The more the United States turns out to be a fickle, unreliable ally of its longstanding friends in the Middle East—especially Saudi Arabia and Israel—the more the leaders of South Korea and Japan will worry whether they can rely on the United States’ defense umbrella. Read Here – The Diplomat
“Sarajevo, 21st-century version.” This is how political scientist Anne-Marie Slaughter, the director of policy planning under former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, refers to what is currently brewing off the Chinese coast, where the territorial claims of several nations overlap. Read Here – Der Spiegel
Traditionally, India has concentrated more on Southeast Asian countries as the lynchpins of its quest to spread political influence and profit from the region’s economic dynamism. New Delhi’s relative neglect of the geographically more distant Northeast Asia, of which South Korea is a pivotal country, is gradually being redressed with a spectacular warming of ties […]
To reveal just how rotten someone so close to the Supreme Leader could become might look unwise. But it also showed that Mr Jang’s execution was a foregone conclusion. The message to the people is that corruption is punishable by death, and that no one is spared—not even family. Read Here – The Economist
China’s growing assertiveness with Japan and the U.S. is helping bring a level of attention to Southeast Asia unseen since the Vietnam War, ushering billions of dollars of investment, wider access to trade and stepped-up military assistance. Read Here – Bloomberg
As US Vice President Joe Biden just discovered on his tour of Japan, China, and South Korea, the American novelist William Faulkner’s observation – “The past is never dead. It’s not even past.” – could not be more apt, writes Jaswant Singh Read Here – Project Syndicate
After a period of distraction, the U.S. reaffirms by word and deed its interest in Asia. Read Here – The Diplomat
One future is an Asia that is relatively familiar: a region whose economies continue to enjoy robust levels of growth and manage to avoid conflict with one another. The second future could hardly be more different: an Asia of increased tensions, rising military budgets, and slower economic growth. Read Here – Council On Foreign Relations
Bureaucratic bungles are denying Indian forces arms they desperately need, writes James Hardy Read Here – The Diplomat
Korea’s real challenge is one of reinvention: to find a new economic model to replace its previous dependence on exports. For years, Koreans buzzed about catching up to the developed world. Now that they largely have, the question is what comes next. If Korea is having the economic equivalent of a midlife crisis, my conversations […]
looking beyond borders 