The US and Australia are increasing military strength in Asia-Pacific to offset influence of China. While the official response from the Chinese government is muted, The Global Times, a newspaper produced by the Communist Party-controlled People’s Daily group, has been far more blunt.

If  “Australia uses its military bases to help the US harm Chinese interests, then Australia itself will be caught in the crossfire”.

And Luo Yuan, a senior officer at the People’s Liberation Army’s Academy of Military Sciences said that while neither the US or China wanted to start a war, “if China’s core interests such as its sovereignty, national security and unity are intruded on, a military conflict will be unavoidable”.

The Third World War — A Future History

Having spoken about the shift of strategic, political and economic gravity moving to Asia, President Obama heads for Australia to announce a stepping up of US military activities in the region. Fifty per cent of world trade goes through the South China Sea that China claims as its own.  Both America and India are moving to protect.Â
The Third World War — A Future History

Wall Street Journal:-

The Obama administration will double-down on the Asia-Pacific region, expanding its economic, military and diplomatic activity in the region to mirror the international system the U.S. built across the Atlantic after World War II, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Thursday.

“It is becoming increasingly clear that in the 21st century, the world’s strategic and economic center of gravity will be the Asia-Pacific, from the Indian subcontinent to the western shores of the Americas,” she said in a speech in Hawaii.

The Third World War — A Future History

Slowly they are speaking out ….  Ken Costa, former chairman of UBS Europe writing in the Sunday Telegraph:

“For some time ,and particularly during the exuberant irrationality of the last few decades, the market economy has shifted from its moral foundations with disastrous consequences.” 

The Third World War — A Future History

Finally — a quarter century too late – the facade is being stripped away from financial advisers and the appalling fee-creaming funds they continue sell. When the FT homes in with a headline ‘Outrage over pension fees’ — they should realise the game is up. Secret fees have amounted to almost 40 per cent of some pensions. A  policy I took out in 1994 with Friends Provident has lost ten per cent in nearly 20 years — despite the funds chosen having been picked by four different ‘financial advisers’. Another with Hansard is losing value despite my putting it into cash three years ago. The fees far outstrip the fixed term interest. 

Even with the mis-sellng scandal of the 1980s, the boom and bust of the 1990s and the recent financial turmoil, this dreadful system has blithelybeen allowed to carry on with its advertising as brash as Vegas casino – without any attempt by the regulating authorities to produce check, balances and transparency. Little wonder the British as so bad at saving.

The most senior US military officer has accused Pakistan’s spy agency of supporting the Haqqani group in last week’s attack on the US Kabul embassy. “The Haqqani network… acts as a veritable arm of Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence Agency,” Adm Mike Mullen told a Senate panel. Some 25 people died in last Tuesday’s 20-hour attack on Kabul’s US embassy and other official buildings.

The Third World War — A Future History

PLA authors describe preemption as necessary and logical when confronting a more powerful enemy. Chinese doctrinal materials stress that static defenses are insufficient to defend territory based on the speed and destructive power of modern forces. As a result, PLA operational concepts seek to prevent enemy forces from massing and to keep the enemy off balance by seizing the initiative with offensive strikes. According to PLA theorists, an effective defense includes destroying enemy capabilities on enemy territory before they can be employed.

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From the FT, on alleged rogue trader Kweku Adoboli and how a big bank protects our pension funds:- 

“About two and a half years ago they got rid of a lot of senior people and promoted young people with not vefry much experience from the analyst support roles in order to save money,”  recalled a former employee. 

The Third World War — A Future History

Why is it possible to board a plane with a piece of paper from our home printers, yet to board a train today, I needed, seven (I am not joking) SEVEN different tickets?   Is this because some half-dead remnant, clinging onto a pension, sits in a gate-keeper’s box inventing blocks to efficient trade and travel. 

The Third World War — A Future History