The Duran Podcast - Neocon China hawks; Ukraine failed, focus on Taiwan

Episode Date: May 26, 2024

Neocon China hawks; Ukraine failed, focus on Taiwan

All right, Alexander, let's talk about what is happening in Taiwan. We have the inauguration of Lai, who's the new leader in Taiwan. And we have these military exercises taking place in and around Taiwan by China, very big, powerful military exercises, which, show that China has the capabilities to surround Taiwan and to blockade Taiwan. But more than that, it's about sending a message to the new administration to not get any funny ideas about declaring independence or anything like that. What do you think of everything that is going on in Taiwan? Well, in and around Taiwan, actually. In and around Taiwan, yeah. It is a huge show of force from China.

we're getting all kinds of maps and pictures which show Chinese warships now in all, you know, basically encircling Taiwan, the Chinese plan, or at least we're signalled that the Chinese plan in the event that there is an actual

secession move is an actual straightforward blockade of Taiwan. Now, it's important to say that this is the Chinese plan with respect to Taiwan. What we don't know is what plan the Chinese have, and they do undoubtedly have one, if the United States becomes involved

and seeks to break that blockade. So this is, in a way, a dress rehearsal for a conflict. It's showing us part of what the Chinese would do if there's a positive secession move in Taiwan, but it's a dress rehearsal of just one part of what must presumably be a larger Chinese plan. And it's difficult to imagine that in practice, if the Chinese were to blockade Taiwan in this fashion, given the rhetoric, given the political crisis between China and the United States, has been developing continuously, basically since Obama's time, but which has been given a massive extra impetus

during the Biden period, it's difficult to imagine that the United States would stand by and do nothing if there was such a blockade, a Chinese blockade of Taiwan. And there's been some very interesting pieces. There's a very interesting piece in the Financial Times today.

in which someone who is connected to the Pentagon is telling the Europeans quite straightforwardly, look, our priority now has to be China. China is our main adversary. He touches on Taiwan. The right of this article touches on Taiwan. But he says China is our main adversary. That means that we cannot be strong everywhere. We cannot be strong in Europe. and we are going to have to scale down our presence in Europe. That's inevitably going to happen. It is only a matter of time. We are inevitably going to have to scale down our military presence in Europe in order to confront China in the Taiwan Straits and the South China Sea.

And chillingly, this article speaks about preparing for war with China. so you could see how dramatic this whole situation is becoming now right from the first moment this administration the Biden administration took power there's been this current of feeling within the administration coming mainly I think from the Pentagon which is China first Russia isn't our real concern we've got to focus on China we've got to scale down support for Ukraine. We've got to reduce our presence in Europe. These people come back all the time. They seem to be asserting themselves again now. And the other side, the people who say, Russia first, China can wait. We can bargain and negotiate with the Chinese in a way that we cannot do with the Russians.

Well, they are, of course, also back in force. We have Blinken now quite openly advocating for Ukraine to be given the green light to use attack them's missiles, to strike at positions in Russia itself. And I think a lot of people are focusing on the enormously dangerous thing that that would be. and of course the Ukrainian side of this but it's also I think partly Blinken and the State Department which continues to be centred on

Europe fighting the Pentagon and saying look we've got to continue to focus on Europe. That remains for the EU that should remain for the US the major area of importance and it's Russia not China that is our adversary

now. So you're seeing this tension in the United States, which has never resolved itself between the China Hawks and the Russia Hawks. And I suspect this exercised by the Chinese around Taiwan is going to strengthen the hand of the China Hawks. And I'm going to make a guess if we get a Republican administration in November, it will be the China Hawks who will start gradually to gain the ascendancy. Yeah, well, the deal was the compromise, not the deal. Let's say the compromise between the China Hawks and the Russian Hawks was that first they'll dismantle Russia within three, four months. They'll throw the sanctions at Russia. They'll get the regime change. They'll break Russia up. And then once they've dismantled Russia, then they can focus all their energies on China. I mean, that was the compromise, I believe that they came up with. That was the understanding that they agreed on. But that failed. And instead of breaking up and vulcanizing Russia and getting Russia out of the way so that you can focus on China, you now have this alliance, more than an alliance between China and Russia.

So in a way, Blinken's thinking, focusing on or continuing to focus on Russia because we haven't been able to destroy Russia. you know, why should we just leave Russia now and go focus on China when Russia is still strong? When the plan, guys, was first let's take out Russia, then let's go after China. In a way, Blinken's thinking might make some sense, I guess, if you can say. I mean, do you understand what I mean? Oh, absolutely. It's blinking telling them we haven't even been able to destroy Russia. How are we going to focus on China now?

Absolutely. Well, the Pentagon thinks in military terms more, I think, than in, you know, the kind of geostrategic thinking that is beloved of the State Department people and of their friends in the intelligence community and in the think tanks. And I think that's the difference. Now, there's been a really interesting article by Ray McGovern, which I think actually probably tracks the contours of all of this really quite well. And if you remember in the first weeks of the Biden administration, there were articles appearing in places like the website of the Atlantic Council saying, you know, we've got to work to win over the Russians. We've got to try and find some way of getting the Russians to distance themselves from the Chinese. We might try to make some concessions to them, some minor unimportant concessions to them, scare them with the boat. of China. And an effort was made to do that apparently. I remember it at the June

summit, June 2021 summit meeting in Geneva between Putin and Biden. And it seems that they made a big pitch to Putin at that time. Look, you know, we're going to come down on you hard unless you break away from China and China isn't really your friend. China's your enemy. And, you know, if you don't do that, you know, we'll come down really hard. And, well, we're prepared to make a few minor concessions that we'd never been told what those were. And apparently Putin said no. Putin said no. The relationship with China is not up for discussion. And then the pendulum swung to the Blinken-Newland axis who have always wanted, I think, to go after Russia first because they're focused on Europe. And as you said, the great plan, defeat Russia, break it up,

if you can do that. Install at the very least a new regime in Moscow that will do what you want. Distance yourself from, you know, realign with the US. go against China. There was an article, if you remember, in national interest by Michael Wes Mitchell back in August 2021, directly after the Geneva Summit, in which he basically outlined it all. And, you know, use Ukraine to defeat Russia. And of course, it's failed completely. China, Russia, closer than ever. Russia also stronger than ever. And Russia winning the war in Ukraine. So absolutely right.

Lincoln can argue logically, well, what we started in, you know, in 2022 hasn't yet been completed. We've got to stay the course. We've got to escalate. We've got to attack them on their own territory. We've got to do all of this because otherwise, you know, we will be left, not just against China, but against this Chinese-Russia. and Leviathan, which we can't take on. So you could see the logic. But of course, the Pentagon for its part, and that's what the Financial Times article is saying

is, look, we understand that. We understand the logic of what you're saying. But the fact is we cannot be strong everywhere. We've only got finite resources. China is the major threat to U.S. hegemony and U.S. ascendancy, and we've got to redeploy our forces there. Your project in Ukraine and in Europe has failed. All that it's doing is it's draining US resources rather than weakening Russia. And so we've got to try and pivot away. And as for project Ukraine, well, the Europeans can take care of it. I mean, you know, they're rich.

They've got lots of resources. They're used to. to have big armies back in the Cold War days. They can take over and they can do it in our place. So that's the argument that's going on. It's, as I say, very well set out, very clearly set out by that Pentagon person in the financial times. And you can see the push-pull going on all the time. And it looks, again, as if the China Hawks are in the ascendant.

Let me repeat a point, which we've made before. These are not... These are not people who like Russia. These are near Khan Hawks who, you know, want war as well. It's just that the war they see coming and which they want to fight is over, is with China, over Taiwan, not a war in Europe, which they see as a side theater, a less important theater with Russia over Ukraine. that's the only argument that exists, not just within this administration, but I think within the power structure in Washington. There are a number of people now in Congress and in the wider American political community who are now starting to speak out and say this doesn't make any kind of sense whichever way you go. People like J.D. Vance and indeed Marjorie Taylor Green, if you listen to her.

but they are still very, very much isolated voices. We always talk about the collective West taking down Russia or China. How is China and Russia now that we've had the meeting between Putin and Xi, the hug, the hug that rocked the world, that shook the world between Putin and Xi, how are they going to respond to? all of this? What are their moves to take down the collective West, to take down the, to marginalize the United States, to marginalize Europe? I just want to say, you know, Russia, Russia continues to be attacked by the collective West or weapons delivered by the collective West. And there

are many, many analysts who believe that you have UK, German, U.S. soldiers who are actually in Ukraine as trainers, but they're the ones who are actually firing these missiles. That's what some analysts say. Okay. But they are being attacked by the collective West. And, you know, they attack Crimea just the other day with attack those missiles. Now, I understand that Crimea is in this gray area where it is Russian territory. But for some reason, maybe by some agreement at the beginning of this proxy war. Russia doesn't retaliate or will not retaliate in the same way when Crimea's attacked than if Rostovar, Rado onish or somewhere inside of Russia. Pre-2014 is attacked. I know exactly what the understanding is there with Crimea. But how do they retaliate against

the United States? How does Russia retaliate against the UK, France, Germany? No one ever talks about their methods and modes of response. Everything is always about how the collective West is going to dismember Russia and destroy China. What can they do? Yeah. If anything. I mean, before we proceed, you say some analysts are talking about, you know, missile strikes being, you know, helped, assisted by British and French technicians. some analysts and some German generals overheard on a telephone,

on a communication which is recorded. Just say, but no, I mean, obviously all of this is going on, and the Russians and the Chinese, of course, know all about it, and what they're doing is that they're forging ever closer ties and working on military-industrial relations and developing joint technologies and, of course, exchanging intelligence and, of course, exchanging intelligence and intelligence data and in effect making their partnership an indissoluble

one. I think they set out their plan fairly clearly, by the way, in the trip in Beijing, which is that, you know, they go on building Eurasia, building up their armed forces, planning and preparing for these wars. The Russians clearly prepared carefully for the, being preparing carefully for the war. Ukraine, the Chinese too, insulating their economies from sanctions shocks, building up their global, their alternative financial and trading systems, all of the things that we've been seeing them do and we've been talking about for many times. The Americans may be arguing with each other about which side they should take on first, but it's the Chinese and the Russians in reality who have been preparing because they can see all this rhetoric coming out of Washington

and to some extent European capitals. But if they have been taking the action, who've been preparing, have been holding the summit meetings, who've been forging the industrial links, who are almost certainly exchanging weapons technology, all of those things. And I think we're going to see. more of this. I think we're going to see more of the same. So how do the Chinese, for example, counter American warships in the Taiwan Straits and in the South China Sea? The most logical way to do that is with hypersonic missiles. China has developed hypersonic missile technology recently. Where did it get the assistance to do that from? It got it from Russia. And Putin, some years ago, disclosed that the Russians have assisted the Chinese to develop an early warning radar system.

So, you know, that is going on all the time and that process is accelerating. And of course, they're going to forge ever closer ties and they're going to try to involve other countries, bring over other countries to their side as well. and they're having success. The king of Bahrain has just been to Moscow. He's going there touting the idea of the Arab League for an international peace conference to settle the problems of the Middle East.

He told Putin that Russia was the first country. He'd chosen to visit as the current head of the Arab League. And presumably he's going to be going to China as well. So you can see that the Chinese and the Russians gradually pulling more countries into their system. And we saw that again in the United Nations just now, where there was a vote on the events in Srebrenica, do you remember? And a bare majority of the countries that voted to support the proposal that was put forward by the West. but the majority of countries either voted against or abstained. So it's showing you the growing geopolitical weight of this Russian-Chinese axis,

which is gradually, as I said, drawing more and more countries to itself. By the way, I think there was a major diplomatic setback for the Western powers and one that they didn't fully expect. I agree. All right. We will end it there. Durand.locals.com. We are on Rumble, Odyssey, but shoot, telegram, Rockfin, and Twitter, X, and go to the Duran shop. 15% off all merch, use the code, get ready, 15. Take care.