Comment by Riaz Haq on March 21, 2017 at 2:48pm

#China ramped up its #research spending at an avg of 19.5 percent annually from 2003-2013. #tech http://www.computerworld.com/article/3182792/it-industry/5-reasons-... … via @computerworld

1. China’s big science ambitions include a moon base

In the 1950s, the U.S. considered establishing a 12-man Army base on the moon by 1965. The idea was too ambitious for the time and was dropped. Meanwhile, China has set its sights on a permanent lunar base.

2. China wants to win in high-performance computing

U.S. scientists -- including those at the National Security Agency -- believe China will soon lead the world in supercomputing.

“National security requires the best computing available, and loss of leadership in high performance computing (HPC) will severely compromise our national security,” wrote NSA and Energy Department scientists in a recent report.

3. China is attacking U.S. semiconductor dominance

For all its investment and advances, China is at least one and a half generations behind state-of-the-art semiconductors, according to a White House report released in January by President Barack Obama, just days before Trump took office. It was written with industry cooperation.

The report provides insights into criticisms that Trump leveled at China over trade practices. In its push to be first, China isn’t playing fair, the report states.

4. China plans to exceed the U.S. in R&D

China’s investment in R&D is rising so rapidly that the country is expected to surpass the U.S. in overall spending by 2020. This doesn’t necessarily mean that China is doing a better job at innovation. Other measures, such as patents registered in multiple countries, continue to point to the U.S. as the innovation leader.

5. China’s leadership is focused on science

During the campaign, Trump said he supported investment in science, but his proposed 2018 budget cuts science spending.

The cuts are so deep they “threaten our nation’s ability to advance cures for disease, maintain our technological leadership, ensure a more prosperous energy future, and train the next generation of scientists and innovators to address the complex challenges we face today and in the future,” said Rush Holt, the CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Comment by Riaz Haq on May 17, 2017 at 5:45pm

#China’s new world order. #US #India #Pakistan #CPEC #OBOR

by Zahid Hussain

https://www.dawn.com/news/1333603

CHINA recently hosted 29 heads of state and government at the Belt and Road Forum, reinforcing the country’s claim to leadership of an emerging geopolitical and economic world order. The summit conference that also attracted representatives of more than 40 other countries and multilateral financial agencies was the clearest expression yet of China breaking out of its old foreign policy mould that had restrained it from attempting a global role.

China’s multibillion-dollar One Belt, One Road (OBOR) infrastructure development project linking the old Silk Road with Europe, is a manifestation of China’s growing geopolitical ambitions. A brainchild of President Xi Jinping, perhaps, the most powerful Chinese leader after Mao Zedong, OBOR has now been under development for four years, spanning 68 countries and accounting for up to 40 per cent of global GDP.

President Xi’s ambition of propelling China to centre stage of the global power game represents a sharp departure from the approach of previous Chinese leaders who strictly adhered to Deng Xiaoping’s tenet to “hide our capabilities and bide our time, never try to take the lead”. Thus over the past two decades, China has avoided being drawn into global conflicts and has completely focused its energies on development that helped it to become an economic superpower.

China’s push to take the world leadership has come at a time when a strong anti-globalisation wave is sweeping the Western world that is showing a growing tendency of returning to more protectionist regimes. The United States under the Trump administration with its inward-looking approach has virtually abandoned the mantle of globalisation thus ceding greater space to Beijing’s assertion.

--------------------------

Although Beijing downplays geostrategic motivations, CPEC represents an international extension of China’s effort to deliver security through economic development. Notwithstanding their growing strategic cooperation, terrorist sanctuaries in Pakistan have remained a major source of worry for the Chinese government. China’s security concerns, especially those that arise from its restive region of Xinjiang, and the Islamist militancy threatening Pakistan’s stability have also been a strong factor in Beijing’s new approach to achieving security through economic development.

This growing Pakistan-China strategic alliance has also exposed the regional geopolitical fault lines. Predictably, India boycotted the Beijing forum citing serious reservations about the project, particularly regarding China-funded development in Gilgit-Baltistan that is linked to the Kashmir dispute. Yet another excuse given by the Indian authorities was that a trans-regional project of this magnitude required wider consultation.

Explore: Is India trying to convince the world China’s OBOR plan is secretly colonial?

Despite their geopolitical rivalry and long-standing border dispute, trade between India and China has grown significantly crossing $100bn. But there have been some visible signs of tension between the two most populous nations in the past few years with the strengthening of ties between Washington and New Delhi. India has openly sided with the US and Japan against China over the South China Sea issue.

Indeed, the success of the summit has provoked a strong reaction from Delhi. So much so that some leading commentators have called for tougher action to obstruct the OBOR project. “Far from this, CPEC (the life and soul of OBOR) threatens India’s territorial integrity in a manner unseen since 1962,” Samir Saran, a leading Indian commentator wrote in an op-ed piece.

Notwithstanding the scepticism, OBOR is a new geo-economic reality representing an emerging world order. The process cannot be reversed.

Comment by Riaz Haq on June 6, 2017 at 4:37pm

U.S. #Pentagon says #China likely to build more mil overseas bases, maybe in #Pakistan after #Djibouti http://reut.rs/2rSapDG via @Reuters

A Pentagon report released on Tuesday singled out Pakistan as a possible location for a future Chinese military base, as it forecast that Beijing would likely build more bases overseas after establishing a facility in the African nation of Djibouti.

The prediction came in a 97-page annual report to Congress that saw advances throughout the Chinese military in 2016, funded by robust defense spending that the Pentagon estimated exceeded $180 billion.

That is higher than China's official defense budget figure of 954.35 billion yuan ($140.4 billion). Chinese leaders, the U.S. report said, appeared committed to defense spending hikes for the "foreseeable future," even as economic growth slows.

The report repeatedly cited China's construction of its first overseas naval base in Djibouti, which is already home to a key U.S. military base and is strategically located at the southern entrance to the Red Sea on the route to the Suez Canal.

"China most likely will seek to establish additional military bases in countries with which it has a longstanding friendly relationship and similar strategic interests, such as Pakistan," the report said.

Djibouti's position on the northwestern edge of the Indian Ocean has fueled worries in India that it would become another of China's 'string of pearls' of military alliances and assets ringing India, including Bangladesh, Myanmar and Sri Lanka.

The report did not address India's potential reaction to a Chinese base in Pakistan.

But Pakistan, the U.S. report noted, was already the primary market in the Asian-Pacific region for Chinese arms exports. That region accounted for $9 billion of the more than $20 billion in Chinese arms exports from 2011 to 2015.

Last year, China signed an agreement with Pakistan for the sale of eight submarines.

QUANTUM SATELLITE, CYBER HACKS

The Pentagon report flagged Chinese military advances, including in space and at sea.

It cited China's 2016 launch of the first experimental quantum communications satellite, acknowledging that it represented a "notable advance in cryptography research."

As in past years, the Pentagon renewed its concerns about cyber spying, saying U.S. government-owned computers were again targeted by China-based intrusions through 2016.

"These and past intrusions focused on accessing networks and extracting information," the report said.

"China uses its cyber capabilities to support intelligence collection against U.S. diplomatic, economic, and defense industrial base sectors."

In a section discussing China's Navy, the report predicted that China's first domestically designed and produced aircraft carrier would likely reach initial operating capability in 2020.

Comment by Riaz Haq on June 20, 2017 at 11:11am

INTERVIEW WITH GRAHAM ALLISON INTERNATIONAL
Trump’s biggest challenge is to avoid war with China, says Graham Allison
Varghese K George

http://www.thehindu.com/news/international/interview-with-graham-al...

‘S. Korea or Japan, not India or Pakistan, could drag America into war with China’

Graham Allison is Director of the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs and Douglas Dillon Professor of Government at Harvard's John F. Kennedy School of Government. In his forthcoming book Destined for War: Can America and China Escape Thucydides’s Trap?, he argues that confrontations between the two powers are inevitable. He answered questions from The Hindu by email.

In your view, is it possible for Trump to cut a deal with China on trade and leave China's desired sphere of influence in Asia unchallenged?

I do not want to speculate about any specific details of any potential deals, but I do think that a negotiated long peace between China and the United States is one possible outcome. In my book, I note that there is ample precedent for an agreement between the US and China to take a hiatus that imposes considerable constraints in some areas of their competition. This would leave both parties free to pursue advantage elsewhere. From the Thirty Years’ Peace that Athens signed with the Spartans to the US-Soviet détente in the 1970s, rivals throughout history have found ways to accept intolerable (but temporally unchangeable) circumstances in order to focus on more urgent priorities.

In the current stage of the Chinese-American rivalry, both governments face overwhelming demands at home. Given China’s view that progress advances in decades and centuries rather than days and months, it has historically shown a capacity to set problems aside for long periods, as it did in reaching the Shanghai Communiqué in 1972, which effectively set aside the issue of Taiwan, or in 1978 when Deng Xiaoping proposed to Japan that disputes over islands in the East China Sea be shelved for a generation.

Americans tend to be less patient. Yet the menu of potential agreements is long and fruitful: a pact to freeze disputes in the South and East China Seas, to affirm freedom of navigation for all ships in all international waters, to limit cyber attacks to agreed domains and exclude others (for instance, critical infrastructure), or to forbid specific forms of interference in each other’s domestic politics.

How do you think Asian countries will try to balance the US - China rivalry?

----

Besides Korea, the prime candidate for this is probably not India or Pakistan but Japan, a country with a post–World War II history of pacifism, but whose politics have become increasingly militaristic in recent years. Disputes between Japan and China over islands in the East China Sea thus present special risks. If the government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe succeeds in revising Japan’s pacifist constitution and strengthening its military capabilities, including amphibious landings to seize disputed islands, China will do more than take note.

Comment by Riaz Haq on June 27, 2017 at 7:40am

#China media warns of 'Catastrophic Results' Of #India-#US 'Cozying Up' to Counter #China's Rise #ModiInUS http://www.ndtv.com/india-news/catastrophic-results-possible-from-i... … via @ndtv

"Washington and New Delhi share anxieties about China's rise. In recent years, to ratchet up geopolitical pressure on China, the US has cozied up to India," said an article in China's state-run newspaper, the Global Times.

Underlining that India is not a US ally like Japan or Australia, it said, "To assume a role as an outpost country in the US' strategy to contain China is not in line with India's interests. It could even lead to catastrophic results."

The newspaper said that if India becomes a "pawn" for the US in countering China, new geopolitical friction will be triggered in South Asia.

After their meeting at the White House last night, PM Modi and Mr Trump, who bear-hugged, agreed that a close partnership between the United States and India is central to peace and stability in the region.

With an eye on China and its growing military ambitions in the Asia-Pacific area, both sides called for freedom of navigation and resolving of territorial and maritime disputes peacefully in accordance with international law, a reference to Beijing's aggression in the disputed waters of the South China Sea.

President Trump also endorsed India's objections to the new economic corridor that China is building through Pakistan-Occupied Kashmir as part of its gigantic initiative to unlock new land and sea routes to Central Asia. India says the China Pakistan Economic Corridor, being developed at a cost of at least $54 billion, violates its territorial sovereignty.

Thought President Trump has sought to curb China's regional clout, in part by questioning the "One China" policy employed by the US for decades, he has been courting China to persuade it to do more to rein in North Korea.

Comment by Riaz Haq on June 27, 2017 at 10:46am

#Trump ponders crackdown on #Pakistan over alleged #terror ties despite experts' warnings #India #Afghanistan #China

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/jun/27/trump-pakistan-terror...

As US mulls strategy over country’s support for terrorist groups in Afghanistan, experts say tougher stance could drive Pakistan toward China and Russia

The Trump administration is considering taking a harder stance against Pakistan for supporting terrorist groups in Afghanistan, but experts warn that pressure alone will not bring peace.

Similar tactics have failed in the past, and analysts warn that the US can only influence the south Asian country by coupling force with diplomacy, which Donald Trump seems to shun.

And attempts to strong-arm Islamabad could push it deeper into a growing alliance with China and Russia, and lead to more instability.

China in particular offers Pakistan an opportunity to counter the strengthened union between the US and India, whose presence in Afghanistan the Pakistani military considers an existential threat.

Among the tools considered by the Trump administration, according to Reuters, are expanding drone strikes, withholding aid and revoking Pakistan’s status as a major non-Nato ally.

But attempts to bully Pakistan into submission will only drive Islamabad further toward China, said Ayesha Siddiqa, author and research associate at the School of Oriental and African Studies in London.

“It also means that in Afghanistan, there will be more violence. Pakistan sees Afghanistan as an American-Indian project against Pakistani interests,” she said.

Pakistan is widely believed to harbour and support Taliban militants, and has been regarded as a spoiler in peace talks.

US policy on Afghanistan is evolving at a time when the defence department is particularly powerful in policy-making, after Trump delegated authority to his defence secretary, James Mattis, to set troop deployment levels there.

Meanwhile the state department is weakened by a continuing outflow of veteran diplomats and a notable lack of urgency in replacing them on the part of the secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, who has backed plans to cut the departmental budget by a third.

On Friday, the acting special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan (SRAP), Laurel Miller, left the post along with her deputy, leaving doubts over the future of the position, which was created in 2009 by Barack Obama. A state department statement said that Tillerson “has not made a decision” on the issue.

---------------

Afghans have lived under a geopolitical tug-of-war since Russia’s and Britain’s 19th century Great Game. Now it seems more countries than ever are willing to expend political and economic capital to maintain a foothold.

“Unless there is an agreement about Afghanistan between Iran, Russia, China, Pakistan, India and the US, Afghanistan will be unstable,” Rubin said. “And if the idea is that Afghanistan is defended and secured by becoming an American base, there won’t be an agreement.”

Comment by Riaz Haq on July 10, 2017 at 10:57am

#US #Navy carrier group leads biggest yet drills with #India, #Japan off #Malabar #China #Pakistan http://reut.rs/2u48FYX via @Reuters

A U.S. aircraft carrier strike group began naval exercises with India and Japan on Monday that the U.S. navy said would help the three countries tackle maritime threats in the Asia-Pacific region.

The annual exercises named Malabar are being held off India. They are the largest since India and the United States launched the exercise in 1992. Japan was later included.

"Malabar 2017 is the latest in a continuing series of exercises that has grown in scope and complexity over the years to address the variety of shared threats to maritime security in the Indo-Asia Pacific," the U.S. Pacific command said.

Military officials say the drills involving the U.S. carrier USS Nimitz, India's lone carrier Vikramaditya and Japan's biggest warship, the helicopter carrier Izumo, are aimed at helping to maintain a balance of power in the Asia-Pacific against the rising weight of China.

The three countries have been concerned about China's claims to almost all of the waters of the South China Sea, and more broadly, its expanding military presence across the region.

Chinese submarines, for example, recently docked in Sri Lanka, an island just off the southern tip of India that it has long seen as squarely in its back yard.

The maritime drills are taking place as India and China are locked in a standoff on their land border in the Himalayas.

The U.S. Pacific command said in a statement the exercises would help the three countries operate together and it was learning how to integrate with the Indian navy.

India and the United States were for decades on opposite sides of a Cold War divide but have in recent years become major defense partners.

China has in the past criticized the exercises as destabilizing to the region.

India this year turned down an Australian request to join the exercises for now, for fear that would antagonize China further.

The Indian navy said the exercises would focus on aircraft carrier operations and ways to hunt submarines.

The navy has spotted more than a dozen Chinese military vessels including submarines in the Indian Ocean over the past two months, media reported days ahead of Malabar.

"Naval co-operation between India, US and Japan epitomizes the strong and resilient relationship between the three democracies," India's defense ministry said in a statement.

The border stand-off on a plateau next to the mountainous Indian state of Sikkim, which borders China, has ratcheted up tension between the neighboring giants, who share a 3,500 km (2,175 miles) frontier, large parts of which are disputed.

Comment by Riaz Haq on July 19, 2017 at 6:24pm

Deutsche Welle interview with US South Asia analyst Michael Kugelman: 

http://www.dw.com/en/trump-administration-has-zero-patience-for-pak...


DW: Is the US government finally taking a hard line against Pakistan?


Michael Kugelman: A tougher policy is certainly a strong possibility. If there is one US administration likely to take a hard line against Pakistan, it's the Trump administration. Trump projects himself as tough on terror and takes a very principled and strident approach to terror - it needs to be wiped out, wherever it is and in whatever form. It would seem that Trump would have zero patience for Pakistan's policy of going after some terrorists while letting others be.

There has been speculation that the US could expand the drone war and cut Pakistan funds. The harshest critics of Pakistan believe that the US government should revoke Pakistan's status as a major non-NATO ally or even declare it as a state sponsor of terror. These extremely tough policies may well be in the policy tool-kit, though my sense is that the aid cuts and drone strikes would be more likely.

Do you think the Trump administration could force Pakistan to act against the Haqqani Network and other Islamist organizations Washington considers a threat to its interests?
I'm not sure they could. In fact, the Pakistani security establishment may respond to more sticks and less carrots from the US by doubling down and tightening its embrace of militants like the Haqqani Network and Lashkar-e-Taiba.
If the US revoked Pakistan's status as a major non-NATO partner state in the war against terror, how would it affect the situation in Afghanistan?
This would actually be quite devastating for the Pakistani military, because it would probably translate into major reductions in military assistance and arms sales. Pakistan can depend on the largesse of other countries like China and Saudi Arabia, but Islamabad really values the military support it has received from Washington over the years. Revoking Pakistan's status as a non-NATO partner would put this support in doubt and worry quite a few people within the Pakistani security establishment.

The question, however, is if the US would actually go through with such a drastic policy shift. Frankly, I think it's unlikely, at least in the immediate to mid term. The US continues to have troops in Afghanistan, and in fact the Trump administration is poised to send more. So long as the US has troops in Afghanistan, it will need to depend on Pakistan to provide supply routes for US troops. Taking a harder line against Pakistan would likely prompt Islamabad to shut down these supply routes, obliging America to use more circuitous and expensive routes. This could make the US war effort in Afghanistan even more difficult than it already is.
Pakistan is important because of its geographic location and its geopolitical relationship, there's no doubt about that. There's no way that the US will consider Pakistan unimportant, given that it borders Afghanistan, where Americans are fighting their longest ever war, and given that it has deep ties to the world's next superpower (China) and growing ties with one of the world's most dangerous revisionist powers (Russia).

If cornered by the Trump administration, can Pakistan tilt more toward China and Russia?
Certainly a harder US line would send Pakistan deeper into the embrace of China and Russia. But I don't think we should overstate this risk. For one thing, Pakistan is already moving closer to Russia, and especially China. For another thing, the interests and objectives of Russia, and especially China in Afghanistan, are actually closer to those of the US than to those of Pakistan. China and Russia both want a stable Afghanistan and have no interest in Taliban rule. Pakistan, of course, has major ties to the Taliban and arguably benefits from an unstable Afghanistan in that it complicates efforts by India to have a deep presence there.

Comment by Riaz Haq on August 31, 2017 at 10:27am

Why India-Japan’s Knock-Off Of Pakistan-China’s CPEC Is Doomed To Fail

https://www.valuewalk.com/2017/08/india-japan-pakistan-china-cpec-f...

India-Japan joint efforts to copy the idea of China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) can be derailed due to economic impotence.

As India and Japan join hands to develop their own vision of a connectivity initiative – the Asia-Africa Growth Corridor (AAGC), dubbed as ‘India’s New Silk Road’ – New Delhi and Tokyo look over their shoulder to copy rivals Pakistan and China’s ambitious CPEC.

The announcement of AAGC was made by Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi in May and came amid the active phase of CPEC implementation. While India and Japan insist their knock-off of CPEC is designed to integrate the economies of South, Southeast, and East Asia with Oceania and Africa, experts says the intentions behind the AAGC are to counter China and serve as a counterbalance to its ambitious joint project with Pakistan.

India-Japan Making Their Own, Cheaper Version of CPEC

The development of AAGC comes amid a series of seemingly anti-China deals by Japan and India, the most prominent enemies of Beijing looking to counter its growing expansionism in the region. In late July, The Economic Times reported that India-Japan would sign a landmark maritime security pact during Japanese PM Shinzo Abe’s visit in September, something that will allow the two nations to contain China’s alleged expansionism appetites.

A few weeks ago, The Economic Times reported that a historic Indo-Japanese civil nuclear deal – signed in November last year – came into force, enabling Japan to export nuclear power plant technology from India as well as sponsor nuclear power plants in the nuclear-armed nation. The two nuclear-equipped countries signing the landmark deal prompted a furious response from Beijing.

The news comes as Indian and Chinese troops remain locked in the Sino-Indian standoff at the disputed Doklam plateau. With many experts warning that the standoff could spiral into a military confrontation between the two historic rivals, the growing India-Japan strategic partnership comes amid their shared fears of Beijing attempting to change the status quo along the Indo-Bhutan-China trijunction and maritime boundary in East China Sea in Japan’s territory.

But could the development of India-Japan strategic projects under the banner of AAGC help New Delhi and Tokyo counter China’s steadily expanding economic and political outreach in the region?

Why India and Japan’s AAGC Is Doomed to Fail

While India and Japan insist that the idea of AAGC is to create “a free and open Indo-Pacific region” by rediscovering older sea-routes and creating new sea corridors, China is concerned that the initiative is nothing but a cheap knock-off project designed to counterbalance or even disrupt its game-changer Belt and Road initiative.

True, India-Japan’s AAGC is a cheaper alternative to China’s Belt and Road initiative or even CPEC, but experts still doubt whether New Delhi and Tokyo could pull if off.

India and Japan’s ambitions to become the world’s prominent epicenters of economic growth could be derailed and doomed to fail due to India’s chronic economic slowdown, with “the makers of India’s monetary policy cutting interest rates” recently and “rates of job shedding,” according to The Economic Times.

Japan – the seeming driving force behind the AAGC initiative due to being the world’s third-largest economy – could expect a substantial slowdown in economic momentum due to the mounting political crisis in the nation. CNBC reported late last month that anti-government protests are on the rise in Japan, with PM Abe – who drowns in school scandals – having his lowest approval rating ever, under 30%.

Comment by Riaz Haq on October 23, 2017 at 8:02pm

Any Attack on Pakistan Would Be Construed As an Attack on China

"Any attack on Pakistan would be construed as an attack on China," Beijing recently warned the US. After the Abbottabad operation, in which Osama bin Laden was killed, Pakistani Prime Minister Syed Yusuf Raza Gilani's visited China from May 17 – 21, 2011. His trip was hailed by the Pakistani press as a new historic landmark in bilateral relations, and interpreted as a sign of the progressive breakaway between Pakistan and U.S.


https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/2152/china-warns-us-pakistan

China Warns U.S.: 'Any Attack on Pakistan Would Be Construed As an Attack on China' – Evolving Pakistani-Chinese Alliance to Face the U.S./India

https://www.memri.org/reports/china-warns-us-any-attack-pakistan-wo...

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