Posted on 08/22/2010 5:39:42 AM PDT by TigerLikesRooster
Carrier to avoid drill in Yellow Sea
August 21, 2010
The U.S.S. George Washington, a nuclear-powered aircraft carrier, will not take part in the second of a series of the combined military drills between South Korea and the United States following the Cheonan sinking, the UN Command said yesterday.
An initial plan to mobilize the 97,000-ton aircraft career in the drill, scheduled to be held in the Yellow Sea early next month, drew strong protest from China, leading some to worry about a physical confrontation between the world’s superpowers.
“The George Washington is not scheduled to participate in this ASW [anti-submarine warfare] exercise,” the UN Command said in a statement.
The UN Command added that the George Washington will be mobilized for future exercises and operate in the waters off the Korean Peninsula, but did not specify the Yellow Sea, suggesting it will be kept out of the waters near China.
The first combined drill following the Cheonan sinking, dubbed “Invincible Spirit,” and held between July 25-28, involved the George Washington, but only in the East Sea after a hostile Chinese response to a ASW drill in the Yellow Sea.
Asked why the plan to dispatch the George Washington to the Yellow Sea was changed, an official from the UN Command said, “Nothing had been decided about it, so it is not a change.”
The official stressed that the drill is defensive by nature and is designed to send a message of deterrence to North Korea.
Local analysts such as Lee Nae-young, an international relations professor at Korea University, said China's response obviously affected the decision.
Beijing reacted angrily to the planned Yellow Sea drill by Seoul and Washington, with the People's Liberation Army Daily warning of a physical response in an editorial last week.
“If someone harms me, I must harm them,” the editorial warned.
Many observers, however, said the U.S. decision not to send the George Washington was not a fear of China but a strategic choice.
“The U.S. has several issues in which it needs cooperation from China such as sanctioning Iran and pushing North Korea toward denuclearization,” said Jun Byoung-kon, a China expert at the Korea Institute for National Unification.
Said Lee Tai-hwan, a researcher at the Sejong Institute: “The U.S. appears to have judged that it is better to avoid unnecessary misunderstanding.”
MODERATOR: Would you please assess where the U.S. stands diplomatically? Do we have a bad reputation now?
OBAMA: Well, I think that this administration has not been very good at what's been called the exercise of "soft power." You know, all of us recognize and reserve the right of the United States to exercise its military power in the national interest and for our national security--but we also have to recognize that a lot of our power comes from our ideals, our belief in freedom, our belief in democracy, our belief in the ability to work things through in a manner that comports with whatever frameworks of international law that have been shaped. And I think that, unfortunately, this administration has tended to be dismissive of any international efforts--and in his campaign, I think you witness it with a general disdain for, quote unquote, "globalism." In some cases, this is just a function of us trying to have conversations with our allies so that we can move more effectively.
KEYES: See, I think the great problem is that you cannot give a soft response to a hard threat. It would be kind of like trying to meet a bayonet with a spaghetti noodle. And it's not going to help the people of this country to survive.
After 9-11, we were faced with a hard threat. We had lost thousands of people, and we had to move aggressively. The belief that Afghanistan was enough is a belief based on a failure to understand the global infrastructure of terror--so that you deal with the threat that has hit you instead of with the threats that will hit you later if you neglect to preemptively move against their bases of support. It is precisely in order to create a situation in which maybe people who would be otherwise supportive of this bloodthirsty threat will respond a little better to your overtures that you move with decision against regimes like the Iraqi regime that had shown itself disposed to support terror, to fund terror, to be part gleefully of the global infrastructure of terror--and to act against them before they have the opportunity to act against you.
So we appease our enemies now, re-enforcing their view that we are weak, and ensure future bloodshed one day when we can retreat no further.
Weakness, not strength and the willingness to confront, breeds conflict. As the next decade unfurls, this administration may have the blood of millions on its hands.
Yeah, I should have added he kow tows to everything non american...thanks for the edit.
Probe with a bayonet. If you meet steel, stop. If you meet mush, then push. - Vladimir Lenin
But you are right sometime we will have to draw the line
This is very serious if it is true.
Liberalism for ya......
Well, Madeline Albright and other Dims and leftists have expressed how uncomfortable they are with only one superpower in the world, but it still seems China falls far short of that status expect in the eyes of leftists like Obama and his predecessors. Some of them are just trying to feel better and to relive themselves, at lease emotionally, of the horror of the US being the only superpower.
“I really hate to be hearing their non-stop whining and lame excuses these losers hash out to dodge their responsibility.”
Cacophony to us, sweet music to our enemies.
Both of which China refuses to do and emboldens both nations.
ping
Well..the international community, especially Islam, is saying we are week and Bo is much in agreement as we see. So if our great leader throws down our soverignity as he continues to do what other opinion are any to have then we have a coward and a misfit at the highest office in our land...an office I find it harder and harder to respect with the way things are going. Americans hate this path...other countries seem to be basking in our fall.
traveling, figures...
I had read somewhere that H Wouk said Willie Keith was the male parallel to Marjorie Morningstar.
The story itself was supposed to be the ‘coming out’ of Willie Keith and his journey from lad to man but it took on a life of its own....
I know the picture in #27 is p shopped.
In true AA, where is the short, fat white guy that would supposedly give the game balance?
Just wondering...
It sure did. Both novels are great.
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