The Yellow Peril

Do you remember when James Bond villains such as Dr No or Goldfinger, or, well every one of them really, had plans for total world domination?

 

We Can Sell You Parts - Wholesale ....

Invariably they had some cunning scheme about inserting a microchip (or radio control device .... simpler days) into all the Intercontinental and air defence missiles, tanks, planes and computers in NATO, or the continental US, and then threatening to turn them off, thus leaving said countries vulnerable to a take over by their enemies, such as China or the USSR, or even SPECTRE (SPecial Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge and Extortion) ... or was that SMERSH (СМЕРШ)?

China: Cold War Hots Up

Increasingly the US and China are acting as though the 'Cold War' that had existed between the US and USSR in earlier decades has never ended and that they have inherited that mantle. I say that, because its increasingly obvious that the Chinese have two expansionist foreign policy objectives (as well as their interests in Africa), that are going to require the deployment (or the credible threat) of armed force.

 The two main objectives are:

1. "Reunion" with Taiwan, by whatever means, and 
2. The Chinese quite ridiculously claim all the islands in the South China seas, including the Spratly Isles (which as you can see from this map, actually run up to within 30 miles of the Philippines), that are well over a 1,000 miles from the Chinese mainland at their furthest point.  

 

The Taiwan issue is complicated by the fact that its a long-standing ally of the United States, and the Chinese Military need to be able to stop the US Military from supporting Taiwan, if Chinese forces ever blockaded, or even invaded Taiwan.