Is China Gearing Up For War With Japan?

[celtic_crippler]

“Since we have decided that the US is bluffing in the East China Sea, we should take this opportunity to respond to these empty provocations with something real,” wrote Air Force Colonel Dai Xu in China’s Global Times last August. “This includes Vietnam, the Philippines and Japan, which are the three running dogs of the United States in Asia … We only need to kill one, and it will immediately bring the others to heel.”

China’s neighbors see this aggressive posturing and react accordingly. Japan’s new Prime Minister has put forward the first increases to Japan’s defense budget in 11 years, citing China’s belligerent behavior around disputed islands in the East China Sea.

Full Article: http://www.phantomreport.com/game-of-thrones-chinas-military-hawks-go-on-the-offensive

 

[Carol]

Cold War II?

Sure sounds like its going that way.

 

[celtic_crippler]

Sure sounds like its going that way.

Yes, but it looks like some of China's military leaders may want to "heat" things up!

 

[ballen0351]

Looks like Japans not just going to sit back and wait:
http://www.marinecorpstimes.com/mob...ese-forces-power-up-iron-fist-exercise-021713

Indeed, Japan’s military is classified as a self-defense force, established to maintain peace, protect the homeland and provide disaster relief. Its soldiers don’t tend to execute beach assaults, as Japan’s military has no unit like the Marine Corps, but driven by fears of missile attacks from its unpredictable neighbor North Korea, these skills are becoming a growing interest among leaders there.

“They want to be a more viable force,” said Col. Christopher D. Taylor, commander of the 13th Marine Expeditionary Unit. His Marines partnered with the Japanese throughout Iron Fist. “As a [U.S. treaty] partner, they are stepping up.”

Despite expanding its missile defense and stepping up talk about remilitarization, Japan remains sensitive to any impression of having offensive capabilities. Dozens of Japanese journalists followed every aspect of Iron Fist — from opening ceremonies at Camp Pendleton to desert training at in Twentynine Palms, Calif., and later operations on San Clemente Island, the Navy’s offshore range — but they didn’t capture any images of soldiers loading their rifles with blank rounds. They did so out of sight from the press.

 

[celtic_crippler]

That area of Asia is becoming quite a powder keg... wonder how long before it blows?

Article: http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/02/19/us-nkorea-threat-idUSBRE91I0J520130219

North Korea has already told key ally China that it is prepared to
stage one or two more [nuclear] tests this year to force the United States into diplomatic
talks, a source with direct knowledge of the message told Reuters last week.


"As the saying goes, a new-born puppy knows no fear of a tiger. South Korea's
erratic behavior would only herald its final destruction," North Korean diplomat
Jon Yong Ryong told the [UN] meeting.


Since the North tested a nuclear bomb last week in defiance of U.N.
resolutions, its southern neighbor has warned it could strike the isolated state
if it believed an attack was imminent.


Pyongyang said the aim of the test was to bolster its defenses given the
hostility of the United States, which has led a push to impose sanctions on
North Korea.

"If the U.S. takes a hostile approach toward the DPRK to the last, rendering
the situation complicated, it (North Korea) will be left with no option but to
take the second and third stronger steps in succession," he said, without
indicating what that might entail.

 

[Xue Sheng]

Interesting thing here is that Pyongyang and Beijing do not really get along. They are Allies but Pyongyang does not listen to Beijing and Beijing is not really all that happy about it.

However with the USA in the region it is likely that Beijing will not change anything, that is unless Pyongyang does something incredibly stupid which I tend to believe it a strong possibility. Pyongyang appears to have gotten caught up in its own propaganda machine and at times I believe it has lost track of reality. However that last bit about Pyongyang, the reality bit, is purely speculation on my part

 

[celtic_crippler]

More on the 2nd Cold War...

WASHINGTON (AP) -- As public evidence mounts that the Chinese military is responsible for stealing massive amounts of U.S. government data and corporate trade secrets, the Obama administration is eyeing fines and other trade actions it may take against Beijing or any other country guilty of cyberespionage.
According to officials familiar with the plans, the White House will lay out a new report Wednesday that suggests initial, more-aggressive steps the U.S. would take in response to what top authorities say has been an unrelenting campaign of cyberstealing linked to the Chinese government.

If these “more-aggressive steps” go into effect, how will they impact the growing tension in the region and between the US and China?

Article http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/storie...ME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-02-19-19-28-03

 

[Xue Sheng]

Don’t know, have to wait and see. But historically it has been a back and forth type of thing, we sanction them and they sanction us. The sanction us and we sanction them. And this has gone on even in immigration and visas

But this "theft" is nothing new, just the method they are using is new. China has been stealing stuff for years in multiple ways. I once listened to a woman talk you use to be in the PRC’s "information gathering area" and she said getting high tech information from America was easy all you had to do was find and talk to the engineer, flirt a bit, not all that much really (no physical contact) and in some cases not at all, and ask them about what they had invented, worked on or done and act very interested and they would tell you everything. Mostly because people in general did not want to listen to them and never asked for detailed info because they thought it was boring and no one cared about the process only the result.

Another was a camera crew (US) in Beijing; they had a piece of equipment confiscated because the military person there did not know what it was "never seen it before and thought it might be for spying". The item was returned in a couple of days. About a week later a person in the US camera crew came across a Chinese camera crew with the same exact piece of equipment, only this one has Chinese writing on it.

Heck Microsoft went up against them on software piracy, which is rampant in China, and lost and Google tried to based on freedom of the internet and they lost (even OPEC lost in China). The issue will be if the USA does do something in the way of sanctions how will it affect the “BIG” US companies that are there…and there are a lot of them

 

[Xue Sheng]

White House to combat hackers with diplomacy

The Obama administration unveiled a strategy on Wednesday to better protect the business secrets of U.S. companies from theft, including attacks by hackers.