/ Asia

• What is the Best Route for Supplying Landlocked Afghanistan

  Last November when the U.S. unmanned drone killed 24 Pakistani soldiers, in retaliation, the government of Pakistan decided to block the supply routes to Afghanistan. Since then, not only NATO supply trucks have been stopped, but also thousands of Afghan-bound containers loaded with commercial goods have been stranded in the port city of Karachi. Each and every time commercial goods are grounded in Pakistan, Afghan businessmen are losing money and Afghan consumers are paying higher prices for goods that are imported through Pakistan. It seems like landlocked Afghanistan is highly dependent on trade roads from Pakistan. However, there are three…

• China Casts Increasingly Large Investment Shadow Over Southeast Asian Neighbors

  Thinking of opening a textile mill in Kampuchea? A shrimp farm in Vietnam? Anything at all in Laos or Myanmar? Then think fast and act, as China is increasingly dominating is Southeast Asian neighbors' economies. Doubting Thomases should have a look at the document released last month by China's National Development and Reform Commission, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Ministry of Finance, and the Ministry of Science and Technology. Blandly entitled, "Country Report on China' s Participation in Greater Mekong Subregion Cooperation I," the study delineates in detail Beijing's interest in the Greater Mekong Subregion (GMS) nations of Myanmar, Laos, Thailand,…

• Is War in the South China Sea Inevitable?

  If China is not actually preparing for conflict in the South China Sea over disputed archipelagos and islets and their rich offshore resources, from fish to hydrocarbons, then consider the comments made on 6 December by Chinese President Hu Jintao to the Central Military Commission, as reported by Xinhua. Hu said that China's navy should "make extended preparations for warfare," adding that the navy should "accelerate its transformation and modernization in a sturdy way, and make extended preparations for military combat in order to make greater contributions to safeguard national security. Our work must closely encircle the main theme of…

• Central Asian Setback for the U.S. Military

  The last few weeks have seen the U.S. Department of Defense suffer a number of setbacks in its effort to retain military influence overseas. First came the startling announcement on 21 October, when President Obama announced that all American troops would be withdrawing from Iraq by 31 December under the terms of the Status of Forces Agreement. Accordingly, 39,000 U.S. soldiers will leave Iraq by the end of the year. The deal breaker? Washington’s demand for continued immunity for any remaining U.S. troops, and the Iraqi government of President Jalal Talibani couldn’t, or wouldn’t, deliver. Now the handwriting’s apparently on…

• China Believes it has Indisputable Sovereignty Over the South China Seas

  An apocryphal quote attributed to Chinese Premier Chou En Lai when asked about the French Revolution was, "It is too soon to say." Those seeking further advice from Chairman Mao Tse Tung’s closest adviser would do well to heed his comment, “China is an attractive piece of meat coveted by all … but very tough, and for years no one has been able to bite into it.” Chinese gristle has decided to contest sovereignty issues in the South China Seas with its neighbors and Kremlinologists turned into Forbidden City analysts ought to pay attention to a recently published article in…

• North and South Korean Nuclear Breakthrough?

  The U.S.-Mexican border is one of the few in the world where the First World coexists uneasily alongside the Third World. A second is the demilitarized zone dividing North and South Korea, but unlike the Rio Grande, the DMZ is nuclear. Unlike any other frontier in the world, North Korea, an economic basket case by any measure, has nuclear weapons, while prosperous South Korea operates 21 nuclear power stations which provide approximately 40 percent of the country’s electricity. In a brief glimmer of good news, the chief nuclear negotiators of South and North Korea will meet in Beijing next week,…

• The Rise of Vietnam

  After ten years of economic stagnation following the reunification of the country in 1975, after the fall of Saigon, the Communist Party of Vietnam adopted in 1986 a program of broad economic reforms known as the Doi Moi or “renovation.” It introduced new market rules were, opened up to a greater degree of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) and improved the business climate. By and large, the “Doi Moi” reforms brought about profound changes in the Vietnamese “social fabric.” Nonetheless, even after this liberalization effort, the Vietnamese government still wields a great deal of control and influence exerts over major economic…

• China’s Ongoing Territorial Disputes

  While the West is pummeled by China’s rising economy, neighbors fear possible Beijing territorial claims. The dazzling rise of the Chinese economy over the last decade has been the 21st century’s greatest economic success story. While Western economies find their indigenous manufacturing industries being gutted by massive floods of cheap Chinese imports, China’s neighbors are looking worryingly at the possibility that Beijing might flex its growing military strength in contests over bilateral territorial disputes, which exist with nearly all of its neighbors, encompassing both land and maritime issues. The list of disagreements is extensive. Top of Beijing’s list is reincorporating…

• Tajikistan, A Frail Nation-State Amidst the New Great Game

  The past two decades since the 1991 collapse of Communism have seen the Russian Federation and the U.S. involved in an updated version of the 19th century’s “Great Game’ for mastery in Eurasia over the debris field of the former USSR. Not surprisingly, Moscow regards its former colonial fiefdoms as part of its “near abroad,” a “Monroeskii Doktrin” variant of U.S. interest in Central and Latin American, where a priori interests rule. U.S. interests in the post-Soviet Eurasian space since 1991 have fixated first on the region’s immense but underdeveloped energy resources, while the post-9/11 environment added a second dimension…

• Short-Sighted U.S. Policy Towards Pakistan Imperils All of South Asia

  The U.S. State Department and the Department of Defense both contain some of Washington’s “best and brightest.” As massive bureaucracies, they also both contain a number of dimwitted people, who now ensconced in their well-paid bureaucratic sinecures, are solely concerned about moving up to the next pay grade, where the “Peter Principle” ultimately determines their ability to function. To use a grim, black humor metaphor, a number of these suits have now well and truly ‘drunk the Kool-Aid” as regards Pakistan. There is simply no other explanation for the implications of Washington’s potentially disastrous ratcheting up of its confrontations with…