MR. PRESIDENT – MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN – STANDUP FOR AMERICAN VALUES
"VOTE ‘T’ " – MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN – VOTE FOR AMERICAN VALUES
President Donald Trump successfully invented several insulting nicknames to win his 2016 presidential election. To win ‘The Cold War in Asia’, to achieve victory in ‘Unfinished Korea-Vietnam War’, and to ‘Make America Great Again’, Americans have to Vote for American Values and recreate independent American Spirit. I ask Mr. ‘T’ to Standup for Freedom, Democracy, Peace, and Justice in Asia and to Stop waging his ‘Twitter Warfare’ inventing nicknames.
Rudranarasimham Rebbapragada
Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA 48104 – 4162.,
SPECIAL FRONTIER FORCE
ANALYSIS : FROM ‘SLEEPY EYES’ TO ‘ROCKET MAN’ – A COMPENDIUM OF BELITTLING NICKNAMES TRUMP HAS INVENTED
Midway through his Sunday morning Twitter storm, President Trump assigned his latest in a long line of nicknames — this time to the leader of nuclear-armed North Korea, Kim Jong Un, henceforth known as “Rocket Man.”
Without addressing the geopolitical wisdom of tweet-baiting an unpredictable dictator, even some of Trump’s critics had to admit that he’d come up with a pretty clever name.
In a mere nine letters, the president simultaneously mocked Jong Un, belittled his regime’s missile arsenal and alluded to the popular lyrics of Elton John.
But that really shouldn’t surprise anyone. A brief review of the long history of Trumpisms shows that, regardless of how he’s doing as leader of the free world, Trump has really stepped up his name game.
“Sleepy Eyes” and “Pocahontas”
While it’s hardly his most famous creation, one of Trump’s oldest and most enduring nicknames is reserved for Chuck Todd, or “Sleepy Eyes,” as Trump has repeatedly called the NBC host.
Trump started using the term on Twitter during the 2012 presidential election, when he decided Todd — “an absolute joke of a reporter” — was too friendly to then-president Barack Obama.
But Trump has kept “Sleepy Eyes” around into his own presidency, most recently when he complained that the soporific journalist was paying too much attention to “the Fake Trump/Russia story.”
By then, “Sleepy Eyes” shared Trump’s imaginative landscape with many other characters, like Sen. Elizabeth “Pocahontas” Warren (D-Mass.), whose name he explained this way:
Academics occasionally try to analyze the nicknames Trump invents, seeing in them either genius or a psychological malady.
A writer for Psychology Today once called the names “a symptom of nounism” — or, in other words, the result of Trump’s compulsion to simplify people into objects, good or bad.
Last year, a communications professor at the University of Wisconsin told Business Insider that the nicknames were crafty politics, allowing Trump to reference his enemies’ scandals and embarrassments in a breath, as prefix, every time he spoke their names.
Little Marco and Lyin’ Ted
As he fought his way through the candidate-clogged Republican primaries last year, Trump experimented with various insults for his many rivals.
He briefly tried out “Robot Rubio” for Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida but found an alternative form far more successful when the two men met on stage at a debate in March 2016.
“I have a policy question for you, sir,” the moderator told Trump.
“Let’s see if he answers it!” Rubio chirped.
“I will,” Trump replied, stone-faced. “Don’t worry about it, Marco, don’t worry about it. Don’t worry about it, Little Marco. I will.”
Rubio tried get in a comeback over the cheers. “Well, let’s hear it, big — big Don, big Donald!” he said.
But Trump just talked over him, not even looking at Rubio and simply repeating to wild applause, “Don’t worry about it, Little Marco.”
Less than two weeks later, “Little Marco” Rubio dropped out of the race, and Trump moved on to his next big rival, Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, a.k.a.:
Over on the Democratic side of the primary, Hillary Clinton was having none of this name-shaming business.
“Clinton’s campaign and her allies are planning an aggressive, sober defense of their candidate in response to businessman Donald Trump’s trademark personal attacks, which he has already aimed her way,” The Washington Post wrote in April 2016, as Trump barreled past “Lyin’ Ted” and every other Republican.
The Democrat resolved to ignore whatever insult Trump came up with, which at the time was “Incompetent Hillary,” a clunky prototype of the term he would crystallize two weeks later while speaking to reporters in New York.
“You know the story,” Trump said. “It’s Crooked Hillary. She’s as crooked as they come. We are going to beat her so badly.”
And he did beat her, though Clinton’s primary contests with Bernie Sanders took so long to resolve that Trump found opportunity to nickname both Democrats.
“Mr. Elegant,” “non-people,” and “T”
We don’t pretend this is a comprehensive list. The nicknames that Trump has come up with are probably uncountable, extending from his real estate and show-business days into his presidency.
They encompass nonhuman antagonists, like the “Failing New York Times” and “Amazon Washington Post,” collectively part of the entity he deems “fake news.”
And some monikers appear to live only in the president’s mind, or at least his private conversations. Like “Mr. Elegant,” whom Trump referenced in an interview with the Wall Street Journal last month, leaving everyone confused as to whom he was talking about.
Finally, after all those people, there are the self-referential nicknames. The autotrumpisms.
Trump is hardly the first politician to refer to himself occasionally in third person. But he has done so over the years with a typically Trump-like inclination toward brevity.
His first tweet, in 2009, invited fans to “tune in and watch Donald Trump” on late-night TV. By 2013, as Trump congratulated himself for the success of his reality show, he had moved on to the more familiar “Donald:”
And as Election Day approached last year, Trump had reduced himself to a single character — “Vote ‘T.’ ”
We might chalk that up to the 140-character limit of Trump’s favorite medium. But he did it again a year later, as he complained of the FBI investigation around T’s young administration.
Which isn’t to say that Trump will always be ‘T.’ Nor that Hillary must be Crooked, or Chuck Todd Sleepy.
In fact, as Sunday’s “Rocket Man” saga demonstrated, nicknames are a little like nuclear weapons. They risk retaliation:
DEMOCRACY vs COMMUNISM – UNITED STATES NOT DOING ENOUGH
DEMOCRACY vs COMMUNISM – UNITED STATES NOT DOING ENOUGH
North Korea’s nuclear and missile test programmes are mere symptoms of ‘The Cold War in Asia’. It is strange to read that the US expects China and Russia to do enough to stop North Korea. In my analysis, the US is not doing enough to contain the spread of Communism in Asia. This problem dates back to the Communist takeover of mainland China in 1949.
Rudranarasimham Rebbapragada
DOOM DOOMA DOOMSAYER
NORTH KOREA FIRES SECOND MISSILE OVER JAPAN AS US TELLS CHINA AND RUSSIA TO TAKE ‘DIRECT ACTION’
Unnerving alert sirens ring out in Japan in response to North Korea’s missile launch
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The missile, launched from Sunan, the site of Pyongyang’s international airport, flew farther than any other missile North Korea has fired. The distance it flew is slightly greater than between the North Korean capital and the American air base in Guam.
It was "the furthest over ground any of their ballistic missiles has ever travelled", Joseph Dempsey of the International Institute for Strategic Studies said on Twitter.
Physicist David Wright, of the Union of Concerned Scientists, added: "North Korea demonstrated that it could reach Guam with this missile, although the payload the missile was carrying is not known" and its accuracy was in doubt.
Sirens sounded and alerts were issued in Japan as residents were warned to take shelter while the missile passed over Hoakkaido.
"We can never tolerate that North Korea trampled on the international community’s strong, united resolve toward peace that has been shown in UN resolutions and went ahead again with this outrageous act," Shinzo Abe, the Japanese prime minister, said.
Jim Mattis, US Defence Secretary, called the latest missile launch a reckless act and "put millions of Japanese in duck and cover".
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson urged China and Russia to do more to rein in North Korea.
"China and Russia must indicate their intolerance for these reckless missile launches by taking direct actions of their own," Mr. Tillerson said in a statement.
China said it "opposes" the test, but reiterated its call that "all parties" should exercise restraint.
"The situation on the Korean Peninsula is complicated and sensitive,” a spokeswoman said.
In response to the launch, South Korea’s military immediately carried out a ballistic missile drill of its own, the Defence ministry said, adding it took place while the North’s rocket was still airborne.
One Hyunmu missile travelled 250 kilometers into the East Sea, Korea’s name for the Sea of Japan – a trajectory intentionally chosen to represent the distance to the launch site at Sunan, near Pyongyang’s airport, it added.
But embarrassingly, another failed soon after being fired.
President Moon Jae-In told an emergency meeting of Seoul’s national security council that dialogue with the North was "impossible in a situation like this", adding that the South had the power to destroy it.
In New York, the Security Council called an emergency meeting for later on Friday.
However, a North Korean official said Pyongyang would continue to defy sanctions.
Choe Kang-il, deputy director general for North American affairs at the North’s foreign ministry, said: “You can impose whatever sanctions you want, but no matter how long these sanctions last – whether it is for 100 or 1,000 years – we will keep stepping up efforts and continue with our planned tests.”
North Korea last month used the airport to fire a Hwasong-12 intermediate range missile that flew over northern Japan.
The North then declared it a "meaningful prelude" to containing the U.S. Pacific island territory of Guam and the start of more ballistic missile launches toward the Pacific Ocean.
Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga denounced North Korea’s latest launch, saying he was conveying "strong anger" on behalf of the Japanese people.
Mr. Suga said Japan "will not tolerate the repeated and excessive provocations."
China said it opposed North Korea’s latest missile test and warned that the situation on the Korean peninsula was “complicated and sensitive”, China Correspondent Neil Connor reports from Beijing.
Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said: “China opposes North Korea violating relevant UN Security Council resolutions by making use of ballistic missile technology to embark on launch activities.
“Currently, the situation on the Korean Peninsula is complicated and sensitive,” Ms Hua told a regular briefing in Beijing.
“All relevant parties should exercise restraint and should not make any moves which would escalate tensions.”
Boris Johnson urged united response to North Korea’s latest missile test
The latest missile launch by North Korea must be met with a united international response, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson has urged.
Mr. Johnson condemned the test as "illegal" and the latest sign of "provocation" from Pyongyang.
"Yet another illegal missile launch by North Korea. UK and international community will stand together in the face of these provocations," he said on Twitter.
In a subsequent statement, he added: "The UK and the international community have condemned the aggressive and illegal actions of the North Korean regime, and the succession of missile and nuclear tests. We stand firmly by Japan and our other international partners.
"We are working to mobilize world opinion with the aim of achieving a diplomatic solution to the situation on the Korean peninsula.
"This week the most stringent UN sanctions regime placed on any nation in the 21st century was imposed on North Korea, after being unanimously agreed at the UN Security Council.
"These measures now need to be robustly enforced. We urge all states to play their part in changing the course North Korea is taking."
Before the latest launch, Mr. Johnson had called for China to use its influence over North Korea to ease tensions caused by Pyongyang’s nuclear and missile development programmes.
At a press conference with US counterpart Rex Tillerson on Thursday, Mr. Johnson said Pyongyang had "defied the world".
What kinds of missile was launched by North Korea?
The missile was launched from Sunan, the location of Pyongyang’s international airport and the origin of the earlier missile that flew over Japan.
Analysts have speculated the new test was of the same intermediate-range missile launched in that earlier flight, the Hwasong-12, and was meant to show Washington that the North can hit Guam if it chose to do so.
This graphic explains what we know about North Korea’s missiles:
Japan’s Defence minister said on Friday that he believed North Korea "has Guam in mind" after its most recent missile launch, noting it had sufficient range to hit the US territory.
Pyongyang has threatened to hit the US Pacific territory with "enveloping fire," sparking dire warnings from US President Donald Trump.
Itsunori Onodera told reporters that the latest missile, which overflew Japanese territory, flew 2,300 miles – "long enough to cover Guam", which is 2,100 miles from North Korea.
"We cannot assume North Korea’s intention, but given what it has said, I think it has Guam in mind," Onodera said.
He warned that "similar actions (by the North) would continue" as Pyongyang appeared to have shrugged off UN sanctions agreed earlier this week.
The US Pacific Command confirmed the launch was an intermediate range ballistic missile (IRBM) but said it posed no threat to Guam or to the American mainland.
But, for the second time in less than a month, it overflew Japan’s northernmost island of Hokkaido, sparking loudspeaker alerts and warnings to citizens to take cover.
As North Korea continues to goad the world with its weapons programme, we examine in this video how much of a threat Kim Jong-Un’s regime is to Britain.
North Korea’s launch of a ballistic missile that flew more than 2,300 miles before falling into the Pacific Ocean is a "clear and unequivocal" message to the United States that Pyongyang has the ability to strike Guam.
The distance from Pyongyang to Guam is a little over 2,100 miles and North Korea identified it as a target in early August, threatening to launch four Hwasong-12 intermediate-range ballistic missiles into waters close to the island.
North Korea has threatened to attack the US base in Guam Credit: Reuters
The intention, according to analysts, was to demonstrate that Pyongyang would have no compunction in the event of war from targeting the resort island in order to interrupt air attacks on the North as well as efforts to reinforce ground forces on the Korean Peninsula.
"From previous launches and the altitude and ranges of those missiles, it has been assumed that Guam is within range of the North’s missiles, but this latest test is proof", Garren Mulloy, a Defence expert and associate professor of international relations at Japan’s Daito Bunka University, told The Telegraph.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in ordered his military to conduct a live-fire ballistic missile drill in response to the North Korean launch.
South Korea’s Joint Chiefs of Staff said one of the two missiles fired in the drill hit a sea target about 250 kilometers (155 miles) away, which was approximately the distance to Pyongyang’s Sunan, but the other failed in flight shortly after launch.
North Korea has launched dozens of missiles under young leader Kim Jong -un as it accelerates a weapons programme designed to give it the ability to target the United States with a powerful, nuclear-tipped missile.
Two tests in July were for long-range intercontinental ballistic missiles capable of reaching at least parts of the US mainland.
Yang Uk, a senior research fellow at the Korea Defence and Security Forum said:
"This rocket has meaning in that North Korea is pushing towards technological completion of its missiles and that North Korea may be feeling some pressure that they need to show the international community something."
Some residents in Japan have reacted angrily to the latest test.
"Japanese people have not been subjected to this kind of threat since the end of the war more than 70 years ago", Ken Kato, a Tokyo-based human rights activist, told the Telegraph.
"People genuinely feel that unless something is done quite soon, then their families are at risk", he told The Telegraph. "This is the situation we are in now and we have to adapt to these realities, but these missile launches and nuclear tests are leading a lot of people to conclude that Japan needs its own nuclear deterrent.
A passerby walks under a TV screen reporting news about North Korea’s missile launch in Tokyo Credit: Reuters
"Personally, the launch did not come as much of a surprise because this is becoming a fact of life for us in Japan", he said. "But there is also a growing sense of anger among ordinary people.
"North Korea is a terrorist nation and I expect this situation to escalate even further,"
Residents in northern Japan appeared calm and went about their business as normal despite the sirens warning them of a missile flying overhead.
It was the second such alert in a matter of weeks, but, for some residents, there was no question of this becoming a routine event.
Yoshihiro Saito, who works in the small fishing town of Erimo on Hokkaido, told AFP:
"I cannot say that we are used to this. I mean, the missile flew right above our town. It’s not a very comforting thing to hear.
"It’s pretty scary. I heard that it went 2,000 kilometers in the Pacific and dropped in the sea" where 16 of his ships were operating under the missile’s flight path."
The New York Times reports that the Trump administration chose not to take out the missile on the launching pad, even though they saw it being fueled up a day ago.
Officials said Vice President Mike Pence was even shown images of the missile during a visit to one of the nation’s intelligence agencies.
A North Korean Hwasong 12missile is paraded across Kim Il Sung Square during a military parade in Pyongyang Credit: AP
Air Koryo flight 151, which left the area of the missile launch 90 minutes after it was conducted, has now landed in Beijing – 10 minutes ahead of schedule.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in says North Korea’s latest launch of a missile over Japan will only result in further diplomatic and economic isolation for the North.
"President Moon ordered officials to closely analyze and prepare for new possible North Korean threats like EMP (electro-magnetic pulse) and biochemical attacks," Moon’s spokesman Park Su-hyun told a briefing.
North Korea said earlier this month it was developing a hydrogen bomb that can carry out an EMP attack. Experts disagree on whether the North would have the capability to mount such an attack, which would involve setting off a bomb in the atmosphere that could cause major damage to power grids and other infrastructure.
The missile was launched at 6.59am from Sunan, the site of Pyongyang’s international airport. An hour and a half later a passenger flight took off for Beijing.
Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe says United Nations sanctions on North Korea needed to be firmly imposed.
Abe said that the international community must send a clear message to North Korea over its provocative actions.
"We can never tolerate that North Korea trampled on the international community’s strong, united resolve toward peace that has been shown in UN resolutions and went ahead again with this outrageous act."
US Defence Secretary Jim Mattis says North Korea’s missile launch over Japan "put millions of Japanese into duck and cover" before it landed in the Pacific Ocean, and added that top US officials had fully coordinated after the test-launch.
"We have just got done with the calls we always make to coordinate among ourselves. Steady as she goes," Mattis told reporters traveling with him during a visit to the U.S. Strategic Command, which oversees U.S. nuclear forces.
The United Nations Security Council will meet at 3 p.m. EDT (1900 GMT) on Friday on the latest North Korea missile test, diplomats said, at the request of the United States and Japan.
The 15-member Security Council unanimously stepped up sanctions against North Korea on Monday over its Sept. 3 nuclear test, imposing a ban on the country’s textile exports and capping imports of crude oil. It was the ninth U.N. sanctions resolution adopted on North Korea since 2006.
In confronting North Korea’s latest provocation, the focus will almost certainly shift once again to Beijing, China Correspondent Neil Connor says.
Donald Trump has warned that the United States would cease trading with any country that trades with North Korea – comments which were met with concern in China. And in London only hours before Pyongyang fired its latest projectile, the US secretary of state Rex Tillerson urged China to use its supply of oil to North Korea as leverage against the regime.
"That is a very powerful tool and it has been used in the past," Tillerson said at a news conference. "We hope China will not reject that."
In 2003, China shut down its oil pipeline to North Korea for three days after a missile launch. Officials said it was due to a mechanical failure, although it was thought to be deliberate and ultimately helped force a climb-down from Pyongyang.
US believe it was an intermediate range ballistic missile
The US Pacific Command says initial assessment indicates the projectile was an intermediate range ballistic missile.
It said the North American Aerospace Defence Command (NORAD) determined this ballistic missile did not pose a threat to North America, nor Guam.
"Our commitment to the Defence of our allies, including the Republic of Korea and Japan, in the face of these threats, remains ironclad. We remain prepared to defend ourselves and our allies from any attack or provocation.
South Korean experts said the August launch was Pyongyang’s attempt to make missiles flying over Japan an accepted norm as it seeks to test new projectiles and win more military space in the region dominated by its enemies.
The Offices of Guam Homeland Security and Civil Defence said the latest launch posed no immediate threat to Guam or the Marinas.
White House spokeswoman Sarah Huckabee Sanders says US President Donald Trump has been briefed on North Korea’s launch of the unidentified missile over Japan.
"The President has been briefed on the latest North Korea missile launch by General Kelly," Sanders said, referring to the president’s chief of staff.
South Korea’s Defence Ministry said the country’s military conducted a live-fire drill of a Hyunmoo-2 ballistic missile in response to the North’s launch on Friday.
It came two days after it said it conducted its first live-fire drill for an advanced air-launched cruise missile it says will strengthen its pre-emptive strike capability against North Korea in the event of crisis.
Watch as South Korea’s new Taurus cruise missile hits target
Australia, a strong and vocal ally of the United States, quickly condemned the launch. In an interview with Sky News, Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said:
"This is another dangerous, reckless, criminal act by the North Korean regime, threatening the stability of the region and the world and we condemn it, utterly.
"This is a sign, I believe, of their frustration at the increased sanctions on North Korea, recently imposed by the Security Council. It’s a sign that the sanctions are working."
The missile test has come shortly after the top commander of U.S. nuclear forces said he assumed the Sept. 3 nuclear test by North Korea was a hydrogen bomb, suggesting a heightened US concern that the North has advanced to a new level of nuclear firepower.
Air Force Gen. John E. Hyten, commander of Strategic Command, told reporters that while he was not in a position to confirm it, he assumes from the size of the underground explosion and other factors that it was a hydrogen bomb – which is a leap beyond the fission, or atomic, bombs North Korea has previously tested.
This before-and-after images courtesy of Planet, show a closer view of the Punggye-ri test site Credit: AFP
North Korea claimed they exploded a hydrogen bomb, and while U.S. officials have not contradicted them, they have not confirmed it, either.
"When I look at a thing that size, I as a military officer assume that it’s a hydrogen bomb," Hyten said. As head of Strategic Command, he would be in charge of all elements of the U.S. nuclear force in the event of nuclear war.
"I have to (assume this)," he added, "I have to make that assumption. What I saw equates to a hydrogen bomb. I saw the event. I saw the indications that came from that event. I saw the size, I saw the reports, and therefore to me I’m assuming it was a hydrogen bomb."
Seoul’s Defence ministry said it probably travelled around 3,700 kilometers and reached a maximum altitude of 770 kilometers – both higher and further than the previous device.
However, the intercontinental ballistic missile had the potential to fly further.
Details of the latest launch came within hours of reports suggesting that the North Koreans were preparing to carry out another underground atomic test.
Satellite images showed mining equipment and trucks close to the Punggye-ri Nuclear Test Site.
Further activity was also seen close to another underground access point.
The main concern had been whether the North Koreans have succeeded in developing a bomb small enough to fit onto an intercontinental ballistic missile.
Japan’s Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga says Japan is strongly protesting what it called Pyongyang’s latest intolerable provocation.
The missile was launched at 6:57 a.m. Japan time (2157 GMT), flew over Hokkaido and splashed down at 7:06 a.m. (2206 GMT) some 2,000 kilometers east of the northern island’s Cape Erimo, he said.
Japan protests the latest launch in the strongest terms and will take appropriate and timely action at the United Nations and elsewhere, staying in close contact with the United States and South Korea, Suga told reporters.
The Japanese government’s alert message called J-alert notifying citizens of a ballistic missile launch by North Korea is seen on a television screen in Tokyo Credit: Reuters
South Korea’s presidential Blue House has called an urgent National Security Council meeting.
The North’s launch comes a day after the North threatened to sink Japan and reduce the United States to "ashes and darkness" for supporting a U.N. Security Council resolution imposing new sanctions against it for its Sept. 3 nuclear test.
The North previously launched a ballistic missile from Sunan on Aug. 29 which flew over Japan’s Hokkaido island and landed in the Pacific waters.
SEPTEMBER 12, 1972 – NIXON-KISSINGER VIETNAM TREASON – UNFINISHED KOREA-VIETNAM WAR
On September 12, 2017, the United States is facing consequences of Unfinished Korea-Vietnam War which began in 1950 to contain the spread of Communism in Asia.
On September 12, 1972, US President Richard M Nixon was briefed about the presence of large numbers of North Vietnamese troops inside South Vietnam. This crucial factor was not taken into consideration when Dr. Henry Kissinger during Paris Peace Accords signed in January 1973. Further, US President Nixon gave false promise to South Vietnam when he assured them of continued US support in the War on Communism.
Rudranarasimham Rebbapragada
DOOM DOOMA DOOMSAYER
U.S. INTELLIGENCE AGENCIES REPORT 100,000 TROOPS IN THE SOUTH – SEPTEMBER 12, 1972
U.S. intelligence agencies (the Central Intelligence Agency and Defense Intelligence Agency) report to the National Security Council that the North Vietnamese have 100,000 regular troops in South Vietnam and can sustain fighting “at the present rate” for two years.
The report further stated that while U.S. bombing had caused heavy casualties and prevented North Vietnam from doubling operations, the overall effects were disappointing because troops and supplies had kept moving south. It was estimated that 20,000 fresh troops had infiltrated into the South in the previous six weeks and that communist troops in the Mekong Delta had increased as much as tenfold–up to 30,000–in the last year. This report was significant in that it showed that the North Vietnamese, who had suffered greatly since launching the Easter invasion on March 31, were steadily replacing their losses and maintaining troop levels in the south. These forces and their presence in South Vietnam were not addressed in the Paris Peace Accords that were signed in January 1973, and the North Vietnamese troops remained. Therefore, shortly after the ceasefire was initiated, new fighting erupted between the South Vietnamese forces and the North Vietnamese troops who remained in the South.
The South Vietnamese held out for two years, but when the United States failed to honor the promises of continued support made by President Nixon (who resigned on August 8, 1974, in the wake of the Watergate scandal), the North Vietnamese launched a major offensive and the South Vietnamese were defeated in less than 55 days. Saigon fell on April 30, 1975.
SEPTEMBER 10, 2017 – THE COLD WAR IN ASIA – TELL THE COMMUNISTS, “WE STILL MEAN BUSINESS”
SEPTEMBER 10, 2017 – THE COLD WAR IN ASIA – TELL THE COMMUNISTS, “WE STILL MEAN BUSINESS”
On September 10, 2017, United States must tell the Communists, “We mean Business.” The time has come to squarely address the problem of Communism that spread to mainland China in 1949.
Rudranarasimham Rebbapragada DOOM DOOMA DOOMSAYER
PRESIDENT JOHNSON SENDS SIGNAL TO BOTH NORTH AND SOUTH VIETNAMESE – SEPTEMBER 10, 1964
Following the Tonkin Gulf incidents, in which North Vietnamese torpedo boats attacked U.S. destroyers, and the subsequent passage of the Tonkin Gulf Resolution empowering him to react to armed attacks, President Lyndon Johnson authorizes a series of measures “to assist morale in South Vietnam and show the Communists [in North Vietnam] we still mean business.” These measures included covert action such as the resumption of the DeSoto intelligence patrols and South Vietnamese coastal raids to harass the North Vietnamese. Premier Souvanna Phouma of Laos was also asked to allow the South Vietnamese to make air and ground raids into southeastern Laos, along with air strikes by Laotian planes and U.S. armed aerial reconnaissance to cut off the North Vietnamese infiltration along the route that became known as the Ho Chi Minh Trail. Eventually, U.S. warplanes would drop over 2 million tons of bombs on Laos as part of Operations Steel Tiger and Tiger Hound between 1965 and 1973.
Also on this day
Vietnam War
1963
President Kennedy gets mixed signals
Maj. Gen. Victor Krulak, USMC, Special Assistant for Counterinsurgency and Special Activities to the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Joseph Mendenhall of the State Department report to President John F. Kennedy on their fact-finding mission to Vietnam. The president had sent them to make a firsthand assessment of the situation in Vietnam…
On September 09, 2017 Chairman Mao Zedong’s Legacy lives. Unfinished Korea-Vietnam War is mere symptom of ‘The Cold War in Asia’ which started with Communist takeover of mainland China. In Korean Peninsula, the US faces security challenge posed by the spread of Communism in Asia. It is not surprising to note that Vietnam recognizes the same threat and is willing to cooperate with the United States to contain Expansionist Doctrine formulated by Communist Party Chairman Mao Zedong. Rudranarasimham Rebbapragada DOOM DOOMA DOOMSAYER
1976 On this day in 1976, Chinese revolutionary and statesman Mao Zedong, who had been suffering from Parkinson’s disease and other health problems, dies in Beijing at the age of 82. The Communist leader and founder of the People’s Republic of China is considered one of the most influential figures of the 20th century. Mao was born into a peasant family in the village of Shaoshan in China’s Hunan province on December 26, 1893. During the 1911 Revolution, he was a soldier in the revolutionary army, which eventually defeated the Qing Dynasty. After serving in the army, he resumed his education and eventually moved to Beijing, where he studied Marxist social and political thought. In 1921, he attended the first session of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), which was held in Shanghai. He went on to found the Hunan branch of the CCP and organize workers’ strikes. Marxism held that cultural revolution would be brought about by urban workers; however, Mao came to believe that China’s millions of peasants were the key to change. In 1934, during his long civil war with Chiang Kai-Shek and his nationalist government, Mao broke through enemy lines and led his followers on the Long March, a trek of some 6,000 miles to northern China. There, he built up his Red Army and fought against the Japanese invaders. In 1945, civil war resumed, and in 1949 the Nationalists were defeated. On October 1, 1949, Mao proclaimed the founding of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Under Mao’s leadership, the Communist Party took control of China’s media and executed its political enemies, including business owners, landlords, former government officials and intellectuals. In 1958, Mao launched the Great Leap Forward, an economic initiative aimed at boosting the country’s agricultural and industrial production. The program involved the establishment of large farming communes, which would free up more workers for industrial jobs. Instead, the plan failed as grain production declined and millions of Chinese died due to famine. In 1966, Mao launched the Cultural Revolution, in an attempt to wipe out China’s old customs and ideas, promote Mao’s teachings and purge the Communist party of his political enemies. Mao urged students and other young people to join the Red Guards, who in turn shut down schools, churches, temples and museums and tortured or killed academics and other authority figures who were viewed as capitalists and anti-revolutionaries. The Cultural Revolution resulted in widespread chaos and civil unrest. Despite these failures, Mao maintained fanatical followers all across China and, as the founder of modern China, remains one of the most influential figures of the 20th century. After his death, Deng Xiaoping emerged as China’s leader. Today, Mao’s embalmed remains are housed in a mausoleum in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square.
Also on this day
Cold War 1976 Mao Zedong Dies Mao Zedong, who led the Chinese people through a long revolution and then ruled the nation’s communist government from its establishment in 1949, dies. Along with V.I. Lenin and Joseph Stalin, Mao was one of the most significant communist figures of the Cold War. Vietnam War 1967 Hackney receives Medal of Honor
Sergeant Duane D. Hackney is presented with the Air Force Cross for bravery in rescuing an Air Force pilot in Vietnam. He was the first living Air Force enlisted man to receive the award, the nation’s second highest award for bravery in action.
1969
Ho Chi Minh buried in Hanoi
Funeral services, attended by 250,000 mourners, are held for Ho Chi Minh in Hanoi’s Ba Dinh Square. Among those in attendance were Soviet Premier Aleksei Kosygin, Chinese Vice-Premier Li Hsien-nien and Prince Norodom Sihanouk of Cambodia. Ho had established the Indochinese Communist Party in 1929. 1972
U.S. Air Force Capt. Charles B. DeBellevue (Weapons Systems Officer) flying with his pilot, Capt. John A. Madden, in a McDonnell Douglas F-4D, shoots down two MiG-19s near Hanoi. These were Captain DeBellevue’s fifth and sixth victories, which made him the leading American ace (an unofficial designation awarded for…
SEPTEMBER 07, 2017 – THE COLD WAR IN ASIA – UNCLE SAM’S UNFINISHED KOREA-VIETNAM WAR
SEPTEMBER 07, 2017 – THE COLD WAR IN ASIA – UNCLE SAM’S UNFINISHED KOREA-VIETNAM WAR
On September 07, 2017 Uncle Sam’s Korea-Vietnam War remains unfinished. Uncle Sam’s real Enemy is neither Korea nor Vietnam. The real Enemy is the threat of spread of Communism in Asia. Nixon-Kissinger paved the way for Communist China’s admission to the United Nations and as Permanent Member of UN Security Council. Uncle Sam will never get the opportunity again to pass resolution in the United Nations for the use of force to repel the Communist North Korea.
Rudranarasimham Rebbapragada
DOOM DOOMA DOOMSAYER
UNITED NATIONS DEFEATS SOVIET MOTION – SEPTEMBER 07, 1950
Slightly more than two months after the United Nations approved a U.S. resolution calling for the use of force to repel the communist North Korean invasion of South Korea, the Security Council rejects a Soviet resolution that would condemn the American bombing of North Korea. The Security Council action was another victory for the United States in securing U.N. support for the war in Korea.
In June 1950, armed forces from communist North Korea attacked South Korea. Days after the invasion, the United States secured approval in the U.N.’s Security Council for a resolution calling for the use of force to repel the communists. The Soviet Union could have vetoed the resolution, but its representatives were boycotting the Security Council because of the U.N. decision not to seat the communist government of the People’s Republic of China. Just a few days after the Security Council resolution was passed, President Harry S. Truman ordered U.S. military forces into South Korea. The introduction of the U.S. forces turned the tide of the war, and by September 1950, the North Korean forces were in retreat and U.S. planes were bombing military targets inside North Korea. On September 7, the Soviet representative on the Security Council proposed a resolution condemning the United States for its “barbarous” bombing of North Korea. Referring to U.S. policies in Korea as “Hitlerian,” the Russian representative called the bombings “inhuman.” The U.S. representative responded by charging the North Koreans with numerous war crimes, including murdering prisoners of war. He also denied that the bombings were “inhuman,” insisting that the United States was using every effort to warn North Korean civilians to stay away from the military targets being hit. He concluded by stating, “The moral is plain: Those who sow the wind will reap the whirlwind. Moral guilt rests heavily upon the aggressors.” By a vote of 9 to 1, the Security Council defeated the Soviet resolution, with only the Russian representative voting to support it.
The Security Council defeat of the Russian resolution was another victory for the United States in securing U.N. support for the war effort in Korea. This war marked the first time the United Nations had ever approved the use of force, and U.S. officials were determined to maintain U.N. support for what was, in effect, a U.S. military effort. America supplied the vast majority of the ground, air, and sea forces that responded to the Security Council’s resolution calling for the use of force in Korea. The Soviets, sensing the grave consequences of their absence from the vote on that resolution, now desperately tried to attack U.S. actions in Korea. As they discovered with the crushing defeat of their resolution condemning the U.S. bombings, it was too late.
Also on this day
1813
United States nicknamed Uncle Sam
On this day in 1813, the United States gets its nickname, Uncle Sam. The name is linked to Samuel Wilson, a meat packer from Troy, New York, who supplied barrels of beef to the United States Army during the War of 1812.Wilson (1766-1854) stamped the barrels with “U.S.” for United…
Vietnam War
1965
Marines launch Operation Piranha
U.S. Marines and South Vietnamese forces launch Operation Piranha on the Batangan Peninsula, 23 miles south of the Marine base at Chu Lai. This was a follow-up to Operation Starlight, which had been conducted in August. During the course of the operation, the Allied forces stormed a stronghold…
1967
McNamara Line announced
U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara announces plans to build an electronic anti-infiltration barrier to block communist flow of arms and troops into South Vietnam from the north at the eastern end of the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ). The “McNamara Line,” as it became known, would employ state-of-the-art, high-tech…
On September 08, 2017, I live in Ann Arbor, Michigan which hosts President Gerald R. Ford’s Presidential Library on the University of Michigan North Campus. I was serving US President Ford on September 08, 1974 as member of Special Frontier Force while Ford granted pardon to Nixon. The United States missed an opportunity to investigate Nixon-Kissinger Vietnam Treason. The Cold War in Asia was placed on the backburner without resolving the problem posed by spread of Communism in Asia.
In a controversial executive action, President Gerald Ford pardons his disgraced predecessor Richard M. Nixon for any crimes he may have committed or participated in while in office. Ford later defended this action before the House Judiciary Committee, explaining that he wanted to end the national divisions created by the Watergate scandal. The Watergate scandal erupted after it was revealed that Nixon and his aides had engaged in illegal activities during his reelection campaign–and then attempted to cover up evidence of wrongdoing. With impeachment proceedings underway against him in Congress, Nixon bowed to public pressure and became the first American president to resign. At noon on August 9, Nixon officially ended his term, departing with his family in a helicopter from the White House lawn. Minutes later, Vice President Gerald R. Ford was sworn in as the 38th president of the United States in the East Room of the White House. After taking the oath of office, President Ford spoke to the nation in a television address, declaring, “My fellow Americans, our long national nightmare is over.” Ford, the first president who came to the office through appointment rather than election, had replaced Spiro Agnew as vice president only eight months before. In a political scandal independent of the Nixon administration’s wrongdoings in the Watergate affair, Agnew had been forced to resign in disgrace after he was charged with income tax evasion and political corruption. Exactly one month after Nixon announced his resignation, Ford issued the former president a “full, free and absolute” pardon for any crimes he committed while in office. The pardon was widely condemned at the time. Decades later, the John F. Kennedy Library Foundation presented its 2001 Profile in Courage Award to Gerald Ford for his 1974 pardon of Nixon. In pardoning Nixon, said the foundation, Ford placed his love of country ahead of his own political future and brought needed closure to the divisive Watergate affair. Ford left politics after losing the 1976 presidential election to Democrat Jimmy Carter. Ford died on December 26, 2006, at the age of 93.
American troops arrive in Korea to partition the country U.S. troops land in Korea to begin their postwar occupation of the southern part of that nation, almost exactly one month after Soviet troops had entered northern Korea to begin their own occupation. Although the U.S. and Soviet occupations were supposed to be temporary, the division of Korea quickly became permanent.
Presidential 1974 President Ford pardons former President Nixon On this day in 1974, President Gerald Ford, who assumed office on the heels of President Richard M. Nixon’s resignation, pardons his predecessor for his involvement in the Watergate scandal. Congress had accused Nixon of obstruction of justice during the investigation of the Watergate scandal, which began in 1972.
1954 SEATO established Having been directed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower to put together an alliance to contain any communist aggression in the free territories of Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia, or Southeast Asia in general, Secretary of State John Foster Dulles forges an agreement establishing a military alliance that becomes the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization. 1968
Vietnam War ARVN general killed Troung Quang An becomes the first South Vietnamese general killed in action when his aircraft is shot down. The commander of the U.S. 1st Infantry Division (more popularly known as the ‘Big Red One”), Maj. Gen. Keith L. Ware, suffered a similar fate when his helicopter was shot down…
FRIDAY SEPTEMBER 01, 2017 – BEIJING DOOMED – A STONE’S THROW AWAY
I am not an expert on asteroid strikes. But, in my analysis, Beijing awaits her Doom as the word ‘EVIL’ means Disaster, Catastrophe, Cataclysm, Doom, and Apocalypse.
A massive 2.7-mile long asteroid is set to pass by Earth Friday. There’s no need to worry, though – the asteroid, dubbed Florence, will pass at a safe distance of 4.4 million miles, roughly 18 times the distance between Earth and the Moon.
“While many known asteroids have passed by closer to Earth than Florence will on September 1, all of those were estimated to be smaller,” said Paul Chodas, manager of NASA’s Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) at the agency’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. in a statement. “Florence is the largest asteroid to pass by our planet this close since the NASA program to detect and track near-Earth asteroids began.”
The asteroid, which is named in honor of Florence Nightingale, was discovered in 1981. Friday’s flyby will be Earth’s closest encounter with the asteroid since 1890, and the closest it will be to our planet until after 2500.
Florence has been assigned an asteroid catalog number of 3122.
While ground-based radar will closely observe the giant space rock, NASA says that the asteroid will also be visible to small telescopes. Sky & Telescope reports that Florence reaches peak brightness late on Thursday and early on Friday, it will remain bright for several days. 8 p.m. EDT on Saturday Sept. 2 will be a particularly good time to view the asteroid, it says.
Earlier this year, a skyscraper-sized asteroid named (441987) 2010 NY65 flew past Earth at about eight times the distance between Earth and the moon.
ASTEROID THAT KILLED DINOSAURS MAY HAVE DARKENED EARTH FOR TWO YEARS
Last year NASA opened a new office to track asteroids and comets that come too close to Earth. The Planetary Defense Coordination Office (PDCO) formalizes the agency’s existing program for detecting and tracking near-Earth Objects, known as NEOs. The office is located within NASA’s Planetary Science Division, which is in the agency’s Science Mission Directorate in Washington and works with the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and other federal agencies and departments.
NASA has been working on planetary defense for some time – its Near-Earth Object Observations Program already works with astronomers and scientists around the world to look for asteroids that could harm Earth.
STAND UP FOR NATURAL RIGHTS OF JEWS AND TIBETANS IN THEIR HOMELANDS.
I stand up for Natural Rights of Jews to live in Judea and Samaria; and I stand up for Natural Rights of Tibetans to their ancestral Homeland. I support His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s Five-Point Peace Plan to stop Communist China’s Colonization of Tibet.
STAND UP FOR NATURAL RIGHTS OF JEWS AND TIBETANS. I SUPPORT DALAI LAMA’S FIVE-POINT PEACE PLAN. UNITE TIBET. STOP HAN CHINESE COLONIZATION OF TIBET.STAND UP FOR NATURAL RIGHTS OF JEWS AND TIBETANS. STOP HAN CHINESE COLONIZATION OF TIBET.
BLOG: UN: JEWS CAN’T LIVE IN JUDEA AND SAMARIA, BUT 7.5 MILLION CHINESE CAN COLONIZE TIBET
STAND UP FOR NATURAL RIGHTS OF JEWS TO LIVE IN JUDEA AND SAMARIA.
“United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on Israel to stop settlement construction in the West Bank…. We believe that settlement activity is illegal under international law.”
Why has United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres never made similar statements about Tibet?
Stand Up for Natural Rights of Tibetans. Stop Han Chinese Tibet Colonization.
Tibetan students in New Delhi demonstrate at UN Information Center (photo: R.T.Y Rohini)
In his 5-point peace plan, the Dalai Lama called to stop Chinese colonization of Tibet.
“When the newly formed People’s Republic of China invaded Tibet in 1949/50, it created a new source of conflict. This was highlighted when, following the Tibetan national uprising against the Chinese and my flight to India in 1959, tensions between China and India escalated into the border war in 1962. Today large numbers of troops are again massed on both sides of the Himalayan border and tension is once more dangerously high.
“The real issue, of course, is not the Indo-Tibetan border demarcation. It is China’s illegal occupation of Tibet, which has given it direct access to the Indian sub-continent. The Chinese authorities have attempted to confuse the issue by claiming that Tibet has always been a part of China. This is untrue. Tibet was a fully independent state when the People’s Liberation Army invaded the country in 1949/50.
“Since Tibetan emperors unified Tibet, over a thousand years ago, our country was able to maintain its independence until the middle of this century. At times Tibet extended its influence over neighboring countries and peoples and, in other periods, came itself under the influence of powerful foreign rulers – the Mongol Khans, the Gorkhas of Nepal, the Manchu Emperors and the British in India.
“It is, of course, not uncommon for states to be subjected to foreign influence or interference. Although so-called satellite relationships are perhaps the clearest examples of this, most major powers exert influence over less powerful allies or neighbours. As the most authoritative legal studies have shown, in Tibet’s case, the country’s occasional subjection to foreign influence never entailed a loss of independence. And there can be no doubt that when Peking’s communist armies entered Tibet, Tibet was in all respects an independent state…
“Human rights violations in Tibet are among the most serious in the world. Discrimination is practiced in Tibet under a policy of ‘apartheid’ which the Chinese call ‘segregation and assimilation’. Tibetans are, at best, second class citizens in their own country. Deprived of all basic democratic rights and freedoms, they exist under a colonial administration in which all real power is wielded by Chinese officials of the Communist Party and the army.
“Although the Chinese government allows Tibetans to rebuild some Buddhist monasteries and to worship in them, it still forbids serious study and teaching of religion. Only a small number of people, approved by the Communist Party, are permitted to join the monasteries.
“While Tibetans in exile exercise their democratic rights under a constitution promulgated by me in 1963, thousands of our countrymen suffer in prisons and labor camps in Tibet for their religious or political convictions…
“The massive transfer of Chinese civilians into Tibet in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention (1949), threatens the very existence of the Tibetans as a distinct people. In the eastern parts of our country, the Chinese now greatly outnumber Tibetans. In the Amdo province, for example, where I was born, there are, according to the Chinese statistics, 2.5 million Chinese and only 750,000 Tibetans. Even in the so-called Tibet Autonomous Region (i.e., central and western Tibet), Chinese government sources now confirm that Chinese outnumber Tibetans.
“The Chinese population transfer policy is not new. It has been systematically applied to other areas before. Earlier in this century, the Manchus were a distinct race with their own culture and traditions. Today only two to three million Manchurians are left in Manchuria, where 75 million Chinese have settled. In Eastern Turkestan, which the Chinese now call Sinkiang, the Chinese population has grown from 200,000 in 1949 to 7 million, more than half of the total population of 13 million. In the wake of the Chinese colonization of Inner Mongolia, Chinese number 8.5 million, Mongols 2.5 million.
“Today, in the whole of Tibet 7.5 million Chinese settlers have already been sent, outnumbering the Tibetan population of 6 million. In central and western Tibet, now referred to by the Chinese as the “Tibet Autonomous Region”, Chinese sources admit the 1.9 million Tibetans already constitute a minority of the region’s population. These numbers do not take the estimated 300,000-500,000 troops in Tibet into account – 250,000 of them in so-called Tibet Autonomous Region.
“For the Tibetans to survive as a people, it is imperative that the population transfer is stopped and Chinese settlers return to China. Otherwise, Tibetans will soon be no more than a tourist attraction and relic of a noble past. “
Why has United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres never complained about Chinese settlements in Tibet as he complains against Jewish settlements?
In a better analogy of the Arab-Israeli conflict, Israel plays the role of Tibet, the dozens of Arab countries that surround it are like China. The Palestinian Arabs serve as the spearhead of the dozens of Arab Nations that are trying to engulf the world’s only Jewish State (smaller than New Jersey) the same way gigantic China is trying to absorb Tibet.
Since United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is not planning to go to the Tibet to condemn the Chinese presence there as illegal, he should not come to Israel to call for the ethnic cleansing of Jews from Judea and Samaria.
Stand Up for Natural Rights of Tibetans. Stop Han Chinese Colonization of Tibet, Inner Mongolia, Manchuria, and East Turkestan.
Border disputes and Border conflicts along Himalayan Frontier are mere symptoms of ‘The Cold War in Asia’. India – China feud will not be over until and unless the underlying problem is resolved. In the past, the United States fought bloody wars in Korea and Vietnam to contain the spread of Communism in Asia. I speak of ‘Unfinished Vietnam War’ as that War concluded prematurely without resolving the problem posed by Communism.
As China-India feud ebbs, tiny Bhutan reexamines its place in the world
By Annie Gowen
Asia & Pacific
August 29 at 2:24 PM
A woman stands near prayer wheels at an eighth-century temple in Paro, Bhutan. (Annie Gowen/The Washington Post)
THIMPHU, Bhutan — During the long weeks soldiers from two of the world’s largest armies camped on their doorstep, officials in the tiny Buddhist kingdom of Bhutan maintained a meditative silence.
Government leaders resolutely declined to comment, and even the Bhutanese media largely refrained from covering the standoff, which began in mid-June when Indian troops crossed into a remote plateau claimed by Bhutan and confronted Chinese soldiers preparing to build a road there.
When the respective armies began withdrawing from the Doklam area Monday, the Himalayan nation of just under 800,000 finally exhaled, and analysts said that its temperance had helped defuse tension between the two nuclear-armed powers.
For years, Bhutan — a landlocked nation squeezed between the Tibet plateau to its north and India to its east, south and west — has trod a delicate balancing act between China and its great patron, India, which trains its soldiers, buys its hydroelectric power and gives it $578 million a year in aid.
In the country’s capital of Thimphu, India’s influence can be seen everywhere — from the army officers jogging on its streets to the laborers on Indian projects to build mountain roads.
“Bhutan is really caught between two sides, and the confrontation at Doklam has brought everything to the surface,” said Nirupama Menon Rao, India’s former foreign secretary and ambassador to China. “Bhutan has played this game of survival for a long, long time. Nobody does it better than them.”
But the dispute caused many in Bhutan to call for the country to reevaluate its close — some say suffocating — relationship with its southern neighbor.
“If India’s border closed tomorrow, we would run out of rice and a lot of other essentials in a few days. That is how vulnerable we are,” said Needrup Zangpo, the executive director of the Journalist Association of Bhutan. “Many Bhutanese resent this.”
The country — with stunning mountain passes, rippling Buddhist prayer flags and ancient temples — was until recently a monarchy, its villages isolated from much of the world for most of the past century. Television arrived in 1999, and even now, only about 60,000 tourists from outside the region visit each year, paying a hefty $250-a-day visa fee during the high season.
The tiny Himalayan nation of Bhutan was thrust into an international showdown as militaries from China and India were locked in a two-month standoff on a remote plateau in territory claimed by both Bhutan and China. (Annie Gowen/The Washington Post)
Its beloved and progressive fourth king, Jigme Khesar Namgyel Wangchuck, set the country on the path to democracy in 2008 and popularized the “gross national happiness” indicator, which rates quality of life, preservation of culture and environmental protection over economic output. In a 2015 study, more than 90 percent of residents said they experienced some level of happiness.
Bhutan’s long ties with India, by far its largest trading partner, were cemented in 1958, when India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru, traveled through the mountains on a yak. The two countries already had agreed, in a 1949 treaty, that India would guide its foreign policy; the terms were softened and modified in 2007.
Bhutan has an ongoing border dispute and no official diplomatic ties with China, and India has frowned upon any change in this status quo. India cut off a cooking gas subsidy in 2013 because, some analysts said, it feared Bhutan’s then-government was growing closer to its northern neighbor. India has long seen Bhutan as an important ally against Chinese expansionism in the region.
A man spins a prayer wheel at the Memorial Stupa in Thimphu. (Annie Gowen/The Washington Post)
Thimphu is a still-quiet valley town, dotted with traditionally painted homes and apartments, that has modernized rapidly in the past 10 years and recently began having traffic jams.
Many of its younger, educated residents — who followed the China-India conflict on their mobile phones, via social media — said that the weeks-long standoff had raised questions about Bhutan’s place in the world and whether the country was being well served by maintaining such a close relationship with India while holding China at arm’s length.
Many of the tenants of Thimphu Tec Park, a government-owned business park that opened in 2011 as a symbol of the country’s aspirations, took a pragmatic view of China — saying they see it as a potential marketplace for fledgling Bhutanese entrepreneurs. Bhutan has long looked inward, they said, and now needs to start looking outward.
“I think because we are in a global community now, we should have good relations with both China and India,” said Jigme Tenzin, the young chief executive of Housing.bt, an online real estate portal. Unlike some of his peers, he cheerfully wears his gho, the robe-like garment that is the country’s national dress, including to international conferences, saying it helps set him apart from other Asian entrepreneurs.
When the Tec Park opened, it initially did not do well. But today, it has more than 700 Bhutanese employees, offices for several foreign companies and an incubation center for start-ups. One of the companies is trying to create a children’s cartoon in Bhutan’s national language, Dzongkha, to compete with the Hindi cartoons broadcast from India.
world
Launching a real estate start-up in a country where only about 37 percent of people are on the Internet has been a challenge, Tenzin says, as the needs of millennial apartment seekers do not always match up with the offerings of older property owners, most of whom are not online. He and his small band of employees ended up having to go door to door with brochures, trying to educate people.
“We’re in the middle of one foot in the future and one foot in the past,” he said with a laugh. “This transition is killing me.”
Three young boys pose for a photo at an eighth-century Buddhist temple in Thimphu, the capital of Bhutan. (Annie Gowen/The Washington Post)
Annie Gowen is The Post’s India bureau chief and has reported for the Post throughout South Asia and the Middle East.
Follow @anniegowen
Sat Mohabir
5:04 PM EDT
The picture is one-sided if you only look at India’s role in Bhutan. China has been making territorial claims against Bhutan one little slice at a time so much so that Bhutan’s highest mountain peak was ceded to China. Bhutan has lost significant territory to China already reducing its area from about 47.000 sq. km to about 38,000 sq. km and China still has border claims against Bhutan.
If you think that China will stop claiming Bhutanese territory, you just have to look at the Philippines. “a Philippine lawmaker, Congressman Gary Alejano, released images showing Chinese coast guard, naval, and civilian vessels within a stone’s throw of Pag-asa, or Thitu, Island — a significant Philippine possession in the disputed Spratly group. ” And this is happening after a friendly relationship was established with Duterte.
Or, you can look at Mongolia. China turned the screws on trade with Mongolia after Mongolia had the audacity to host the Dalai Lama. After Mongolia cried uncle and promised not to invite the Dalai Lama again, trade was normalized.
We can look at the structure of loans China has made to friendly countries and see who is the main beneficiary but we will save that for another day.
In other words, China is not the friendly power that those with rose-colored glasses portray it to be in comparison to India.
Rudranarasimham Rebbapragada
5:01 PM EDT
The Cold War in Asia:
Border disputes, and Border conflicts along Himalayan Frontier are mere symptoms of ‘The Cold War in Asia’. The single-party governance of People’s Republic of China with no transparency and public accountability remains the core issue. In the past, United States fought bloody battles in Korea, and Vietnam to contain the spread of Communism in Asia. I speak of ‘Unfinished Vietnam War’ for that War concluded without resolving the problem.
Whole Dude - Whole Concept 