They say history is a great teacher — but only to those who are willing to learn. China’s continuing bullheadedness in building artificial islands in the disputed maritime territories in the South China Sea is growing more and more reminiscent of Adolf Hitler’s maneuvers before the outbreak of World War II, moving into Czechoslovakia on […]
SINGAPORE—A senior Chinese naval commander has claimed new islands his country is building in the South China Sea will benefit the region, while stressing that such activities “fall well within the scope of China’s sovereignty.” Read more: http://www.wsj.com/articles/chinese-military-official-defends-island-building-in-south-china-sea-1433045698
The Philippines and the United States are putting up a defensive line meant to prevent China from punching through to the Pacific and threatening American military real estate in Guam, analysts say. The US will be able to use at least eight military bases in the Philippines where it can rotate its troops, planes and ships, […]
After a months-long row over Beijing’s island-building in the South China Sea, the United States and China were relatively restrained at Asia’s top security forum this weekend, but no closer to any solution. U.S. Defense Secretary Ash Carter told the Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore that China was threatening security in the region with its maritime […]
Australia has urged China and south-east Asian countries squabbling over territory in the South China Sea to sign a code of conduct immediately. The defence minister, Kevin Andrews, issued a veiled swipe at China during a speech to an Asia Pacific security summit in Singapore on Sunday. “We are particularly concerned at the prospect of […]
Is China starting down a path similar to that followed by Japan and Germany before 1945, when nationalism backed by new economic clout led to overconfidence and adventures which eventually proved disastrous? The question needs asking in the context of China’s latest moves ultimately aimed at making the South China Sea into a Chinese lake. […]
SINGAPORE — China’s land reclamation in the South China Sea is out of step with international rules, and turning underwater land into airfields won’t expand its sovereignty, Defense Secretary Ash Carter told an international security conference Saturday, stepping up America’s condemnation of the communist giant as Beijing officials sat in the audience. Carter told the […]
SINGAPORE – Vietnam’s deputy defence minister said on Saturday that reports China had placed mobile artillery weapons on a reclaimed island in the disputed South China Sea were, if true, a very worrying development. “If it has actually happened it is a very bad sign for what is already a very complicated situation in the […]
Japan’s Minister of Defense has warned that land reclamation projects in the South China Sea risked plunging the region into disorder and has urged nations, including China, to behave responsibly. Gen Nakatani said “If we leave any unlawful situation unattended, order will soon turn to disorder, and peace and stability will collapse,” “I hope and expect […]
The drumbeat of war on distant horizons is reverberating through Southeast Asia with increasingly strong declarations of U.S. determination to stop the Chinese from expanding their writ over the South China Sea, notably islands claimed by the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia and Brunei. While Defense Secretary Ashton Carter was in Singapore vowing that U.S. planes and […]