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The South China Sea has once again become a focal point of international attention following sudden clashes between coast guard vessels of the Philippines and China. As tensions rise, the involvement of global powers like the US and Japan adds further complexity to the situation, potentially pushing more nations to align against Beijing. Amid these escalating tensions, it becomes imperative for China to reconsider its assertive stance and respect the existing global order to avoid further international backlash The South China Sea (SCS) has once again come into focus following sudden skirmishes between the coast guard vessels of the Philippines...

American foreign policy experts have long argued that China has been laying the groundwork for a permanent rise as a major global power, and U.S. politicians (particularly on the Republican side) have certainly counted the ways in which China is clearly our No. 1 geopolitical foe. However, China's ascendency isn't without its setbacks, and at times it seems possible that China is closer to declining than rising. Their economy hasn't recovered since COVID-19, and Chinese President Xi Jinping has been dealing with more internal struggles than were previously let on. One such problem for the leader of the Chinese Communist...

The PRC has adopted a sustained coercive campaign against the Philippines to seize its sovereign territory. The world is witnessing this aggression today in the South China Sea. Awarning from the 20th century is that dictatorships tend to use aggression not first against great powers but against smaller states. Hitler pressured Austria and seized the Sudetenland from Czechoslovakia before seizing the rest of the Czech Republic, turning Slovakia into a protectorate, and seizing Memel (Klaipeda) from Lithuania. After checking Japan in 1938 and 1939 in the Far East, Stalin aggressed against Poland with his ally Nazi Germany before turning to...

After being run out of Tarrant County for alleged election discrepancies in the 2020 vote-by-mail election, Heider Garcia is now running the elections office right next door in Dallas County. YIKES! Many Republicans in Dallas County are hoping Dallas Mayor and freshly-minted Republican, Eric Johnson, will bolster his newly discovered conservative brand by calling for Garcia’s removal and push for election integrity. Will he rise to the occasion? Star-Telegram: Tarrant County’s former election administrator is headed next door to Dallas County to run its elections. Heider Garcia resigned from his Tarrant County job in April, citing disagreements with County Judge...

The Chinese People’s Liberation Army Navy Shandong Carrier Strike Group is operating in the Philippine Sea, being shadowed separately by Republic of China Navy and Japan Maritime Self-Defense Force (JMSDF) destroyers, according to both countries. Meanwhile, North Korea fired two ballistic missiles into the Sea of Japan on Wednesday – shortly before its leader, Kim Jong Un, met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Russia – marking the first time North Korea has conducted such a launch while its leader was overseas. Taiwan’s Ministry of National Defense in a Wednesday social media post stated that a total of 35 PLA...

Officials have raised the alert level due to various seismic events being recorded. Smoke rises from Mayon volcano as seen from Daraga, Albay province in the Philippines Mayon has increased chances of lava flows and a potential for explosive activity within weeksImage: Caroline Francis via REUTERS Authorities in the Philippines on Friday began evacuating around 10,000 people living near the Mayon Volcano after volcanic earthquakes and hundreds of rockfall events were detected. Mount Mayon is situated in the eastern province of Albay, some 330 kilometers south of the Filipino capital of Manila. The Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (Phivolcs)...

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) — Two years ago, Apple threatened to pull Facebook and Instagram from its app store over concerns about the platform being used as a tool to trade and sell maids in the Mideast. After publicly promising to crack down, Facebook acknowledged in internal documents obtained by The Associated Press that it was “under-enforcing on confirmed abusive activity” that saw Filipina maids complaining on the social media site of being abused. Apple relented and Facebook and Instagram remained in the app store. But Facebook’s crackdown seems to have had a limited effect. Even today, a quick...

A mysterious aircraft caught flying over the Philippines could be the United State's ultra-secret new RQ-180 stealth drone, aviation experts believe.

While U.S. pundits see Vice President Kamala Harris's visit to Hanoi as a way for her to get out of town and avoid awkward questions, the Chinese media responded with sharp commentary accusing her of inciting Vietnam against China. For her part, Harris accused China of "bullying" in the South China Sea. The U.S.-China-Vietnam strategic triangle is certainly on the minds of ordinary Vietnamese.At a park in central Saigon, some students asked me, "Do you know why we love Trump?""Is it because he hates China?" I asked."Yeah!" They responded in unison.Yes, Donald Trump is a Vietnamese folk hero.  In fact, Trump...

A 1986 federal law makes it a crime to “encourage” unauthorized immigrants to come to or stay in the United States. “The statute potentially criminalizes the simple words — spoken to a son, a wife, a parent, a friend, a neighbor, a co-worker, a student, a client — ‘I encourage you to stay here,’” Judge A. Wallace Tashima wrote last year for a unanimous panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, in San Francisco, in striking down the law. The law applies to a grandmother urging a grandchild to overstay a visa or a lawyer...

China is forging ahead with the construction of its third aircraft carrier in under a decade, highlighting the scale of Beijing’s maritime ambitions. A series of satellite images from the Jiangnan shipyard, recently published by a China-focused think tank, shed light on the ongoing construction of China’s Type 002 carrier. The images reveal a typical military vessel construction site, replete with a floodable basin and multiple sluice gates. While the haziness of the photos makes it difficult to discern the carrier’s dimensions, the hull appears to measure forty meters in width by forty-eight meters in length. If prior reports are...

Following Japan's proclamations that it will take over another 280 'disputed ownership' islands, it appears the increasingly dis-approved of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's path of militarism and provocation is working. As China Daily Mail reports, citing experts, China intends to take back Zhongye Island - 'illegally' occupied by the Philippines, according to the Chinese. The Chinese navy has drawn a detailed combat plan to seize the island and the battle will be restricted within the South China Sea. Philippines military is building up on the island and the Chinese see as 'intolerable' the "arrogance" relying on US support.

Chinese Territorial Assertions: The Case of the Mischief Reef China has on-going disputes with Vietnam, the Philippines, Malaysia and Brunei regarding conflicting claims of sovereignty over different islands in the Spratly group in the South China Sea, but its assertion of its claim over the Mischief Reef at the expense of the Philippines is an educative case study of how China doggedly pursues its irredentist territorial claims - by stealth, if possible, and by other means, including force, if necessary.The Spratly group consists of 12 main islands and 390 islets, banks, reefs, shoals and cays, of which only 33 permanently...

Detained at Manila airport for a week, Bahareh Zare Bahari says Tehran-issued Interpol alert for assault is ‘fake,’ came due to her political activism An Iranian beauty queen has requested asylum in the Philippines after an Interpol alert about her filed by Tehran got her detained at the Manila airport. Bahareh Zare Bahari has been held at Ninoy Aquino International Airport’s Terminal 3 since October 17, as authorities examine Iran’s allegation that she assaulted a fellow Iranian in the Philippines and Bahari’s counter-claim that the Islamic Republic is targeting her for her political activism and that the charges against her...

Rodrigo Duterte, the firebrand president of the Philippines, on Wednesday called on the US to send warships to defend the island nation against Chinese military aggression as part of a decades-old Mutual Defense Treaty.

MANILA (Reuters) - Chaos erupted at a huge party to celebrate the 90th birthday of former Philippine first lady Imelda Marcos on Wednesday, with 261 friends and supporters rushed to Manila hospitals with suspected food poisoning. Emergency rooms in the city’s Pasig area were inundated with patients vomiting and suffering from diarrhea and dizziness, according to staff who spoke to Reuters.

NORFOLK Former state Del. Ron Villanueva is a mentor, a family man and just a generally good person, civic and business leaders said. Over the years, he's traveled to the Philippines to assist with an Operation Smile trip and repeatedly taken a family friend to the hospital to visit her dying father. But he is also a criminal. And that, a federal judge said Tuesday, shouldn't be forgotten. "You have done good things, but that doesn't put you above the law," U.S. District Judge Rebecca Beach Smith said from the bench.

In recent years, the United States has struggled to persuade the Philippine government and the country’s citizens it is serious about honoring its commitments under the 1951 U.S.-Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty (MDT). China has been feeding this growing mistrust, hoping to drive a wedge between the two long-standing allies to the point one or both will move to terminate the treaty. Twenty-seven years ago, the stars and stripes were hauled down for the final time at Naval Base Subic Bay, Republic of the Philippines, fulfilling the U.S. obligations to withdraw all military forces and vacate all bases after the Philippine...

Filipinos vote on Monday in midterm polls that are being seen as a crucial referendum on Rodrigo Duterte’s brutal crackdown on illegal drugs, unorthodox style and contentious embrace of China. The poll is expected to strengthen his grip on power, opening the way for him to deliver on pledges to restore the death penalty and rewrite the constitution. Duterte has found international infamy for his foul-mouthed tirades, but remains hugely popular among Filipinos fed up with the country’s dysfunction and elite politicians. He wants to bring back capital punishment for drug-related crimes as part of a crackdown on narcotics in...

There are two links for this story. I started linking to the short video which I originally watched. It is from Asia Times. Basically it is almost an advertisement for the article. Runs about a minute and a half, although it mentions the major points from the article. Then there is an actual article in the Asia Times. I will also include a link to that article, for those who want to read the full thing.