Tackling the South China Sea Together: British and French Navies Chart a Course

Posted on June 26, 2018 by admin

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 7, No. 6, June 2018

Pictured are Royal Navy Marines taking part in a simulated beach landing using Landing Platform Dock ships. Two ships appear in the foreground, with a larger one in the background.

Pictured are Royal Navy Marines taking part in a simulated beach landing using Landing Platform Dock ships.
The Assault Ship HMS Bulwark is visable in the distance. The Marines were part of the NATO Exercise, Trident Juncture. The role of the Landing Platform Dock ships, HMS Bulwark and HMS Albion, is to deliver the punch of the Royal Marines ashore by air and by sea, with boats from the landing dock in the belly of the ship and by assault helicopter from the two-spot flight deck. LPDs can carry 256 troops, with their vehicles and combat supplies, and this can be swollen up to 405 troops. Source: Defence Imagery via Flickr.

Peter M. Solomon

Government and Regulatory Affairs Consultant

At a September 2015, joint press conference at the White House, China’s President Xi Jinping stood beside U.S. President Barack Obama and said, “China does not intend to pursue militarization” with respect to “construction activities that China are undertaking” on the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea.[1] Since then, China has established several offensive capabilities in the region, including surface-to-air and anti-ship missile systems on three features in the Spratly Islands and the ability to deploy strategic bombers from the Paracel Islands.[2] In comparison to the United States, which has been a consistent critic of China’s reclamation and militarization and has embarked on numerous freedom of maritime navigation exercises in the region, the European Union (EU) has historically been reserved in its comments regarding China’s activities in the South China Sea. Instead, the EU has limited itself to general comments about the importance of maintaining freedom of the seas and resolving disputes peacefully. While these statements are not without importance, the lack of a more critical, unified EU approach to China’s destabilizing activities has left missing a crucial voice. The tides could soon turn.

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Trade Strategy is a Proper Part of National Security

Posted on June 10, 2018 by admin

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 7, No. 6, June 2018

A ship, the Emerald Princess, is photographed crossing the new Cocoli Locks of the Panama Canal expansion in Panama City.

Emerald Princess crosses the new Cocoli Locks of the Panama Canal expansion in Panama City. A giant Chinese-chartered freighter nudged its way into the expanded Panama Canal on Sunday to mark the completion of nearly a decade of work forecast to boost global trade. Source: Craig Stanfill via Flickr.

William R. Hawkins

International Economics and National Security Consultant

On June 4, the Koch brothers (Charles and David) announced the launch of a “multi-year, multimillion-dollar” campaign against the tariffs and trade restrictions imposed by the Trump administration; especially those levied on China. The billionaire brothers are regularly called “conservatives” because they make large campaign donations to Republican candidates. But they are not conservatives; they are libertarians, a very different breed of cat. And their donations to the GOP are meant to sway the party in their ideological direction, not merely support it. The liberal media tries to tarnish conservatism by placing libertarians on “the Right” even though this is not their intellectual origin. This is done to further the left-wing narrative that “conservatives” are self-interested, greedy individuals who are enemies of organized society and the common good. This is true for libertarians, who doubt the very legitimacy of the nation-state or the “higher” norms of society. Too often they define right and wrong on the basis of whether it turns a profit.

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Hearts and Minds in Afghanistan

Posted on May 31, 2018 by admin

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 6, No. 5, May 2018

A screenshot of a Facebook post. A cropped photo of Jason Pegg's bloodied arm is in the background with the following text in the foreground: "11 years ago today (31MAY2005) outside of a village I cannot spell in Afghanistan, Jonny Jihad and his band of heathens tries to take my life with an IED.While they got my arm, I am fortunate that I was able to pass it out worse than I got it.#NotTodayTommyTaliban"

A cropped photo of Jason Pegg’s bloodied arm following his and the author’s hearts and minds campaign in an Afghan village on May 31, 2005. Source: Facebook.

Heath B. Hansen

U.S. Army

I opened my eyes. It was still dark, but I could see the night was ending and another day in some village in Afghanistan was beginning. The smell of dip-spit and cigarette smoke betrayed the fact that the platoon was awake and breaking down the patrol base. “Get the f*** up, Hansen,” was the greeting from my team leader. “Get your s*** on the humvee, we’re leaving in a few mikes.” “Roger, Sergeant,” I replied. It was May 31 2005, and time to win over more hearts and minds in the War on Terror.

We listened to the convoy brief. The platoon would be heading to another village, in the middle of nowhere, to help villagers that probably had no idea why Americans were in their country and couldn’t care less about ‘democracy.’ The typical information was passed down about the scope and purpose of the mission followed by the monotone, repetitive, “Keep your heads on a swivel” and, “Make sure we have full, three-sixty security at all times. Remember your battle drills.”

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The Price Of Paramount Power: Xi Jinping’s Ascension Could Make China A Much Riskier Place To Do Business

Posted on March 17, 2018 by admin

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 6, No. 3, March 2018

A noodle vendor sits beside a poster showing the late Chinese chairman Mao Zedong in February 2016. Fifty years after the Cultural Revolution spread bloodshed and turmoil across China, the Communist-ruled country is driving firmly down the capitalist road, but Mao Zedong’s legacy remains — like the embalmed leader himself — far from buried. Source: Carsten ten Brink via Flickr.

Richard Hornik

Stony Brook University

One of the peculiar pathologies of western businessmen active in China is an almost religious reverence for its lack of due process, enthralled by the combination of free(ish) markets and political stability proffered by China’s Market-Leninism (a term coined by Nicholas Kristoff). What they miss, however, is the price that must be paid for such short-term control, and during the course of Chinese history that price has proven to be very high.

The latest convert to this envy for authoritarian efficiency is Tesla’s Elon Musk who has spoken and written extensively about China’s ability to conceive, approve and build enormous infrastructure projects in a matter of a few years – or less[1]. No zoning rules, environmental regulations, cost-benefit analyses — much less property rights — can stand in the way of the gleaming high-speed rail lines, shiny new airports, massive harbors and 12-lane highways and bridges that have covered the Middle Kingdom in the past two decades. Likewise with housing developments and mega industrial installations like petrochemical plants, steel mills and refineries.

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After China’s Naval Modernization, It Seeks to Rewrite International Law and Exclude the U.S. from the South China Sea

Posted on February 22, 2018 by admin

Journal of Political Risk, Vol. 6, No. 2, February 2018

A PLAN Shenyang J-15 carrier-based fighter aircraft is preparing to land on Chinese aircraft carrier PLANS Liaoning (CV-16). The aircraft carrier is located in the middle of the ocean.

A PLAN Shenyang J-15 carrier-based fighter aircraft is preparing to land on Chinese aircraft carrier PLANS Liaoning (CV-16). Source: Wikimedia Commons.

James E. Fanell

(Capt., USN, Ret.)

The People’s Republic of China (PRC) Ministry of Defense representative reportedly stated at this week’s Munich Security Conference that the PRC now interprets the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) as stating that naval forces are forbidden to operate in a coastal state’s Exclusive Economic Zone (EEZ) without said state’s prior permission.

This raises the question of why Beijing has now come to this “enlightened” position? Where was the PRC since 1949 as US Navy warships peacefully sailed the waters of the South China Sea over the past 70 years? Or where was the PRC from 1972 to 1982 as China participated in the American-led effort to craft and ratify UNCLOS? More importantly, why did Beijing not complain of US Navy operations in the South China Sea in 1996 when the PRC ratified UNCLOS?

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