Aug 26

Today’s News 26th August 2018

  • Yet Another US-Saudi Massacre In Yemen: UN Condemns Airstrike Killing 22 Children

    Just two weeks after a US-Saudi coalition airstrike on a school bus in Yemen killed some 40 children in an event which finally caught international media attention, there’s a new report that coalition jets have struck a camp for internally displaced people in the flashpoint region of Hodeidah.

    Pro-Houthi rebel outlets were the first to report the massacre, which was quickly picked up in international media. According to reports, at least 22 children and four women were killed. 

    Prior US-Saudi strikes on Yemen in 2017. Image source: Getty via The New Arab

    “[The victims were] dead children and women. [It was a] disgusting crime,” the Houthi-run Al Masirah TV network reported Thursday. Refugees were reportedly fleeing fighting in the area area when the airstrike occurred. 

    The BBC reports the following based on a United Nation official in the region: “The victims were fleeing fighting in the al-Durayhimi district, south of the port city of Hudaydah, when their vehicle was hit on Thursday. A separate air strike the same day killed four children, according to the UN’s humanitarian chief Mark Lowcock.”

    The UN quickly weighing in on the attack is significant, given both Saudi and United States recent statements indicating they do not deliberately target civilians or civilian infrastructure.

    Screengrab from Al Jazeera coverage showing the strike aftermath on Thursday.

    After the August 9th attack on a school bus in the north of the country, which killed scores of mostly children, the Saudi coalition spokesman defended its actions as “legitimate”.

    The BBC continues of the heightened scrutiny regarding US-Saudi coalition war crimes in Yemen: 

    Mr Lowcock’s statement on Friday confirmed that the victims had been fleeing violence around the rebel-held port city Hudaydah.

    He renewed calls for an impartial and independent investigation into air strikes. A report by Human Rights Watch the same day accused the Saudi-led coalition of failing to hold “credible” investigations into such incidents.

    The reported attack was condemned by Unicef, Save the Children and other international organisations.

    Earlier this month, UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called for an independent and prompt investigation into Saudi coalition airstrikes on civilian targets, including the August 9 school bus attack.

    UNICEF’s regional director in the Middle East and North Africa, had tweeted in the aftermath of the school bus massacre: “NO EXCUSES ANYMORE!!”

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    There’s further been rising bipartisan support in Congress for cutting off US intelligence support and weapons supplied to Saudi Arabia, especially after it was revealed the specific laser-guided bomb used on the school bus was a US-supplied Lockheed Martin manufactured weapon. The UAE also plays a lead role in air operations over Yemen as a regional US and Saudi ally.

    In subsequent statements a Pentagon official told Vox that the US is not going to investigate the origins of the bomb from the August 9th attack, saying, “We may never know if the munition [used] was one that the US sold to them.” However, a tracking number on the side of a bomb fragment confirms it was supplied by the US, as also recently confirmed by CNN. 

    The Pentagon has lately claimed to be heavily drawing down its assistance to the Saudi coalition fighting in Yemen. 

  • Chinese Naval Expansion Hits High Gear

    Submitted by SouthFront.org

    While there was much fanfare and attention given to the July 3rd launch of two Type 055 guided missile destroyers at the Dalian Shipbuilding Industry Co. (DISC) shipyard in Dalian, very little mention has been made of the many other warships that the People’s Liberation Army Navy (PLAN) has launched or commissioned since the beginning of the year. Although the Type 055 DDG is the PLAN’s most powerful surface combatant, and the largest such vessel constructed by an Asian nation since World War II, they are one component in a steadily growing naval force structure. While the addition of three Type 055 DDGs this year, added to the first vessel in class which rolled into the water from Dalian just over a year ago in June of 2017, showcase China’s growing capabilities not only in producing powerful and modern warships, they also illustrate the maturity and  stunning capacity of the Chinese ship building industry. This industry has launched and/or commissioned 15 modern warships in just the first seven months of 2018.

    Three More Type 055 Destroyers

    This year is proving to be a big year for the PLAN. Of the fifteen vessels built so far in 2018, three have been the newest and most powerful surface warfare vessel in the Chinese arsenal, the Type 055 DDG. The world was stunned when China was able to complete the first of this new class in June of 2017. Sections of a second in this class were clearly visible in satellite imagery at the time. That vessel was launched in May of this year, but two more Type 055 destroyers were launched simultaneously on July 3rd, just two months later. The 5th and 6th vessels in class are already in varying stages of construction.

    Although initial reports had suggested that a total of six vessels had been ordered, it has been hinted that this number has been increased to eight. This number will most likely grow to at least 12 vessels by 2025, when the PLAN will be looking to expand its aircraft carrier program with the introduction of at least one carrier of the Type 002 class. It has yet to be determined if this new carrier (CV-18) will employ steam or electromagnetic catapults, but it will definitely be a CATOBAR carrier. PLAN aviators continue to practice CATOBAR take-off and landings at the Huangdicun Airbase in southern China. Chinese naval engineers have had a great deal of success in developing an Electromagnetic Aircraft Launching System (EMALS) that requires much less energy than the system currently utilized aboard the U.S. Navy’s Gerald Ford Class carrier. It remains to be decided if the Type 002 will be conventionally powered, or will make use of a nuclear reactor.

    Regardless of the next generation carrier’s specific design specifications and capabilities, powerful surface warfare ships will be required to escort them in a larger aircraft carrier battle group formation. The Type 055 DDG will likely serve a similar role as the Ticonderoga Class CG of the U.S. Navy within the carrier strike groups (CSG), and will also be utilized as a command ship or heavy AAW and ASW platform in PLAN naval task forces or while supporting amphibious ready groups (ARG). The Type 055’s significant weapons payload, multifaceted offensive and defensive capabilities, and great range and endurance will aid Chinese efforts to protect and expand its maritime territories, protect its shipping lanes, and maintain its naval lines of communication.

    Type 052D DDG Continued Growth

    A number of photos that appeared both online and in the print media exhibiting the two newest Type 055 DDGs to be launched at the DISC shipyard in Dalian failed to mention that three brand new Type 052D destroyers also appeared in these same images. The Type 052D is a powerful guided missile destroyer in its own right, rivaling the U.S. Navy Arleigh Burke Class DDG. China launched the first Type 052D, the Kunming DDG-172 in 2014. There are currently 9 ships of the class in service, 2 undergoing sea trials, and a further two being fitted out. Three Type 052D DDGs have been commissioned in the first half of this year.

    No less than five destroyers in various stages of fitting out are docked at the Dalian Shipbuilding Industry Co. (DISC) shipyard on July 3rd; three Type 052D and two Type 055 DDGs.

    Although original rumors had hinted at 16 vessels being ordered, some inside sources now claim that the number has been increased significantly. It would seem reasonable that a total of 18 to 26 vessels may end up being built, dependent upon how ambitious the PLAN aircraft carrier program becomes. IHS Janes Defense Weekly reported on May 2nd of this year that satellite imagery appeared to show a Type 052D under construction at the Jiangnan Changxingdao shipyard in Shanghai that had approximately 4 meters (13.1ft) added to its LOA. The after flight deck may have been lengthened to accommodate larger helicopters which would aid the vessel in its ASW role.

    It remains to be seen if the above mentioned modification will enter serial production under a different designation, or will prove to be a concept testbed for fielding larger rotary wing assets at sea. It is important to note that China produced six Type052C Class DDGs from 2004 to 2015, and has produced thirteen of the much improved Type 052D Class DDGs in just four years, a six fold increase in annual production.

    A Type 055D DDG docking with the aid of a tug at a PLAN naval base. The deck gun and forward 32 cell VLS are clearly visible. Although bearing some similarity to the U.S. Navy’s Arleigh Burke Class DDG, the Type 052D is more streamlined and esthetically pleasing. Its good looks likely equate to a much smaller radar signature.

    More Frigates and Corvettes

    While smaller warships do not enjoy the limelight of their larger peers, they can teach the observer a great deal about a nation’s maritime defense posture and priorities. While the Chinese shipbuilding industry has constructed and launched nineteen Type 052 DDGs of both variants, and four Type 055 DDGs from 2014 to the present, they have also turned out fourteen Type 054A Class guided missile frigates (total of 32 of all variants) and a no less than twenty Type 056A Class corvettes (total of 42 in class of all variants) over the same period of time.

    The smaller warships traditionally perform a number of different roles in naval warfare. Firstly, they serve as coastal patrol craft. They are nimble and fast, heavily armed for their diminutive size, and are outfitted to be flexible enough to perform a multitude of different missions. Their small size equates to limited firepower and shorter range, but they are well suited to serve as picket ships and screening forces to task forces fielding larger and more powerful vessels when those fleets are operating within close range of home ports and naval facilities.

    Three Type 056A Class corvettes tied-up alongside one another. The vessel in the middle is conducting a crew muster on the aft flight deck. Approximately half of the 42 vessels in the Type 056 class are of the upgraded Type 056A variant.

    The Type 056A Class corvette is ideally suited to patrol China’s coasts, the maritime territories within China’s EEZ, as well as the island archipelagos of the Paracel and Spratly Islands. They will most likely begin patrol operations from the key island bases at Fiery Cross Reef, Subi Reef, and Mischief Reef as the maritime logistics facilities on these islands are improved.

    The Type 054A frigate is a well balance and powerful naval surface combatant for its size, and carries an ample arsenal of anti-aircraft, anti-ship, and anti-submarine weapons. It is an ideal escort vessel with a range of over 8,000 nautical miles. It is a traditional multi-purpose frigate, possessing the inherent ability to attack other surface ships, engage aircraft, and track and destroy submarines. It is this class of warship that the PLAN first sent to the Gulf of Aden in 2009 to serve in international anti-piracy duties. Eleven Type 05A frigates have served on anti-piracy duties in this region since that time.

    The Type 054A Class Frigate is a flexible, yet powerful surface warfare asset that possesses significant range and the ability to engage in a multitude of operations. It is equipped with an aft hangar and flight deck, and carries either a Ka-28 or Harbin Z-9 helicopter depending on mission requirements. Type 054A FFGs will likely be deployed as part of naval flotillas stationed on a rotational basis at the PLAN naval base in Djibouti, and eventually at Gwadar, Pakistan. They will also be used to police the long maritime supply lines to and from China to strategic waterways near the Horn of Africa and the Straits of Hormuz, as well as continuing patrols in the South China and East China Seas.

    Type 054A Yiyang, FFG-548. This vessel was constructed in 2010 and was the seventh vessel in class to be built. Note the 32 cell VLS forward of the superstructure, 76mm dual-purpose deck gun, and Type 87 anti-submarine rocket (ASROC) launchers just forward of the deck gun. Amidships are the twin 4 cell launchers for the C-803 anti-ship/land attack cruise missiles.

    New Nuclear Submarines

    Without a doubt one of the segments of Chinese defense strategy most shrouded in mystery are the attack submarines and ballistic missile submarines of the PLAN. They are very rarely a topic of discussion by government officials, either on or off the record. What is known is that the PLAN has a newer SSN and SSBN in service. China’s submarine technology has run behind that of both the United States and Russia for decades, but China has been rapidly closing the gap in recent years. It is no secret that Chinese espionage efforts to acquire U.S. submarine warfare technology have been very active, and quite successful over the past decade in particular.

    The most capable nuclear attack submarine (SSN) in service with the PLAN is the Type 093B. A notable improvement over the Type 093, it has the capability to fire submarine launched cruise missiles (SLCM) while submerged via a dorsal mounted VLS. Like its predecessor, the Type 093, it retains the ability to fire SLCMs from its bow torpedo tubes. This is accomplished by using a specifically designed torpedo tube missile canister. It is not known how many Type 093B SSNs are currently in service, but most analysts, including those at the U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence, put the number at six. Of greater interest is the newer SSN that is either currently being fitted out or is undergoing sea trials later this year, the Type 095.

    A pair of Type 093B SSNs. Of particular interest in this image are the improved hydrodynamics of the conning tower and the slight dorsal hump denoting the presence of a VLS for launching anti-ship and land attack cruise missiles.

    The Type 095 is an SSN, but reportedly has a sizeable VLS (12-16 cells) which can fire a multitude of PLAN missiles including anti-ship cruise missiles (ASCM) and land attack cruise missiles (LACM). The U.S. Office of Naval Intelligence has classified the Type 095 as a nuclear attack guided missile submarine (SSGN) due to its large missile capacity. The Type 095 is thought to utilize pump-jet propulsion, make use of noise reducing technologies, and a hybrid pressure hull design.

    The Type 095 is being constructed at the new Bohai Shipbuilding Heavy Industry Company (BSHIC) submarine manufacturing facility located in Huludao, in the Liaoning province. It is the largest submarine manufacturing facility in the world, with an assembly building measuring some 430,000 square feet (39,948 sq. meters). Completed in 2017, the main assembly hall can accommodate four submarines at any given time. The facility is totally enclosed, and operations cannot be viewed from the air or via satellite surveillance. This also allows manufacturing operations to continue year round regardless of weather conditions. The facility will be used to build all Type 095 SSN and Type 096 SSBN class submarines.

    A satellite image of the BSHIC submarine manufacturing facility in Huludao in the province of Liaoning, China.

    The Type 094 Jin Class nuclear ballistic missile submarine has also undergone a noticeable transformation, resulting in what has been renamed the Type 094A. Improvements to the new variant include a larger VLS aft of the conning tower, a more streamlined shape which produces less noise and cavitation while submerged, likely greater speed submerged (less hydrodynamic drag), and a new ballistic missile armament. The Type 094A is most likely equipped with the next generation JL-2A submarine launched ballistic missile (SLBM). The JL-2A is based on the DF-31, and has an estimated maximum range of 11,200 kilometers (6,960 miles). The JL-2A is likely equipped with a multiple independently targetable reentry vehicle (MIRV) warhead. The PLAN likely has between four and six Type 094/094A class SSBNs in service. These SSBNs serve as the third leg of the nuclear deterrent triad that China lacked for so many years, and the 094A offers China a viable second strike capability. The Type 096 SSBN currently being designed will offer notable improvements over the 094A SSBN, yet little is known about the project.

    This rare image shows not only a Type 094A Class SSBN in the foreground, but also a Type 093B Class SSN in the background. The improved hydrodynamics of both vessels can be seen, especially in the conning towers that now lack windows. The large dorsal hump of the Type 094A houses the powerful JL-2A submarine launched ballistic missiles that have a range in excess of 11,200 kilometers.

    The Sixth and Final Type 071 LPD?

    The final Type 071 Class LPD of the original order of six vessels was launched at the Hudong-Zhonghua shipyard on January 20th of this year. The fifth vessel was launched just 7 months prior. It remains unknown if the PLAN will decide to order additional LPDs of this class, or will concentrate instead on the larger Type 075 LHDs currently under construction at the same shipyard which constructed all six Type 071 LPDs.

    It is logical to conclude that China may decide to build additional Type 071 LPDs, but this will depend perhaps on how long it takes to construct, launch and commission the first of the new class of LHDs. With six LPDs in service, after the final two vessels are finally commissioned, the PLAN will always have at least two of them ready to deploy as the backbone of a small Amphibious Ready Group (ARG). A PLAN ARG would likely consist of at least one Type 071 LPD, 2 Type 072 LSTs and a surface warfare escort of a mix of DDGs and FFGs.

    These smaller amphibious warfare vessels lack the size and capability of bringing their own aviation strike element with them. The Type 071 can accommodate two helicopters on its large aft flight deck, and is equipped to house four helicopters in the adjacent hangar. The Type 072 LST can also accommodate one helicopter on its after flight deck. Lacking a VSTOL attack aircraft, the PLAN will most likely modify the Z-10 attack helicopter for naval use, with it serving a similar purpose as the U.S. Marine Corps AH-1Z Viper and Russian Ka-52k naval attack helicopters. China has already conducted take-off and landing tests with Z-10s on both the Type 071 LPD and 072A LST. The Type 075 LHD will undoubtedly have an attack element of at least eight to ten modified Z-10s.

    It is clear that a larger amphibious warfare platform is a requirement for the PLAN in the immediate future. If the time it took China to design, build, launch and fit-out its first indigenous aircraft carrier is an indicator, we are likely looking at the first Type 075 to be launched sometime in 2020. Fitting out and sea trails will take an additional two years before the first vessel is commissioned. The LHD is without a doubt the most flexible and capable of all amphibious warfare platforms and the PLAN will need these vessels to be able to field viable ARGs to respond to challenges within its maritime territories and to project power at greater ranges along the full length and breadth of the Maritime Silk Road.

    The All Important Support Vessels

    China signaled to the world that it fully intended to field aircraft carrier battle groups (CBG) in the near future when it launched the first Type 901 Fast Combat Support Ship in December of 2015. Built by Guangzhou Shipyard International Company Ltd. (GSI), the first vessel in this class Hulun Hu (hull # 965), commissioned in September of 2017 after successful sea trials and UNREP trails, bears the distinction of being the only fast combat support ship fielded by a nation other than the United States, which operates the Sacramento and Supply Class vessels. These massive underway replenishment ships are designed to be able to meet the logistics needs of fast moving carrier battle/strike groups.

    The Type 901 is a massive vessel, with a fully loaded displacement of 48,000 tons. It is equipped with five liquid bulk cargo transfer stations, three on the port side and two on the starboard side, and is also equipped for liquid transfers astern. They can refuel an aircraft carrier with fuel oil and aviation fuel to starboard while supplying fuel oil to surface warfare escorts to port. The disclosed cruising speed is in excess of 25 knots, which is likely understated. It is equipped with a large aircraft hangar and flight deck that can accommodate large Z-8 heavy transport helicopters which are well suited to aerial replenishment duties. A second Type 901 is currently in an advanced state of construction.

    The massive size of the Type 901 is clearly on display in this image. The vessel tied up alongside Hulun Hu is a Type 640 Class auxiliary tanker.

    The PLAN also operates the Type 903 and Type 903A Class fleet replenishment vessels. The Type 903 was greatly improved and took on the designation Type 903A with the first two examples commissioned in the summer of 2013. There are six Type 903A replenishment ships on active service, and a seventh currently in an advanced state of construction. These vessels have a fully loaded displacement of approximately 24,000 tons and can carry 10,500 tons of bunkers (fuel), 250 tons of potable water, and roughly 700 tons of dry cargo.

    Type 903A Honghu, commissioned in July of 2016. The PLAN should take delivery of the seventh such vessel sometime in the middle of 2019. The PLAN increased production of this class of vessel since the first was commissioned in 2013. Four were commissioned in a span of just 8 months from December 2015 to July 2016.

    Fleet replenishment vessels are a vital component of a blue water navy. They allow fleet task forces, carrier battle groups and amphibious ready groups to engage in complex missions thousands of miles from home ports and over extended periods of duration. They replenish fuel, food stores, fresh water and munitions to warships while underway, and can provide a rapid logistics solution to both naval and land forces deployed to far flung bases and garrisons. These vessels are indispensable to aircraft carrier battle groups engaged in long deployments.

    The Big Picture, PLAN 2025

    The rapid pace of warship construction by China is impressive from an engineering and manufacturing standpoint, but of greater interest is in understanding the motivation behind such an ambitious program. Why has the Chinese leadership decided that the PLAN must expand and acquire a full spectrum of naval warfare capabilities that it has previously lacked, and in such a short space of time? The answer to this question becomes clear after a short analysis of China’s geopolitical, economic and national security goals in the twenty-first century.

    In many ways, China is engaged in a concerted effort to redefine the economic realities that have established the way the world exchanges goods and services, and distributes the product of human endeavors globally. The New Silk Road/Maritime Silk Road project seeks to once again make China the center of the economic world. China is already the largest economy in the world in terms of economic production, and is on pace to usurp the U.S. as the world’s largest economic consumer as well. Continued growth and prosperity depend upon cheap and efficient movement of energy resources and raw materials to China, and the cheap and efficient movement of finished goods from China. The overwhelming majority of these influxes and outflows transit the international waterways of the world. Continued prosperity and stability depend upon the security of these maritime lanes of trade. In strategic terms, these naval lines of communication must remain open. In times of strife and natural or man-made disaster, China must have the capacity to secure these lines of communication and to keep them open. The great naval strategist Rear Admiral Alfred Thayer Mahan, writing in 1893, then just a Captain, stated this concept very succinctly:

    “Let us start from the fundamental truth, warranted by history, that the control of the seas, and especially along the great lines drawn by national interest or national commerce, is the chief among the merely material elements in the power and prosperity of nations. It is so because the sea is the world’s great medium of circulation. From this necessarily follows the principal that, as subsidiary to such control, it is imperative to take possession, when it can be done righteously, of such maritime positions as contribute to secure command.”

    Although China has been the first and most determined nation to move in this direction, it is not alone. As China moves to build a new logistics system that aims to redirect the movement of information, energy, and economic goods that competes with the current established system dominated by the United States, the United States and its allies are determined to maintain the status quo. Some of these allies, such as India, are allies of necessity and are also attempting to maintain their independence. China has accepted the wisdom of long standing naval strategy, and has proven the most decisive in embracing these centuries old concepts.

    This map illustrates established and potential naval bases of rivals in the Indian Ocean, South China Sea and Asia Pacific regions. The U.S. bases were established through imperialist expansion, war and the long running U.S.-U.K. alliance. India has moved to leverage its own cooperative relationship with the U.S.-U.K. alliance and also maintain a level of independence. China has moved to secure the maritime lines of communication to and from Africa and the Middle East. Bases in Gwadar and Kyaukpyu will prove indispensable if either the Straits of Malacca or Aden become impassable.

    If China does not alter its current building projects by increasing or reducing orders, the PLAN will still be a highly transformed fighting force by 2025. The year 2025 will prove to be a milestone for the PLAN for many reasons. By 2025, China will likely be declaring its first Type 002 Class aircraft carrier operational. The Type 002 will be an EMALs assisted CATOBAR capable carrier that may likely be nuclear powered. At the same time, two other aircraft carriers, although recognized as developmental steps along the way to the Type 002, will also be in service. Based on the pace of pilot training and the procurement of aircraft over the past decade, the PLAN will have at least one more regiment of carrier strike aircraft in service, bringing the total to two regiments. China is already seeking to develop and field a carrier borne strike aircraft superior to the J-15, even though many of the J-15’s shortcoming will be rectified by the improved CATOBAR system of the new Type 002 carrier.

    Liaoning CV-16 with its air wing of J-15s and rotary wing ASW and support aircraft, and a Type 054A frigate escort. A modest yet impressive start in carrier borne naval aviation, and definitely just the beginning.

    The Plan will have 30 Type 054A Frigates, 18 Type 052D and 8 or more Type 055 Destroyers in service. Improvements upon the destroyers will likely occur in the intervening years. A total of 50 Type 056 Corvettes (28 of the Type 056A improved variant) will be policing the coastal waterways of China and its outlying island territories. These modern and capable surface warfare vessels will be supplemented by older vessels that China has been actively modernizing.

    The PLAN will be able to transport an enlarged PLA Marine Corps to battle in its first Amphibious Ready Group, albeit with limited capabilities. The First Type 075 LHD will be undergoing operational training to test the capabilities of the vessel and familiarize sailors, marines and airmen with amphibious and air assault missions from such a complex and powerful platform. There will be six Type 071 LPDs in service, as well as 15 Type 072A LSTs. The majority of an additional 17 Type 072 LSTs of an earlier, yet sound design will still be in service. The recently expanded PLAMC, numbering approximately 100,000 men, a five-fold increase from 2017, will finally have the modern amphibious sealift capacity that it currently lacks. PLAMC marines will serve in duties deployed at sea and stationed at a growing number of Chinese sovereign island bases, or abroad at naval bases in foreign countries such as Pakistan and Djibouti.

    By 2025, the PLAN will have a robust naval logistics arm available to support naval operations across the length and breadth of the Maritime Silk Road. Two Type 901 fast combat supports ships, and 9 Type 903A replenishment ships will be available at a minimum. Four Type 904 general stores issue vessels are currently in service to resupply island garrisons and offshore bases. This number may be increased in the intervening years.

    Of equal interest is the question of just how the U.S. Navy will look in 2015. It will still be the largest and most powerful navy in terms of global reach and power projection; however, it is a military branch that seems to be without focus or direction. The PLAN has increasingly invested in high tech, powerful and flexible conventional warships that are also cost effective when compared to the new designs pursued by the U.S. Navy. Even the Type 002 aircraft carrier is a conservative design, with a limited mission foreseen for it, one which will minimize its weaknesses and make use of its strengths. It is telling that China has built the largest surface warfare ship since the U.S. commissioned the last Ticonderoga Class cruiser Port Royal CG-73 in 1994. The U.S. has no plans to replace the 22 Ticonderoga Class cruisers anytime soon, nor is there a replacement design to consider. The Gerald R. Ford Class CVN-78 has proven to be a costly and disappointing investment so far. It will use the F-35 JSF and F-18 Super Hornet which lack the range to be a threat to peer adversaries. The Zumwalt Class DDG is a dead end failure and the troubled LCS program has proven to be less capable than the traditional multi-purpose frigate designs of other major navies.

    Ticonderoga Class cruiser USS Lake Champlain CG-57. Decommissioning of these vessels will begin in 2019, with no viable replacement. The U.S. Navy command has proposed keeping half of the 22 vessels in service. Despite the largest defense budget of any nation in the world, and larger than that of Russia and China combined, the U.S. Navy cited budget constraints as a key factor in being unable of replacing the vessels.

    While the U.S. has wasted its great wealth on failed designs, whose sole aim is to earn profits for a defense industry more interested in profit-generating waste than in producing weapons systems that balance capability, efficiency and cost effectiveness, China has done something quite different. China has produced cutting edge warships and aircraft for its navy that are largely improvements upon proven designs and technology. China has made major progress in missile technology, surpassing the U.S. in many respects. It has also reaped rewards from years of investment in research and development of advanced radar and even photon detection technologies. There is no doubt that China has gotten far more return on its investments in terms of its defense industry in comparison to the United States. For the military defense complex that rules the United States the goal is profit, not the defense and security of the nation.

    From 2001 to the present, the United States military has morphed into a force obsessed with counterinsurgency and occupation, leaving it woefully unprepared for a conventional conflict with peer adversaries, such as Russia or China. The U.S. Navy has transformed into a global police force meant to be used as a stick to bludgeon any small nation that dares to disobey the diktats of Washington. Its powerful aircraft carrier strike groups (CSG) lack the air wing capable of striking the shores of powerful adversaries, rendering these great symbols of U.S. power impotent against any capable foe in a major conflict. The U.S. Navy is powerless to change the strategic situation in the South China Sea through military means, as China has already “crossed the Rubicon”. Imperial hubris, corruption and arrogance have done greater damage to the U.S. military than any foreign adversary has over the past 17 years.

    The year 2025 will witness a PLAN in ascent and a U.S. Navy in decline. This is not to say that the U.S. Navy will not still be the preeminent naval power globally, but it will continue to be mired in a lack of strategic direction, focus and budgetary crisis. The PLAN will be guided by a clear strategic focus, increasing capabilities, and a robust shipbuilding and weapons acquisition program. There is no doubt that the PLAN will emerge as the second most powerful navy in the world, and will exert significant influence in both military and geostrategic terms.

  • "The Parallels Are Remarkable": Trump Is Using The Bill Clinton Playbook And It Just Might Work

    Authored by Joseph Moreno, op-ed via TheHill.com,

    The parallels are remarkable. Twenty years ago this month, a special prosecutor investigating the president was weeks away from releasing a report accusing the chief executive of illegal conduct unrelated to his official duties. Three months later, Bill Clinton was impeached by the House of Representatives on charges of lying and obstructing justice to hide a extramarital affair from his wife and the country. While this may have meant he lost a battle, there is no question that Clinton ultimately won the war against independent counsel Ken Starr by not only surviving but continuing on to complete an otherwise successful presidency.

    Today, President Trump is not only following Clinton’s playbook to a tee, he stands a good chance of winning his war of words against an opponent who remains unable to fight back. Just as we are seeing with the ongoing Russia probe, Starr’s original investigation started specific and broadened over time. In Starr’s case, his 1994 appointment was to investigate potential violations of criminal law relating to Bill and Hillary Clinton’s involvement in the “Whitewater” land deal. Four years and $50 millionlater, Starr’s most impactful findings involved Clinton’s affair with a White House intern and his lying about it under oath.

    Robert Mueller’s original mandate was also narrow. He was appointed to find evidence of “any links and/or coordination” between the Russian government and individuals associated with the Trump campaign. Fifteen months and more than $16 million later, it is impossible to know when and how the probe will conclude. However, the conviction of former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort and the guilty plea of former Trump attorney Michael Cohen on grounds entirely unrelated to Russia mirror how Starr’s investigation also morphed into altogether new areas.

    What is also being mirrored is how Trump is taking the fight with Mueller in the court of public opinion. At some point, Clinton decided that rather than wait until Starr completed his investigation, he would step up and fight on his own terms. Lacking the benefit of a Twitter account, Clinton used surrogates who repeatedly attacked Starr as a highly partisan Republican operative obsessed with bringing down Clinton. Starr was accused of being fixated on sex, and being a runaway Inspector Javert who spent years and millions of dollars on a wasted effort. In the reported words of a Clinton White House official, the attacks were “part of our continuing strategy to destroy Ken Starr.”

    Sound familiar? Trump’s initial legal team seemed content to remain under the radar and keep public comments to a minimum. All this changed with the hiring of Rudy Giuliani, who has relentlessly attacked the Russia investigation as a runaway train with no end in sight. Combine this with Trump’s constant tweets describing Mueller’s probe as a “witch hunt” staffed with Democratic partisans and tainted by Mueller’s own undefined conflicts of interest. Trump has also criticized how long the investigation is taking and how much it has cost.

    This is because Trump and his attorneys know that his fate will depend not on the legal intricacies of campaign finance laws or whether “collusion” constitutes a crime. This is a political battle that potentially leads to impeachment, and Trump is fighting not on the legal issues but over what it would take for Congress and his supporters to turn on him.

    After years of investigating President Clinton the best Starr could come up with was that he lied about a personal relationship. To anyone paying attention this did not come as a surprise. Allegations of marital infidelityhad swirled around Clinton prior to his first presidential run, yet voters twice elected him because he was considered a successful leader. Democrats in Congress uniformly voted against ousting Clinton because they felt Starr uncovered nothing that warranted removal. The fact that Starr had been damaged from years of pummeling ensured the Democrats would receive no repercussions for their votes.

    Today, if Mueller’s findings simply reinforce what voters already knew about Trump, such as that he is fast and loose with the truth, has surrounded himself with questionable characters, and openly invited Russians to find and release Hillary Clinton’s deleted emails, it likely will not be enough to turn public opinion against him. Trump’s team will thus continue to attack the prosecutors and attack the process in an effort to undermine whatever Mueller ultimately finds. The special counsel will be accused of bias, of mission creep, and of doing whatever it takes to reverse the results of the 2016 election.

    Meanwhile, the bar will keep getting raised as to what would justify removal of a president. Is it unseemly and highly inappropriate for a president to smear the prosecutors who have been duly tasked with investigating him? Sure. But it worked before with Bill Clinton, so it is not crazy to imagine that it just might work again.

  • Russia Sends Largest Naval Armada Of Syrian War Amidst New Chemical Attack Warnings

    We observed previously after John Bolton’s threat late this week of “greater military force” should chemical weapons allegations emerge against Damascus, that a familiar pattern has long been in play on Syria: just when it appears the jihadists are on the brink of final defeat, and as stability is returning after seven years of grinding war, something happens to bring things right back to the brink of global crisis and escalation. 

    Authored and submitted by Leith Aboufadel via Al Masdar News,

    Russia has built up its forces around the Mediterranean Sea in response to reports that the U.S., France, and Great Britain could be preparing to attack Syria after US National Security Advisor John Bolton informed Russia that America is prepared to respond with greater military force than it has used against Assad’s regime in the past, according to Bloomberg.

    According to Yoruk Isik of the Bosphorus Observer, the Russian Navy has sent another armada of ships towards Syria’s territorial waters in order to increase the strength of their forces around the country.

    Isik said that the powerful Russian warships, Admiral Grigorovich and Admiral Essen class frigate, were spotted transiting the Bosphorus Strait en route to the Port of Tartous.

    This latest move by the Russian Navy comes just 24 hours after they sent three ships en route to the Port of Tartous in western Syria.

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    The Turkish coast guard monitored the frigates as they passed through the Bosporus toward the Mediterranean, reportedly en route to Russia’s only major deep-water port in the region along the Syrian coast.

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    With the Syrian Arab Army (SAA) preparing to launch a large-scale offensive in northwest Syria, Russia fears that the jihadist rebels may fake a chemical weapons attack in order to get the U.S. and its allies to attack the government.

    Ships are also being deployed as Syrian and Russian forces prepare for what’s expected to be the final push to liberate all of Idlib province, which Russian forces are expected to play a central role in executing. 

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    Currently, the following Russian military vessels are stationed in the Mediterranean near the Syrian coast according to Naval military observers:

    • CG Marshal Ustinov
    • DDG Severomorsk
    • DDG Yaroslav Mudryy
    • FFG Admiral Grigorovich
    • FFG Admiral Essen
    • FFL Pytlivyy
    • FSG Vyshniy Volochek
    • FSG Grad Sviyazhsk
    • FSG Velikiy Ustyug
    • LST Orsk
    • LST Nikolay Fil’chenkov
    • MS Turbinist
    • MS Valentin Pikul
    • SS Kolpino
    • SS Velikiy Novgorod

    Those listed are featured in the following: 

    Per @Capt_Navy

    Meanwhile, in reference to reports that Washington could be preparing another round of attacks, the Russian MoD pointed out on Saturday that “the US Navy’s destroyer Sullivans with 56 cruise missiles on its board arrived in the Persian Gulf several days ago while a B-1B strategic bomber of the US Air Force armed with AGM-158 JASSM air-to-surface missiles was redeployed to the Al Udeid air base in Qatar,” according to TASS. 

  • Escobar: Sun Tzu And The Art Of Fighting A Trade War

    Authored by Pepe Escobar via The Asia Times,

    It will be long, it will be nasty and Trump would be foolish to underestimate Xi and the resolve of China…

    Imagine the Chinese leadership out of the public eye for nearly two weeks – virtually holed up, immersed in a secret debate. That is exactly what just happened at Beidaihe, the beach resort in eastern Hebei province.

    While there might be James Bond-ish conspiracy theories out there for this annual ritual, there are no doubts about the key theme of discussions: The US-China trade war.

    The second-largest world economy under President Xi Jinping is deep into the long march towards superpower status. The previous geopolitical and geoeconomic status quo is dead.

    Xi has made it abundantly clear that for China to just become a “responsible stakeholder” in the post-Cold War US-controlled liberal international order is not enough.

    It did not escape the notice of the senior leadership at Beidaihe of the change of direction by the US. President Donald Trump’s administration is taking a belligerent approach while the US National Security Strategy in December 2017 unmistakably labeled China a “revisionist power,” a strategic rival and for all practical purposes, from the Pentagon’s point of view, a top threat.

    Instead, what the Beijing leadership identifies is what we could define, in Chinese culture terminology, as the “three threats.”

    A threat to their foreign policy concept for the coming decades, such as the Belt and Road Initiative, and a threat to China’s own integration drive centered on the three strategic zones of the Greater Bay Area, the Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei corridor and the Yangtze river delta. And, of course, a threat to the Chinese stock market.

    State media is still grappling on how to deal with it. The People’s Daily has, politely, defined the Trump administration’s strategy as “engagement plus containment.”

    China Global Television Network (CGTN) has played the soft power card by addressing a sarcastic letter to Trump. The network thanked him for uniting the rest of the world while forcing China to make its economic environment more seductive to foreign investment. The CGTN video subsequently “disappeared” from YouTube and Twitter.

    So, even as the leadership consensus may be this is all about containing China’s irresistible rise, and even considering the fog surrounding major Beijing decisions, it’s still possible to detect some fascinating nuances.

    No mercy

    For Trump, on the record, “trade wars are good and easy to win.” That reflects his fascination with the World Wrestling Entertainment (WWE) ethos. Trump, in this case, is The Undertaker bent on taking Xi to the woodshed. Xi is no more Mr. Nice Guy, Trump’s former “good friend.”

    So, Xi cannot possibly believe that galvanizing the crowd like superhero The Rock will save the day. The WWE is not about “win-win” – that is for losers. Now, it is no holds barred. Trump accuses China of US election interference: “Fools that are so focused on looking only at Russia should start also looking in another direction, China.”

    China’s military “adventurism” allows the Pentagon to come up with a Space Force. China is also barred from investing in US industries related to national security.

    The US response to the reach of the Belt and Roaf Initiative is to invest in the fuzzy “Indo-Pacific” – by committing a paltry $113 million in energy, infrastructure, and digital commerce. “Made in China 2025” is qualified as an absolute threat to “America First.”

    And China is increasingly depicted as “malign” – the buzzword of choice that makes Trump, in this case, fully aligned with the industrial-military-security-think tank complex.

    So, how to fight a cage match with no referee? Enter Sun Tzu, China’s legendary military strategist who wrote The Art of War. The first rule is simple: “All warfare is based on deception.” As in Beijing gearing up to negotiate both as a partner and a threat.

    ‘Outside barbarians’

    It will be long, it will be nasty, it will be protracted, going way beyond the talks this week in the US, which importantly do not feature Vice-President Wang “Firefighter” Qishan, a key player and Xi’s trusted consigliere. He is more useful coordinating long-term strategy in Beijing.

    Here, a quick flashback to the British Empire is in order. In 1793, during the first diplomatic mission to Beijing, led by Lord Macartney and received by Emperor Qianlong, the Brits quickly identified how the teeming markets of China posed a “threat” to Europe and the contemporary world trade system.

    China was self-sufficient at the time and exported to Europe goods such as silk, tea, textiles, porcelain. In fact, all the trimmings of the luxury market in a web of silk routes or an earlier version of the Belt and Road.

    But what did they import? Not much, apart from Siberian furs, some exotic food and ingredients for traditional Chinese medicine. Here is Emperor Qianlong comments: “The Celestial Empire possesses all things in prolific abundance and lacks no product within its borders. There is, therefore, no need to import the manufactures of outside barbarians in exchange for our own products.”

    We all know how that ended – gunboat diplomacy, the Opium Wars, Beijing being sacked in 1860, “unequal treaties” and the Chinese “century of humiliation.”

    All that still features deeply in the Chinese collective unconscious as much as the real roots of the current trade war. Deng Xiaoping’s brilliant strategy was to open China’s special economic zones or SEZs as unbeatable, low-cost production bases for Western and Asian multinationals.

    Deng offered the prime platform for the expansion of global capitalism. The inevitable consequence was a stampede of foreign direct investment (FDI), off-shoring and outsourcing.

    Now, compare it with key data supplied by China’s General Administration and Customs. In the first six months of this year, no less than 41.58% of China’s exports to the rest of the world came from American, European and Asian multinationals.

    There is no evidence corporate US – represented by multinational companies – is willing to sacrifice low production costs to “bring those jobs back.” Multinational companies also prize a devalued yuan because that keeps those low production costs down.

    Additionally, any Trump attack on “Made in China 2025” does not alter the fact that the world’s second-largest economy is relentlessly climbing up the manufacturing ladder. Eventually, it will overtake the US in technological innovation.

    As Zhigang Tao, director of the Institute for China and Global Development at Hong Kong University, pointed out, Beijing handed American capital the proverbial offer you can’t refuse – access to the Chinese market in exchange of technological transfer.

    “[In fact,] this technology-for-market-access strategy has worked extremely well, as evidenced by China’s rise in key industries including high-speed rail, aviation, automobiles and wind turbines,” Tao said.

    So, the next step should be an extension of the Tesla-in-Shanghai model.

    Class struggle?

    Seducing American capital to invest in China under more lenient rules may be only one aspect of a Sun Tzu maneuver for Beijing to defuse the trade war. Beidaihe certainly evaluated what might happen if this all goes wrong and becomes a hot trade war.

    A Hurricane Tariff would have the potential to devastate China’s employment and financial landscape and provoke high inflation and even a recession. Xi cannot possibly risk losing his de facto power base, which is not the Chinese proletariat, but the rising middle class on a frenetic consumption and global tourism binge.

    Add to that, the relentless working-class anger, already in full effect, according to the University of Utah’s Minqi Li. After all “Socialism with Chinese Characteristics” is hardly Marx.

    Proverbial Western myopia has been riffing about a China collapse for years. Yes, there is a possible debt bomb. Yes, China’s dependency on foreign sources of oil and gas is a recurrent nightmare. And yes, US-China relations are now unmistakably in Cold War territory, even without considering the South China Sea and Taiwan.

    But underestimating a rising power capable of planning a concerted global strategy in detail up to 2049 is foolish. Xi and Trump will have the chance to have a serious face-off on Nov. 30 at the G20 summit in Argentina.

    Trump may even bill it as a “win”, as in his summits with Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un. Sun Tzu, though, is waiting in the wings.

  • Trump: "I May Have To Get Involved" To Get To "Bottom Of Crooked Hillary Corruption"

    With his back against the well after longtime Trump Organization CFO Allen Weisselberg was granted immunity by US prosecutors one day after the National Enquirer’s David Packer received a similar deal, on Saturday morning Trump continued his attacks on Attorney General Jeff Sessions, accusing the former senator of not understanding “what is happening” at his Justice Department.

    In a pair of tweets Saturday morning, the president wrote that Sessions was allowing Mueller “and his gang of 17 Angry Dems” to have a “field day” at the Justice Department with his decision last year to recuse himself from the investigation into the Trump campaign.

    “Jeff Sessions said he wouldn’t allow politics to influence him only because he doesn’t understand what is happening underneath his command position. Highly conflicted Bob Mueller and his gang of 17 Angry Dems are having a field day as real corruption goes untouched. No Collusion!” the president wrote.

    Trump then quoted Sen. Lindsay Graham speaking about the possibility of a new attorney general, suggesting that the president may be considering Sessions’ firing.

    “Every President deserves an Attorney General they have confidence in. I believe every President has a right to their Cabinet, these are not lifetime appointments. You serve at the pleasure of the President,” Trump added, quoting Graham.

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    Trump’s criticism of Sessions had escalated in recent days after the guilty verdicts handed down in the trial of Paul Manafort and the guilty plea from Trump’s former attorney, Michael Cohen. In a rare statement on Thursday, Sessions appeared to rebuke Trump and pledged to remain untainted by political bias in his work at the agency. “While I am Attorney General, the actions of the Department of Justice will not be improperly influenced by political considerations. I demand the highest standards, and where they are not met, I take action,” Sessions said.

    It is unclear if Trump will fire his Attorney General; some media reports are suggesting that Trump may certainly try to do so, although probably not before the midterm elections.

    Trump then continued the attack on Twitter, and referenced a recent report by investigative journalist Paul Sperry according to which FBI Director James Comey was incorrect when he told Congress that the bureau had “reviewed all of the communications” from top Clinton aide Huma Abedin on her disgraced husband, and in fact “a technical glitch prevented FBI technicians from accurately comparing the new emails with the old emails. Only 3,077 of the 694,000 emails were directly reviewed for classified or incriminating information.”

    Citing Fox News, Trump tweeted that “The FBI only looked at 3000 of 675,000 Crooked Hillary Clinton Emails.” They purposely didn’t look at the disasters. This news is just out.“

    He then predicted that “we will soon be getting to the bottom of all of this corruption” involving “tens of thousands of Crooked Hillary Emails, many of which are REALLY BAD” and warned that “At some point I may have to get involved!”

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    “The FBI looked at less than 1%” of Crooked’s Emails!” Trump concluded.

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    With the Mueller probe getting a second wind, if not into Russian collusion then certainly into Trump’s allegedly illicit financial dealings, we expect that Trump will escalate his attempts at distraction; and with attacks on Syria no longer serving as a key distraction to the US population while Russian sanctions remain largely ignored, Trump may have no choice but to make good on his threat to “get involved” in cracking down on “crooked Hillary” and “getting to the bottom of all of the corruption” under his attorney Sessions.

    In either case, fireworks are assured.

  • Ebola Deaths In DRC Spike 21% In Four Days, Bordering Countries On High Alert

    The latest Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DNC) has claimed 67 lives, up from 55, according to Robert Redfield, director of the CDC. On Friday the WHO said that the virus has spread to an area of “high security risk,” and that ongoing local conflicts have made finding and monitoring infected people extremely difficult.

    “Really, in two weeks, we’ve gone from 24 cases to 105 cases,” said Redfield, who just returned from the hot zone where an outbreak centered in North Kivu is responsible for 105 confirmed or suspected cases, according to the Washington Post. There are currently 77 confirmed cases, 28 probable cases in which biological samples are not available for laboratory testing, while 3,000 people have received an experimental Ebola vaccine. 

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    Source: World Health Organiztion (WHO)

    Redfield said the rapid spread of the disease was primarily because many health workers at a hospital in the town of Mangina, where the outbreak started, contracted the virus after treating early patients without recognizing that they had Ebola. The disease spreads through contact with the bodily fluids of victims, putting health workers and patients’ family members at greatest risk, notes the Post.

    “In the next couple of weeks, we’ll have greater clarity,” about the scope of the outbreak, said Redfield. 

    In response, neighboring Uganda has beefed up precautions at the border, making it more difficult for the roughly 19,000 people who travel from Congo’s North Kivu province across the border into the Ugandan town of Mpondwe to shop at an open-air market. 

    Source: World Health Organiztion (WHO)

    Uganda is determined to keep the deadly hemorrhagic fever from spreading to its side of the border. Before travelers are allowed through, they must step in small tubs of chlorinated water to disinfect their shoes, and their temperatures are taken with no-touch thermometer guns aimed at their temples.

    Uganda moved quickly, imposing the precautions a week after the latest outbreak was declared Aug. 1. It has found six suspected cases at this crossing, but laboratory tests cleared them all. –WaPo

    “So far, we have not gotten any case of Ebola,” Ithungu Honorata, a nurse who oversees the screening effort, said Friday. “But we don’t want it to come to Uganda.”

    One bit of good news; two of the first 10 patients to receive an experimental Ebola treatment have recovered and have been released from isolation. 

    The two people received the mAb114 treatment isolated from a survivor of an Ebola outbreak in 1995. It was the first of five experimental treatments Congo approved for use in the outbreak that was declared on Aug. 1. The others are ZMapp, Remdesivir, Favipiravir and Regn3450 – 3471 – 3479. –WaPo

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  • John McCain Dead At 81

    Senator John McCain has died at the age of 81, according to the New York Times. The Republican congressman and two-time presidential candidate passed at 4:28 p.m. at his Arizona home on Saturday. 

    According to a statement from his office, Mr. McCain died at 4:28 p.m. local time. He had suffered from a malignant brain tumor, called a glioblastoma, for which he had been treated periodically with radiation and chemotherapy since its discovery in 2017. –NYT

    McCain’s family announced on Friday that the Senator had chosen to discontinue medical treatment for an aggressive form of brain cancer, a year after the Vietnam War hero announced his prognosis. 

    “John has surpassed expectations for his survival,” the family said, adding that the disease’s progression and McCain’s age, 81, had led him to stop treatment for the “aggressive glioblastoma.” “With his usual strength of will, he has now chosen to discontinue medical treatment,” the family said.

    Full statement below:

    “Last summer, Senator John McCain shared with Americans the news our family already knew: he had been diagnosed with an aggressive glioblastoma, and the prognosis was serious. In the year since, John has surpassed expectations for his survival. But the progress of disease and the inexorable advance of age render their verdict. With his usual strength of will, he has now chosen to discontinue medical treatment. Our family is immensely grateful for the support and kindness of all his caregivers over the last year, and for the continuing outpouring of concern and affection from John’s many friends and associates, and the many thousands of people who are keeping him in their prayers. God bless and thank you all.”

    His daughter, Meghan McCain tweeted:

    My family is deeply appreciative of all the love and generosity you have shown us during this past year. Thank you for all your continued support and prayers. We could not have made it this far without you – you’ve given us strength to carry on.

    McCain, a harsh critic of President Trump who hand-delivered the controversial “Steele dossier” to FBI Director James Comey, returned to the Senate in July 2017 after emergency brain surgery to become the deciding vote that killed the GOP’s repeal of the Affordable Care Act. 

    McCain specifically requested that President Trump not attend his funeral, instead insisting that Vice President Mike Pence attend the service in Washington’s National Cathedral. 

    His intimates have informed the White House that their current plan for his funeral is for Vice President Mike Pence to attend the service to be held in Washington’s National Cathedral but not President Trump, with whom Mr. McCain has had a rocky relationship. –NYT

    Meanwhile, McCain associates have been quietly spreading the word that they want a “McCain person” to eventually fill his Senate seat – “a roster that includes his wife, Cindy.“

    The matter of succession for the McCain seat — a topic of such intense discussion that Republicans officials here joke that Washington lawyers know Arizona election law better than any attorney in the state — is officially verboten among party officials and the senator’s friends. They are determined to reward him with the same good ending that his friend Senator Edward M. Kennedy enjoyed before he succumbed to brain cancer in 2009.

    In May, Frank Bruni detailed in the NYT the Arizona Senator’s battles with President Trump – who McCain has criticized for his “half-baked, spurious nationalism.

    The son and grandson of four-star admirals, McCain was shot down over Hanoi during Vietnam, suffering broken limbs and enduring torture for approximately two years. 

    McCain lost the 2000 GOP nomination to George W. Bush and the 2008 US election to Barack Obama – admitting that he regretted picking Alaska Governor Sarah Palin over Joe Lieberman. 

    A lifelong war hawk, McCain strongly advocated for military action in several countries, including; Iraq, Syria, Kosovo, North Korea, Afghanistan and Iran. McCain supported the Al-Qaeda-aligned Free Syrian Army, calling for arming them with heavy weapons in order to overthrow Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. 

    The New York Times has published a comprehensive eulogy / biography here.

    Several statements have been issued in response to McCain’s death: 

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    Via Axios: 

    Former Vice President Joe Biden said, “McCain will cast a long shadow. His impact on America hasn’t ended. Not even close. It will go on for many years to come.”

    Senator Lindsey Graham, one of McCain’s closest friends in the Senate, tweeted: “America and Freedom have lost one of her greatest champions ….And I’ve lost one of my dearest friends and mentor.”

    Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer announced he wants to rename one of the Senate office buildings after McCain:

    “Nothing will overcome the loss of Senator McCain, but so that generations remember him I will be introducing a resolution to rename the Russell building after him.”

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  • Andrew Cuomo & The Chronic Existential Anxiety Of The White Male Democrat

    Authored by John Derbyshire via Unz.com,

    Andrew Cuomo, Governor of my home state of New York, was speaking in Manhattan on Wednesday, signing a bill to make sex trafficking a felony in the state. He made a now-famous gaffe, which says a great deal about the state of the modern Democratic Party.

    But first, just a word about sex trafficking.

    Kidnapping vulnerable young girls and renting them out for sex is a flourishing business down among the urban underclass. The Pakistani pimps of Rotherham and other English cities are the best-known cases, but plenty of it goes on here in the U.S.A., too. As in England, it’s very much an ethnic affair here, although news reports tie themselves in pretzels trying to obscure the fact. [Inside New York’s silent sex trafficking epidemic, NYPost, April 17, 2018] There’s an immigration angle, too; a lot of the women being trafficked here are illegal aliens from Mexico, Central America, and Asia.

    It’s a problem in New York, and our legislators figured we need a new law to deal with it. I find it hard to believe that the laws we already have on kidnapping, prostitution, and abuse of minors are not adequate to deal with the issue; but hey, it’s an election year, Cuomo’s up for re-election as governor, and signing a new law is good show business.

    So there was Cuomo doing the soft-shoe shuffle. Our Governor is a sort of grandee of the Democratic Party: son of a former three-term Governor, ex-husband of a Kennedy gal.

    But I should say that the phrase “Democratic Party” in my last sentence refers to the oldDemocratic Party, the party of FDR, JFK, Bill Clinton and John Kerry. Andrew Cuomo, like those other names, is a white guy of European ancestry. Like other white guys in his party, Cuomo has the uncomfortable feeling that the ground is moving under his feet—that the Democratic Party is turning into something different from what it has been though his, and my, lifetime.

    As a result, the Governor is nursing some serious political insecurities. Is the Democratic Party still a party for him, for white guys? Or is it on its way to being a party for women, blacks, mestizos, and sexual eccentrics?

    Naturally the guy is nervous. He is, as I said, up for re-election in the fall; and before that, next month, he faces off in a Democratic primary against TV actress Cynthia Nixon.

    Nobody thinks Ms. Nixon has much of a chance of becoming the Democrat nominee for Governor in the fall, but that’s not really the point. The point is that in Andrew Cuomo’s eyes, and the eyes of old white male heterosexual Democrats like him, Cynthia Nixon looks like the future while he looks like the past. Ms. Nixon is female, homosexual, and wa-a-a-ay out on the political Left. She makes our poor governor feel like a relic.

    Don’t place any bets against Cuomo. He’s a skillful politician with the state party in his pocket. He’ll get the nomination, then he’ll win re-election in November. Our state is mostly Republican; but the wee bit that isn’t includes New York City, which has close to half the state’s population … enough said.

    Still the guy’s nervous. He was also a little rattled, earlier this week—before the Wednesday bill-signing event—he was a little rattled by President Trump having been in the state on Monday, at a fundraiser for the state Republican Party. At that event our President speculated that maybe Cuomo wants to run for President in 2020. “Please do it, please,” said the President mockingly. [Trump dares NY Gov. Cuomo to run against him in 2020, says ‘anybody that runs against Trump suffers’, By Alex Pappas, Fox News, August 13, 2018] The Governor doesn’t like to be mocked, any more than you or I do.

    So when Cuomo stepped up on Wednesday to sign this bill against sex trafficking, he was both suffering from chronic existential anxiety about the direction of his party andrattled by Trump’s Monday remark. Under those stresses, his self-control slipped, and he spoke unwisely.

    What he actually said was:

    We’re not going to make America great again. It was never that great. We have not reached greatness, we will reach greatness when every American is fully engaged, we will reach greatness when discrimination and stereotyping against women, 51 percent of our population, is gone and every woman’s full potential is realized and unleashed and every woman is making her full contribution.

    [Andrew Cuomo shocks crowd, says America ‘was never that great’, by Adam Shaw, August 1, 2018]

    Now, taken on face value, that’s gibberish. Men and women are biologically different; they are never going to exhibit identical profiles on every kind of behavior, achievement, or social outcome. As for “discrimination”: Well, someone should ask the governor why, if women are “51 percent of our population,” they are 56 percent of college students but less than seven percent of federal prison inmates.

    But that’s giving the Governor’s words more respect than they deserve. He’s not making observations about real things in the real world; he’s a politician sending out signals to likely voters. The signal there was:

    “I’m not a part of that rotten old patriarchy trying to keep women down. I am cool and up-to-date with the newDemocratic Party, which is absolutely not a party of straight old white guys.”

    But Cuomo just went a bit too far, saying that America “was never that great.” It’s a logical thing for a Progressive to think. American society in the past had imperfections and injustices; therefore we shouldn’t talk about it having been great; that’s the Progressive mentality.

    What it misses is, that all societies everywhere have imperfections and injustices, and this will always be so. The U.S.A. was, and is, great because it had, and has, fewer imperfections and injustices than other nations. That’s why so many people—so many millions, tens of millions of people—wanted, and want, to come and live here.

    I got to know the U.S.A. during its Golden Age—the third quarter of the 20th century—and mostly from outside: I grew up in England, didn’t actually get here until 1973. Boy, America was great! —free, rich, victorious, generous, creative…Britain was in imperial decline, half of Europe was under the Soviet yoke, Africa was sinking into post-colonial chaos, India and Pakistan were at loggerheads, South America was run by buffoons like Juan Perón, and in China tens of millions were starving to death under the crudest, cruellest kind of totalitarian dictatorship.

    America was great—with very restricted immigration and men mostly running things. We had imperfections, sure; but by comparison with any other country at that time…Well, there was no comparison. We were the greatest.

    The Progressive vision is narrow, provincial, and present-centric. The past, according to them, was bad; the present is just tolerable; the future will be radiant.

    That is no basis for policy. There are good reasons to think that if we don’t get a grip on mass immigration, America’s future will be Venezuela. There are good reasons to think that if the insulting and belittling of men under labels like “toxic masculinity” keeps going, the things that men do better than women—leadership, risk-taking, science, engineering—won’t get done, or will get done elsewhere, not in America.

    Whether Andrew Cuomo understands any of that, I don’t know. He has to pretend notto understand it because of the threat from his Left—from people like Cynthia Nixon, who surely don’t understand it.

    That is the dilemma of white men in the Democratic Party today. They deserve it.

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