China's entry into the "Aukus" is a matter of grave concern to China
Hello everyone, welcome to Chiming World. Japan suddenly announced that it would join the "AUKUS" military alliance of the United States, Britain and Australia, and the Canadian prime minister also said that he would consider starting talks on joining the "AUKUS."
Wu Qian, spokesman for the Ministry of National Defense, said on April 25 that China is gravely concerned about this, and resolutely opposes the cobbling together of exclusive "small circles" by relevant countries, resolutely opposes any bilateral or multilateral military alliance against China, and resolutely opposes creating separatist confrontation and bloc confrontation.
On the issue of expanding the capacity of the "Aukus," the Korean Central News Agency commented that the move of the United States, the United Kingdom, and Australia to expand the "Aukus" security partnership to more countries will lead to the Asia-Pacific region turning into a "nuclear minefield that is about to erupt."
Japan's entry into the "Aukus" alliance came very suddenly. On April 8, when the United States, Britain and Australia held a meeting of defense ministers, they only said that they would "explore cooperation with Japan." There is also a controversy within the Kishida government over whether to join AUKUS.
Unexpectedly, on April 24, Japan's Kyodo News Agency reported that Jenkins, the US State Department's Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs, revealed that Japan has become the first batch of countries to join the second pillar of "AUKUS", and will consider cooperation with countries other than Japan in the future.
Although Jenkins did not mention the names of the new partner countries, it is clear that Canada and New Zealand will become new potential members after Japan joins AUKUS, given that Canada and New Zealand have already applied. Jenkins also said that the United States, Britain and Australia have determined the selection principle, taking into account the concerns of neighboring countries about military expansion, and the next "important thing is to move forward cautiously."
Japan's entry into the "AUKUS" alliance, followed by Canada and New Zealand, is another important layout of the U.S. Indo-Pacific strategy, and its direction is self-evident. As a result, the Asia-Pacific region could be plunged into new tensions. Perhaps in order to prevent the situation from getting too tense and out of control, the Philippine government recently launched an "urgent debunk" of a rumor.
It was rumored on the Internet that Marcos Jr. "declared war" on China, and the Philippine government urgently refuted the rumors
According to a report by the Philippine Star on April 24, the Philippine Presidential Communications Office issued a statement on the evening of the 23rd, saying that a fake audio of Philippine President Marcos Jr. has recently appeared on the Internet, trying to make people believe that Marcos Jr. threatened to "take military action against China". The statement stressed that Marcos Jr. had never given a similar order, and that the Filipino people needed to be vigilant against disinformation.
The audio was posted by a YouTube channel with thousands of subscribers, and a voice similar to Marcos Jr. said that if China "attacks the Philippines," the Philippine military will take action and cannot allow Filipinos to be "harmed by China," the report said. The video was accompanied by photos of Chinese vessels operating in the South China Sea.
Although the Philippine government has urgently refuted the rumors about this fake audio, there is a breeding ground for any rumors. Some foreign media noticed that on April 15, Marcos Jr. admitted at a foreign correspondents' forum that the four new US military bases in the Philippines last year were to "deal with China's activities in the South China Sea."
Marcos Jr. also claimed that the Philippines would invoke the U.S.-Philippines Mutual Defense Treaty if Filipino soldiers were killed "in a foreign attack." In addition, since April 22, the United States, the Philippines and other countries have held a "shoulder-to-shoulder" multinational joint military exercise in the South China Sea and the Luzon Strait, which will continue until May 10.
In such an environment, it is entirely possible for some people to fabricate rumors with ulterior motives in an attempt to provoke China-Philippines relations to increase the risk of getting out of control. If the Philippines does not face up to the source of the rumors and continues to provoke China in the South China Sea, similar rumors will continue to emerge.
Blinken was invited to visit China, and China-US diplomacy may make significant progress
As a matter of fact, whether it is Japan's entry into the "AUKUS" alliance or the Philippine government's "refutation of rumors" aimed at sowing up Sino-Philippine relations, they all show one thing: The game against China in the Asia-Pacific region is heating up, and the source of the game is Sino-US relations.
Now Blinken is on his second visit to China. Although Blinken had exchanges with Chinese political and business representatives during his stay in Shanghai, the real "highlight" was in Beijing, the second stop of Blinken's visit to China.
According to the press release from the Chinese side, Blinken came at the invitation of Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi. You must know that when Blinken visited China in June last year, the Chinese side did not mention the invitation, and the official statement was that it was agreed between China and the United States, which means that it was not the Chinese side that took the initiative to invite him.
As a matter of fact, from last year to the present, although there have been visits by senior US officials to China, only US Secretary of Commerce Raimondo has enjoyed the "invite" treatment. And after Raimondo's visit to China, there has indeed been greater progress in the business field between China and the United States than in other areas. So this time, after Blinken's visit to China at the invitation of China, will there be new progress in the field of Sino-US diplomacy?
It should be said that this possibility exists. The first is the Russia-Ukraine conflict. The issue of Blinken's visit to China is the so-called "aid to Russia" by China. In order to force China to reduce its cooperation with Russia, the US media even threatened to sanction Chinese financial institutions. But we had predicted that this threat would only be "thunder and rain", and more for the sake of showing Europe.
China is different from Russia, the United States can shut down Russia's connection with the Swift system, and even confiscate Russian assets in the United States, but the same thing should be carefully considered when it comes to China. Compared with Russia, China's ties with the world are much more extensive and complex, and if it really tries to copy Russia's system to China, the United States itself will suffer serious backlash.
The main purpose of the United States is to exchange some interests with China and persuade China to help promote the de-escalation of the situation between Russia and Ukraine.
Russia and Ukraine "fight tigers" on the same day, Biden may visit China within the year?
Coincidentally, on the 23rd, the day before Blinken's visit to China, Russia announced that it had detained Timur Ivanov, the deputy defense minister in charge of logistics, on suspicion of huge bribes, and if convicted, he would face up to 15 years in prison.
On the same day, the Ukrainian government also passed a personnel resolution at a cabinet meeting, announcing the dismissal of Deputy Defense Minister Vitaly Polovenko, who is also in charge of army logistics.
At the same time, Russia and Ukraine both used their logistics ministers to "open the knife", which released a very intriguing signal. This shows that the two sides have sensed some possible results of the Sino-US diplomatic talks and have begun to prepare for the upcoming ceasefire talks. Cleaning up corrupt logistics officials is not only to solve the problem of corruption in the army, but also to find "scapegoats" for the war.
It is also worth noting that Blinken's visit to China, in addition to the well-known Russia-Ukraine issue, Sino-US economic and trade issues (such as the so-called "China's production capacity spillover" issue), may also have a more important purpose.
The U.S. election is coming up at the end of the year, and Biden's term is running out. If he does not make a trip to China, Biden will become the only US president in the past few decades who has not visited China during his term of office. Biden is obviously reluctant to set this precedent.
After all, European leaders such as Scholz and Macron have already visited China. Russian President Vladimir Putin has also finalized his itinerary for visiting China within the year. If Biden were to make the exception, it would be neither good for the presidential race nor in the interests of the United States.
Therefore, whether Blinken's visit to China this time will also shoulder the heavy responsibility of serving Biden and making arrangements for the US president's visit to China and the meeting between Chinese and US leaders is also a key point of observation.
For Biden, if he successfully completes his visit to China during his term of office, it can not only highlight his international leadership and "control" of China-US relations, but also lock in the general direction of China-US relations in the coming period. This is definitely a plus point that must be fought for by Biden, who has been controversial in the Kazakh-Israeli conflict.