Duterte: America has lost

Duterte said this in Beijing, ‘Both in military, not maybe social, but economics also, America has lost. America has lost a 70 year ally in the Philippines to China. 

The USA has been crooning the 70 years of dominating the Philippines as a smaller member of the military alliance as ‘rich people to people ties, including a vibrant Filipino American diaspora, and a long list of shared security interests.’ They did not want to remind the Pinoys that the relations went back even further, to 1898 when they invaded and colonized the Philippines and the massacres of the Pinoys by the Americans. …We also remain one of the Philippines’ strongest economic partners, the current stock of US foreign direct investment stands above US$4.7b’.

The 4 day visit by Duterte to Beijing has led to US$13.5b of agreement signed between the two countries with more to come. And it revives the centuries old relationship between the two countries and the people to people ties built over the past with more than 2m Pinoys with Chinese ancestry and many millions more with Chinese blood in them.

After all these years of manipulation, coercion and behind the door arm twisting, all the American effort and scheming came to nought on 20 Oct 16.  The US$30m spent on the farcical kangaroo court proceedings and rulings went up in smoke. Would the Americans now send the bills to the Pinoys?  All the cloak and dagger hustling behind closed doors in Asean minister meetings to fix China with the Pinoys as the point man now looked so ludicrous. It fell flat.

As they said, man proposed God disposed. Someone up there just said enough is enough and the chapter of American conspiracy to divide the Asean states against China must come to an end. The most crucial piece of pawn in the American game plan, the Philippines, called out. And Duterte even suggested an alliance with Russia and China, and to tell Putin ‘that there are three of us against the world – China, Philippines and Russia. It’s the only way.’

The changing dynamics of the Asia Pacific balance of power would look very different going forward. What would the Americans be thinking of doing? Brewing a military coup against Duterte or an assassination bullet? Would there be more punitive measures against the Philippines or more carrots, like throwing a few antique museum pieces as gifts to the poor brown brothers’ navy for Christmas?

The whole initiative to the new development came out of the blue, in one man, in Rodrigo Duterte. He wrote the script and played the key role to change the course of history of the Asia Pacific region. Now this is powerful.

The American camp is in total disarray, not knowing what happened or what hit them. Obama, you still there? Abe, where are you? More joint naval patrols, freedom of navigation in the South China Sea without the approval of China and the Philippines?

To quote Foreign Secretary Yasay, ‘The US Philippines alliance is the most profound and problematic institutional manifestation of this colonial legacy of arrested development…The US held on to invisible chains that reined us in towards dependency and submission as little brown brothers not capable of true independence and freedom.’

Red Arrows over Marina Bay

Some of the pics I took of the Red Arrows on 18 Oct from the Marina Barrage. Quite a brief display with three passes and all over in 15 minutes. The Brits could put on a better show to show that they still have it as a former world power. The few hundred photographers braving the hot tropical sun with a bright sunny day did not have their fill and were somewhat disappointed as they knew the Red Arrows could show off a bit more.

China misunderstand Singapore? Really?

Tommy Koh wrote a piece titled ‘What China misunderstands Singapore’ in the ST on 21 Oct 16. Before dealing with the content of what he said, let me just take a broad view of what the article is trying to say. My first point, is the author assuming that the Chinese are not that clever and did not understand what Singapore is all about? If that is the case maybe Singapore can loan one of its super talented diplomats to help the Chinese understand Singapore.  Even our journalists and political thinkers are all full of themselves and wanting to teach the Chinese how to run their country.

Oh, they did not know that Singapore is a multi racial country and is in the middle of a sea of Muslim states and have different kinds of problems and issues to think about. They did not understand or got no intelligence to understand that Singapore needs the Americans to use might is right to protect Singapore from its neigbours if they turned hostile.

Ok, let me deal with the straw men that were raised to be shot down.  I would not deal with every little piece of thing the author said but just a few pertinent points for discussion. The Chinese, because Singapore has a Chinese majority country, ‘has given rise to unreasonable expectations on the part of China towards Singapore’. Now what are these unreasonable expectations and why are these unreasonable? ‘They feel that since Singaporeans are fellow Chinese, we should have a better understanding of China’s policies than other Asean countries. They also expect Singapore to support China’s policies.’ The first expectation, a better understanding of China’s policies, unreasonable? Even without the Chinese majority, any foreign officer or leader in charge of foreign affairs are expected to try to have a better understanding of the policies of big powers. Whether he/she agrees is another thing. It will only be an issue when taking a position. What is so unreasonable about a better understanding of another country’s position?

The second expectation, Singapore to support China’s policies. This would be unreasonable when the policies are against the interest of Singapore.  And if it is a case of a tussle between two super powers, it would be unreasonable for China to expect Singapore to support China against another superpower. Likewise it would be unreasonable for Singapore to support another super power against China. Ok, this part is only true if Singapore really wants to be neutral. See, we can see clearly why China is unreasonable but blind to our own unreasonableness. Oh, I forgot, we support US position, or not really support US position, is because we are supporting principles, supporting international laws, supporting freedom of navigation, and these seemed to be the same as what the US is supporting, so we are not supporting the US against China, we are not unreasonable. My eyeballs are rolling. To say this kind of argument is clever is as good as saying snake oil salesmen are very clever.
I do not want to rehash why the kangaroo court is not UN backed and is not about international law or freedom of navigation is affected or someone is more principled and someone is not.

How many reasonable people, principled people, really believe, honestly believe, that the kangaroo court, the way it was set up and the way judgement was passed, is about international law, upholding international law and about principles, justice and fair play?

I will touch on the other 3 ‘misunderstandings’ if I feel exasperated enough to touch on them later, one at a time.

A kangaroo court is a kangaroo court, UN backed or not UN backed. And this kangaroo court was definitely not UN backed.  And its decision was nothing binding and nothing about international law. It abused international law by its rubbish interpretation of reefs and islands. Not all international judges are intelligent and the kangaroo court is a good example to prove how silly these people can be.

AHPETC saga is ongoing – What is the point?

I don’t know and don’t really care. Any impact on the parties involved, on the residents managed by the town council? Plenty! The WP would be so tied up with the ongoings that not only they would be so frustrated, agitated but also got no time for anything else. They would be spending a lot of their time and energy answering to the other party and trying to take defensive measures, preparing and wondering what would be next coming. The other party has all the resources to sit on the matter, keep digging, keep asking, till the cow comes home, or till the next GE, hopefully the WP would be no more.

What about cost? How many man hours, how many professional hours would be charged to the affair? And who would be paying for it? The WP or the residents?

I hope the charges and fees would not be coming out from the residents, from their fees and charges paid to the town council, from the reserves in the town council. But I think it would come from the residents as the WP are managing the town council and the people’s fund and any cost would likely be paid officially from the town council fund as they are working in the official capacity as town council management..

As the unending saga continues, like the fairy tales of the unending story, would the town council be bankrupt at the end of the story? If so, who should be responsible for this sorry state of affair? Never mind the incapacitating of the WP, with little time left to perform their duty as town council managers and as MPs in Parliament. Tsk, tsk, tsk….

Stupidity has no cure

Whenever Xi Jinping goes on a foreign state visit, he would bring along an entourage of businessmen and agreements to be signed for infrastructure developments, trade deals and a suitcase of cash to fund the deals. Many developing countries are eagerly hoping for a visit by President like waiting for a Santa Claus in Christmas. And they would not be disappointed.

Duterte of the Philippines just did the reverse. He brought a team of businessmen to visit Xi Jinping. This is like if the Mohammed does not visit the mountain, the mountain will go to Mohammed. And the results are likely to be the same. Duterte is going to return to the Philippines with a bag of goodies for his people. There will be many trade deals and infrastructure development projects. He wants a few railway lines for the Philippines and would not be disappointed. If he wants ports, industrial projects, new cities, all he has to do is asked.

When the Obama goes visiting, he would bring along his generals and also an entourage of business honchos.  And he would be very generous to sell military weapons, guns, missiles, tanks, fighter aircraft, battle ships, drones, anything that can be used for wars. And in return he would want the countries he visited to sign military alliances with the Americans, to provide military bases for the Americans.

And the unthinking will be screaming their lungs out, the Chinese President is expansionist and planning to start a war of conquest. The Chinese President is coercing the other countries to take advantage of them, to exploit their natural resources. The Chinese are belligerent and waiting to start wars. Just you wait, just you wait, they are coming to attack you and to rob your country to build a Chinese Empire.

Oh, the Americans are peace loving countries. They sell weapons to countries for peace, so that they can live in peace. They sign military alliances to protect these countries from their enemies. They did not have enemies but once they signed the agreements, the enemies of the Americans would become their enemies. And they must provide land for the American Empire to station their soldiers and war machine.  No, the Americans are not taking control of their countries, the Americans are not their colonial masters, just the Emperor of the American Empire and these countries signing the military alliances just become part of the American Empire and now have enemies to fight for.

The Americans are all for peace, very peace loving people. When they conduct regime change like the invasion of Iraq, Libya, Syria and Afghanistan, they are there to fight terrorists or rogue regimes, to protect the people of those countries.

Yeah, yeah, the Americans are for peace, the Chinese are for war. The Chinese are coming. Never mind if the Americans are already in their countries with their soldiers and military bases as the new masters.

Stupidity has no cure.

Below are quotes from Duterte, ‘The Asian giant was “good”, …It has never invaded a piece of my country all these generations….During the Cold War, China was portrayed as the bad guy, …And all of these years, what we have read in our books in school was all propaganda produced by the West.’

Remove your blinkers and compare facts against fiction, for goodness sake, and stop being stupid. We must know our own history, write our own history, know our own truths.