Tag Archives: #China

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The Dummkopf from Delaware strikes again! Nothing quite like insulting a leader when you are trying to negotiate with him

We have previously noted how Joe Biden has managed to insult Saudi Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman, and how that hasn’t produced the foreign policy results the President wanted.

So now, with the United States military weakened by having send war materiel to Ukraine, and abandoned more in Afghanistan, Mr Biden has sent Secretary of State Antony Blinken to China for negotiations with Xi Jinping, and one would think that it might not be a great time to insult the Chinese President, right? Well, if one did think that, one would be wrong!

China says Biden comments likening leader Xi to a dictator ‘extremely absurd and irresponsible’

Associated Press | Wednesday, June 21, 2023

China on Wednesday called comments by President Joe Biden referring to Chinese leader Xi Jinping as a dictator “extremely absurd and irresponsible.”

The new clash of words comes just over a day after Secretary of State Antony Blinken concluded a visit to Beijing that sought to break the ice in a relationship that has hit a historical low.

Foreign Ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said Biden’s comments at a fundraiser in California “go totally against facts and seriously violate diplomatic protocol, and severely infringe on China’s political dignity.”

“It is a blatant political provocation. China expresses strong dissatisfaction and opposition,” Mao said at a daily briefing.

“The U.S. remarks are extremely absurd and irresponsible,” Mao said.

Blinken’s visit, during which he met with Xi, was aimed at easing tensions between the two superpowers but appeared not to have achieved any solid results.

The policy of the United States has long been that Taiwan is a part of China, but supports the separate government. However, Xi Jinping has long been annoyed at Taiwan’s separate government, and now that he has secured his position at home as President for life, and pretty much rooted out any real opponents, he has the opportunity to invade and conquer Taiwan.

Taiwan is only a couple hundred miles from the Chinese coastline, but over 6,000 miles from the continental United States. We are committed to defending Taiwan, but that begs the question: how can we defend Taiwan if China invades?

Add to that all of the war materiel we have sent to Ukraine, as well as just left behind in Afghanistan, and we are simply unprepared to do what it would take to defend Taiwan. China could invade and occupy before we could get any substantial forces there. At that point, the problem is no longer the defense of Taiwan, but the liberation of Taiwan.

The last time the United States and Chinese military were in direct conflict didn’t produce an American victory, but a bloody stalemate around the 38th parallel in Korea, and in that instance, American forces were already strongly in place in Korea before China sent its ‘volunteers’ across the Yalu River. The only good result of the Korean War was that my parents met in Tokyo!

The People’s Liberation Army (PLA) has over two million trained men and women on active duty. Ground troops make up the bulk of the army with 965,000 soldiers, while the navy has 260,000 members and the air force 395,000. There is also a strategic missile force of 120,000 and a paramilitary arm with 500,000 soldiers.

Our worldwide defense commitments were made when we were by far the world’s strongest nuclear power, but now both the Soviet Union Russia and China have nuclear forces capable of completely obliterating our country, and we have no way to stop them other than our own deterrent forces.

Biden, at the fundraiser on Tuesday night local time, said that Xi was embarrassed over the recent tensions surrounding a suspected Chinese spy balloon that had been shot down by the Air Force over the East Coast.

“That’s a great embarrassment for dictators. When they didn’t know what happened,” Biden said.

LOL! It was a great embarrassment for the United States that we allowed the thing to cross the entire US before shooting it down. If anything, it showed President Xi that Mr Biden lacked decisiveness and resolve.

Will China invade Taiwan? We know neither if nor when such would happen, and, supposedly, China is building up its military even more before such action would be seriously contemplated, but it could also happen tomorrow. China has certainly been pushing the envelope with what appear to be deliberate provocations, but insulting the Chinese leader when you have your top diplomat in Beijing, trying to reach a less tense accommodation is pretty much what I’d expect from the dummkopf from Delaware.

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The foreign policy disaster that is Joe Biden He managed to drive a former friend into the arms of Russia and China

Remember how Joe Biden defeating the evil Donald Trump in 2020 was supposed to make the United States respected again?

Saudi Arabia Seeks Regional Embrace of Assad in Win for Iran

Kingdom keen to assert itself as regional political leader

Syria has been banished from Arab League for atrocities

By , and | April 5, 2023 | 7:44 AM EDT | Updated: April 6, 2023 | 4:41 AM EDT

(Bloomberg) — Saudi Arabia is leading efforts to formally bring Syrian President Bashar al-Assad back into the Arab inner circle as early as next month, in what would be a win for Iran and Russia and in defiance of US warnings after more than a decade of conflict.

For those of you stymied by Bloomberg’s paywall, you can read it for free here.

The kingdom is taking steps that would allow the Arab League grouping of regional states to end a suspension of Syria’s membership in time for a summit in Riyadh in mid-May, according to three people briefed by the Saudis and one person close to the United Arab Emirates government, which backs the plan.

Those efforts are ongoing and could be stretched out or even fall through, or Arab leaders could settle on an interim plan next month, the people said. The US is aware of the push, has warned against it but has realized it can do little to stop it, several of the people said.

Saudi Arabia’s de facto ruler Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman is eager to cast the kingdom as the Arab world’s uncontested political and economic leader.

Following last month’s surprise restoration of ties with Iran, Riyadh now wants to be at the forefront of initiatives to calm regional conflict zones like Syria and ensure nothing disrupts its ambitious efforts to transform its economy, the Saudi daily Okaz said in an Op-Ed last week.

As we have previously reported, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, the de facto ruler of the country, really doesn’t like President Biden. Mr Biden directly, to his face, accused the Crown Prince of being responsible for the murder of Jamal Khashoggi, after Mr Khashoggi called the prince a liar, in public, in the pages of The Washington Post.

So, what did Saudi Arabia do?

U.S. Officials Had a Secret Oil Deal With the Saudis. Or So They Thought.

After Saudi leaders pushed to slash oil production despite a visit by President Biden, American officials have been left fuming that they were duped.

By Mark Mazzetti, Edward Wong and Adam Entous | Tuesday, October 25, 2022

WASHINGTON — As President Biden was planning a politically risky trip to Saudi Arabia this summer, his top aides thought they had struck a secret deal to boost oil production through the end of the year — an arrangement that could have helped justify breaking a campaign pledge to shun the kingdom and its crown prince.

It didn’t work out that way.

Mr. Biden went through with the trip. But earlier this month, Saudi Arabia and Russia steered a group of oil-producing countries in voting to slash oil production by two million barrels per day, the opposite of the outcome the administration thought it had secured as the Democratic Party struggles to deal with inflation and high gas prices heading into the November elections.

From The Wall Street Journal:

Saudi Arabia Considers Accepting Yuan Instead of Dollars for Chinese Oil Sales

Talks between Riyadh and Beijing have accelerated as the Saudi unhappiness grows with Washington

By Summer Said in Dubai and Stephen Kalin in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia | Updated March 15, 2022 11:48 AM ET

Chinese President Xi Jinping shakes hands with Saudi Crown Prince and Prime Minister Mohammed bin Salman on arriving at Al Yamamah Palace in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on December 8. Photo: Saudi Press Agency via AP

Saudi Arabia is in active talks with Beijing to price some of its oil sales to China in yuan, people familiar with the matter said, a move that would dent the U.S. dollar’s dominance of the global petroleum market and mark another shift by the world’s top crude exporter toward Asia.

The talks with China over yuan-priced oil contracts have been off and on for six years but have accelerated this year as the Saudis have grown increasingly unhappy with decades-old U.S. security commitments to defend the kingdom, the people said.

The Saudis are angry over the U.S.’s lack of support for their intervention in the Yemen civil war, and over the Biden administration’s attempt to strike a deal with Iran over its nuclear program. Saudi officials have said they were shocked by the precipitous U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan last year.

China buys more than 25% of the oil that Saudi Arabia exports. If priced in yuan, those sales would boost the standing of China’s currency. The Saudis are also considering including yuan-denominated futures contracts, known as the petroyuan, in the pricing model of Saudi Arabian Oil Co., known as Aramco.

That was 13 months ago, but maneuvers toward this continue apace. The yuan is not all that liquid right now, but the Chinese are making moves to push internationalization of the yuan to weaken the dollar’s grip on international trade, and as the world’s reserve currency.

The Chinese don’t have to buy in yuan; thanks to America’s seemingly insatiable desire for Chinese products, and the Chinese financing so much of the United States’ debt, they have plenty of dollars. But the inflation of the dollar under President Biden has made our currency worth less, and even if that is something of an international problem, there is significant weakness of the reputation of the dollar.

And now OPEC and its allies, including Russia, agreed on Sunday to widen crude oil production cuts to 3.66 million barrels per day (bpd) or 3.7% of global demand. American inflation has been coming down slowly — though it’s still higher than wages have increased — so Saudi Arabia and Russia, the number three and number two oil producers in the world, have decided to push American inflation higher.

It’s pretty amazing, when you think about it. President Biden insults the ruler of Saudi Arabia, and then wages a proxy war against Russia. China, which has no reason to love the US other than our dollars, makes some noises about Taiwan, and the US then proceeds to warn China about the consequences of trying to retake the island. Shockingly enough, all three start taking actions to hurt the United States and its economy. You don’t have to like Mohammed bin Salman or Vladimir Putin or Xi Jinping to realize that they can hurt the United States, and that insulting them really isn’t a great idea, but the dummkopf from Delaware did it anyway.

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Is the “spy balloon’s” mission just to make President Biden look bad? If so, mission accomplished!

I will admit it: I have been reluctant to comment on the purported Chinese spy balloon story, because it seemed like so much of a set-up. Really? A nation with the capacity to launch its own spy satellites, needing to send an easily-shot-down spy balloon over Montana? But, with even the Grey Lady treating it as something serious, I suppose that I should as well. From The New York Times:

Suspected Spy Balloon Hampers China’s Efforts to Ease Tensions With U.S.

Beijing said it was looking into reports about an object seen flying over Montana. “Speculation and hype will not help,” a Chinese government spokeswoman said.

by Chris Buckley | Friday, February 3, 2023 | 8:39 AM EST

A balloon suspected to have come from China and seen floating over Montana has suddenly upstaged a long-anticipated visit to Beijing by the American secretary of state and threatens to undercut efforts to reduce the simmering antagonism between Beijing and Washington.

Pentagon officials disclosed on Thursday that they had detected the “intelligence-gathering balloon, most certainly launched by the People’s Republic of China,” over the state that is home to about 150 intercontinental ballistic missile silos.

While the Pentagon played down the potential value of the balloon for acquiring intelligence, the public reaction by Biden administration officials underscored how brittle and delicate relations with Beijing have become, even over one balloon. The defense secretary, Lloyd J. Austin III, held a meeting about the balloon with senior U.S. defense officials while he was in the Philippines, and President Biden “was briefed and asked for military options,” a Pentagon official told reporters.

The balloon threatens to become a very public irritant looming over the planned two-day visit to Beijing starting Sunday by Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken. Drew Thompson, a former Pentagon official who is now a visiting senior research fellow at the Lee Kuan Yew School of Public Policy at the National University of Singapore, said the timing of the balloon flight was at least maladroit.

Guffaws! “(M)aladroit“? It could actually be very clever. Secretary Blinken has now cancelled his trip. That’ll show them commies how tough we are!

Also see: William Teach, “China Sends Spy Balloon Over U.S., Biden Admin Doesn’t Shoot It Down“

Consider just what has been happening over the past couple of years. The negotiated withdrawal from Afghanistan — and the negotiations began under President Trump — was handled, at the very end, in a wholly FUBARed way, a way which made President Biden and the top military leaders look incompetent. Thirteen Marines and around a hundred Afghanis were killed by a terrorist bomb at the very end of the pullout, and the US did nothing about it. Then, following the Russian invasion of Ukraine, President Biden has decided, in fits and starts, to send over $100 billion in assistance to Ukraine, much of it the form of existing American weapons and munitions, which draws down from our stockpiles. Mr Biden reversed President Trump’s order, and is now allowing openly ‘transgender’ persons to serve in the military.

To the Chinese, all of this demonstrates a real weakening of our armed forces.

That we could shoot down this stupid balloon is obvious. What flows from that is that, if this truly is what it has been claimed, the Chinese would not have included any truly revolutionary technology that could fall into the hands of the United States if it is shot down, and whatever is in this thing is probably booby-trapped.

China is also smarting over the United States’ announcement on Thursday that it would expand its military presence in the Philippines, gaining access to four more sites that potentially could be used to marshal forces to deter or respond to Chinese military threats to Taiwan.

“This balloon surveillance mission really demonstrates that even when Xi is trying to improve the tone of the relationship and the rhetoric softens,” Mr. Thompson said of China’s top leader, Xi Jinping, “there is no interest on Beijing’s part to act with restraint or amend its behavior in ways that actually contribute to genuinely improving the condition of the relationship.”

But it just might be gathering intelligence in a different manner. No, not technical intelligence, but intelligence on President Biden’s strength of will and resolve. If we didn’t shoot the thing down when it was over sparsely-populated Montana, there isn’t any less populated area of the US which it might overfly that would be safer.

The first official reaction from Beijing to the Pentagon’s accusations about the balloon was muted. Mao Ning, a spokeswoman for the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, did not confirm that the balloon was China’s.

“We’ve noted the reports and are checking the situation,” she said, “and I want to emphasize that before the facts are clear, speculation and hype will not help to bring about an appropriate solution to the issues.” Asked again about the balloon, Ms. Mao said that both the U.S. and Chinese governments should stay calm and “handle this with prudence.”

“China is a responsible country, always strictly abides by international law, and has no intention of violating any sovereign country’s territory or airspace,” she said.

Oh, well, yeah, I certainly believe her! https://www.thepiratescove.us/wp-content/plugins/wp-monalisa/icons/wpml_wacko.gif

There’s more at the Times original.

If the balloon is truly from China, it’s purpose could simply be to make President Biden look bad. If that was part of its mission, it has already accomplished that! Even if he orders the thing shot down, his hesitance in doing so has already made him look weak. And if air currents push it out of American airspace and over Canada, we’ll lose the opportunity to shoot it down.