Trusting the “Five Eyes” Only - TomDispatch.com

Trusting the “Five Eyes” Only - TomDispatch.com Michael Klare, Early Signs of the Failure of American Global Power? July 4, 2024 In his years in power, Joe Biden and his top foreign policy officials have come up with a distinctly more aggressive and militarized approach to a rising China and, in particular, its claims to areas of the South China Sea or the island of Taiwan. As an old Cold Warrior who lived through the era of "containing" Soviet power, the president has taken a strikingly similar approach toward China, even if he's repeatedly denied that it's a policy of "containment." Typically, American Green Berets have recently been stationed on the Taiwanese island of Kinmen, just a few miles off the coast of the People's Republic (though the head of the United States Indo-Pacific Command insists that it's not a permanent change). Four new military posts are also being established in the Philippines, all of them strategically closer to China than the other U.S. bases there. Meanwhile, last year the U.S. Marines opened their first new base in 70 years on the Pacific island of Guam as a "strategic hub" for the region, even as the American military command in Japan was also being strengthened. (Imagine for a moment, how this country would react if China were challenging America's "aggressive" behavior by establishing military bases throughout, say, the Caribbean or off the Mexican coast. Truly beyond belief, right?) And then, of course, there's Australia, where the U.S. is now stockpiling military supplies (and conducting joint war games) for a possible future conflict with China over Taiwan and, as TomDispatch regular Michael Klare makes strikingly clear today, that's just the beginning when it comes to future military connections with that country. (Think nuclear submarines!) And all of this is happening, as Klare points out, while American power globally is actually on the wane and its crucial alliances (in a world where the Global South is finally rising), increasingly... well, let's not say "white" but, as Klare makes clear today, distinctly Anglo-Saxonified. Tom