RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2021/11/biden_administration_letting_americas_nuclear_superiority_slip_through_our_fingers.html

The Pentagon’s annual report on China’s military included a section on the PLA’s nuclear buildup.  The report states that the People’s Liberation Army Rocket Force (PLARF) “is developing new intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) that will significantly improve its nuclear-capable missile forces.”  Nuclear warhead production has increased.  At least three new ICBM silo fields are being constructed, “which will cumulatively contain hundreds of new ICBM silos.”  The PLARF’s road-mobile DF-26 intermediate-range ballistic missile (IRBMs) force is growing.

China plans to “modernize, diversify, and expand its nuclear forces,” including land, sea, and air-based platforms (the triad), according to the report.  The Pentagon estimates that by 2027, the PLARF will have at least 700 deliverable nuclear warheads and at least 1,000 deliverable nuclear warheads by 2030.  China’s ICBM force consists of CSS-10 Mod 2 missiles with a range of 11,200 kilometers, DF-41 missiles that can strike targets 12,000 kilometers away, and CSS-4 Mod 2 and Mod 3 missiles with a maximum range of 13,000 kilometers.  With these three missile types, China can deliver nuclear warheads to the entire continental United States, Alaska, and Hawaii.  Some of these missiles have MIRV capability, meaning they can deliver multiple warheads to multiple targets.

China’s nuclear weapons expansion has been characterized by the head of U.S. Strategic Command as “breathtaking,” a “strategic breakout” designed to give China a “coercive capability” to deter the U.S. from defending its allies against Chinese aggression.  Meanwhile, Russia is engaged in its own nuclear buildup, and it may eventually outnumber the U.S. in warheads by ten to one.  And China and Russia have gradually become strategic allies as both seek to undermine America’s role as the organizer of the liberal world order.

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/china-biden-denounced-taiwan-independence-warns-us-playing-fire

China claimed Tuesday that President Biden denounced Taiwanese independence from the communist nation, but warned the U.S. is “playing with fire” in the South China Sea.

The new round of threats arose following an hours-long virtual summit between Biden and Chinese President Xi Jinping that marked the most extensive talks the world leaders have engaged in since Biden took office.

In a read-out following the talks, Chinese officials said Biden reiterated U.S. support for the one-China policy and claimed the U.S. president “does not support ‘Taiwan independence’.”

Taiwan and China have shared a complex history since the government of the Republic of China (ROC) relocated to the island in the western Pacific in 1949 amid conflict with the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). 

Taiwan identifies as a sovereign nation, but it is officially recognized by China, the United Nations and the U.S. as part of the one-China policy. 

China made it clear Tuesday that it has every intention of bringing the island under “complete reunification” with mainland China and threatened action if forces attempt to stop this.

“Should the separatist forces for ‘Taiwan independence’ provoke us, force our hands or even cross the red line, we will be compelled to take resolute measures,” the readout said. “On this question bearing on China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, there is no room for compromise.”

The U.S. and its western allies have backed the security of Taiwan and reports have shown the U.S. is working to shore up defenses in the Indo-Pacific as Chinese aggression in the region escalates. 

The White House did not contradict China’s claim that the U.S. continues to acknowledge the one-China principle, but the tone was far less placatory.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/11/bidens-dirty-deal-taliban-national-security-threat-daniel-greenfield/

Every week new revelations arrive about the scale of Biden’s betrayal in Afghanistan. After months of claiming that only a few hundred Americans had been abandoned behind enemy lines, the real numbers are still growing. Shocking reports continue to come to light including a military memo which claims that over a hundred family members of servicemen may still be trapped under Taliban rule.

Biden and his brass promised an accounting, but have offered only lies and excuses. Congressional hearings have produced nothing except cable news theater. While the Taliban throw parades showing off captured American military equipment, the Biden administration is dispatching $144 million in aid.

With more to come.

The humiliating collapse in Afghanistan is not a mystery. It was the product of a deliberate strategy to maintain relations with the Taliban at any cost. Every step of the disaster was really a betrayal.

Why did the Biden administration abandon Bagram Air Base and the nearby prison facility holding thousands of Taliban, Al Qaeda, and ISIS-K prisoners without notifying the Afghans?

When the Taliban repeatedly violated their agreement to stop the violence, why did the Biden administration still insist on keeping our side of the agreement, withdrawing by the deadline even if it meant leaving Americans behind?

As the Taliban approached Kabul, why was the Biden administration trying to cut a deal to provide a sizable cash delivery if the Taliban included the existing government in its administration?

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17942/biden-xi-meeting

With the U.S. suffering significant inflation, and with supply chain disruptions identified as one of the causes, expect little pressure on China to address intellectual property theft, currency manipulation, unfair Chinese government support in distorting markets, or disruptive Chinese trade barriers. The bias will be to put a happy face on this relationship.

We certainly can hope for Biden to put up a strong position on the COVID-19 pandemic. More than 750,000 Americans are dead…. America, and the world need answers. China needs to be held accountable.

One can only fear where this goes if the U.S. does not confront China. It is unlikely we will see any leadership from Europe on this issue; European leaders seemed determined to forge closer economic ties with China, which will doubtless use these revenues for bulking up its military to “take over the world.” It is either Biden or nobody, and nobody seems to have the upper hand.

An even worse potential outcome on the COVID-19 pandemic issue may be a gauzy statement along the lines that … the U.S. and China will closely cooperate on addressing the current situation…. Even worse, we will form the core of a new global organization to prepare for, confront, and combat any potential future pandemics.

Heaven help us if this is the outcome.

Here is what we likely can expect from the upcoming meeting between U.S. President Joe Biden and Communist China’s President Xi Jinping. Climate change, yes. Human rights, not so much. Throw in a little trade but take out all references to the Wuhan-origin of the coronavirus pandemic. This will be a summit that majors in minors. It will have significance, but only because of what it fails to do rather than what it does.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17910/china-biden-crisis-presidency

How does a president who is struggling on so many fronts lead a nation against China, its biggest geostrategic competitor? China’s military buildup, the ongoing genocide against the Uyghurs, America and the West’s over-reliance on China in the supply chain, Chinese aggression against Taiwan and in the South China Sea, and China’s aggression against India along the common land border are all pressing issues that are only getting worse.

The Chinese communists have made clear in word and deed, however, including their Belt and Road Initiative and Made in China policies, that they have every intention of knocking-off America as global leader and supplanting the West in global standing.

[I]n 2008 Russia invaded the Republic of Georgia. European Union leaders offered a pitifully limited response and Russia faced very few negative reactions from either the EU or the U.S. But there were consequences. Many believe this painfully mild answer was an indicator to Russia that it could employ a more militaristic approach in areas of previous Russian influence. Six years after its invasion of Georgia, Russia invaded Ukraine, annexing Crimea and occupying parts of the Donbas region. The lesson seems clear and quite literal — give a tyrannical country an inch and it will take as many other countries as it can.

[F]or global stability and the standing of the United Sates, it is time for the president to draw a bright red line signaling to the Chinese communists the limits of what they can do and where they can go.

Less than a year in and Joe Biden’s presidency is beset by crises. Domestically, his increasingly unpopular agenda has been stalled by his own political party in Congress. On the international front, the Afghanistan withdrawal debacle continues to reverberate along with Europe’s growing frustration in dealing with the administration. Even on matters where we can agree, such as the submarine deal and our alliance with the Australia and the United Kingdom to counter China, the announcement was so badly handled it became just another friction point in U.S.-European relations. Then there is China itself. From the origins of COVID to its recent hypersonic missile test — an event the Pentagon’s top general Mark Milley concedes was a near “Sputnik moment” — and China’s ability to crush all US satellites as “debris,” the challenges between the U.S. and China only continue to grow.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17891/financing-china-war-machine

How did the Chinese come to possess such prowess? From us.

The Chinese… know that a democracy whose economy is weakened by COVID of a curious origin, a multi-trillion dollar budget that would plunge us into historic debt; a nation staggering under the burden of a possibly enfeebled national leadership, and a military humbled by being ordered off the Afghan battlefield by its commander-in-chief may be a once great country that has lost its way.

Washington needs to pivot and provide appropriate and necessary incentives for businesses to expand our once formidable manufacturing base here in the United States. America has the means, skills, and resources to return to its role as a super exporter, but to do so will also require us to get our economic house in order and freeze our nation’s debt ceiling. An economy that stands on the brink of a multi-trillion dollar self-induced debt makes us vulnerable to a fiscal collapse. Financial discipline will be required if we actually wish to stop our financing of the Chinese war machine.

Historians who have studied the decline and fall of great modern empires must be queasy these days.

Many have chronicled how a once mighty China lost its sovereignty to colonial powers during the early years of the 20th Century. Their enfeebled empress and a humbled military were swept aside by a European coalition of nations only to find that China was to become the bloody prize of Japanese generals whose forces raped and massacred their way to Beijing.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17871/afghanistan-withdrawal-terrorist-cocktail

Despite their promises to deny terrorists safe haven, the Taliban will do the opposite. They and Al Qaida are joined at the hip, with both Osama Bin Laden and his successor Ayman Al Zawahiri having sworn unbreakable allegiance, bay’ah, to the leaders of the Taliban.

The Islamic State’s Khorosan branch, with several thousand fighters in Afghanistan, will pose a similar threat. Many political leaders in the US and UK claim the Taliban are sworn enemies of the IS, with some even suggesting that we might form an alliance against IS with Taliban terrorists. But this abhorrent proposition is merely an attempt to help limit the political fall-out from their ill-judged actions that facilitated the Taliban’s conquest.

Today, all these actors know there is no prospect of further large-scale US intervention in the country, no matter how great their atrocities. The US remains capable of air strikes and even special forces raids against serious threats emanating from Afghanistan, but these require high-grade intelligence which, despite the powerful technical capabilities of the agencies, is extremely difficult to gain now that we have withdrawn all forces.

The prospect of a successful jihadist insurgency in Pakistan, with its nuclear arsenal, has been a long-standing concern for the US, which invested huge intelligence and military resources to help prevent it. Most of this capability was withdrawn with the exit from Afghanistan.

Like Pakistan, China supported the Taliban insurgency for many years. In return, the Taliban have frequently hunted down and killed many of the Uighur leaders — fellow Sunni Muslims — who took refuge in Afghanistan. Desperate for Beijing’s funds and political backing, the Taliban can be relied on to do all they can to prevent any export of jihadism into China.

But we can expect no such efforts from Beijing to prevent terrorist actions against the West. On the contrary, as the new cold war intensifies, China is more than capable of using its increasing cooperation with the Taliban to enlist jihadists from Afghanistan as proxies against the US.

Twenty five year-old Ali Harbi Ali has been arrested on suspicion of the murder last week of British Member of Parliament Sir David Amess in a church in Essex. Ali is a member of a well-to-do Somali family who were given refuge in Britain from the war-torn East African country in the 1990s. British authorities had previously been alerted to his radicalisation and he was referred to the UK’s “Prevent” anti-terrorist scheme.