@xd341


https://www.reuters.com/world/head-us-think-tank-be-extradited-china-agent-charges-2024-09-09/

Well well, you don't often see Israel extradite a citizen to anywhere, even a dual citizen.  You might be on to something.

I wanna know who this guy is:
I mean it's quite the norm for Democrats to take money from the Chinese, but I want to know who didn't pay taxes on it!!!!

That's all I can get due to the paywall, but it struck me as odd that the SCMP didn't include actual dates for the exercise.

Including a beginning date and an end date is the norm as maritime traffic will normally route itself away from exercise areas. Therefore, it's asking for "trouble" for not sharing the dates!

Reuters! Ha! Here's another Reuters story that is one sided, and you know who's side it's on:

Reuters is allergic to getting a contemporaneous quote from the non-Chinese side. It's an allergy, or it's a policy.

The Taiwanese News finally published a Score Card! But there's no flight tracker graphic. I'll just post a link, so you guys can check my math, and I can pretend I'm a post count whore!!!!!

China sends 21 military aircraft and 8 ships around Taiwan

Feel good story of the Day:
Taiwan delegation to advocate UN participation during US trip

The UN did such a bang-up job preventing the outbreak of major war in Europe. Oh wait, never mind.

Yesterday
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Today
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Under Yoon, calls for South Korean nukes 'normalized'

SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA —
Less than two years after South Korean President Yoon Suk Yeol pledged his country would not seek nuclear weapons, his newly appointed defense minister is openly envisioning scenarios in which South Korea might reconsider that stance.

The comments by Defense Minister Kim Yong-hyun, who took office on Friday, are the latest evidence that the once-taboo idea of nuclear armament has gone mainstream in Seoul, amid growing concerns about North Korea's rapidly expanding nuclear arsenal and the long-term reliability of U.S. protection.

As an academic and retired military officer, Kim has long argued that South Korea may need nuclear weapons in some form to counter North Korea. In recently unearthed footage from a 2020 seminar, Kim warned South Korea has “no survival or future” without such a deterrent.

During his confirmation process last week, Kim stood by those comments, saying “all options” should remain open if the U.S. nuclear umbrella proves insufficient.

It appears to be the first time a sitting South Korean defense minister has publicly entertained the possibility of acquiring nuclear weapons, and marks a sharp departure from his predecessor, who repeatedly and firmly rejected the proposal under any condition.

Contacted by VOA, a South Korean defense ministry spokesperson maintained there has been “no change in the principle or position” that Seoul relies on U.S. extended deterrence and the U.S.-South Korea alliance to address the North Korean nuclear threat.

“However, if we cannot guarantee the survival and security of the state, all means and methods are open,” the spokesperson added, emphasizing the need to work closely with the United States.

A spokesperson for Yoon’s presidential office declined to comment for this story.

Most observers doubt South Korea will pursue nuclear weapons any time soon due to the massive economic and national security risks it would entail.

Not only would South Korea risk enraging China, but Seoul could upend its alliance with the United States and invite painful international sanctions, all while possibly encouraging others in the region to consider nuclear weapons of their own.

Despite the risks, Yoon continues to drive the once unthinkable idea further into the mainstream, raising concerns that the proposal could become more acceptable — and eventually turn into reality.

Nuke calls now routine

Yoon himself suggested last January that South Korea could develop nuclear arms if the North Korean threat escalated – raising alarm in Washington, where non-proliferation has long been a priority.

Three months later, Yoon and U.S. President Joe Biden signed what is known as the Washington Declaration, which bolstered U.S. defense assurances while reaffirming South Korea’s commitments under the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.

Yoon’s appointment of Kim, however, appears to contradict the spirit of that agreement, said Lee Sang-sin, a research fellow at the Korea Institute for National Unification. What stands out most, Lee said, is the lack of public reaction to Kim’s remarks.

Kim’s appointment has drawn little attention from South Korean media and been largely ignored by Western outlets — a possible indication that calls for South Korea’s nuclear armament have become routine.

“That’s what I have warned about,” said Lee. “[This conversation] has been normalized.”

When contacted by VOA, the White House National Security Council declined to directly comment on Kim's statements, instead emphasizing South Korea’s pledge under the non-proliferation treaty as outlined in the Washington Declaration.

“We will continue to work with our ROK allies to strengthen our alliance and ensure we are well-positioned to deter nuclear threats,” an NSC spokesman added.

Driving the conversation

Polls have long suggested a majority of South Koreans support acquiring nuclear weapons, although such views were once confined to the political fringes.

Under Yoon’s presidency, the debate has become so entrenched that even some state-backed research institutions are exploring the possibility of nuclear armament.

A June report by the state-run Institute for National Security Strategy recommended that Seoul consider government reviews and public debates on various options, including the redeployment of U.S. tactical nuclear weapons, NATO-style nuclear sharing, and South Korea developing its own arsenal.

Such calls are not only coming from Seoul. A growing number of former Trump officials have expressed an openness to the idea, with some even highlighting the geopolitical advantages of South Korea getting its own weapons – an idea that Trump himself once teased.

The possibility of Trump’s return, along with his "America First" stance, has fueled concerns in Seoul that U.S. protection may be less reliable long-term, further accelerating the nuclear debate.

Some in South Korea appear eager to capitalize on the trend. In an opinion piece this month, Choi Kang, president of the Asan Institute for Policy Studies, an influential conservative research group, argued South Korean nuclear weapons should be presented as beneficial to the U.S.-South Korea alliance.

“If a South Korean nuclear arsenal aligned with U.S. security interests and came to be regarded as a ‘common asset’ of the alliance, then the United States might accept it or even support it,” Choi wrote.

Reality check?

But many analysts caution that such statements downplay the risks of nuclear armament.

“There really needs to be greater questioning of whether more nukes and more countries with nukes truly increases any country’s security situation and a serious examination of what Seoul stands to lose by choosing that path,” said Jenny Town, a North Korea specialist with the Washington-based Stimson Center.

Others, like Mason Richey, who teaches international politics at Seoul’s Hankuk University of Foreign Studies, argue it is unlikely South Korea would pursue nuclear weapons barring profound U.S.-South Korea alliance problems and/or severe regional instability.

“That said, every elite policymaker who engages the South Korea nuclear debate makes it easier to continue down the slippery slope of thinking about nuclear weapons, studying how to develop them, assuring a latent capability, deciding to develop them, and then actually building them,” he added.

https://www.voanews.com/a/under-yoon-calls-for-south-korean-nukes-normalized/7777068.html

I’ve been seeing a lot of talk from South Korea officials talking about getting their own nukes the last few months.

Excellent Work, GoldenMead!!!! We're running out of awards!!!!

Taiwanese News caught up to it as well:
Taiwan tracks 17 Chinese military aircraft, 8 ships
I wonder if I can get the flight tracker visible from a quote! This is how I learn!!!


NOPE!!!

Attached File
If you check out area 1, an aircraft was there for approx 3 minutes. Area 2, 9 aircraft flew in and out of the area for pretty much a duty day, and in area 3 they (7) were there from after breakfast to lunch time.

The Area 1 sortie looks like a boo-boo or perhaps an in-flight emergency happened, but more than likely, it was a boo boo.

I'm fascinated by one aspect of today's modern commie society compared to the commie societies of the old days. First and foremost, it appears that no one worries about pilots defecting these days!!
I come to that conclusion because a single aircraft (and there have been other instances of single aircraft) flying to point A and then returning instead of simply flying away. That tells us something about the morale of the people involved, and their morality as well.

Also, I just had another thought about another purpose of the ships in conjunction with the aircraft that I enumerated in an above post. There's one more purpose: they act as visible "go/no go" boundaries for the aircraft overhead.


The one thing that I am very curious about is so far the PLA hasn't stressed their "system" enough. By that I mean, the aircraft are directed by someone on the ground on a radio freq and watching a RADAR screen. The Pilots are unconcerned with Navigation, oddly enough, and fly in a patterned box waiting to be directed to their targets, but there's never enough planes in there to cause concern.

Planes drift sideways all the time. Other planes have to react to that as well. There's a lot of jostling in pattern flying. (The Navy practices this shit a lot because of it out of necessity.) The upshot of all this, is that with a few confusing radio commands interjected at random times, a large number of planes can and will just bump into each other and then fall out of the sky...which is embarrassing. There's got to be a place in China where they practice huge numbers of planes doing this. Otherwise, we're looking at some very expensive Kibuki Theatre.

I would love to see the Chinese aircraft get shot down.

and Sierradyne just brought up another absolutely valid point: these planes are not failing out of the sky.

I was stationed at Nellis AFB for 4 years, 3 months and 22 days. I saw all kinds of things. Some of it funny; some of it OMG! We don't have a way of deciphering PLAAF problems through the current media we can obtain. It's an impossiblity that there aren't any. That means we have to look for an analogue that happens with an aircraft goes pffft.

Japan has also been talking about having a nuclear inventory!!! The Chinese have people scared, and they've given rise to their own enemies.

Oh, I understand the sentiment, but this is a game that has to be played, or a dance that has to be danced.

I haven't been able to come to a conclusion yet whether War is Politics by other means, or Politics is War by other means. But this aspect as futile as it seems is necessary. Not for you or I, but for others who feel comfortable weighing the "pros and cons" on a "morality" scale. That's what this is for, and to ignore it is to turn away a potential ally or perhas even a friend in the future.

Taiwan firms less worried about possible US-China war compared with 2022
A survey by a US think tank found that companies from the island are continuing to do business with the Chinese mainland

https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3277835/taiwan-firms-less-worried-about-possible-us-china-war-compared-2022

I also have an economic story. Let me grab a few quotes from yours first, and they will be out of order from the published story for chronological consistency:






It gets a bit murky here:
This definintely puts the business class outside of mainstream Taiwan.

Next up:
Taiwan exports to US surpass China in August

Next is just percentages in case you want to skip it:

Then we have some actual economic analysis here!!
Then there's more stats, but not everyone is interested in "disembodied" numbers. But we do have this bit of information:
The times are a-changing.

I wonder why the big decline of exports to Japan?

Getting back to sierradyne's post from last night, his post is on the money. By way of a partial explanation, here are some stories about Taiwanese Air Force planes:
Pilot located after Mirage 2000 crashes off Taiwan's coast
and
Taiwan IDF jet returns to base without dropping bombs
Skipping the ridiculousness of a jet returning to base without dropping its bombs making the national news, the point of this post is to show that shit happens, and it happens all the time.

The PLA is not immune to this, and they're probably more susceptable to it...for all we know. This is why I have "wished" for certain additional information such as points of origin, how many aircraft are staged over the PRC proper etc. We have no idea how many aircraft the PLAAF sends over just to have a small number fly loops around Taiwan. We have no idea how many are loitering or their loiter times, or any of itm somewhere near by. Commercial RADAR for an airport can "see" 60 miles easy. Kinman is only 3 miles away from the Chinese Coast. This cannot be that hard!! Remember, sharing is caring. (this is for those that are just lurking in the "distance" who have this information.)

The obituaries for 2024 aren't out yet, but Japan is paying more for oil and raw materials because of everyone's general trend to inflationary spending. Since the Clinton Admin recreated the "Third Wave" in the early '90s, in it's own image, governments have been looking for "free" money, "magical" money and "tax payer" money. Falling short on the amount of free money and magical money, and there's only so much tax payer money out there before the politicians start having to pay taxes, money is easy enough to create!!

Also, I would assume that normal trade with South Korea will will return to previous volume as they finally got over their BS dispute at the end of last year.

And one last point to make, is that Taiwanese Trade is down with all Asian countries in general.

To your previous post Zoinks. Has anyone else noticed the utter lack of information on China from osint (open source information) accounts?  Like where is the satellite imagery of Fujian Province right across from Taiwan?  China could be preparing a massive force and we would have no idea.  When Russia built up for the Ukraine invasion we had all kinds of intel, hell we even knew when they set up field hospitals.  With China its crickets.

Here's a story I thought would have more pictures, but perhaps Carmel can find and share pictures. We might be stock holders after all, and this is part of our "due dilligence:
1,300 candidates register for 12 flight attendant jobs at Taiwan airline

Yeah, okay, it's an economic story.

EXACTO-MUNDO!!!

If you watch foreign news television broadcasts, you barely get the weather report from the major cities. The information has not returned to pre-Covid volumes, to put it another way.

This whole thread of tweets is good if anyone is interested.

New — For the first time, China’s largest & most advanced amphibious warship integrated with the Shandong carrier group in WESTPAC.

Video shows a Type 075 landing helicopter dock ship operating with CNS Shandong (17) east of Taiwan during a surge deployment & exercise in August. pic.twitter.com/UdXlz7urIa

Ian Ellis  (@ianellisjones) September 10, 2024

Normalcy bias is a big thing.

Favoring unification is up to 25%?

Score Card!!

Taiwan tracks 21 Chinese military aircraft, 10 ships
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I would like to direct your attention to area 3 where a single aircraft flew a pattern for 2 hours and 10 minutes. (Still wondering why they just can't let us, the viewing public, know how planes got to their station.) This has to be one of their large body reconnaissance planes sucking up the EMR spectrum.

Yuppers! It's either a reflection of actual sentiment, OR it's a reflection of the sort of Taiwanese that does business within the PRC. It's one of those swords that cuts both ways. Or it's bull shit!!

I'm willing to bet money for that as much as the CCP/PLA hated Top Gun, they watched and studied how aircraft are launched and recovered!!!

I have to caution everyone again when using South China Morning Post which now has Beijing over it. I still use it but I always have in the back of my mind that it had to remain favorable to Beijing or have its offices raided

https://www.stripes.com/theaters/asia_pacific/2024-09-11/north-korea-threat-un-command-15138298.html

https://www.reuters.com/world/china/china-says-it-is-verifying-email-tips-about-taiwan-separatist-activity-2024-09-11/

U.S. Pacific commander tells Chinese general to halt ‘dangerous’ incidents in South China Sea
Military leaders hold direct talks after long break
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2024/sep/10/us-pacific-commander-tells-chinese-general-to-halt/?utm_medium=SocialFlow&utm_campaign=twtnl_x&utm_source=Twitter

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-09-12/chinese-state-backed-hackers-attack-pacific-islands-forum/104341412

https://www.ft.com/content/0a535bbd-767e-406a-8624-1af9cb7246f7

Gentlemen, I'm doing "training" on Zoom this week and next. It's my first time doing this bullshit in this manner.

For those of you who do this on a regular basis, and didn't climb up on a tower and start shooting people, you have my respect!

Score Card with a flight tracker came in!!!
Taiwan tracks 29 Chinese military aircraft and 9 ships
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Here's another observation on the language I can't read, in the Table where areas 1,2 and 3 are described we have the time range at the top, next is how many aircraft entered that area, and then next in parenthesis is how many aircraft crossed the Median Line. You'll notice that for area 3, there are no parenthetical numbers, and the observation is because by definition area 3 is on the other side of the Median Line, so it's just the number of aircraft observed in area 3. Who needs Uncle Kong!!! (He has covid again. He has Covid right now, so I'm not putting him to work.)

Here's something very interesting and unfortunately unique: a US weapon system delivery to Taiwan.
Taiwan to receive 1st batch of new F-16V fighter jets

This is a follow-up to Carmel's #31 post about the PRC "tip" line to expose Taiwanese advocating for Independence. It's at the same Press Briefing by the same PRC spokesman:
Taiwan rejects China's claim that it does not need defense budget



and here's the "kicker", Gentlemen:
Even the PRC sees the TPP as "pro-China", and if the junior opposition party who works with the KMT is "pro-China", then isn't the main opposition party also considered to be "pro-China" by the PRC?

For a long time now, there’s frequent meetings between them on the mainland including during the election year which I thought cost them votes

US Navy Seal unit that killed Osama bin Laden trains for China invasion of Taiwan

Elite commando team makes plans to help island nation in event Beijing launches war

https://archive.ph/XTnB0

Score Card!!!
Taiwan tracks 22 Chinese military aircraft, 7 ships
Attached File

In the area 1 demarcation, there's always that cross over point almost always in the same place. I wonder what opposes it on the Taiwanese Coast or on the center mountain range that runs North to South?

Here's sort of a follow up to a post I made about President Lai suggesting to the PRC that if the goal of the PRC is to regain former territory, the PRC should get it from the Russians:
Pro-Russia hackers crash Taiwan Stock Exchange website



In other news, there's this surprising story:
US House passes bill backing Taiwan's full participation in WHO



There is no corresponding legislation in the Senate, and when the Senate comes up with a very Pro-Taiwan Bill, there's usually no corresponding bill in the House of Representatives. Pretty cool, huh!!!!! These guys got this shit down!!!!!

German navy makes rare transit of sensitive Taiwan Strait

https://www.reuters.com/world/asia-pacific/german-navy-makes-rare-transit-sensitive-taiwan-strait-2024-09-13/

That's actually a big deal.  Europe is the swing vote on the next world order.

US sends 'unserviceable' arms to Taiwan

TAIPEI (Taiwan News) — A report released by the US Department of Defense's (DoD) Inspector General on Wednesday (Sept. 11) said that arms recently delivered to Taiwan were “unserviceable.”

In the report, the Inspector General said the DoD “did not effectively or efficiently implement accountability and quality controls for items delivered to Taiwan using the Presidential Drawdown Authority.”

It added, “More than 340 pallets of items sustained water damage while they remained at the aerial port of embarkation at Travis Air Force Base for three months pending a flight to Taiwan.”

https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/news/5935826

Yes, xd; it is a big deal. In fact, es ist vieleicht am groessten deal! I can't make an s-set with my keyboard. Hold on. in the past Character Map couldn't make certain symbols with arfcom. Maybe it's different now!

Yes, xd; it is a big deal. In fact, es ist vieleicht am gr  sten deal. If that doesn't show up, then let's go with "molto enorme."

And it's this for the following reason:
It means International Socialism is dead!!

The Europe is actually a pretty fascist land mass led by socialist party after socialist party.

China is a hyper-capitalistic state led by a communist party that can't get it's socialist act together.

There isn't a communist alive today that believes the "State will wither away." This is because there isn't a communist alive today that's going to give up political power for any reason.

Oh, I just realized that I haven't given a definition for International Socialism. In the early days of te 19th Century, these were the guys that believed in violent revolution to overthrow the various political regimes of their day.

Then came the Fabians, who wanted to take power through voting, and you can read that as no violent revolution.

And lastly we have the National Socialists who as a matter of pragmatism tend to form the "nation" around ethnic lines i.e. the pan-Germanic National Socialist German Workers Party, of Stalin in the USSR who was busy creating a pan-Slavic Nation instead of spreading international revolution every where like Trotsky wanted to do.

AND eventually, the Chinese will emerge as also National Socialists, but rest assured it will be okay when they do it.

So, yes, xd341!!!! It's a big deal!!!!!!!!!!!! We need to celebrate it somehow and avoid an alcoholic induced black out!! I'm not certain that's possible.

I'd like to throw in some more quotes here, please.



Things have really changed since I've been in.

Score Card!!!!!
Taiwan tracks 21 Chinese military aircraft and 1 ship

So, after I gave a list of reasons what the ships were for a few days ago, here the PLA completely breaks the pattern. I don't like these guys.
Attached File

Now, I have to think more to figure this out!! Bastards!!!!!!!!!!!

So Ben Casey was your step dad ?

Political News!!!!!!!!
Taiwan's KMT continues to work with TPP after Ko's arrest

This is getting all kind of weird. We've been under the assumption for 2.5 years of this thread that the TPP for sure and the KMT at least were working in some fashion with the CCP, and not to maintain the status quo of the One China Policy as defined by UN Resolution 2758.

Just the other day with have a PRC government official call the TPP "anti-independent."

Today, the KMT comes out with this:
So...is this all a series of small mistakes or are the masks coming off?
I think that's a fair question to ask because things are getting wild out there in the South China Seas.


This next story is one that's interesting in this sense. It's about this guy tied in with Ko, the TPP leader, and Ko's corruption case. His bail was set at 5 million Taiwanese dollors and it was paid!!! Almost everyone else is either in detention or they've been released pending recall. This guy is different.
We will continue to watch this one as I think somebody is not who they say they are, and they will be exposed as a commie of all things!!

Zoinks!  I forgot to tell you that your favorite beer came in.  It appears FedEx decided to treat the box they came in as a pinyatta!  But no fear all 4 beers are safe.  Now I am saving them for a soirée I am having on the 28th where I will share 3 of them with some heathens that think Budweiser is king of beers!🍺.  I will give the AAR once that mission is complete!


Now where did the ships go???  If any of the OSINT account on X are correct it appears many of the PLA ships went to ports nearby.  Also some satellite images from Dacheng Bay show that the civilian ferry’s that participated in the amphibious landing drills are still there.  What does it mean? Resupply? New paint jobs? New crews? Final prep before GO time? I don’t know.

Institute for the Study of War
CHINA-TAIWAN WEEKLY UPDATE, SEPTEMBER 13, 2024
https://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/china-taiwan-weekly-update-september-13-2024

For anyone who is interested