From the Japan Times: The rise of the middle-ranking powers.

     The security environment since the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the United States has clearly demonstrated the limits of the United Nations, or even the U.S. as the world's sole military superpower, to maintain international security. However, like-minded mid-level powers with similar intentions could complement what the U.N. or the U.S. lacks, effectively generating sufficient clout to stabilize the global security environment.   

     Japan, Australia, Germany and Canada might be just such powers. They share common values as free and democratic countries. Moreover, they are nonnuclear powers with no permanent seats in the U.N. Security Council. All are longtime allies of the U.S. In fact, over recent years these countries have already had many opportunities to demonstrate their ability and willingness to contribute to international security if called for. They all also share a recognition that global stability directly serves their own national interests.

     Nevertheless, subtle differences among these countries may influence their bilateral cooperation or coordination with the U.N. or the U.S. As a result, they must complement each other's advantages, characteristics and interests in order to optimize their role in promoting international security.

     While the proposal put forward here is an interesting one it has one major failing, it ignores the fact that such coalitions fail to work as desired due to  each nation putting its needs ahead of those of their partners.   It is most assuredly better to work with allies rather than going it alone, but any nation that wishes to have a real affect on the world must also be prepared to act alone when need be.  The time for loose multilateral organzations like the UN are past, they are remants of the last century, dinosaurs that somehow survived into the age of mamals.  The only effective alliances are those based upon deeply held and shared convictions and codified by clear and concise treaties and agreements.  The UN is a dsicredited organization in the eyes of nearly every American, yet in many places it is still seen as the great panecea where the worlds problems can be solved through talking.  Ignoring the fact that the UN is more often than not a key contributor to the problems it is called upon to fix.  And when they do try to fix them they quickly descend into a fiasco of immoral behavior and a vertiable financial black hole.

     Multilateralism has a place in the world, but not in the formalised, corrupt framework that the United Nations represents.  The way of the future is coalitions of the willing, bypassing the staid and bloated beuracracy of transnational organizations for the expediency of actually getting the job done in a timely and effective manner.

     The author also ignores that while Australia, Canada and Japan have indded been stalwart allies to the US the reliabillity of Germany to the same alliance is questionable.  For a nation of her size, wealth and military potential Germany has deployed a tiny force in Afghanistan and has largely held them out of combat for fear of the public reaction to causalties at home.  Austarlia with its small population has managed to send forces to both Afghanistan and Iraq and to carry out smaller missions in and around the south-west Pacific region.  Why then can Germany not supply another 6 or 8,000 troops to the NATO force in Afghanistan?  Because they have decided that they don't want to take any risks so they focus instead on intergrating into the EU's ERRF while leaving the NATO nations doing the heavy lifting in Afghanistan dangling in the wind.  Alliances only work if the allies are willing to carry their share of the load. 

     The concept is a good one, it just misses the point, the middle rank powers can have a greater effect on the international scene if they join together to work outside of the failed trans-national structure, and that they keep the interests of their own nations in proper perspecctive to the inerests and goals of the alliance.  When that happens this could work, but I remain sceptical.

See my concept for a loophole free and effective alliance for the Pacific rim and Indian ocean here

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     The sad fact is that repressive regeimes repress their citizens.  While I had followed the events in Burma with the quiet hope that perhaps their could be an Asian velvet revolution that is obviously not to be.  The Chinese backed Regeime in Burma has obviously taken to heart the methods its master in Beijing prefers in dealing with peaceful dissent.  The world at large has expressed outrage, and rightly so.  What needs to happen next is that the civilised nations of the world need to take real, meaningful actions to punish the Burmese government.  Sanctions against Burma are all well and good but to be truly effective they should be aimed at the country that keeps the military Juanta in power, China.  Only China has the clout to force Burma to change it behavior, and by making China hurt they will put the screws to Burma and put a stop to the violence.

From Fox News: Myanmar Security Forces Open Fire on Protesters, Killing 9.

     YANGON, Myanmar  —  Security forces fired automatic weapons into thousands of pro-democracy protesters for a second day Thursday, and the military government said nine people were killed and 11 wounded.

     Tens of thousands defied the ruling military junta's crackdown with a 10th straight day of demonstrations. Security forces also raided several monasteries overnight, beating monks and arresting more than 100, according to a monk at one monastery.

      The protests were the stiffest challenge to the generals in two decades, a crisis that began Aug. 19 with protests over a fuel price hike and has drawn increasing international pressure on the isolated regime.

     Rather more uplifting is proof that the people of Burma are not going to simply sit idly by while these events unfold.  The mass media may yet be the undoing of the brutal and illegitimate regieme in Burma.

From the China Post: Internet, mobile phones aid Myanmar pro-democracy activists spread news.

     OSLO, Norway -- Cell phones and the Internet are playing a crucial role in telling the world about Myanmar's pro-democracy protests, with video footage sometimes transmitted one frame at a time. Reporters Without Borders said the junta has cut some cell phone service.

     On the other side of the world in Oslo, a shoestring radio and television network called the Democratic Voice of Burma has been at the forefront of receiving and broadcasting such cyber dispatches by satellite TV and shortwave radio.

     Chief editor Aye Chan Naing said the station, founded in 1992 by exiled Myanmar students, is able to pass on nearly real-time images and information about anti-government protests - unlike in 1988, when a similar uprising was shut down in a bloodbath that left more than 3,000 dead.

     On Wednesday, the military opened fire after a month of mostly peaceful demonstrations by tens of thousands led by Buddhist monks, and the government confirmed at least one demonstrator killed and three wounded. Activists reported the death toll was five.

     This time, the world has been watching through television and still images smuggled out of Myanmar over the Internet - sometimes, Naing said, one frame at a time. Dramatic images arrive via e-mails to exiled activists and via mobile phone calls to journalists outside the country, also known as Burma. Hundreds of images are simply posted on the Internet for anyone to see.

     Those inside Myanmar receive information about the protests on shortwave radio broadcasts.

    "This time, compared to 1988, there are lots of new technologies to get the news out of Burma ... People are able to take pictures, videos to evidence what is going on. It is quite amazing for Burma, which is a very poor country," said Vincent Brossel, director of the Asia desk for Reporters Without Borders. "Technology is the most useful weapon you can use in such types of pacifist struggles."

     Aung Zaw, editor of the independent Irrawaddy Magazine in Thailand, said that in 1988, "it took days, sometimes weeks, even months" to get images out. "Now, it's so fast."

All Photos Copyright Associated Press, 2007.

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     When taking office any leader hopes fora honey moon period that will give him the time and political capital to acomplish some of their key aims, and in so doing generate more public support and momentum to keep pushing their agenda forward.  Just how long the honey moony will last for the new Japanese prime minister Fukuda is hard to say.  He may recieve the benefit6 pf the doubt and get several months.  Or the public could keep him on a short leash and it might last a week or two.  As of right now the indicators seem to be pointing toward a short honey moon for Fukuda.

From the Yomiuri Shimbun: Fukuda Cabinet approval rating at 58%

      Prime Minister Yasuo Fukuda's newly formed Cabinet recorded an approval rating of 57.5 percent, according to a nationwide Yomiuri Shimbun survey.

      The telephone poll of 1,557 eligible voters, conducted Tuesday night through Wednesday, showed 27.3 percent of 926 people giving valid responses disapproved of the Cabinet.

       Among those saying they approved of the Cabinet, most said they did so because they felt it had a "sense of stability."

       The approval rating for the Fukuda Cabinet is the fourth highest recorded in a poll taken immediately after a cabinet has been formed, following the 87.1 percent recorded for Junichiro Koizumi, 71.9 percent for Morihiro Hosokawa and 70.3 percent for Shinzo Abe. Similar surveys have been conducted since the Cabinet of Masayoshi Ohira took office in December 1978.

     While the poll numbers are promising they must be considered in the light that the recently departed abe started with even higher approval ratings that soon came crashing down to earth.  With this sort of thing one just has to watch and wait.

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     As I noted here, my feelings about the upcoming meeting between President Roh and The Dear Leader are unchanged.  The best outcome for this summit is that things remain as they are.  At worst Roh screws up momumentally and gives the staggering regieme in the North a new lease on life.  Roh's continual attemps at opening up the hermit kingdom have been a series of failures that have only given a mesure of undeserved legitimacy to the last of the Stalinist regiemes.  Yet the preparations for the summit go forward despite political turmoil at home and rapidly fading support from the public.

From the Chosun Ilbo: Taking the Roh Moo-hyun Show to Pyongyang

By Kim Dae-joong,

      An old saying has it that you can only do well and exercise your power abroad if all is calm and peaceful at home -- a lesson that a person from a noisy and dysfunctional home can’t accomplish much in society. The same applies to a country. If the leadership puts the country into turmoil with corruption and fosters a society whose members feud and clash, it cannot expect to be treated well abroad, nor can they acquit themselves well. It's impossible for such a country to conduct proper diplomacy.

      Many people watching President Roh Moo-hyun go to Pyongyang early in October will feel that way. A president with less than three months left in his tenure whose closest aides are being grilled by the authorities about corruption scandals; a politically sterile president devoid of a ruling party to lead, whose de-facto party is torn asunder: seeing such a president make a grand entrance in Pyongyang is rather pitiful.

      How will he sit down face-to-face with a self-confident man used to absolute rule? Will he have the nerve to say what he should, and reject what he should, with dignity as the representative of South Korea? Will he be able to act as a bulwark for the South's security and peace, its leader in reality as well as in name? The public is uneasy about that.

      Unfortunately, he keeps betraying public expectations. He ridiculed public hopes that the first point on the agenda of the inter-Korean summit should be the complete dismantling of North Korea’s nuclear facilities and weapons because that was like “provoking a quarrel.” That is incoherent babble from a person responsible for the security of the country.

      Sadly it appears that President Roh is posessed of the same need for peace at any cost that animated the other apeasers of history like Chamblin and Daldier.  His own words make it clear enough that he is far to willing to give up the farm for "peace" with a nation whose stated national policy is the destruction of the nation he leads.

From the Korea Herald: Glimpse into inter-Korean summit

      With only 10 days left before the second inter-Korean summit Oct. 2-4, a rough picture of President Roh Moo-hyun's schedule for his visit to the North is taking shape.

     The president's schedule, which has always been highly confidential, is expected to be announced at the last moment. Roh's possible activities during the inter-Korean summit include watching the North's ultra-nationalistic Arirang Festival and visiting the Gaesong complex to encourage workers.

     Unification Minister Lee Jae-joung said yesterday that Roh watching the Arirang performance together with North Korean leader Kim Jong-il could be a "message for peace to the world."

     Peace huh?  Just how is a nationalistic, jingo-istic anti-South Korean and anti-American display of total subversion to an oppresive regieme that starves its citizens while it spends what little it does have on A-bombs and luxuries for the elite.  Sadly delusion and stupidity aren't checked at the door when one gains high political office.  I would like to see this summit canceled in the wake of the revelations of what is going on in Syria, but that isn't likely to happen.  All anyone can do now is hope that some one on his team will keep President Roh's head screwed on straight and keep him from treading on his three peice set with the old golf spikes.

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     Taiwan is in a bizarre situation, one that should never have happened.  While I believe that preisdent Nixon was right in opening relations with the PRC, president Carter screwed the pooch by withdrawing US recognition of Taiwan for that of the PRC.  The PRC should have been made to live with a two China policy wether they liked it or not.  As far as I am concerned Taiwan, was and is a free, independent and sovergein nation state.  The UN, for what little it is worth does offer a certain level of defacto legitimacy to it members.  The general assembly, and the US and Japan in particular should be ashamed for not doing more to facilitate Taiwan's retun to the UN.

From the China Post on Taiwan's latest UN bid.

     Taiwan's long march to re-join the United Nations has been most arduous, and there is no light at the end of the tunnel. On Wednesday, the United Nations spurned Taiwan's application for membership for the 15th time in as many years. The General Committee of the U.N. General Assembly deliberated behind closed doors on whether to put the application on the agenda of the 62nd General Assembly, which opened Tuesday. The decision against the application was made by "consensus," according to the Associated Press.

Ful Story: Long March to the United Nations

From a rather interesting letter to the Taipei Times.

     What is the "status quo" in East Asia anyway? New democracies in Taiwan and South Korea, a Japan slowly normalizing in terms of foreign relations and defense, a North Korean basketcase fiddling with nuclear bombs and kidnapping foreign nationals, and a China that is growing economically and militarily in a rapid, unpredictable, and opaque fashion.

     The "status quo" is what anybody makes of it at any given time. It is hardly the basis for a foreign policy of a superpower with vital interests in the region.

     US reservations about what is happening here are certainly understandable, as is its need for Chinese help in protecting Japan and South Korea from the regime in Pyongyang, but the US will find that it has been outmaneuvered by the "status quo" if it cannot come up with a more creative foreign policy than one that simply appeases Beijing.

     Taiwanese political and economic development will be stunted and erratic so long as such fundamental questions regarding the sovereignty are kept "undecided" by the powers that have set themselves in judgement over Taiwan.

Read it all in the whole letter here. 

     From my position it seems simple enough that the US has a ready made excuse for serving relations with the PRC.  Namely that the government of the PRC, never having recieved the just consent of the governed is, as a result illegitimate.  Constrated with the freeely elected Goverment across the straits of Taiwan.  If only someone with the power to do so would speek the truth and do the right thing.  For the US to remain a credible supporter and creator of democratic nations it must stop giving recognition and assistance to non democratic regiemes.

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     I have made my choice, I am backing Fred Thompson for the 2008 Republican nomination.  As long time Republican, like since I could vote, I feel like Fred has the best credidentials in all of the important categories, national security, second amendment rights and just general Reagn-esque conservatism.  Sadly my home state of Kansas is not going to have a presidental primary, again.  Not that it matters with everybody and their mother going for front loaded primaries in the first quarter of the year.  Congress needs to step in and put in place a rotating, regioanl primary system that gives all members of each party a chance to shape their presidental ticket.  Basically the sytem that has been proposed would have each quarter of the nation hold a primary one month apart over four months, rather than the all over the map primary sytem that we have now, with the starting region changing every presidental election cycle.

Oh yeah give money to Fred 08 or put up a donate button, or get a bumper sticker etc, you get the idea.

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     Yasuo Fukuda is to be the new Prime Minister of Japan, that comes as no great shock.  He will face a difficult time in office, but hopefully he will be able to garner more public support than Abe managed.

From the Yomuiri Shimbun:

     Former Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda scored a comfortable victory in an election Sunday to succeed outgoing Prime Minister Shinzo Abe as president of the Liberal Democratic Party, which virtually guarantees that he will become the nation's next prime minister.

Fukuda wins LDP race / Will follow in footsteps of father as prime minister.

     I don't envy the job facing Fukuda, but in the end he will likely carry out the same policies as Abe, and hopefully prove rather more adept at doing so.  The first thing he needs to do is scrutinize his cabinet members very carefully.  Continual scandals among Abe's cabinet was one of the prime reasons for his downfall.

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     Sometime ago you may remember that I put up a rambling and admittedly incoherent post about how the EU was bad for the UK's national defence, well this is a hopefully rather more readable take two.

     I stand by the basic and simple premise that the UK must make a choice between being able to influence world events on her own militarily and as a result diplomatically or to subsume herself to being just one more cog in the defective European machine.  The nature of the cosequences of making the wrong choice are readily observable and nearly came to pass twenty five years ago.  The Falklands war proved that the UK was willing and capable of looking after her overseas interests without European assistance, of which none was forthcoming.  The assistance she did receive however was from her one truly reliable ally, the United States.  The help the US provided certainly helped swing the war in Britains favor, but in the end only the Brits themselves could go and take back what was rightfully theirs.  A fine quote from Admiral Sandy Woodward's* book One Hundred Days bluntly warns of the dangers of excessive European integration and entanglements even before the UK became a member of the EU.

     I can not resist a review of this whole affair.  Were I Galtieri I would have observed the Malvinas** negotiations of the last few decades and found little hope of early staisfaction.  I would have also observed that, over the same long period, there had been a progressive withdrawl of , and reduction in, British overseas military capability.  In the General's boots, I would have concluded that at some time in the not so distant future, British policy on the Falklands issue would become all shadow and no substance.

     When the cuts in the Royal Navy were announced recently, the way ahead ust have seemed clear to Galtieri, and he only needed a half reasonable excuse.  Senor Davidoff's scrap dealers and our indignant reaction to them provided just such an excuse.  Galtieri attacked.  His reasoning was as impeccable as his timing was previous.  All he had to do was wait another six months, when Hermes, Invincible, Fearless and Intrepid would all have gone...

     If the Argentinian government, or others similarly minded elsewhere, are to be deterred from this kind of military adventurism, we shall need to provide not only the mark of our resolution on the spot [a flag, a ship, a platoon].  But also the obvious wherewithal to reinforce it [mobile forces, at short readiness].

     We would not again wish to repair our mistakes the hard way.  But it was the last Defence Review that was a problem.  After the needs of the strategic nuclear deterent and the defence of the home base had been met, they decided in favor of the short term, politically expedient, continental European commitment.  This was to the detriment of Britain's long term, long established, worldwide, national interest.  This was plainly evident to Galtieri, and I doubt he was alone.

     Whatever I may have thought before, the Falklands experience has given me a new insight into the capacity of non-democratic governments for immorality and dishonesty.  That capacity is apt to be too common in this turbulent world.  What, if any, should Britain's role in all be in all of this?  It is clear enough that our traditional global policy has long suited our geographic and political interests.  That is a matter of history.  And this war has once again demonstarted that it suits our professional military capability-air, land and sea.

     Our Defence budget, of course can only buy a certain amount. But I am convinced that it ought to be spent where it can influence both European and World affairs.  It must be a mistake to place it where it can affect - and in a very limited way at that - the policies of our European neighbors only.

       The nature of the EU beast is vexingly complex and multifaceted, so much so that the definitive site on the EU, Richard North's EU Referendum has spawned a second blog just for defence issues, Defnce of the Realm check out these to great blogs and their forum for deep background and discussion on pretty much any EU related topic.  As for the topic at hand the needs of Britains distant interests have not been well served by three sucessive governments, one Conservative and two Labour.  They have invested heqavily in often inferior european made hardware that is available form others cheaper, with higher performance and a willingness to let the work be done by and large inside of the UK, creating jobs and the subsequent economic growth and wealth creation that it spurs, plus more tax revenue for the government.  And  some procurement projects that are quite frankly fiasocs of the first order, namely the Cougar Comand Liason Vehicle and the Eurofighter Typhoon, both of which are well nigh unuseable in the curent conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq.

      The fact is that today the UK would be hard presed to recapture the Flakland Islands, while they posess plenty of the major vessels needed for the task the sharp decline of Destroyers and Frigates in the Royal Navy would leave the Phibs and Flattops open to attack, not mention the nightmarishly long fleet train required in such distant waters.  I have great personal respect for the drive and ingenuity of the individual British servicemember, but he has been let down continously since the early nineties by his Government and High Command in the name of European intergration, and sadly the cost has not just been wasted pounds and pence but caskets draped in the Union Jack.  The choice is clear to everyone involved, but no one has the courage to do what must be done to save the military capability of the mother democracy.  The people of the United Kingdom must speak loudly and with one voice, delivering a clear and concise message to their servants in Parliment that the UK free itself of the parsitic usurping European Union before it is too late.

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From the Yomuiri Shimbun:

     Former Chief Cabinet Secretary Yasuo Fukuda and Liberal Democratic Party Secretary General Taro Aso, who are running in Sunday's LDP presidential race, both emphasized Friday the need to submit a bill on a new law to continue Japan's refueling mission in the Indian Ocean for U.S.-led antiterrorism operations in and around Afghanistan.

     The two candidates in the LDP presidential race to pick a successor to LDP President Shinzo Abe, the prime minister, held a debate forum at the Japan National Press Club in Chiyoda Ward, Tokyo, on the day.

     The current Antiterrorism Law, which allows the Maritime Self-Defense Force to refuel U.S., British and other military vessels in the Indian Ocean, expires on Nov. 1.

Read the whole thing here: Fukuda, Aso urge new law on refueling / Say bill should be passed in current session.

     So in the end the DPJ's intransagence may have toppled prime minister Abe but whoever succeeds him will ram through a renewal of the anti-terrorism law anyway.  The DPJ gained a tactical victory but a strategic defeat, they hurt the LDP but did not, and can not prevent them from accomplishing their goal.  In the end the outcome is the same, but the DPJ can claim that it forced concessions wether they did or not. (since the DPJ will likely regard the resignation of Abe as a form of concesion even though he could have gutted it out and pushed on ahead despite the resistance.  So in the end nothing will signifigantly change in terms of policy at the top, at least as regards the war even though the players may change.

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As you may have noticed things are changing rather quickly around here as mee.nu upgrades from Minx 1.0 to Minx 1.1.  Please bear with me as I try to figure out how to get things as I want them and  generally learn how the new model handles.  Also sorry for the rather sparse postings over the last few days, I am going to try and make up for that with a number of posts over the next three days.

Addendum, from now on all internal links in posts will be Steel Blue and all outgoing links will be either Blue for work safe sights and Yellow for non work safe sights.  All links in the sidebar will remain as they were previously

Addendum to the Addendum, Fresh From the Front links will remain Steel Blue.

Have an ecchi picture for your troubles.

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     Politicians as a group tend to be a rather slimy bunch, no matter what part of the world the hail from, so it is always nice to see one who is willing to stand on principle and do the right thing, even it were to mean the end of their career.  So it is with Japanese prime Minister Abe as the following story and editorial from the Yomiuri Shimbun detail. Abe pledges to continue MSDF mission / Promises Bush he'll fight for refueling issue.(story) and Shirking the war on terror not an option.(editorial)

JDS Karuma, DDH-144

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