no foothold in Thailand, but they did have a tenuous grasp in Burma, but, the foothold was there.
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| Henry, you are my tool! |
What no one, including the Chinese, expected, was the surprise move by Henry Kissinger who met with the Chinese leadership in 1971 and, in exchange [so he thought) for Chinese trade opportunities with the US, Kissinger stated, and wrote in a 1972 letter to Chou en Lai that "... the United States has no further interest in Southeast Asia and will take no action should China wish to expand its influence in the region."
Notably, Kissinger did not disclose this commitment to President Nixon, or to the State Department, or to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the US continued to fight the Vietnam war until 1975, with thousands losing their lives.
At the close of the war, Kissinger, as Nixon's proxy, and again without Nixon's knowledge, directed -- "by order of the President" -- that all US regional intelligence operations were to be terminated immediately, shutting down espionage networks that had been in place since World War 2. He subsequently extended that directive world wide, gutting the capacity of the CIA and the Intelligence Community and using the Church Committee hearings as his excuse. So, our eyes and ears on the potential adversaries were sealed shut, neutering our safeguards. Supposedly, NSA could take up the slack.
The purpose of Watergate, engineered by former Director of Central Intelligence Vernon Walters, was to dislodge Kissinger since Nixon had consummate faith in his most trusted advisor. Unfortunately, we note that Kissinger, like a spotted tick, remains in the mix and has even met with President Trump - whom we hope did so solely out of courtesy.
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| Southeast Asia |
And it was thus that all of Southeast Asia nearly fell to the Chinese.
The Chinese had engineered the fall and conversion to Communism of Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, compliments of Kissinger, and they had structured the insurgency in Thailand, running a secret supply line [Binh Tram] through Vietnam and Laos to Northeast Thailand, setting up the Communist insurgent headquarters in Cambodia in the tri-border area. The insurgency had been penetrated, however, to include sending double agents to the Chinese insurgent training centers, compromising their cadres and strategy, and disclosing their regional headquarters and strategies.
As luck would have it, a flight of F-4 Phantom attack planes was returning to its base in Northeast Thailand in 1974 and jettisoned their extra ordinance over what was thought to be an uninhabited area which was actually the insurgent headquarters and supply depot.
The result was a series of over 325 secondary explosions and a body count of roughly 300 insurgents. The impact was the near complete destruction of weapons, ammunition, training centers, communications, etc., of the Chinese backed Thai insurgency, a blow from which the Chinese almost did not recover, and crippled the insurgency.
The operative word is "almost", since the Chinese shifted from military/insurgent force to political persuasion as they targeted Thailand's political system, and nearly succeeded. But, that battle continues today. However, in the meantime, the Chinese backed insurgency in northern Burma also collapsed under pressure from the Burmese military -- again, through penetration of the insurgency by US Intelligence operatives.
But, as in all exciting assessments, the preceding history lays the groundwork for the current scenario, in which China carefully takes possession of more territory one piece at a time.
We won't go into all the specifics, but rather provide the strategy.
As you can see by the map, the current playing board is the South China Sea, which extends to the West beyond Vietnam's Eastern border, South to Indonesia, and East just beyond the Philippines -- and area of strategic interest to the US.
Within that area, China has been building little islands on coral bases and claims these manufactured islands are their territory -- enforced by building aircraft runways and military facilities on them. Although our Military has viewed these outcroppings with some alarm, the Pentagon and Intelligence Community hierarchy under Obama seemingly ignored these territorial reaches, and, like Neville Chamberlain in 1938 who advocated appeasing Germany would sate the Nazis, the US leadership presumed the Chinese would not become a threat; at worst, it would be a "warm war".
Well, the Brits and Europe saw how well Neville's approach worked out.
But, the US approach, to the consternation of US allies in the region, has been appeasement to the Chinese.
"
Oh gosh, they're tiny little islands! What possible danger can that be.
The Chinese are merely wishing to extend their influence."
Notably, the CIA map above, which we used to open this discussion, focuses solely on the South China Sea and ignores the rest of the Pacific region. Specifically, the map ignores the Communism of Vietnam and Laos and the semi-Communism of Cambodia. There remains a Communist insurgency in Malaysia [albeit sub-rosa], and then there's the tilt towards Communism in the Philippines.
Meanwhile, we are witnessing the increased
saber rattling of North Korea, threatening a nuclear attack on Japan.
In Indonesia and Singapore, there have been a number of port "
visits" by the Chinese Navy which have merely dominated the ports with military vessels in a very visible show of force, though not a shot was fired. There was no need since the Chinese Armada was of sufficient size and strength to intimidate even the most stalwart of local military forces. The psychological impact was overwhelming, and the local governments recognized all this as a veiled, but very effective threat.
In the meantime, the US Navy has steadily been degraded in armament and size, while our best commanding officers were relieved of their commands during, and in the wake of Benghazi. Our Defense contractors have created and deployed worthless sea-going vessels, which at best can be regarded as floating targets, but the Defense Contractors have made great profits, and political admirals look forward to this eternal revolving door with the private sector profiteering. Worse, the Chinese have penetrated their production levels and
stolen the sensitive design data for weapons such as the F-35 -- supposedly our most advanced [and expensive] fighter aircraft.
The US presence in the Pacific [and world-wide] has been downgraded, to include our carrier Strike Groups. These depredations began with the attack on Benghazi, during and after which our fleets were rerouted and essentially downgraded to paper status while command officers were cashiered. Mr Obama essentially gutted our Navy and made it into a paper tiger [with homage to Chinese lore].
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| Open Source Data provided by StratFor |
Our allies in the Pacific have been convinced over the last eight years that they are at the mercy of the Chinese and have essentially acquiesced to the dominance of the Chinese. So, as an interim status, the US accepted the dominance of the Chinese, and the encirclement of the region.
Our Army forces in the Pacific are now being retrained and equipped for Jungle Warfare. Oddly, it is as if there were no Military troops skilled in such matters, and so it's necessary for research and development of boots, uniforms, and equipment to operate in a jungle environment. Apparently, the Army is unaware that we fought a 15 year war in Southeast Asia, and that there are quite a few Vietnam Vets who would be perfectly willing to train and equip our young troops for jungle operations similar to those conducted in Vietnam.
We were concerned that Mr Obama had linkage to the Russians or Chinese as it became evident that he was subverting the US Military to a Communist structure, perhaps to accommodate a transition to Communism. Specifically, we noted that the Deputy Commander of Unified Commands had been converted to a civilian in some cases who served more as a [Communist]
Political Officer to ensure adherence to political doctrine rather than as a subordinate. In several cases during Benghazi, we noted such Political Officers relieved their Military commanders on orders from the White House. Investigating further, we found that in some cases that the J2 in these commands was a civilian with no Military or Intelligence training, but appeared to be a secondary Political Officer. Our current Military is unfamiliar with the Communist Military political structure, so such revelations lie in the hands of retired Cold Warriors.
Now, we throw in an extra factor to this odd equation.
Under the Obama Administration, we presumed there was linkage to China, complete with the trade deals, and movement of massive amounts of US currency to China via the Fed [$15 Trillion in 2009] which was unaccounted for, but tracked nonetheless. Almost overnight, the
Gross National Product of China skyrocketed, and suddenly, China was an economic force to be reckoned with.
And, by all reasoning in the economic world, it was not easily explained [well, other than the NY Fed transferring $15 Trillion to the PRC]. Suddenly, China had the cash to buy controlling interest in many US companies, to include IT and Defense -- which then depended on Chinese components for US Defense contracts. Think in terms of guidance and communications systems -- now controlled by the Chinese.
But, there's more to the story.
Why would the NY Fed move that amount of money out of the Fed to the Chinese.
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| Turbo-Tax Timmy Geithner |
Well, it seems that Turbo-Tax
Timmy Geithner was a classmate of Obama when they both attended school in Indonesia, when Barack was still
Barry, and Timmy's dad was running the Ford Foundation - Asia, which employed Obama's mom, who lived with Barry in a four-star hotel and he was chauffeured every morning to school. And, they were pals.
Tim Geithner then became allies in the development of the
TPP [Trans-Pacific Partnership] which supposedly would "
create jobs" due to the lowering of tariffs. Unfortunately, most US manufacturing jobs had been forced out of the US due to high taxes and massive government regulation, so there was no job creation to be had. In effect, China had consumed the American economy, emplacing still another piece of "territory" in its encirclement strategy.
Once again, as a reminder, we are using the Wei Chi strategy of encirclement -- but the encirclement includes subversion from within.
As we move forward, we return again to the strategic piece of the puzzle which is Tim Geithner, the supposed buffoon whom we all ridiculed for his incompetence.
In reality, Timmy is a pretty smart guy; his mother was a Mayflower descendant with ties to the Rockefellers and George W Romney. He grew up in China, spoke several Chinese dialects [
e.g., Mandarin] and Japanese. Geithner is also is tied to Kissinger [
imagine that] and served as a Treasury attache' to Japan.
But, US Presidents also have ties to China, including George H.W. Bush, who was the Chief of the US Liaison Office to the PRC from 1974 to 1975. The Clintons and Carters also had close ties to China, of which we heard little in the Press. We have to wonder just how many deals were cut over the years between the US and China of which we were unaware.
But, getting back to Geithner, we learn that the company he formed has been actively engaged with China in developing deals for Obama while he was President, and on today as they cut deals about which we have no clue.
But, there are facts that are hard to deny.
Timmy has memberships in, among other questionable groups, the Bilderberg Group, which is tied to the ford foundation, which was known for its leadership in the New World Order, which advocates a One-World Government, which would have the world ruled by a small collection of elites.
Geithner's last employment of record was as President of the Warburg Pincus group of New York, with offices in Beijing, Hong Kong, and Shanghai, plus offices in Europe and Brazil. We wonder about Geithner's dealings with China, and continue to wonder what became of that $15 Trillion he transferred from the US while he was President of the NY Fed.
So, here we are, back to the starting point.
Will we go to war with China, and is China on the verge of taking control of the Pacific.
Well, under Obama, it was a given that the US would withdraw its presence from the Pacific and allow China to control the region without firing a single round. The Wei Chi strategy had worked quite well, and the Chinese were virtually in control. The key word there was "virtually", since it was mostly smoke and mirrors, and the US had essentially abandoned a presence in the Pacific.
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| Pacific Fleet strength |
But, the fact now is that Trump has pulled the US out of the TPP and assured the US Navy that he will fund the acquisition of new warships to patrol the Pacific and reenergize the US participation in the Pacific alliances such as the now defunct SEATO [Southeast Asia Treaty Organization] which was instrumental in containing China and ANZUS [Australia, New Zealand, US] which partners three strong countries to serve as a barrier to Chinese regional expansionism.
Will there be a confrontation between China and US with its allies, to include Japan?
It depends.
Trump is an unknown "wild card" in this game changing scenario. We estimate that the game of Wei Chi has gone on hold for the time being as they presume Trump will rebuild the US Navy into a formidable Pacific Military force with efficient ship-building programs that meet wartime Blue Water needs versus the nonsense vehicles like the Littoral Combat Ships which were poorly manufactured, slow, and became essentially sitting targets.
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| 25th Division troops |
The US Army has begun training for fighting in the Asian environment, particularly in jungle warfare, perhaps anticipating a Chinese incursion into the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, or even into Thailand.
But, the Chinese are patient strategists. In the West, we think in warfare terms of days, weeks, or months. The Chinese, on the other hand, think in terms of years or generations to achieve their objectives.
World War Three may have begun 60 years ago, and may go on for another 50 to 100 years; or, they may lose their tempers as they did with the MacArthur threat to China during the Korean War and actually unleash their fury, drawing us into a full-fledged "hot" war.
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| Commander in Chief |
Can we beat them?
Well, according to Mr Faby, we are in a "warm war" with China. It may get hot, but we suspect that with Trump's strengthening of the US Military, China will think long and hard about heating up the warm war.
Probably, but will we have the leadership and the will to keep them peaceful?
We won't know that except through the leadership we elect and put into office.
Stay tuned; we'll keep you up to date.
