"China-Russia air patrol shows Japan and South Korea in disarray" Frank Ching

"China and Russia conducted their first-ever joint air patrol last week by sending bombers along the South Korean coast, intruding into its air defense identification zone as well as that of Japan, with Seoul charging that a Russian warplane had violated Korean airspace – the first such incursion since the Korean War. Japan, too, sent its jets aloft to intercept the Russian aircraft.

Russia’s defense ministry issued a statement denying any violation of airspace, saying the flights had taken place “over a pre-planned route.” China’s foreign ministry pointed out that the airspace in an air defense identification zone is “not territorial airspace and countries enjoy the freedom of overflight under international law.”

China’s defense ministry spokesman, Wu Qian, explained that the purpose of the joint patrol “is aimed at deepening the comprehensive strategic partnership of China and Russia, and boosting the strategy coordination and joint combat ability of the two nations.” He said it did not target “any third nation.”

Yet, the two countries chose to patrol the sensitive airspace along the Korean coast, above waters linking Korea and Japan. They must have known that there would be a reaction to such an exercise.

The Russian intrusion into airspace claimed by both South Korea and Japan triggered off several hundred rounds of warning shots fired by Korean jets toward the Russian A-50 airborne warning and control plane."  Frank Ching in ejininsight.com

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This is a really bad thing and IMO it is altogether the result of the hyper-aggressiveness displayed by the US toward Russia since the fall of the USSR.  We had the option then of offering a welcoming hand to Russia as it emerged from the nightmare of communist rule, but we did not extend such a hand.  Instead, our civilian and military policy elites insisted that Russia was necessarily an enemy for the US and was still the communist USSR in disguise.

We (the US) drove the eastern boundary of NATO absurdly far into Russia's "comfort zone," and actively recruited the former member countries of the Warsaw Pact into NATO.  We have also recruited many former Union Republics of the USSR into a specifically ant-Russian military alliance.

We are now surprised that a weakened Russia, spurned by us, makes common cause with China?  What else were the Russians supposed to do?  Fall on their knees before us and beg our pardon for existing?

Neocon folly and a lack of any sort of policy thoughtfulness have brought us to this..  pl

http://www.ejinsight.com/20190729-china-russia-air-patrol-shows-japan-and-south-korea-in-disarray/

Comments

[John Minehan]

It seems like the nation we should have reached out to first in the East was Russia in the 1990s, it has been an important part of Europe since (at least) the time of Peter the Great, our remembering that would have been a good insight.

[turcopolier]

John Minehan

Amen

[David Solomon]

Colonel, As I recall (with admittedly dimming brain power) we explicitly promised at the breakup of the Soviet Union not to do all the things which you outlined that we did. Clearly we had an opportunity for world peace and we screwed it for national aggrandizement. We reap what we sow.

[Patrick Armstrong]

Yep. In 1814 the four winners had the sense to include France in the deliberations: they realised France would always be a player and no settlement would endure is it weren't included. In 1919, on the other hand, their wiser descendants....

I am starting to think that Russia/China were reacting for a long time; now I suspect they have started acting, Given that they completely outwitted the West's assemblage of giant minds in their reaction period, we can look for lots and lots of surprises to come.

[Fred]

On this evening's CBS news I saw the clip of the departing DNI, Mr. Coates, laughing at the idea President Trump would meet with President Putin, which occurred at the Aspin Summit last year. Apparently our elites are not as bright as they have always told us we were. Of course that was before Mueller's Muesli report.

[Jim Ticehurst]

I Agree...This "STrategic Partnership "has been forming since the 1990s ..The Logistics and Progress into this Century have been Intriguing to watch...Just do a Year by Year Timeline of Events and you can see it all Develop...Putin had no choices and Events across Europe and Asia and The Middle East have been Crystal Clear..Connect the Dots..Its too late Now..Decisions have been made..The Geo-Political.. Factor is Red Line..No turning back...It will only get worse...IMO

[johnf]

In the late Middle Ages the Silk Road silted up with so many territories and tarrif barriers to cross. The Portuguese and Spanish could do the East West trade so much more cheaply by sea. Europe grew to dominate the world from the wealth they accrued from that trading.

Now it is the sea trade and its choke points that are silting up. The East West trade can be conducted cheaply and quickly through only two countries who are in agreement and through which tariffs are low.

[Paco]

Congratulations, a sober analysis, when the wall came down naive folks, including me, thought the world would start a new era, peace dividend, reduction of defense spending, but it was not to be, neocon folly you say, but it was Bill Clinton more preoccupied with young girls than with the new opportunities that would be wasted. I worked with a joint US-USSR company, one of the first, it was all cheerful optimism about the future, but first Panama, then Irak and then the point of no return, Yugoslavia. Blind politicians, the USA are paying the price of such follies, and it seems there is no way back.

[PRC90]

A higher level of public display of unity between Russia and PRC, varied by timing and intensity to suit the occasion, would/will be Russian use of air and port facilities in the new Chinese 'islands' in the SCS.

[Amir]

As Persian Gulf topping on the South China Sea dessert, Russian Federation Navy to hold joint naval drills with Iranian counterpart in the Persian Gulf: www.newsweek.com/iran-says-it-will-expand-military-ties-russia-hold-joint-drills-us-tries-build-rival-coalition-1451630%3famp=1

[casey]

We "did not extend such a hand," is putting it a bit mildly, no? As I recall, the pedo-elites sent Summers and his crew in to commit economic genocide on the place by asset stripping everything, resulting the in the premature deaths of millions. Also, Korea's self-declared air boundaries are just that, self-declared, and have no merit in terms of international law, for what "law" is worth anymore.

[The Twisted Genius]

Thoughtful policy ended when the Bush-Baker approach ended. Throughout the fall of the USSR, the Bush-Baker team maintained a quiet, respectful, hands off approach in order to prevent chaos and nuclear war. When that approach ended, we sealed our fate. Eastern Europe and the Baltics naturally clamored for the shield of NATO. We should have greatly reduced and modified the scope of that alliance or even disbanded it altogether rather than quickly letting these newly freed countries in. Bringing Russia in as an equal partner when Yugoslavia disintegrated, even though Russia was at its weakest at that time would have been the wise move. And our long, aggressive regime change policy in Ukraine really sealed our present state of animosity.

Economically, it wasn't just Western robber barons stripping the former Soviet Union of assets. Russian oligarchs and the Russian mafiya filled the vacuum left by the fall of the CPSU and their organs of power. They were stripping the carcass to the bone until those organs of power were restored by Putin. Russia today is a far better place than Stalin's USSR. But the heart of the USSR and the CPSU was still Russia. That heart still beats strong in Putin's Russian Federation. There is a strong continuity. Even so, it was our ham-handed neocon policies that were and are at fault in our present terrible relationship with Russia.

[Flavius]

Well said, Colonel, well said!
Washington, with its myopic "we see farther" nonsense, blew the peace. How's that for irony, Madame "it was worth it" Albright?
The only thing I would add is that the dimwits in our own Evil Party who couldn't stomach the results of a fair election, and our special relationship pal across the Atlantic with its Russia fixation, now bear equal responsibility for perpetuating what could very well end in disaster.
We should add our regular media organs into the mix: these invincibly ignorant fools not only let them get away with it, they amplify the madness into news entertainment which only encourages them in their folly.

[PRC90]

Casey, yes, international 'law' always needs to be enforced which is moot in many cases.

The 'boundaries' if any are those around the civilian airspace administered by Republic of Korea under ICAO conventions, and the very different in nature RoK military ADIZ which also has a formal meaning and significance and is a part of the escalation process of air defence. These don't overlap.
Both have meaning under international law; breaches of the former may result in Moscow getting an infringement notice from the RoK civil aviation authorities for operating aircraft without an air traffic clearance, and of the latter breach then pretty much what occurred.

I'd expect that Moscow will get and will pay the note.

[PRC90]

Well I hope that no one shoots an Arch-Duke anytime soon.

[PRC90]

The heart beats, however Russia has a falling population that Putin has been unable to arrest via social and economic incentives. One outcome of this is likely to be growing independence and separation of distant regions, as well as falling Russian nett economic and military capacity.
Our Western robber barons have always had their eyes on the riches of Eurasia, currently largely under Russian control or denial. Regardless of opportunities such as the Ukraine adventure, if the population trend continues then they can afford to wait with misplaced confidence while the beast bleeds out.
I doubt the Russians will concur. Unless our barons in the Western Swamp are properly drowned, then this entire affair will have a very bad ending.

[PRC90]

And also encourages the voting public to believe that an incensed Bear is only capable of a bit of social media election fiddling.

[Jim Ticehurst]

When Bill Clinton became President...Russia resonded in a calculated Strategic way as they had to..after the Breakup..Tit for Tat..And less Hystarically than the United States is responding to Political events here..i/e Immigration..With George Bush the L Lesser...it got even Worse..The timeline Indicated that Putin said he Warned President Bush about the 9/11 Attack Plan TWO DAYS before it Happened...DCI George Tennent Said He knew who the Players were the Day of 9/11...and fully supported the WMD garbage...So DCI Tennent gets the Medal of Freedom..! Putin said He warned Bush the Lesser of the Consequnces of Invading Iraq..Ignored..We all know why..What would events be now if Iraq was still a Sunni Buffer with Iran.??. The Obama/Clinton team finished it off...The DNC gave Bernie Sanders a Platform for His Call for a Revolution..and the Sleeping Giant is Awake.The British are Coming...The British are Coming!

[John Minehan]

The seriousness of the pundit varies inversely with the amount of opprobrium directed at the "Chicken Kiev Speech," it seems. There were issues wit the Bush/Baker approach (as their are with any approach) but they seemed to understand how to deal with the post-Soviet east.

[JamesT]

Amir - thank you for that interesting link. The most interesting part to me is where the Iranian admiral says the joint naval drills "may be considered as a turning point in relations of Tehran in Moscow". Wow.

[Richard Ong]

The "Soviet communism lives on" fixation lives on in the minds of Diana West, J.R. Nyquist, Frank Gaffney, Trevor Loudon, and other excellent thinkers. Gaffney is now an ardent neocon but had sensible things to say about the USSR at one time.

Bottom line: we squandered an opportunity to create an amazing relationship with Russia. Instead we chase our tail in insignificant missions to do the bidding of Israelis.

[turcopolier]

Richard Ong

IMO Frank Gaffney was always an asshole. i remember when he and other neocons would come and try to rot the minds of my analysts in DIA.

[fasteddiez]

Paco:

Your comment "Blind politicians, the USA are paying the price of such follies", Could you explain the politicians paying a price please? It seems to me that neither Clinton the lecher, Dubya & his vp, Obuma, nor the current preznit and the Izzies are paying any price for their frolicsome war games, until now that is.

[Thirdeye]

Russia's birth rate has been climbing since 1999 and the natural population reached stable replacement in 2012.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Russia#/media/File:Natural_Population_Growth_of_Russia.PNG

That's not even considering immigration from other former SSRs.

[Barty Ross]

"... a lack of any sort of policy thoughtfulness..."

I respectfully disagree. There has most certainly been policy thoughtfulness, but it has been towards the objectives of the rulers of the American Empire that we of the American nation now find ourselves in, rather than towards objectives beneficial to our American nation. The American nation, while still the largest, is only one of many nations within the empire. We Americans are in possession of NONE of the control nodes (coinage, courts, education, media, etc) of the civilization that our forebears left for our inheritance.