Special to WorldTribune.com Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe has turned down China’s invitation to a military parade next week marking the end of World War II. Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga told reporters on Aug. 24 the decision was made because of Abe’s parliamentary schedule, but many observers believe it had more to do with […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com SEOUL — Maybe Japan’s Prime Minister, Shinzo Abe, should have kept his mouth shut. No matter what he might have said on the 70th anniversary of the Japanese surrender, he would be the target of intensive criticism. The fact is the Japanese are done with apologizing for World […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com SEOUL — The looming 70th anniversary of the Japanese surrender and Korea’s ”liberation” reminds us of the dangers of new wars in a region where peace may be a fleeting phenomenon. North Korea, writhing under the humiliation of the failure of “Great Leader” Kim Il-Sung’s invasion of the […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com The temptation to slash defense spending is overwhelming. Why worry about huge standing forces overseas when they’re not deployed much except on military exercises and war games that are repetitious and boring? Easy to say, but the U.S. had only 500 advisers in South Korea when the North […]
Special to WorldTribune.com China issued a warning to Japan after parliament in Tokyo passed two landmark bills allowing Japanese troops to fight abroad for the first time since World War II, 70 years ago. China plans to mark the end of World War II in the Pacific theater with a large-scale military parade even though […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com It’s a time for anniversaries and memories of the tragedies that have afflicted Northeast Asia over the past century. On Tuesday, the Japanese remembered the horror of the single worst battle in Asian history, the three-month struggle for Okinawa. The battle ended with the final defeat of the […]
Special to WorldTribune.com by Dr. Jack Caravelli, Geostrategy-Direct The retrenchment of U.S. foreign policy under Barack Obama is triggering major changes in relations with formerly stout allies around the globe. In Europe, Asia and the Middle East, trust in the Obama administration among U.S. allies is at an all-time low and reflected in numerous policy […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Donald Kirk, East-Asia-Intel.com The stakes are escalating in the contest for Northeast Asia. North Korea’s got nukes and lots of missiles, most recently maybe the SLBM for submarine-launched ballistic missile. The U.S. has glistening new hardware too. THAAD, Terminal High-Altitude Area Defense, the missile system for Star Wars, is capable, they […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Miles Yu, Geostrategy-Direct.com With Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s week-long high-profile visit to the United States, a new global U.S. partnership is emerging that could replace the U.S. “special relationship” with Britain, which is fading fast with London’s rapid retreat to isolationism and global insignificance. The formation of this new strategic […]
Special to WorldTribune.com By Willy Lam, EastAsiaIntel.com The Xi Jinping administration’s aggressive power projection in the South China Sea could deal a frontal blow to Beijing’s “peripheral diplomacy,” which is supposed to improve the country’s relations with neighbors in the Asia-Pacific Region. The Xi leadership has redoubled reclamation efforts in several islets and rocks in […]