June 24, 2022 (Brian Berletic - New Eastern Outlook) - The British International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS) has hosted the “Shangri-La Dialogue in Singapore since 2002. It is billed as “Asia’s premier security summit,” all while being almost entirely Western-centric in agenda and design. To help illustrate this, since the format was created, the first plenary meeting has always been centered around the US Secretary of Defense – the United States being a nation not even located in Asia.
This year was no exception, the West and its interests took center stage. Opening remarks by IISS Director-General and Chief Executive John Chipman centered around the conflict in Ukraine and the notion that “it is essential for the West to prevail.” Chipman also ensured that it was clear that the West prevailing in Ukraine is just one small part of the West’s “rules-based order” prevailing globally, including over the Indo-Pacific region.
While the opening and keynote address was given by Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio, it might as well have been given by US President Joe Biden or another senior representative from Washington. Prime Minister Kishida’s “vision” was indistinguishable from that of the US State Department or the US Department of Defense’s, it consisted of various objectives for the region identical to American interests right down to the fact that nothing PM Kishida proposed would actually benefit the people of Japan and instead would be pursued on Washington’s behalf at the Japanese public’s expense.
June 18, 2022 (Brian Berletic - New Eastern Outlook) - Military activity on all sides has been increasing in northern Syria. Turkish forces are increasing their presence and the pace of operations against Kurdish held territory north of Aleppo and to the east along the Turkish-Syrian border in what may lead up to a major military operation.
The Daily Sabah in an article titled, “Turkey urges Russia to fulfill deals to clear N. Syria of terrorists,” would speak from Turkey’s point of view regarding what Ankara saw as a terrorist threat to Turkish territory, and its expectations of its Russian counterparts in dealing with the situation or, apparently, Turkey will deal with it itself.
The article claims:
Turkey expects Russia to fulfill commitments made in Syria against terrorist organizations and abide by agreements signed in 2019, Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said Wednesday, reiterating Ankara’s call for northern Syria near the Turkish borders to be cleared of terrorist groups threatening security and stability in the region.
Holding a joint press conference with his Russian counterpart Sergey Lavrov in the capital Ankara, Çavuşoğlu said terrorist groups threatening Syria have also upped the ante against Turkey and stressed the need to eliminate them.
Russian military forces as well as their Syrian allies have also increased their activity in northern Syria. The Syrian Arab Army may potentially move into Kurdish-held territory to both act as a deterrent against any possible Turkish offensive, and possibly as a stabilizing factor defusing tensions between Turkey and Kurish fighters.
AP in its article, “US-backed Syrian Kurds to turn to Damascus if Turkey attacks,” would note:
The US-backed and Kurdish-led forces in northern Syria said Tuesday that they will turn to the government in Damascus for support should Turkey go ahead with its threat to launch a new incursion into the war-torn country.
The article also noted:
Erdogan has repeatedly said over the past weeks that he’s planning a major military operation to create a 30-kilometer (19 mile) deep buffer zone inside Syria along Turkey’s border, through a cross-border incursion against US-allied Syrian Kurdish fighters — an attempt that failed in 2019.
Analysts have said Erdogan is taking advantage of the war in Ukraine to push his own goals in Syria — even using Turkey’s ability as a NATO member to veto alliance membership by Finland and Sweden as potential leverage.
The current standoff in northern Syria is one of several crises stemming from the 2011-onward US-led proxy war against Syria. The US and its allies poured billions of dollars in weapons, equipment, and training into opposition forces in an unsuccessful bid to overthrow the government of Syria.
Russia intervened in 2015 at the request of the Syrian government, quickly leveraging its superior airpower and other military capabilities to cut the supply lines of militant groups emanating from both Turkey and Jordan, before assisting Syrian, Iranian, and Lebanese forces in retarking most of Syria’s population centers west of the Euphrates River.
Because of an enduring US military occupation in eastern Syria, Syria’s oil and agricultural land remain in the hands of US-backed forces including Kurdish groups long labelled as terrorists by Turkey.
Turkish Concerns Reflect NATO Dysfunction
The complex contradictions among NATO members like Turkey and the US illustrate a systemic dysfunction within the alliance, rooted first and foremost in how the alliance can serve US interests even (and perhaps especially) at the cost of other NATO members.
This dysfunction has been amplified amid the ongoing conflict in Ukraine where the US is leading Europe in economic self-destruction to advance Washington’s agenda versus Moscow.
June 9, 2022 (Brian Berletic - New Eastern Outlook) - Two recent events, both overshadowed by the ongoing conflict in Ukraine, help illustrate how the same problematic aspects of Western foreign policy driving the Ukrainian conflict are hard at work in provoking conflict with yet another global power, China.
Western complaints about an alleged naval base China is accused of building in Cambodia and an altercation between Chinese and Canadian patrol aircraft in the North Pacific reflect growing tensions between an inflexible and declining Western unipolar order and a rising China that increasingly refuses to subordinate or explain itself to the West upon the global stage.
While peaceful coexistence would not only be possible but preferable in regards to global peace, stability, and prosperity, the US-led “rules-based international order” has openly declared its intentions of inhibiting China’s rise and has demonstrated just how far in terms of disrupting global peace, stability, and prosperity the US and its allies are willing to go to achieve this.
China’s “Secret Navy Base”
The Washington Post in an article titled, “China secretly building PLA naval facility in Cambodia, Western officials say,” would claim:
China is secretly building a naval facility in Cambodia for the exclusive use of its military, with both countries denying that is the case and taking extraordinary measures to conceal the operation, Western officials said.
The Washington Post already reported that:
The establishment of a Chinese naval base in Cambodia — only its second such overseas outpost and its first in the strategically significant Indo-Pacific region — is part of Beijing’s strategy to build a network of military facilities around the world in support of its aspirations to become a true global power, the officials said.
The unnamed Western officials failed to point out just how far China actually has to go to become a “true global power” in terms of building military installations abroad. A 2021 Al Jazeera article titled, “Infographic: US military presence around the world,” noted that, “The US controls about 750 bases in at least 80 countries worldwide and spends more on its military than the next 10 countries combined.”
June 7, 2022 (The New Atlas) - Update on Russian military operations in Ukraine for June 6, 2022:
Key developments:
Russian forces continue encirclement and elimination of Ukrainian forces in the Severodonetsk-Lysychansk cauldron;
During encirclements in Syria, similar “offensives” were attempted as acts of desperation;
Claims of Ukrainian “counter-offensives” are a distraction from the overall, imminent strategic defeat these forces face in the cauldron;
Other “offensives” near Kherson and outside of Kharkov have failed to make any strategic gains and represent political distractions for Ukraine’s strategic defeat;
HIMARS, additional artillery systems, drones, and other heavy weapons will not change the tide of the conflict;
Russia is winning because of air power, air defenses, logistics, advantages in correlation of forces;
Western media continues to pivot from “Ukrainian victory” to a more sober realization of Ukrainian losses and its bleak outlook for the future.
