Beijing responds to landmark ruling on the South China Sea by landing airliners on militarized islets

Beijing responds to landmark ruling on the South China Sea by landing airliners on militarized islets

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler UNITED NATIONS — In a major legal setback for Beijing, an international tribunal has rejected and rebuffed many of Mainland China’s claims regarding exclusive sovereignty and rights in the disputed South China Sea. The landmark ruling in the Hague, by the Permanent Court of Arbitration stated there was […]

View from Taipei: U.S. ‘pivot to Asia’ strategy will require muscle, not just diplomacy

View from Taipei: U.S. ‘pivot to Asia’ strategy will require muscle, not just diplomacy

Special to WorldTribune.com By Parris H. Chang Foreign policy is an integrated structure of assumptions, objectives and means. Critics of American foreign policy contend that the decisive factor of the failure of U.S. policy toward China has been the imbalance between political ends and military means. Professor Tang Tsou’s classical study “America’s Failure in China […]

Washington’s growing China problem is becoming impossible to ignore

Washington’s growing China problem is becoming impossible to ignore

Special to WorldTribune.com By Sol W. Sanders The U.S.’ confrontation with an increasingly powerful and incipiently aggressive China is getting much more complicated. There is no question of its high priority among the U.S.’ foreign policy issues. But were you a Chinese strategist attempting to measure an American opponent’s intentions, the contradictory U.S. positions might […]

China deploys missile system to disputed S. China Sea island

China deploys missile system to disputed S. China Sea island

Special to WorldTribune.com Satellite images show China has deployed the advanced HQ-9 surface-to-air missile system to a disputed island in the South China Sea. Taiwanese and U.S. officials confirmed that batteries of the HQ-9 surface-to-air missile launchers were set up on Woody Island in the Paracels chain, according to a report by Reuters. China, Taiwan […]

Democratic Taiwan: More important than ever after failed U.S. ‘pivot to Asia’

Democratic Taiwan: More important than ever after failed U.S. ‘pivot to Asia’

Special to WorldTribune.com By Sol W. Sanders Largely ignored by the mainstream media, the Jan. 15 Taiwan elections have enormous implications not only for the Island’s 25 million people, but for China – and the U.S. Ironically, the election of the Democratic Progressive Party [DPP] leader, Tsai Ing-wen, a woman at that — reinstalled a […]

Taiwan’s ‘strawberry generation’ rejects pro-China party

Taiwan’s ‘strawberry generation’ rejects pro-China party

Special to WorldTribune.com The landslide victory for Taiwan’s Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) over the pro-China Kuomintang, (Nationalist Party) in the Jan. 16 elections was driven by the nation’s youthful “strawberry generation.” It was a particularly satisfying victory for Taiwan’s youth movement, who had been written off by their elders as soft, self-satisfied and apathetic – […]

2016: Light vs darkness, time to solve Syria, opportunity in Latin America, rising China threat

2016: Light vs darkness, time to solve Syria, opportunity in Latin America, rising China threat

Special to WorldTribune.com By John J. Metzler NEW YORK — It’s time to consult the crystal snow globe for a look at both the likely and unexpected events which will shape the New Year. Serious strife both in the Middle East, and Africa to a lesser extent, have expanded leading to a culture of conflict […]

Best of Lev, 2012: China demonstrating will to dominate as West loses the will to resist

Best of Lev, 2012:  China demonstrating will to dominate as West loses the will to resist

Lev Navrozov From Moscow, the capital of the slave country founded in 1917, I came to New York, to the 21st floor of a skyscraper. The owners of the slave country had created their radio and television and even their own art and philosophy — in short, they created a new culture, with inevitable shortcomings. […]

As U.S. ‘pivots’ to East Asia, Taiwan is drifting into Beijing’s orbit

As U.S. ‘pivots’ to East Asia, Taiwan is drifting into Beijing’s orbit

Sol W. Sanders   TAIPEI – The U.S.’ 50-year-old alliance with [Formosa] Taiwan is eroding slowly but surely in the face of Beijing’s siren call and growing indifference of the Obama administration. Yet at a moment when U.S. strategy ostensibly calls for a “pivot” toward Asia, the de facto alliance could never have been more […]

A modest solution to the China-Japan dispute over islands: They belong to Taiwan

A modest solution to the China-Japan dispute over islands: They belong to Taiwan

Special to WorldTribune.com By Sol W. Sanders TAIPEI – Annette Lu Hsiu-lien, former Taiwan vice president, proposes a demilitarized settlement of the East China islands flash point between China and Japan. In an interview with WorldTribune, Lu claimed Taiwan actually has the best claim to the Diaoyutai/Senkaku chain of uninhabited islands. Although China seems to […]