South China Sea battle lines have been drawn ?

South China Sea battle lines have been drawn ? Sept 25, 2021 20:31:29 GMT 10

Quote

Post by batngat on Sept 25, 2021 20:31:29 GMT 10

from

www.voltairenet.org/article214159.html

The AUKUS preparing a nuclear war to sustain Taiwan

by Thierry Meyssan

The official reactions to the announcement of the Australian-British-US pact (AUKUS) are only about the termination of the Australian-French arms contract. As terrible as this is for the shipyards, it is only a collateral consequence of a reversal of alliances aimed at preparing for a war against China.

he announcement of the Australian-British-US (A-UK-US) pact [1] was like an earthquake in the Indo-Pacific region.

There is no doubt that Washington is preparing for a long-term military confrontation with China.

Until now, the Western deployment to contain China politically and militarily has involved the United States and the United Kingdom as well as France and Germany. Today, the Europeans are left out. And tomorrow the area will be controlled by the Quad+ (US and UK, plus Australia, India and Japan). Washington is preparing a war in one or two decades.

While France and Germany have not been consulted on this strategy, nor even warned of its public announcement (but other countries had been warned, such as Indonesia), the new device should be staged next week in Washington.

While it is logical that London and Washington should rely on Camberra rather than Paris, since Australia is a member of the "Five Eyes" with which France is just associated, the entry into the game of Japan and especially India puts an end to a long period of uncertainty. More troubling is the role assigned to Germany, which could join the "Five Eyes" [2], but not the Quad, i.e. spying on telecommunications, but not military action.

ALLIANCES SHAKEN UP

This new situation forces each alliance to reposition itself.

The A-NZ-US, which linked Australia, New Zealand and the United States, has not been in operation since 1985 and has been definitively buried. New Zealand had affirmed its policy of nuclear disarmament and consequently refused entry to its ports to nuclear-armed or nuclear-powered ships. Since the Pentagon refuses to reveal these "details", no US warship has entered the country. Future Australian submarines will also be banned.

For the moment, the European Union has not reacted. Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, who was giving a state of the Union address [3] on the same day the AUKUS pact was announced, is paralyzed. She was talking about her new strategy in the Indo-Pacific area, while the Brexit Brits were pulling the rug out from under her. Not only is the European Union not a military power, but those of its members who are, will no longer have a say.

NATO is silent. It had ambitions to expand in the Indo-Pacific and understands that it will not be part of the game.

ASEAN has not reacted either, but the Indonesians who host its general secretariat have already expressed their disappointment. The Association of Southeast Asian Nations was conceived during the Cold War like ANZUS or the EU to contain the communist bloc, but it evolved afterwards. Unlike the EU, which has become a supra-national bureaucracy, ASEAN, influenced by the ideology of the Non-Aligned Movement, aspires to form a vast free trade area that includes China. Without delay, many Indonesian intellectuals have denounced the torpedoing of this dream of peace by the AUKUS.

China and Russia, the main enemies designated by the Anglo-Saxons, have not yet reacted. Unlike the West, they never communicate about their intentions, but only about the decisions they have already taken and implemented. Speaking for itself, China has expressed indignation at the Anglo-Saxon mentality of forming the broadest and most powerful alliances possible without regard to the intricacies of each player. This is not a communication trick: the Chinese consider everyone as an equal with their own particularities. For example, when President Xi went to meet European leaders, he spent more time in Monaco than in some EU countries. Putting its money where its mouth is, the day after the AUKS announcement, China formally applied to join the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement on Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP), the successor organization to President Obama’s proposed Trans-Pacific Partnership. The coincidence of the two events is officially purely fortuitious. In practice, Beijing is offering economic exchanges to all, while Washington is offering war.

....

South China Sea battle lines have been drawn ? Sept 25, 2021 20:51:45 GMT 10

Quote

Post by batngat on Sept 25, 2021 20:51:45 GMT 10

from

www.strategic-culture.org/news/2021/09/24/aukus-is-a-criminal-war-footing-towards-china/

AUKUS Is a Criminal War Footing Towards China

Finian Cunningham

September 24, 2021

The objective is to subordinate Australia and Britain more tightly under Washington’s command for its war plan against China. Cutting the French out of the mix makes the line of command more direct for Washington.

The declaration of a new military alliance between Australia, the United Kingdom and United States – AUKUS – is a declaration of war intent towards China. The touchstone that is the tell of this aggression is the supply of nuclear-powered submarines to Australia by the U.S. and Britain.

Only a few days after announcing this new Indo-Pacific military alliance, U.S. President Joe Biden was this week addressing the UN General Assembly issuing a solemn appeal, among other things, to “save the planet” from adverse climate change. The complacency and hypocritical double-think are astounding. Biden is afforded a platform and respect at a forum originally founded on preventing aggression and war – only days after he unveiled a provocative war plan against China along with Britain and Australia.

The supply of nuclear-powered submarines to Australia is a categorically offensive move. Such vessels have a greater patrol range compared with conventional submarines and they are intended to allow Australian naval forces to sneak up on China. They can also be feasibly equipped with nuclear missiles despite official denials of this being an option. Australia is a non-nuclear state with obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty. It is therefore the party changing its status by violation of treaty obligations, not China.

In acquiring nuclear-powered submarines from the U.S. and Britain, Australia has cancelled an existing €56 billion contract with France to supply diesel-electric vessels. That decision has enraged Paris which denounced it as a “stab in the back” by allies. But what is more important about the decision is not the bickering and sordid stealing of lucrative business by one ally from another. The move from conventional submarine design to U.S. nuclear power is the key to understanding how grave the war agenda has become.

The AUKUS pact unveiled by Biden on September 15 in a joint virtual press conference with the British and Australian prime ministers did not mention China specifically. But that omission is more of the stealth that underpins the sinister new alliance. Nonetheless, Beijing was quick to condemn it as a provocation that would destabilize the Pacific region. China also warned that it would henceforth target Australia with nuclear weapons as a result of its military pact with the U.S. and Britain.

What is inescapably shaping up is a war footing by the United States, Britain and Australia towards China. Contemptibly, however, the Anglo-American leaders are playing down the criminal agenda, instead cynically claiming that the AUKUS pact is not a threat to anyone. Australian premier Scott Morrison even had the gall to say he was “open” to talks with China following the news of AUKUS and the nuclear submarines.

The Western mainstream media are also complicit in criminal complacency. Not one outlet has questioned or criticized the rationale for such a provocative military pact. The media parroted the unsubstantiated narrative that China represents a “growing threat” and “therefore” must be challenged. There is no explanation about how exactly China is supposed to be threatening global security. It is couched in vague terms such as that nation’s “expanding influence” or “footprint”. This false premise of posing a threat is adopted as if a fact that is then used to justify what is an unprecedented plan of aggression by the United States, Britain and Australia – the very type of aggression that the United Nations was established in 1945 to outlaw after the barbarity of the Second World War.

Michael Brenner, Emeritus Professor of International Relations at Pittsburgh University, is scathing of the Western duplicity and complacency.

He comments: “Once again, an American president is lying to us about a grave matter of war and peace. Biden’s team is bent on a confrontation with China that runs a heavy risk of war. And let’s make no bones about it, the war will be nuclear. We are the victims of a cascade of lies and deceit. The New York Times and other mainstream media are co-conspirators. Has anyone explained why the U.S. sees war with China as almost inevitable? Are we offered contrary views? No. We are marching in lockstep toward Armageddon.”

.....