7th Fleet bluff

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

1/28/2013

Daily Tribune

Provocative acts from Japan and the Philippines on territorial disputes with China are hinged on the two's "Mutual Defense Treaties" with the US, backed up with the presence of the US 7th Fleet. Thus we often hear that "China is afraid of the U.S" because of this. Is the 7th Fleet that invulnerable? Author Gary Brechter of the "The War Nerd" writes in Alternet "'Navy's Big Weakness: Our Aircraft Carriers Are (Expensive) Defenseless Sitting Ducks'… The Chinese military has developed a ballistic missile, Dong Feng 21, specifically designed to kill US aircraft carriers… the missile employs a complex guidance system, low radar signature and a maneuverability that makes its flight path unpredictable… it can evade tracking systems … travel at Mach 10 and reach its maximum range of 2,000 kilometers in less than 12 minutes."

2,000 kilometers is about the distance from China's Hainan naval base, where the closest missile bases are expectedly based, to strategic locations for any anti-China armada. Frederik van Lokeren writes In "'Implications of the Chinese naval base at Hainan' …The US 7th Fleet finds itself cornered by the newly discovered Chinese activity at Hainan. While the US 7th Fleet is capable of containing the Chinese Northern Fleet it is unable to have enough influence on Chinese activities in the South Chinese Sea …. the 7th Fleet would require a more central location such as the Philippines for example. Right now the United States military is already voicing demands for closer cooperation and basing in the Philippines." The article envisions the Japanese and Philippine navy to have a bigger naval role in the area — and right smack into the range of the Chinese missiles.

Brecher writes further, "Every single change in technology in the past half-century has had 'Stop building carriers!' written all over it." Aircraft carriers are good for psywar and bullying, but not much more. The Western fleets are even uncertain of victory against Iran's land launched missiles in the Straits of Hormuz, and have not launch a "no fly zone" in Syria for fear of anti-aircraft missiles. Then this from Weapons and Technology: "'China's Buying a Fleet of Russian Bombers Perfect for Taking on the US Navy'… Tupolev Tu-22M3 bomber at a cost of $1.5 billion…. supersonic, swing-wing, long-range strategic and maritime strike bomber … it will get updated with indigenous systems and an extended range making it a significant threat to many latest generations weapon systems."

The Department of Foreign Affairs under green card holder Alberto del Rosario raised the Philippines-China territorial dispute to the ITLoS (International Tribunal on the Law of the Sea). China ratified the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea only to the extent that it does not impinge upon its sovereign claims and does not submit to Article 298 arbitration as UNCLoS provides. Due to this, diplomatic experts say the Philippine case in ITLoS would not prosper if Beijing refuses to participate in the arbitration. Also, as condition to it ratification China stipulated that, "The PROC reaffirms its sovereignty over all its archipelagos and islands as listed in Article 2 of the Law of the People's Republic of China on the territorial sea and the contiguous zone…. promulgated on Feb. 25, 1992." The Philippines also posited conditions for ratifying UNCLoS.

RP also stipulated that UNCLoS "shall not diminish … (its) rights and obligations… under the Mutual Defense Treaty" with the US" and "…shall not in any manner impair or prejudice the sovereignty of the RP over any territory over which it exercises sovereign authority…" But the DFA reveals its real helplessness in saying, "What we want to do is to form an arbitral panel and we invite China to do so," unfortunately the guest won't be coming to dinner. The result of the Japanese "nationalization" of the Diaoyu and Philippine diplomatic escalation actually conforms to US strategic plans instead of the national interest of the respective countries, the region and the peaceful and balanced development of the World economy is the loss of badly needed economic cooperation and impetus; but that is good for the economic recovery of the US with arms sales and depressed intra-Asian trade.

Lawyer Harry Roque in an article supported the DFA's ITLoS case, then ironically concludes: "Lest I be accused of being overly optimistic, the truth is China may very well argue that its legal entitlement to the disputed waters is based on its 'uncontroverted' sovereignty to land territories… it may be enough to remove jurisdiction from it (ITLoS) because the matter, as phrased by China, may no longer be an issue of 'interpretation' and 'application' of the UNCLoS. If this happens, we will be back to where we were: a standoff." BS Aqino III has been led into a fiasco by the DFA green card holder. Their 7th Fleet card is a bluff. RP loses goodwill as most of Asean enjoy boom trade with China.

(Watch Destiny Cable GNN's HTL edition, Talk News TV, Saturdays 8:30 to 9:30 p.m.: "Against Money Politics," also on www.gnntv-asia.com; tune to 1098AM radio Tuesday to Friday 5 to 6 p.m. http://newkatipunan.blogspot.com)

Money, debt, freedom

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

1/25/2013

Daily Tribune

The BS Aquino government is nearing its full third year in power. Despite the hullabaloo about the so-called seven-percent growth and more in the coming years from government, the Yellow parrots, and the international finance cliques, along with up and coming credit upgrades, it is still acknowledged without any doubt that the Filipino people are getting poorer and hungrier. And even as the Senate still squabbles over money gifts from savings that should have reverted to the people, the humongous burden carried on the backs of the populace has just grown heavier by tons and tons. In less than three years, outstanding Philippine government debt has already grown to P5.381 trillion, almost P500 billion from the last year of Gloria Arroyo when it stood at P4.9 trillion — this when Aquino boasts of lending $1 billion to Greece to aid in its financial debacle.

This week, a trumpeted delegation of US business personages, claiming to be on the hunt for investment opportunities, arrived in Manila. Led by former Ambassador to the Philippines John Negroponte (1993 to 1996), the group is under the auspices of what has been described as a non-profit entity called the US-Philippine Society.
Certainly, putting "non-profit" beside such big names and giant corporations is oxymoronic, especially in light of the fact that many of these are tainted with scandals.

Let us make a short run-through: Citigroup collapsed in 2008; Chevron imposed on us the grossly one-sided Malampaya deal; JP Morgan Chase has just paid $153.6 million to settle a US fraud case; and Maurice Greenberg was indicted for fraud by former New York attorney general Eliot Spitzer. Those are just for starters.
Federal Express closed its hub in the Philippines in 2009 (and no one thinks it will return); Peregrine Development International is suspected of being a British Virgin Islands registered company; US Education Finance Group is a lobby group; GE also collapsed in 2008 but got a $140-billion bailout; while Spence, which is in seafoods, is alleged by McLarty's site to have only six dozen employees and advisors but wants to get multibillion-dollar PPP (public-private partnership) businesses in this country.

These US transnationals are seeking investment prospects in the country alright, but haven't they been investing in the Philippines the past century and with a vengeance in the last decades in the power industry, like Mirant cashing in and getting out pronto?
What the initial reports of the aims of the delegation did not mention were two worrying agenda items. The first, a meeting with SC Chief Justice Maria Lourdes Sereno for "American businessmen to get a feel of how legal issues will play out in the Philippines over the next few years (something foreign businessmen have always complained about in the past)."

Just what is a chief magistrate doing meeting with foreign businessmen whose issues can definitely reach the highest court of the land one day? That will surely compromise the SC, especially when the CJ faces the super-special envoy of the US (Negroponte) known for being the alleged "butcher of Honduras" in the "dirty war" there in the 80s and the alleged "butcher of Iraq" in the "Iraq surge" of 2005, where it will be another case of "sheep justice" arising from it. The second alarming item: Lobbying for the TPP (trans-Pacific partnership) agreement proposed by the US for a new economic community countering the Apec (Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation) forum and explicitly excluding China, which plan was reiterated to the Asia-Pacific community by Obama in 2012 but was roundly rejected by its target nations.

David Goldman writes in Asia Times ("Post-US world born in Phnom Penh"): "It is symptomatic of the national condition of the United States that the worst humiliation ever suffered by it as a nation, and by a US president personally, passed almost without comment last week. I refer to the Nov. 20 announcement at a summit meeting in Phnom Penh that 15 Asian nations, comprising half the world's population, would form a Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership excluding the United States." So is the US now trying to break Asian unity through the Philippines?

In a country where the people carry the debt and where politicians and business oligarchs have all the money, with the US controlling the political-economic ruling class — conditions that have prevailed over the past decades — all one has to do is put one and one together to know the primary causes of the Philippines' financial, economic and political crisis. Unless these basic conditions change, poverty and decay will continue to rule.
Thus, we need to end the rule of money in our politics, starting with the end to the "pork barrel," as well as a drastic cut to the national debt using our Gross International Reserves surplus, in order to start the path toward economic independence.

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.; watch GNN's HTL show, GNN Channel 8, Saturdays, 8:15 p.m. to 9 p.m., 11:15 p.m. and Sunday 8 a.m., and over at www.gnntv-asia.com, with this week's topic, "The Criminal Cyber Law" with the Philippine Internet Freedom Alliance; also visit http://newkatipunan.blogspot.com)

'Mali-volent' wars

DIE HARD III

Herman Tiu Laurel

1/21/2013

Daily Tribune

Not until OFWs were reported to be imperiled by another hostage situation did Filipinos here at home realize the existence of a country such as Mali. If current mainstream news accounts were to be the sole gauge, we would be led to believe that Western powers led by France are on a righteous crusade in stemming the rising tide of war in that North African country. A careful study, however, leads back to the recent war on its neighboring Libya.
The late Libyan leader Muammar Kadhafi harbored a third of the Malian warrior tribesmen known as the Tuareg, who lived as citizens — and many as soldiers — of his erstwhile non-discriminatory Libyan state.

After Kadhafi's fall, the black Tuareg came under brutal attack by the victorious Western-backed Benghazi Libyans of Arab decent and were forced out of Libya — but not before carting off thousands of powerful and high tech weapons of Kadhafi, which enabled them to start a Tuareg nation liberation movement in Mali.
Two times the land area of France, Mali's population of up to 15 million consists of seven major ethnic groups, including the Tuareg. Mali was one of the few African electoral democracies until March 2012 when elected president Amadou Toumani Toure was ousted by the military, allegedly for failing to contain the Tuareg rebellion. Interim President Dioncounda Traore took office but was ousted two months later in another coup by the junta that seated him.

Despite its desperate maneuvers, the Mali government continued to lose territory to the Tuareg rebellion — this, as the rebels captured French intelligence agents.
France stepped in with a rescue mission in the second week of January 2013 that ended in a fiasco, leading to the deployment of up to 2,500 French troops in Mali and the expansion of the conflict into Algeria last week. With the US "leading from behind," the French claim they are there to stop the "Islamist terrorists." But this isn't France's first recent misadventure. Aside from its frontline role in the war against Kadhafi, France also intervened in Côte d'Ivoire, installing an IMF (International Monetary Fund) man, Alassanne Quattara, in place of elected President Laurent Gbabo in November 2011.

Is it all good intentions that bring the French, reminiscent of its Foreign Legion, back to action in Africa? R. Teichman writes in Center for Research on Globalization ("The War on Mali. What you should Know: An El Dorado of Uranium, Gold, Petroleum, Strategic Minerals"): "If we are to believe this (French) narrative, we are misled again about the real reasons. A look at Mali's natural resources reveals what this is really about:
"Gold: Mali: Africa's third largest gold producer with large scale exploration ongoing… Uranium … Exploration is currently being carried out by several companies with clear indications of deposits … thought to be 5000 tones… Diamonds … potential to develop its diamond exploration… Precious stones consist of the following… Garnets and rare magnetic minerals … Pegmatite minerals… corindons… pegmatite and metamorphosing minerals… quartz and carbonates… more than two million tons of potential iron ore reserves… Bauxite reserves are thought to be 1.2 million tons … Other mineral resources and potential … Calcarous rock deposits: 30 million tons estimated … Copper… 10.6 MT estimated reserves … Phosphate: Reserve located at Tamaguilelt, production of 18,000 t/per annum and an estimated potential of 12 million … Lead and zinc…

"1.7 MT of estimated reserves … Lithium … Bitumen schist: Potential estimated at 870 million tons… Petroleum potential has been documented since the 1970s where sporadic seismic and drilling revealed probable indications of oil… So here we have it. Whatever is reported by the mainstream media, the goal of this new war is no other than stripping yet another country of its natural resources by securing the access of international corporations to do it. What is being done now in Mali through bombs and bullets is being done to Ireland, Greece, Portugal and Spain by means of debt enslavement.
"And the people suffer and die…"

Teichman ends with a quote from an African: "God help any country and its people with natural resources to be exploited."

In "2013 and the New Scramble for Africa," Chris Marsden writes: "China has surpassed the US as Africa's largest trading partner with trade of $90 billion in 2009, compared with $86 billion for the US and foreign direct investments of over $50 billion. Bilateral trade topped $160 billion in 2011 and is expected to reach $200 billion this year. In addition, China has proposed or committed about $101 billion to commercial projects in Africa since 2010, of which construction and natural resource deals total approximately $90 billion. Unable to compete economically with Beijing, Washington is once again turning to militarism to secure its advantage."

What the US and the West cannot get by trade, they get by force. This is so typified in this "Mali-volent" African war and in all their malevolent wars across the world.

(Tune in to 1098 AM, Tuesday to Friday, 5 p.m. to 6 p.m.; watch GNN's HTL show, GNN Channel 8, Saturdays, 8:15 p.m. to 9 p.m., 11:15 p.m. and Sunday 8 a.m., and over at www.gnntv-asia.com, with this week's topic, "The Criminal Cyber Law" with the Philippine Internet Freedom Alliance; also visit http://newkatipunan.blogspot.com)