World View: Nationalistic Bloggers Ridicule China over America's B-52s

World View: Nationalistic Bloggers Ridicule China over America's B-52s

This morning’s key headlines from GenerationalDynamics.com

  • CENTCOM delivers Thanksgiving dinners to soldiers in Afghanistan
  • Nationalistic bloggers ridicule China over America’s B-52s
  • Iran rejects White House summary of nuclear agreement

CENTCOM delivers Thanksgiving dinners to soldiers in Afghanistan

Marines at Forward Operating Base Geronimo, Afghanistan, Nov 22, 2012, eat turkey dinner
Marines at Forward Operating Base Geronimo, Afghanistan, Nov 22, 2012, eat turkey dinner

The U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM), based at MacDill Air Force Base inTampa, Florida, is making sure that tens of thousands of Americansoldiers on the front lines in Afghanistan can enjoy a ThanksgivingDay mean featuring turkey, mashed potatoes, gravy, stuffing andpumpkin pie. According to Scott Anderson:

“The last I saw, we were nearing 100 percent ready forThanksgiving. That means all the turkeys are there for our troopsso they’re ready to have a Thanksgiving meal on Thanksgiving. Andwe’ll turn to and get ready for Christmas. There are some specialmeals that we make sure our troops are taken careof.”

Never let it be said that I can’t post a happy good news story.WUSF (Florida)

Nationalistic bloggers ridicule China over America’s B-52s

There was a flood of support by Chinese bloggers when China announced on Saturday that it wasestablishing an “Air Defense Identification Zone” (ADIZ) encompassingthe East China Sea, including Japan’s Senkaku Islands, and demandedthat any aircraft flying through the ADIZ must report to China’smilitary, or face military “defensive” measures. Bloggers wrote,

“Claiming what is ours and now defending what is ours.This is something that is worth fighting for.”

But then on Tuesday, when U.S. B-52s flew into the ADIZ and were unchallenged by China’s military, thesupport turned to ridicule. “That’s it?” asked several bloggers.Others said the government would be an international “laughing stock”and “will face international ridicule.” Others called the ADIZ afarce.

From the point of view of Generational Dynamics, this is an extremelydangerous situation. Those who refer to some statement or other bypresident Xi Jinping as proof that China has no intention to start awar don’t understand what’s going on. It’s not the octogenarians inCentral Committee who are going to drive China to launch a war. It’sthe highly nationalistic younger generations, the soldiers, the middlemanagers, the girls who send their heroes out to fight, who make theday to day decisions that create situations that lead to war. Chancesare that this decision to set up the ADIZ was made, or at leastheavily promoted and supported, by highly nationalistic 30-50 yearolds in the government and military bureaucracies, and this is exactlythe kind of thing that can lead to a confrontation that can spiralinto full scale war. International Business Times (Australia) and VOA

Iran rejects White House summary of nuclear agreement

As I’ve mentioned a couple of times, in the news conferences thatfollowed last weekend’s nuclear agreement with Iran, U.S. Secretary ofState John Kerry said that Iran had no right to enrich uranium, whileIran’s foreign minister Mohammad Javad Zarif gloated that Iran hadpreserved its right to enrich uranium. The contrast between these twostatements was so dramatic that I’ve been wondering whether anyonewould even point it out, or whether it would just be swept under therug like most things these days.

Iran has now rejected the summary of the nuclear agreement that wasposted on the White House web site. According to the foreignministry:

“What has been released by the website of the WhiteHouse as a fact sheet is a one-sided interpretation of the agreedtext in Geneva and some of the explanations and words in the sheetcontradict the text of the Joint Plan of Action (the title of theIran-powers deal), and this fact sheet has unfortunately beentranslated and released in the name of the Geneva agreement bycertain media, which is not true.”

Iran doesn’t state what the specific contradictions are, but theyalmost certainly have to do with enrichment. Free Beacon (Washington) and Fars (Tehran) and White House

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