Hong Kong Protests: Fading Foreign Tantrum, Not Genuine Revolution

September 27, 2019 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - Just as unfolded in 2014 during the so-called "Umbrella protests" or "Occupy Central" movement, a growing backlash has begun across Hong Kong against US-funded protests that have attempted to disrupt governance and commerce as part of a floundering movement to maintain Western influence in the region.

The Sydney Morning Herald in its article, "Triads linked to violent pro-China gangs as Hong Kong protests enter dangerous new phase," ignored weeks of violence carried out by US-backed protests in Hong Kong, and portrayed locals retaliating as "violent pro-China gangs." It should be pointed out that Hong Kong is in China.

The article claims:

Turbulence in Hong Kong has reached a dangerous new phase, analysts say, amid escalating violence and the failure of Chief Executive Carrie Lam to respond to the political crisis. 

Television broadcasts on Monday were dominated by scenes of white-shirted men believed to be triad members caning and chasing train commuters as they hunted for democracy protesters on Sunday evening. People screamed as the gangs entered train carriages at Yuen Long station.

Having failed to attract wider public support, US-backed protesters have begun resorting to increasingly disruptive activities including raiding government buildings, storming commercial districts to intimidate visitors from mainland China and even targeting public transportation.

Backlash Follows Weeks of Violence and Vandalism by Pro-Western Protests

Before the SMH's "violent pro-China gangs" showed up, US-backed protesters had admittedly stormed Hong Kong's Legislative Council (LegCo) building.

The BBC in its article, "Hong Kong police evict protesters who stormed parliament," admitted:

Activists had occupied the Legislative Council (LegCo) building for hours after breaking away from a protest on the anniversary of Hong Kong's transfer of sovereignty to China from Britain.

The BBC also admitted the protesters carried out vandalism inside the building:

Inside, they defaced the emblem of Hong Kong in the central chamber, raised the old British colonial flag, spray-painted messages across the walls, and shattered furniture.

The Financial Times in their article, "Hong Kong protesters target Chinese government office," mentioned another government building targeted by the protesters, the Liaison Office for Hong Kong representing Beijing. The article reported:

Demonstrators spray-painted over the lenses of security cameras in front of the building and one threw an egg that splattered on its glass facade. Others wrote graffiti on a wall including an insult against China, and defaced lettering on the building’s gate.

The Guardian attempted to conceal the nature of the protests in its article, "Hong Kong protest ends in chaotic clashes between police and demonstrators," which was ultimately about protesters targeting a shopping centre popular with mainland visitors.

The article would claim:

Violent clashes have erupted between Hong Kong police and protesters at the end of a peaceful demonstration against the controversial extradition bill. The incidents took place late on Sunday in a bustling town between Hong Kong island and the border with China. 

The scene descended into chaos shortly before 10pm local time (1400 GMT), after riot police chased protesters into a shopping centre in Sha Tin.

However, the Financial Times in its article, "Hong Kong protesters try to woo Chinese tourists to their cause," admitted the protesters intentionally targeted the shopping centre rather than merely being "chased into it." The article admits:

Hong Kong protesters against a controversial extradition bill for the first time targeted a busy shopping district popular with mainland Chinese tourists in an attempt to raise awareness of the issue across the border.

A recently built high-speed train station connecting Hong Kong with mainland China was also targeted. AFP-JIJI in its article, "Hong Kong protesters march on station to get message across to visiting Chinese mainlanders," would admit:

Tens of thousands of anti-government protesters on Sunday rallied outside a controversial train station linking the territory to the Chinese mainland, the latest mass show of anger as activists try to keep pressure on the city’s pro-Beijing leaders. 

The US-backed protesters have also targeted journalists. The New York Times in its article, "Hong Kong Protesters’ New Target: A News Station Seen as China’s Friend," attempted to defend the targeting of journalists perceived as being "pro-Beijing" claiming:

The confrontation on Wednesday, when the TVB journalist was surrounded, was not an isolated incident. Last month, protesters heckled another TVB video journalist, unfurling umbrellas to block his camera and chanting, “TVB news, selling out the people of Hong Kong!”

The New York Times fails to mention that opposition media is almost exclusively funded and supported from abroad, particularly out of Washington DC. If Beijing has no say or influence in Hong Kong, territory literally within its own borders, what say does Washington have so many thousands of miles away?

Together, the increasingly disruptive behaviour of the protesters coupled with growing violence and overt endorsement and even support being provided by the United States and other foreign interests, are attempting to target and impact virtually every aspect of life in Hong Kong linked to stability, peace and prosperity.

If the United States cannot maintain Hong Kong as its foothold inside Chinese territory and enjoy the benefits of its prosperity, no one else will either.

Chinese-Thai Military Cooperation Expanding

September 18, 2019 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - Recent news of Bangkok signing a 6.5 billion Thai Baht deal with China to procure a naval landing ship (a landing platform dock or LPD) further illustrates growing ties between Beijing and Bangkok in the sphere of military matters.

The Thai Royal Navy's only other ship of similar capabilities is the HTMS Angthong, built by Singapore, Bangkok Post reported.

The deal comes in the wake of several other significant arms acquisitions made by Bangkok in recent years including 39 Chinese-built VT-4 main battle tanks (with another batch of 14 being planned), China's Type-85 armoured personnel carriers and even the nation's first modern submarine made by China expected to be in service by 2023.

These are more than merely arms deals. The purchasing of sophisticated weapons systems like submarines and ships will require closer military cooperation between Beijing and Bangkok in order to properly train crews, transfer critical knowledge of maintaining the vessels and operate them at sea.

There are also joint Thai-Chinese weapon development programmes such as the DTI-1 multiple rocket launcher system.

The interoperability that is being created between Thai and Chinese armed forces (and arms industries) ensures ample opportunity for joint training exercises and weapon development programmes in the future, several of which have already been organised, with many more on the horizon.

The Myth of Thai Subservience to Washington 

Thailand is often labeled a close "non-NATO ally" of the United States by both the United States itself and many analysts still clinging to Cold War rhetoric.

However, today's Thailand is a nation that has significantly expanded its cooperation with China and not only in military matters, but across economic spheres as well.

Thailand's lengthy history of weathering Western colonisation that otherwise consumed its neighbours is a story of adeptly playing great powers against one another and ensuring no single nation held enough power or influence over Thailand to endanger its sovereignty. This is a balancing act that continues today, with Thailand avoiding major confrontations and overdependence on outsiders by attempting to cultivate a diversity of ties with nations abroad.

Thai cooperation with nations like the United States, particularly now, is done cynically and as a means to keep the US from investing too deeply in the disruptive regime-change methods it has aimed at other nations including neighbouring Myanmar but also distant nations like Syria and Libya ravaged by US meddling.

Despite these efforts to appease Washington, the US still backs opposition parties determined to overthrow the current Thai political order and replace it with one openly intent on rolling back progress between Thailand and its growing list of Eurasian partners, especially China.

What little the US has to offer has been reduced to deals bordering bribery, such as offering free military hardware.

US is Behind Hong Kong Protests Says US Policymaker

September 10, 2019 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - The US continues to deny any involvement in ongoing unrest in China's special administrative region of Hong Kong.

However, even a casual look at US headlines or comments made by US politicians makes it clear the unrest not only suits US interests, but is spurred on almost exclusively by them.

The paradoxical duality of nearly open support of the unrest and denial of that support has led to headlines like the South China Morning Post's, "Mike Pompeo rebukes China’s ‘ludicrous’ claim US is behind Hong Kong protests." The article claims:

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo has said it is “ludicrous” for China to claim the United States is behind the escalating protests in Hong Kong. 

Pompeo rebuked Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying, who had claimed violent clashes in the city prompted by opposition to the Hong Kong government’s controversial extradition bill were “the work of the US”.

However, even US policymakers have all but admitted that the US is funnelling millions of dollars into Hong Kong specifically to support "programs" there. The Hudson Institute in an article titled, "China Tries to Blame US for Hong Kong Protests," would admit:

A Chinese state-run newspaper’s claim that the United States is helping pro-democracy protesters in Hong Kong is only partially inaccurate, a top foreign policy expert said Monday. 

Michael Pillsbury, senior fellow at the Hudson Institute, told Fox News National Security Analyst KT McFarland the U.S. holds some influence over political matters in the region.

 The article would then quote Pillsbury as saying:

We have a large consulate there that’s in charge of taking care of the Hong Kong Policy Act passed by Congress to insure democracy in Hong Kong, and we have also funded millions of dollars of programs through the National Endowment for Democracy [NED] … so in that sense the Chinese accusation is not totally false.

A visit to the NED's website reveals an entire section of declared funding for Hong Kong specifically. The wording for program titles and their descriptions is intentionally ambiguous to give those like US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo plausible deniability.

However, deeper research reveals NED recipients are literally leading the protests.

The South China Morning Post in its article, "Hong Kong protests: heavy jail sentences for rioting will not solve city’s political crisis, former Civil Human Rights Front convenor says," would report:

Johnson Yeung Ching-yin, from the Civil Human Rights Front, was among 49 people arrested during Sunday’s protest – deemed illegal as it had not received police approval – in Central and Western district on Hong Kong Island.

The article would omit mention of Johnson Yeung Ching-yin's status as an NED fellow. His profile is - at the time of this writing - still accessible on the NED's official website, and the supposed NGO he works for in turn works hand-in-hand with US and UK-based fronts involved in supporting Hong Kong's current unrest and a much wider anti-Beijing political agenda.

Johnson Yeung Ching-yin also co-authored an op-ed in the Washington Post with Joshua Wong titled, "As you read this, Hong Kong has locked one of us away."

Wong has travelled to Washington DC multiple times, including to receive "honors" from NED-subsidiary Freedom House for his role in leading unrest in 2014 and to meet with serial regime-change advocate Senator Marco Rubio.

Southeast Asia Ignores US War on Huawei

September 7, 2019 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - The Western media has begun complaining about Southeast Asia's collective decision to move forward with 5G network technology from Chinese telecom giant Huawei despite US demands that nations ban all Huawei products.

These demands are predicated on clearly fabricated security threats surrounding Huawei technology. The US itself is a global leader of producing hardware with hidden backdoors and other security flaws for the purpose of spying worldwide.

Instead, the US is clearly targeting the telecom giant as part of a wider campaign to cripple China economically and contain its ability to contest US global hegemony.

Media Disinformation Serves the War on Huawei 

 Articles like Reuters' "Thailand launches Huawei 5G test bed, even as U.S. urges allies to bar Chinese gear," in title alone confounds informed readers.

The article's author, Patpicha Tanakasempipat, fails to explain in which ways the US is "allies" with any of the nations of Southeast Asia, including Thailand. The history of US activity in Southeast Asia has been one of coercion, interference, intervention, colonisation and protracted war.

As US power has faded, it has resorted to "soft power," with its most recent "pivot to Asia" being accompanied by several failed attempts to overthrow regional governments and replace them with suitable proxies.

Considering this, and a complete lack of suitable US alternatives to Huawei's products, there is little mystery as to why the region as a whole has ignored US demands regarding Huawei.

The article claims:

Thailand launched a Huawei Technologies 5G test bed on Friday, even as the United States urges its allies to bar the Chinese telecoms giant from building next-generation mobile networks.

Huawei, the world’s top producer of telecoms equipment and second-biggest maker of smartphones, has been facing mounting international scrutiny amid fears China could use its equipment for espionage, a concern the company says is unfounded.

Patpicha fails categorically to cite any evidence substantiating US claims. She also fails categorically to point out that there is in fact a glaring lack of evidence behind US claims, just as many other articles across the Western media have predictably and purposefully done.

Vietnam, the Outlier 

The one exception in Southeast Asia is Vietnam. It has sidestepped considering Huawei in favour of US-based Qualcomm and Scandinavian companies Nokia and Ericsson. While the Vietnamese government said its decision was based on technical concerns rather than geopolitics, a Bloomberg article quoted the CEO of state-owned telecom concern, Viettel Group, who claimed:

We are not going to work with Huawei right now. It’s a bit sensitive with Huawei now. There were reports that it’s not safe to use Huawei. So Viettel’s stance is that, given all this information, we should just go with the safer ones. So we choose Nokia and Ericsson from Europe.

The same article would also cite supposed experts who claim Vietnam seeks closer ties with the US in countering China's growing stature upon the global stage, and ultimately folded to US demands because of this.

This however is unlikely. Vietnam - among all of Southeast Asia's nations - is not an "ally" of Washington.

The US waged a bloody war against Vietnam at the cost of 4 million lives. The nation still bears the burden of chemical warfare through persistent birth defects as well as swaths of land covered in unexploded ordnance. To this day the US maintains a stable of opposition groups it funds to pressure and coerce the Vietnamese government. The US also invests in groups fanning anti-Chinese sentiment inside Vietnam.

Considering this, Vietnam, by spurning Huawei at the moment, is more likely cynically playing the US and China off one another with this particular move aimed at currying leverage over Beijing and favour with Washington, while at other junctures, Vietnam has made moves to gain leverage over Washington while cultivating closer ties with Beijing.

Not Just Thailand

The same Bloomberg article would note:

Vietnam’s decision to shun Huawei appears to make it an outlier in Southeast Asia, where other countries such as the Philippines, Thailand and Malaysia are open to deploying Huawei’s technology.

The irony of this is that the Philippines in particular has been touted by Washington as one of its key partners in provoking China over its claims in the South China Sea. Not only has Manila repeatedly sabotaged or undermined Washington's efforts in the South China Sea deciding to bilaterally deal with Beijing instead and without US help, it is now openly ignoring US demands to dump Huawei technology.

Hong Kong Crisis: Made in America

August 25, 2019 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Claims that Western interests are driving unrest in Hong Kong to undermine China have been decried across the Western media as "fake news," "disinformation," and even grounds for censorship from platforms like Facebook and Twitter.

Yet a look at the organizations directly involved in leading the unrest and those supporting it reveals unequivocally that it originates in Washington DC - not organically from within Hong Kong itself.

In order to conceal this fact, the Western media has attempted to portray the unrest as "leaderless." Yet coordinated protests most certainly have both leaders and organizations directing the majority of the movement's decisions as well as providing the logistical support necessary for the sustained unrest Hong Kong now faces.

Who is Leading Hong Kong's Unrest

Despite repeated and unrealistic claims that Hong Kong's recent protests are "leaderless," they are clearly being led by a combination of opposition political parties, supporting fronts posing as nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and foreign-funded media organizations.

Even partial admissions of this fact can be found throughout Western coverage of these supposed "leaderless" protests.

Hong Kong Indigenous: A July 2019 Quartz article titled, "The leader of Hong Kong’s leaderless protest movement is a philosophy student behind bars," would admit:

...there is one person to whom many protesters have turned to for inspiration and guidance, even though he hasn’t been physically present at any of the demonstrations: jailed activist Edward Leung.

The article also reports:

Over the past two to three weeks, protesters have also begun to march with placards of Leung’s face. Meanwhile, Leung’s 2016 election slogan (link in Chinese)—”Reclaim Hong Kong! Revolution of our times!”—has roared back in full force, quickly becoming the clarion call of the current wave of protests.

Edward Leung is a leading figure of the Hong Kong Indigenous political party which holds zero seats in either of Hong Kong's elected legislative bodies.

While Quartz describes Leung's "localism" movement as emphasizing "Hong Kong identity as separate to mainland Chinese" and openly advocating "Hong Kong's independence from China," the "localism" movement itself is by no means independent.

In a 2016 South China Morning Post article titled, "‘Not some kind of secret meeting’: Hong Kong Indigenous leaders meet with American diplomats," Edward Leung and fellow Hong Kong Indigenous member Ray Wong would attempt to explain why they were caught secretly meeting with US consulate staff in Hong Kong.

The article would claim:

The photos, published by news website Bastille Post on Wednesday night, showed three members of the group – including Edward Leung Tin-kei and Ray Wong Toi-yeung – meeting two consulate staffers. The quintet reportedly chatted for around an hour and a half, speaking in Putonghua at times, before going their separate ways.

Some mainland media and Chief Executive Leung Chun-ying have both claimed that there were foreign forces behind the city’s pro-democracy protests of 2014.

Today, Edward Leung encourages protesters from jail, including members of his political party to continue sowing unrest across Hong Kong.

Hong Kong Free Press - itself a foreign-backed media platform admittedly partners with US-UK government-funded fronts including PEN Hong Kong - would admit in an article titled, "Jailed Hong Kong activist Edward Leung urges protesters to focus on convincing those who oppose them," that Leung has been writing letters addressed to the protesters - who in turn carry his portrait around in the streets and have used his 2014 protest slogan during recent unrest. 

Ray Wong has since fled Hong Kong being granted asylum in Germany, the South China Morning Post would report in their article, "Hong Kong activists wanted over Mong Kok riots granted asylum in Germany."

In every instance, Hong Kong Indigenous has been supported by the United States and its European partners. Holding no elected seats in Hong Kong's government and thus in no way representing the will of the people of Hong Kong, Hong Kong Indigenous instead represents Washington's ambitions of maintaining Hong Kong as a foothold in and a pressure point against China.

Demosisto Party: Having held only one seat in Hong Kong's elected legislative bodies - Demosisto is also playing an active role in leading and directing recent protests. Its secretary general - Joshua Wong - is openly involved in leading current protests.

Wong was also a prominent figure during the 2014 "Umbrella Revolution," and was invited to Washington DC by National Endowment for Democracy (NED) subsidiary - Freedom House - to collect an award for his role in leading the unrest .

On Freedom House's own website, a post titled, "Freedom House marks its 75th anniversary by honoring three generations of Hong Kong democracy leaders: Joshua Wong, Benny Tai and Martin C. M. Lee," would praise Wong, claiming:

Wong rallied over 200,000 peaceful protestors in 2014 during the Umbrella Revolution. For his efforts, he has been recognized by notable media outlets including Fortune, Time Magazine, Foreign Policy, and London’s The Times. He has been arrested by Chinese authorities on a number of occasions, which sparked international outrage and further protests in Hong Kong.

Wong is now center stage amid current protests with his name regularly appearing in articles like The Times' "Hong Kong protests: Joshua Wong says British police commander ‘must pay price’," directing the agenda, focus, and tempo of the unrest.

While platforms like Google, Twitter, and Facebook delete accounts attempting to expose the West's role in backing unrest in Hong Kong, the Strait Times in an article titled, "Google warns Hong Kong's Joshua Wong of government-backed hackers," suggests US-based tech giants continue to provide assistance to Western-backed opposition groups and figures - including Wong - just as they were exposed doing in 2011 during the so-called "Arab Spring."

US Walks Away From Southeast Asia Summit Empty-Handed

August 13, 2019 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) -  A recent meeting of the 10 member Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) convened in Bangkok, Thailand and attended by representatives from China, Russia and even the United States, provides us with a clear indicator of how power and influence are being shaped across wider Asia and even globally.

Headlines like the Associated Press', "Pompeo ends frustrating Bangkok visit," gives a good feel for how, at least for Washington, the meeting went and how the region responded to Washington's "plans" for it.

The article would note: 

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo left Thailand on Saturday with his hopes for resuming nuclear talks with North Korea dashed, while facing an escalating trade war with China and a potentially devastating breakdown in relations between key American allies Japan and South Korea.

Another article published just ahead of the meetings would better frame US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo's (and Washington's) agenda. The LA Times', "Pompeo seeks to restore U.S. influence in Southeast Asia amid China’s rise," would report:

Against a backdrop of China’s rising economic and military power, Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo arrived in the Thai capital of Bangkok this week with a difficult mission: Try to win back lost ground in Southeast Asia, a region once dominated by the U.S.

The article would continue:

Pompeo is also attempting to solidify another initiative of his tenure: creation of the so-called Indo-Pacific region, which portends to redraw boundaries to stretch from the U.S. West Coast to Japan, down through Southeast Asia to Australia and west across another ocean to India. It is replacing the familiar Asia-Pacific region and incorporates India (while sidelining Pakistan) to expand U.S. heft against China. 

China has not been shy about pouring tens of billions of dollars into infrastructure projects as part of its mammoth Belt and Road initiative, promising to boost transport systems and connectivity to help drive a sustained period of growth and stepping in where the U.S. often isn’t. 

Thanks in part to China’s investment, the Assn. of Southeast Asian Nations, or ASEAN, has posted a combined economic-output growth of 50% in the last decade. 

The LA Times would then attempt to cite "backlash" across the region, but upon closer examination, things like Malaysia "cancelling" One Belt, One Road (OBOR) projects with China were more about negotiating better agreements rather than cancelling them.

The Diplomat in an article from April this year titled, "Malaysia: Revised China Deal Shows Costs Were Inflated," helps explain how the Chinese-Malaysian "row" was blown out of proportion by many in the Western media and how the project is once again moving forward.

Despite this renegotiating having long-since taken place, the LA Times and other media outlets are still trying to portray various countries in Southeast Asia as "opposed" to China or having cancelled deals that are still very much moving forward.

The LA Times also tries to cite disputes in the South China Sea, another area of conflict cultivated by Washington with even the nations it is supposedly "defending" dragging their feet on initiatives Washington had hoped would divide the region and isolate Beijing.

The LA Times does finally admit:

Many Southeast Asian governments have also recoiled at what they see as U.S. efforts to force them to take sides in the trade dispute with China. 

Apart from Vietnam, no country in the region has agreed to join the U.S. boycott of Huawei, despite the Trump administration’s warnings that the U.S. could cease sharing sensitive information with countries that use the company’s technology. 

Not only has ASEAN rejected US demands regarding Huawei and other coercive polices designed to divide the region and set back joint development, the LA Times quotes Western policymakers who have no choice but to admit the US has no alternatives to offer the region.

From Coercion to Pan-Handling 

Thailand in particular has suffered years of coercion from Washington in a bid to roll back Thai-Chinese relations.

US Leaves INF Because "Russia," But Points Missiles at China

August 9, 2019 (Gunnar Ulson - NEO) - We're told that the US withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty singed in 1987 between the US and Soviet Union was based on claims that Russia had violated it.



While we continue waiting for Washington to provide evidence to prove these claims, the US itself admitted it had already long begun developing missiles that violated the treaty. 

A February 2018 Defense One article titled, "Pentagon Confirms It’s Developing Nuclear Cruise Missile to Counter a Similar Russian One," admitted that:

The U.S. military is developing a ground-launched, intermediate-range cruise missile to counter a similar Russian weapon whose deployment violates an arms-control treaty between Moscow and Washington, U.S. officials said Friday. 

The officials acknowledged that the still-under-development American missile would, if deployed, also violate the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty.

Just as the US did when it unilaterally walked away from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002, the goal is to blame Russia for otherwise indefensible and incremental provocations aimed at Moscow. For example, after the US walked away from the ABM Treaty in 2002, the US began deploying anti-missile systems across Europe.

But if Russia is the problem, why did the US also begin deploying similar missiles in Asia?

It is Washington's goal of hemming in its competitors anywhere and everywhere that is at the heart of these serial treaty terminations, not any particular "violation" on Moscow's part.

China Too   

That the US already had missiles under development that would undoubtedly violate the INF Treaty before it accused Russia of such violations, is one indicator of Washington's true intentions. Another is the fact Washington is rushing to encircle China with both defensive and offensive missile systems as well.

China is not a signatory of either the ABM Treaty or the INF Treaty. Its missiles are deployed strictly within its mainland territory with no plans by Beijing to deploy them anywhere else in the future.

The only threat they pose is to any nation that decides to wage war on China, in or around Chinese territory.

Washington's behavior post-INF Treaty indicates that it was its intent to violate the treaty all along, creating the same precarious security crisis in Asia the treaty sought to prevent in Europe.

Destabilizing Pakistan: Bookending Washington's China Policy

July 26, 2019 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - Much is being said of US activities aimed at China. Recent protests in Hong Kong together with a US-led propaganda campaign aimed at Beijing's attempts to quell a growing terrorist threat in Xinjiang are aimed at pressuring the nation to fall back into line within Washington's enduring unipolar international order.

The latter of these two campaigns in particular - claims of Chinese authoritarianism as Beijing attempts to neutralize US-backed separatists and terrorists in Xinjiang - has also been spun as China "targeting Muslims."

This ignores the fact that one of China's closest and oldest allies in Eurasia is Pakistan - a Muslim-majority nation. It also ignores the fact that in Pakistan, the US is playing the same game aimed at cultivating violent extremism, separatism, violence, division, and even the dissolution of Pakistan's current borders.

Balochistan - the other Xinjiang 

While all the focus has been directed by the Western media on Xinjiang and a supposed "anti-Muslim crackdown" in the region, Pakistan faces the same problem in its southwestern province of Balochistan. In Pakistan - attempts by the government to root out violent separatists surely is not "anti-Muslim." 

In Balochistan, the US agencies involved in fanning the flames of separatism and violence instead portray Islamabad and the Pakistani military's efforts to restore order as simply trampling "human rights." 

US interference in Balochistan is just as extensive as it is in China's Xinjiang.

Despite the recent move by Washington to list the armed Balochistan Liberation Army (BLA) as a terrorist organization - Islamabad has long accused Washington of funding and arming it along with segments of the Indian government aligned with US interests.

The fact that otherwise ignored activities by Balochistan separatists are covered by certain Indian newspapers even as recently as this year seems to give credence to these accusations. NDTV's article, "Pro-Balochistan Slogans Raised During Imran Khan's Address In US," and India Today's article, "16 EU Members of Parliament write letter to Trump to intervene in Balochistan," are just two such examples.

US support is much easier to track down.

US-based Stanford University's Mapping Militant Organizations project admits that the BLA receives much of its financial aid from the Balochi diaspora. The project's profile on the Balochistan Liberation Army notes:

Due to high community support for autonomy and independence from people of the Balochistan, many analysts suspect that a large amount of the BLA’s income and weapons supply come from donations from the Balochi people. Balochi leaders have also claimed that financial contributions from the Balochi diaspora make it possible to procure arms and ammunition through the black market.

Thus, even if the US is not directly arming and funding the BLA, it is openly supporting pro-separatists among the Balochi diaspora who even Stanford University experts admit are - in turn - funding the BLA's terrorism.

The US move to designate the BLA as a foreign terrorist organization holds little meaning. The BLA will find itself beside organizations like Jabhat Al Nusra in Syria which is all but openly funded and armed by the United States and a large cross-section of Washington's closest European and Arab allies.

Arming militants is only half of the overall strategy seeking to destabilize Pakistan. Subverting national institutions and replacing them with those interlocking with US special interests is the other half.

US NED Working Hard in - and Against - Pakistan  

The US State Department-funded National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and its various subsidiaries are busy at work in Pakistan's Baluchistan province as well as China's Xinjiang.

NED has been directly funding and supporting the work of the "Balochistan Institute for Development" (BIFD) which claims to be:

"...the leading resource on democracy, development and human rights in Balochistan, Pakistan."

In addition to organizing the annual NED-BFID "Workshop on Media, Democracy & Human Rights" BFID reports that USAID had provided funding for a "media-center" for the Baluchistan Assembly to "provide better facilities to reporters who cover the proceedings of the Balochistan Assembly." It can be assumed that BFID meant reporters are "trained" at NED-BFID workshops and at its USAID-funded center.

There is also Voice of Balochistan whose every top-story is US-funded propaganda, including op-eds by US representatives promoting Balochi separatism, foundation-funded Reporters Without Borders, Soros-funded Human Rights Watch, and a direct message from the US State Department.

BBC Says China Building Schools is "Bad"

July 14, 2019 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - China's recent building-spree of schools in its underdeveloped and remote region of Xinjiang - in a saner world - would be good news. But for editors at the BBC it is being depicted as sinister and dystopian.

The BBC's article, "China Muslims: Xinjiang schools used to separate children from families," attempts to depict boarding schools - a concept popular in the UK itself - as a "form of interment" and "cultural re-engineering."

The BBC's article claims:

China is deliberately separating Muslim children from their families, faith and language in its far western region of Xinjiang, according to new research. At the same time as hundreds of thousands of adults are being detained in giant camps, a rapid, large-scale campaign to build boarding schools is under way.

The "new research" conducted by the BBC is admittedly not even being done in China itself. The BBC admits:

China's tight surveillance and control in Xinjiang, where foreign journalists are followed 24 hours a day, make it impossible to gather testimony there. But it can be found in Turkey.

"Testimony" gathered in Turkey - one of the nations abetting US efforts to fuel radicalism and separatism in Xinjiang in the first place - is accompanied by satellite photos taken from outer space of vacant lots in Xinjiang being transformed into newly built schools complete with football pitches and jogging tracks.

The images are only proof that China is building schools in Xinjiang. Not of any of the claims being made by the BBC of "internment" or "cultural re-engineering." The inclusion of the images is meant to serve as convincing stand-ins where actual evidence of the BBC's otherwise baseless accusations should be.

The BBC Omits the Real "Cultural Re-Engineering" in China's Xinjiang 

The BBC has been one of the leading voices promoting claims of Xinjiang "concentration camps," "one million Muslims" being detained, and now the "internment" of children in schools.

The BBC - however - has been relatively quiet for years over genuine cultural re-engineering taking place in Xinjiang - funded by the United States, Saudi Arabia, and abetted by nations like Turkey and even the UK itself through its propaganda and political support of such efforts.

The LA Times in a 2016 article titled, "In China, rise of Salafism fosters suspicion and division among Muslims," would reveal:

Salafism is an ultra-conservative school of thought within Sunni Islam, espousing a way of life and prayer that harks back to the 6th century, when Muhammad was alive. Islamic State militants are Salafi, many Saudi Arabian clerics are Salafi, and so are many Chinese Muslims living in Linxia. They pray at their own mosques and wear Saudi-style kaffiyehs.

The article also noted (emphasis added):

Experts say that in recent years, Chinese authorities have put Salafis under constant surveillance, closed several Salafi religious schools and detained a prominent Salafi cleric. A once close-knit relationship between Chinese Salafis and Saudi patrons has grown thorny and complex.

 And that:

...Saudi preachers and organizations began traveling to China. Some of them bore gifts: training programs for clerics, Korans for distribution, funding for new "Islamic institutes" and mosques.

This pervasive radicalism has translated directly into real violence - another fact omitted completely from the BBC and other Western media coverage of events in Xinjiang.

China's efforts to reverse the growing influence of Salafism - such as collecting deliberately mistranslated copies of the Koran published and distributed by Saudi Arabia to promote radicalism - have been depicted by the Western media as religious oppression with all context intentionally omitted.

That the BBC claims China building schools teaching Mandarin and Chinese culture in China is "cultural re-engineering" while overlooking Saudi Arabia building Salafist networks thousands of miles away from its borders fuelling very real extremism in western China to begin with - helps fully reveal recent BBC reports on Xinjiang and China's Muslim community as pure propaganda.

Salafism as a Geopolitical Tool 

Not only does the BBC intentionally omit mention of extremism and violence in regions like Xinjiang or how it came to be, the BBC is also omitting the fact that Salafism itself was admittedly spread worldwide by Saudi Arabia as a geopolitical tool.

In the pages of the Washington Post, the Saudi Crown Prince would recently admit:

Asked about the Saudi-funded spread of Wahhabism, the austere faith that is dominant in the kingdom and that some have accused of being a source of global terrorism, Mohammed said that investments in mosques and madrassas overseas were rooted in the Cold War, when allies asked Saudi Arabia to use its resources to prevent inroads in Muslim countries by the Soviet Union.

Wahhabism is closely related to Salafism and the terms are often used interchangeably. The Crown Prince's admission refers specifically to the Cold War and the Soviet Union, but it is abundantly clear that these networks didn't simply vanish with the collapse of the Soviet Union, they evolved.

They are now used to help feed extremists into Washington's many proxy wars around the globe including in Libya and Syria. They are also being used to pressure nations across Asia and to create a pretext for a continued US military presence in Asia-Pacific.

US vs China: Smartphone Wars

July 7, 2019 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - If Washington's goal was to pressure and isolate China by targeting smartphone giant Huawei, it seems to have accomplished the exact opposite. In the process, the US has only accomplished in exposing its own growing weakness and unreliability as a trade partner amid a much wider, misguided and mismanaged "trade war."

While we're only talking about smartphones and economic competition, however fierce, the outcome of this smartphone battle amid a much wider trade war will have an impact on global power and who wields it in the years to come.

Losing Ungracefully  

By May 2019, Huawei had firmly climbed to the number two spot in global smartphone sales at the expense of US-based Apple. By the first quarter of 2019 it had shipped 59.1 million phones compared to Apple, now third place, at between 36-43 million phones, IDC (International Data Corporation) reported.

IDC and many other articles based on its data would note that while Huawei and Apple have traded places in the past over who held second place among global smartphone sales, Huawei's ascension this time seemed much more permanent.

Those watching the trajectory and inner workings of both tech giants will have noticed Apple's decline as endemic internal management problems coupled with growing global competition tattered its reputation and consumer appeal.

Was it just a coincidence that just as first quarter sales data emerged, the US announced one of its more dramatic turns amid its wider trade war with China? The Trump administration would announce a ban on all American-made goods to Huawei including microchips made by Intel and Qualcomm as well as the Android operating system (OS) made by US tech giant Google.

Coupled with this move was a public relations blitz across the US media and their partners working within nations moving closer to China. In Thailand, for example, local media trained and influenced by US interests attempted to undermine consumer confidence in Huawei in the wake of US sanctions against the company.

This one-two punch was a partial success. Sales did slump and Huawei was faced with significant obstacles. But significant obstacles are not the same as insurmountable obstacles, and overcoming obstacles is often how true competitors strengthen themselves.

What Doesn't Kill You Makes You Stronger 

For Huawei, a tech giant integral to China's wider economic and political success upon the global stage, it has all the resources and support it needs to weather the toughest of storms.

In the wake of US sanctions, and even in the lead up to them, Huawei has begun to source critical parts from non-US companies. It is also investing significantly in its own in-house alternatives to US manufactured microchips and even in an alternative OS to replace Android.

Digital Trends in its article "Huawei’s Android-alternative operating system: Everything you need to know," helps illustrate just how determined Huawei is to overcome these obstacles.

The fact that work on the OS supposedly began as early as 2018 indicates that Huawei executives are under no illusions regarding American goodwill. If America is to play nicely with Huawei and other Chinese companies, it will be because Huawei and other Chinese companies took steps leaving the US no other choice but to do so.

US "Color Revolution" Struggles in Hong Kong

June 27, 2019 (Tony Cartalucci - NEO) - The Western media has been boasting over recent protests in Hong Kong. Western headlines have claimed the protests have "rattled" Beijing's leadership.

The protests have been organized to obstruct Hong Kong's elected government from moving forward with an extradition bill. The bill would further integrate Hong Kong's legal system with that of mainland China's, allowing suspects to be sent to the mainland, Taiwan, or Macau to face justice for crimes committed anywhere in Chinese territory.

The protests oppose the extradition bill as a wider means of opposing Hong Kong's continued reintegration with China - arguing that the "One Country, Two Systems" terms imposed by the British upon Hong Kong's return under Chinese sovereignty in 1997 must be upheld.

Uprooting the Last Vestiges of British Imperialism 

The story of Hong Kong is one of territory violently seized by the British Empire from China in 1841, being controlled as a colony for nearly 150 years, and begrudgingly handed over to China in 1997.

The "One Country, Two Systems" conditions imposed by the British were a means of returning Hong Kong to China in theory, but in practice maintaining Hong Kong as an enduring outpost of Western influence within Chinese territory.  The West's economic and military power in 1997 left Beijing little choice but to agree to the terms. 

Today, the Anglo-American international order is fading with China now the second largest economy on Earth and poised to overtake the US at any time. With economic and military power now on China's side, it has incrementally uprooted the vestiges of British colonial influence in Hong Kong - the extradition bill being the latest example of this unfolding process. 

Beijing has reclaimed Hong Kong through economic and political means. Projects like the recently completed Hong Kong high-speed rail link and the Hong Kong–Zhuhai–Macao Bridge have helped increase the number of mainlanders - laborers, visitors, and entrepreneurs - travelling to, living in, and doing business with Hong Kong. With them come mainland values, culture, and politics.

Hong Kong's elected government is now composed of a majority of openly pro-Beijing parties and politicians. They regularly and easily defeat Hong Kong's so-called "pan-democratic" and "independence" parties during elections. It is the elected, pro-Beijing government of Hong Kong that has proposed the recent extradition bill to begin with - a fact regularly omitted in Western coverage of the protests against the bill. 

US Color Revolution Masquerades as "Popular Opposition" 

Unable to defeat the bill legislatively, Hong Kong's pro-Western opposition has taken to the streets. With the help of Western media spin - the illusion of popular opposition to the extradition bill and Beijing's growing influence over Hong Kong is created.

What is not only omitted - but actively denied - is the fact that the opposition's core leaders, parties, organizations, and media operations are all tied directly to Washington DC via the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) and corporate foundations like Open Society Foundation. 

Hong Kong’s opposition has already long been exposed as US-sponsored. 

This includes the entire core leadership of the 2014 so-called “Occupy Central” protests, also known as the “Umbrella Revolution.” Western media has portrayed recent anti-extradition bill protests as a continuation of the "Umbrella" protests with many of the same organizations, parties, and individuals leading and supporting them. 

The West's Losing Battle for Hong Kong

June 24, 2019 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - Another pivotal battle is being fought over Hong Kong between Beijing and political forces backed by the special administrative region's former British colonial masters.

At the heart of the battle is a proposed law that will allow suspects to be extradited to mainland China, Taiwan or Macau.

The BBC in its article, "Hong Kong lawmakers fight over extradition law," would claim:

Critics believe the proposed switch to the extradition law would erode Hong Kong's freedoms.

By "critics," the BBC is referring to US and British-backed opposition, with the article specifically linking recent protests against the proposed law to the US-funded "Umbrella Movement" demonstrations in 2014.

The BBC would also remind readers of the conditions the British imposed on China as a condition of returning Hong Kong:

Under a policy known as "One Country, Two Systems", Hong Kong has a separate legal system to mainland China.

Beijing regained control over the former British colony in 1997 on the condition it would allow the territory "a high degree of autonomy, except in foreign and defence affairs" for 50 years.

The BBC would also quote the last British governor of Hong Kong, Chris Patten, as if to dispel any doubts over how the fault lines of this most recent political controversy formed, and the interests really driving opposition to the recently proposed law.

Patten would claim the proposed law was, "an assault on Hong Kong's values, stability and security."

Hong Kong's "values, stability and security" in this context reflects Western desires to maintain the region as a foothold not only for its interests in Asia-Pacific, but within China itself. The slow, incremental erosion of Western influence in Hong Kong and elsewhere across Asia-Pacific appears to be ending what has been centuries of European and then American primacy over the region.

The West's Losing Battle for Hong Kong 

Colonised by the British Empire in the 1800s, Hong Kong served for over a century as an Anglo, then Anglo-American outpost in Asia-Pacific. Since its handover in 1997, Beijing has incrementally reasserted control over the territory.

More recently, as China rises economically and militarily, Hong Kong has served as an indicator of waning Anglo-American domination over China and its peripheries.

Beijing's strategy has been to avoid direct political confrontations with Hong Kong's dwindling US-funded opposition parties and to instead patiently develop surrounding territory, inundating Hong Kong with mainlanders who bring with them culture and politics aligned with Beijing and economic influence that is slowly displacing Western-leaning leftovers from British colonisation.

Beijing's completion of the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge and the opening of a Hong Kong-mainland high-speed rail link, along with the subsequent political and media backlash from the US and UK are recent examples of major setbacks for Washington and London in this ongoing battle for influence and the West's ungraceful retreat amid it.

The extradition law, if passed, will set a precedence further eroding British demands imposed during the 1997 handover and will lead to an accelerated political and economic integration of Hong Kong.

Beijing is set to maintain many of Hong Kong's unique economic and political characteristics, as it has done with other regions across the mainland. But it is clear that it will do so on its own terms, as China's own interests require. It is also clear that digging out Anglo-American influence from Hong Kong, root and stem, drives China's side of this ongoing political struggle.

Despite the see-sawing nature of this struggle, unless global economic factors change drastically, China's continued rise along with the continued erosion of Washington's and London's unipolar international order all but ensures the inevitable and complete marginalisation of Western-backed political and economic forces based in Hong Kong.

Hong Kong's gradual integration into Beijing's wider plans for China as a whole is a microcosm of what to expect in regards to other holdouts of Anglo-American influence, including those forces in Taiwan determined to continue using the island as a point of leverage for Washington against Beijing.

The degree of patience and fairness exhibited by or absent from Beijing's approach to Hong Kong will serve as an example either fostering cooperation across the rest of Asia, or aiding Western efforts to fuel paranoia and division across the region and around the world in a bid to contain China's further rise.

Joseph Thomas is chief editor of Thailand-based geopolitical journal, The New Atlas and contributor to the online magazine “New Eastern Outlook”.

New Thai Government and America's Asia "Pivot"

June 18, 2019 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - After much uncertainty and a turbulent election, Thailand now has a new government led by its newly elected prime minister, Prayuth Chan-o-cha. This bodes well for Thailand's stability and development as well as its growing ties with its ASEAN neighbours as well as with China.

For the US and its attempts to reassert "primacy" over Asia while encircling and containing the rise of China, the defeat of its "pro-democracy" proxies it is a nightmare.

The Western media, their media partners in Thailand and a small army of US-funded fronts posing as nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) have decried the new government as a "dictatorship disguised as democracy."

Articles like, "Thailand Junta Leader Named Prime Minister After Contentious Vote," published by the New York Times, set the tone of the West's backlash against the newly formed government, citing unqualified claims like, "an election marred by charges of manipulation" or depicting the opposition as being "pro-democracy."

Absent from NYT articles and others across the Western media is any mention of who PM Prayuth Chan-o-Cha was really running against or why there was a coup in 2014 to begin with. This omission is deliberate, because its inclusion by the media would provide crucial context both justifying the coup and exposing the "pro-democracy" opposition as anything but.

Putting Things in Context 

PM Prayuth led a 2014 coup, ousting the regime of Yingluck Shinawatra, which in turn served merely as a front for convicted criminal, fugitive and US-proxy Thaksin Shinawatra.

From 2001-2006, Shinawatra had loyally served US interests as Thai prime minister. He privatised Thailand's energy concerns which were promptly bought up by US and European oil corporations, committed Thai troops to the 2003 US invasion and occupation of Iraq, invited the US Central Intelligence Agency to use Thai territory for its extraordinary rendition programme and even attempted to pass a US-Thai free trade agreement without parliamentary approval.

Additionally, Shinawatra carried out a brutal "war on drugs" which left over 2,800 innocent people dead in just 90 days and crippled free speech by suing, intimidating or outright killing critics, making him the worst human rights offender in Thailand's history. He also carried out sweeping abuses of power, including changing the nation's laws in order to sell his satellite concern, Shin Corp, to Singapore investors tax free.

For this and Shinawatra's attempts to illegally consolidate power by eliminating his rivals which include Thailand's military, courts and constitutional monarchy, it is clear why he himself was ousted in a coup in 2006 and his sister ousted in a similar coup in 2014.

Between 2006-2011 Shinawatra twice attempted to seize power by force, once in 2009 and again in 2010. The latter attempt included 300-500 heavily armed militants resulting in nearly 100 deaths and the destruction of several sections of Bangkok's downtown districts.

He has been convicted of corruption and sentenced to now 4 years in prison with multiple arrest warrants issued against him.

Despite being a fugitive, from 2011-2014 he openly ran his sister's government remotely from Dubai, in the United Arab Emirates.

In recent elections, Shinawatra openly headed his Pheu Thai Party (PTP) along with several other "hedge parties" fielded in case any one of them was disbanded. In fact one, Thai Raksa Chart, was disbanded. Another, Future Forward, had its leader Thanathorn Juangroongruangkit nominated as PM by Shinawatra's Pheu Thai itself.

The fact a fugitive is to this day running these parties remotely or its obvious implications, is entirely omitted across the Western media.

Washington's "Tiananmen" Lies Begin to Fray

June 9, 2019 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - Washington and its allies across the Western World have been particularly eager in observing this year's anniversary of their version of the 1989 Tiananmen protests.



It has become an opportunity to add political pressure atop economic pressure already being exerted on Beijing by Washington in its bid to encircle and contain China's rise.

This pressure comes mainly through the Western media.

But the monopoly the US once enjoyed over the flow of global information is coming to an end. The more attention the US tries to draw to certain events, the more objective scrutiny others apply resulting in growing, irreversible damage to some of Washington's most valuable propaganda narratives.

Attempts to characterise the Tiananmen protests as a violent crackdown on peaceful protesters is meant to portray China, then and now, as an violent authoritarian regime and a threat to not only freedom in China, but freedom worldwide.

But as this lie is exposed, the US itself appears to be the real risk to global peace and freedom.

US State Department Cables Contradict US Secretary of State's Version of Events 

The US State Department itself would set the tone of Washington's annual propaganda drive. In a press statement titled, "On the 30th Anniversary of Tiananmen Square," US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo would claim:

On June 4, we honor the heroic protest movement of the Chinese people that ended on June 4, 1989, when the Chinese Communist Party leadership sent tanks into Tiananmen Square to violently repress peaceful demonstrations calling for democracy, human rights, and an end to rampant corruption. The hundreds of thousands of protesters who gathered in Beijing and in other cities around China suffered grievously in pursuit of a better future for their country. The number of dead is still unknown.

Yet according to the US State Department's own cables, thanks to Wikileaks, what Secretary Pompeo stated is categorically untrue.

In a 2011 Telegraph article titled, "Wikileaks: no bloodshed inside Tiananmen Square, cables claim," it is admitted that:

Secret cables from the United States embassy in Beijing have shown there was no bloodshed inside Tiananmen Square when China put down student pro-democracy demonstrations 22 years ago.

While the Telegraph attempts to claim Chinese troops merely killed protesters they portray as peaceful and unarmed "outside" the square, evidence within the US State Department's own cables proves precisely the opposite.

One cable dated June 3, 1989 admits:

[Embassy officers] encountered a number of incidents in different locations in which crowds harassed military or police personnel, forced their vehicles to turn around, jeered at displays of captured military equipment, or vandalized captured military vehicles.

Further detailing the violence was an oblique admission in the New York Times in a recent article titled, "Witnessing China’s 1989 Protests, 1,000 Miles From Tiananmen Square," in which now US Representative Andy Levin of Michigan gives his account of what he saw as a student during the protests.

The article admits (my emphasis):

Word spread quickly about what had happened. Rumor had it that protesters were being held in a particular police station, and a huge crowd massed outside it. The students weren’t there after all, but the crowd set fire to the police station. 

Three fire trucks arrived, sirens blaring. The first instinct of the crowd was to move aside. But then, I could see the crowd change its mind. As in, “Wait a minute, we set this fire on purpose, so we don’t want this fire truck putting it out.” The crowd converged on a truck, chased off the firemen, flipped the truck on its side and set the truck itself on fire.

A forgotten Washington Post article from 1989 deceitfully titled, "Images Vilify Protesters," attempts to dismiss evidence the article itself admits proves violence and atrocities were indeed carried out by protesters against soldiers who were displaying restraint.

The article admits (my emphasis):

The government's case is bolstered by the fact that, in some areas, demonstrators did attack troops who did not respond, and these incidents were captured on videotape. On nightly television now, images are broadcast of protesters stoning troops, beating them with poles and, in some particularly dramatic photos, firebombing trucks, buses and even armored personnel carriers. In some cases, soldiers were still inside at the time. On one avenue in western Beijing, demonstrators torched an entire military convoy of more than 100 trucks and armored vehicles. Aerial pictures of the conflagration and columns of smoke have powerfully bolstered the government's argument that the troops were victims, not executioners. Other scenes show soldiers' corpses and demonstrators stripping automatic rifles off of unresisting soldiers.  

If Chinese troops did kill "thousands" of protesters as many across the West claim, there is no evidence of it. This is why Secretary Pompeo himself admitted even this year, "the number of dead is still unknown."

If Chinese troops fired into crowds at all, the US State Department itself, witnesses now holding political offices in the US government and prominent US newspapers all admit it was at mobs carrying out deadly violence against troops, police and rescue workers.

We don't have to imagine what the US government itself would do if mobs attacked military personnel, burned down police stations then attacked responding rescue workers before destroying their equipment in a large US city. During the 1992 Los Angeles riots, thousands of US Army soldiers and Marines were deployed and authorised to use deadly force.

We could, however, try to imagine how absurd it would be if Beijing and media concerns it controlled tried to portray the LA riots as peaceful protests which the US "cracked down" on with disproportionate force. Only the West's enduring monopoly over global news and information affords its the ability to portray Tiananmen Square in such absurd terms, despite evidence disclosed by the US government and media itself proving precisely the opposite.

Tiananmen Anniversary: A Time for US-Backed Political Stunts, Hypocrisy 

Across Asia, the US is determined to drive a wedge between Beijing and the many nations in the region eager to build ties and do business with it. By promoting Washington's Tiananmen narrative across the region, the US hopes to turn local opinions against Beijing. 

The US has invested tens of millions of dollars a year in building up fronts posing as nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) or "student activists" to oppose regional governments doing business with China and to sour ties between regional nations and Beijing itself.

US War on Huawei is a War on Tech Sovereignty

June 5, 2019 (Gunnar Ulson - NEO) - Unable to compete on equal terms with Chinese telecom giant Huawei, the United States and the corporations that influence its domestic and foreign policy have decided instead to simply cut Huawei off from its many monopolies including chip manufacturing and mobile phone operating systems.

But US measures come at a time when Huawei is already well on its way to unseating US tech monopolies. US measures may only spur Huawei (and many other companies and countries) to further work toward creating alternatives to current US tech monopolies and establishing enduring technological sovereignty from US control.

US Cites False Pretext to Cripple a Competitor 

The US Department of Commerce claims:

...Huawei is engaged in activities that are contrary to U.S. national security or foreign policy interest. This information includes the activities alleged in the Department of Justice’s public superseding indictment of Huawei, including alleged violations of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), conspiracy to violate IEEPA by providing prohibited financial services to Iran, and obstruction of justice in connection with the investigation of those alleged violations of U.S. sanctions.

Evidence (as is the case with most US allegations) is lacking, yet US measures prohibiting "the sale or transfer of American technology" to Huawei coincidentally gives a boost to US tech companies unable to compete against Huawei in free and fair global markets.

Fortune, in its article, "Huawei Wants to Play Nice With Google and Microsoft, But Has Its 'Last Resort' Ready," elaborates further on what this ban means to Huawei.

Microsoft removed Huawei laptops from its online store, while chip manufacturers including Qualcomm, Intel, Nvidia, Lattice and ARM are poised to stop supplying Huawei assembly lines.

Google is also reportedly preparing to cut Huawei off from its Android mobile phone operating system. Android and Apple's iOS, both US-based, currently dominate the markets and without access to either, Huawei would face significant challenges, giving US tech companies a chance to catch up. This, more than any sort of ambiguous "security threat" explains the motivations of the US Department of Commerce.

Self-Inflicted Wounds Amid a Senseless Fight

US bans targeting Huawei will not be painless for US corporations involved. Huawei currently occupies second place, just behind Samsung, in the smartphone market. Depriving Huawei of US-made components will deprive US corporations of associated profits at least in the short-term. How fast other corporations fill the void left behind by Huawei, if a void appears, is hard to say. If US corporations are counting on US corporations and US-friendly nations and the respective telecom industries filling a potential void, it is a long bet.

It is clear that Huawei, if accusations by the US of its close association with the Chinese government are true, will have the support, resources and impetus required to begin developing alternatives to Microsoft, US chip designs and Google's Android operating system. In the long-term, US corporations may find themselves faced by renewed competition, not only in terms of smartphones this time, but also in terms of everything in and on them.

As Thai-Chinese Relations Grow, So do US Threats

May 2, 2019 (Joseph Thomas - NEO) - The Southeast Asian Kingdom of Thailand, a nation with nearly 70 million people and the second largest economy in the region, has accelerated already growing ties with China over the past 5 years.

These ties include military purchases to replace Thailand's aging US hardware with newer and more capable Chinese main battle tanks, armoured personnel carriers, infantry fighting vehicles and even submarines either already in use or on their way.

Thai-Chinese relations also centre around Beijing's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and Thailand's role as a major partner through which high-speed rail will connect China itself with Laos, Thailand, Malaysia and by extension, Singapore granting passengers and freight travelling from China a shortcut to the Strait of Malacca and the Indian Ocean beyond.

The obvious, negative implications this will have on Washington's self-proclaimed notion of Asian primacy has led to gathering political storm clouds. The US is leading a noticeable uptick in propaganda aimed at not only undermining China's BRI, but also attacking China's partners, including Thailand.

The US and its partners are also increasing their political interference in Thailand, attempting during recent elections to install political forces into power that will reverse Thai-Chinese relations. The failure of these forces to decisively win elections even with US aid, leaves the looming prospect of the US resorting to backing protests and even terrorism to spoil Thai-Chinese gains. 

Bangkok-Beijing Cementing Ties  

Thai Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-o-cha attended Beijing's recent 2nd Belt and Road Forum for International Cooperation.

Pro-Western English newspaper, the Bangkok Post, in an article titled, "Regime talks up China ties on visit to Beijing for 'Belt and Road' forum," would note:

"Both sides were satisfied with the fact that over the past five years, Thailand and China have had their closest relations ever," deputy government spokesman Werachon Sukondhapatipak, told the media in the press wrap-up about the meetings between Thai and Chinese leaders.

"Gen Prayut gave an assurance that Thailand will take care of Chinese investors and tourists," said Lt Gen Werachon.

Both nations pledged to help drive up the value of trade between them to US$140 billion by 2021, double the current $73.6 billion.

To put Thai-Chinese trade in perspective, China is already Thailand's number one trade partner, with over 15% of all Thai exports going to China, with the US in second at 11.5%. Over 20% of Thai imports come from China versus only about 5.7% from the US.

China also accounts for the vast majority of all tourists visiting Thailand, beating out the combined number of tourists travelling from all Western nations combined.

Thai-Chinese trade and tourism is only set to grow. Along with expanding military ties and obvious shared-interests in regional security and stability, Cold War notions of Thailand being a US proxy should be finally and definitively laid to rest.