by Robert Whitcomb | Aug 4, 2016 | News
By LLEWELLYN KING
Can Vietnam talk some sense into North Korea, and in so doing make itself the go-to country in Asia for diplomatic fixes? There are those in Hanoi, and quite a few scattered across the foreign policy establishment, who think so.
Vietnamese President Tran Dai Quang believes so, and would like to be the intermediary between the United States and North Korea.
Back-channel talks — if they can be called that — have begun. Influential American academics have met with leaders in Vietnam and President Quang has been involved. An idea, however inchoate, is in the air in Hanoi – and the government would very much like to see the concept grow.
For Hanoi, being useful to both Washington and Pyongyang, would help Vietnam gain international stature, as well as accelerate its importance in the region.
Globally, Asian scholars and diplomats are hoping to see strong initiatives, particularly from the United States, to affect the seeming intractability of a number of issues in Southeast Asia, which include North Korea’s adventurism and China’s continued expansion in the South China Sea. An additional irritant is China’s damming of the Mekong River, starving Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia of water.
No one involved believes that a communications channel will cause Kim Jong-un, the North Korean leader, to abandon his war games with rocket and missile tests. But they do believe that when and if there is a need to have some kind of opening to North Korea, and to speak to its obtuse leadership, Vietnam is uniquely well-placed facilitate a conversation.
Vietnam, like North Korea, has fought the United States. It also knows what it is like to be dependent on China for its survival, as North Korea is and as North Vietnam was. It also knows what it is like when that kind of lifeline of dependence goes wrong. Vietnam fought a war with China in 1979, with intermittent clashes until 1990.
Hanoi’s hopes to become a bigger player in the Asia diplomatic firmament extend beyond helping the United States with Pyongyang. It would like to be a bigger player in general in Asian diplomacy and use its unique history with the United States and with China to make it a valuable go-between with other countries including Myanmar and even Iran.
“Vietnam feels it has come of age among nations and wants to play a role in offering its good offices to the United States and other world powers,” says a Vietnamese academic, who lives in the United States and is involved in these early diplomatic moves. He says Vietnam, after the fall of Saigon in 1975 and the abrogation of the peace treaty in 1975, and the United States have come a long way and enjoy very good relations. Polls show that the United States is favorably regarded by 78 percent of the Vietnamese population of nearly 100 million. President Obama visited a thrilled Vietnam in May. Eight percent of the foreign students studying in the United States are from Vietnam.
But all is not completely rosy. The foreign-policy establishment in Washington, as well as a plethora of civil rights groups, worries about human rights in Vietnam, its authoritarian ways and the treatment of dissidents.
Particularly vexing to those who would like to see Vietnam become a kind of Asian Switzerland, friendly to all and skilled at bringing disputatious parties together is the treatment of journalists, bloggers and others who are imprisoned when they run afoul of the Vietnamese leadership’s sensitivities. Press freedom is high on the list of reforms the West in general would like to see ifVietnam is to realize the role which it seeks.
For its part, Vietnam would like to see the United States take a stronger stand against China’s virtual annexation of the South China Sea and to pass the Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement. Here, there are real fears that the hostile political climate in the United States will do damage to its relations with Southeast Asia at a critical time.
Still, Vietnam wants ever-closer relations the United States and a bigger diplomatic role in Asia. The feelers are out.
Llewellyn King, a member of The Boston Global Forum’s editorial board, is executive producer and host of White House Chronicle, on PBS. His e-mail is[email protected].
by Robert Whitcomb | Aug 3, 2016 | News
Japan’s annual defense review has expressed ”deep concern” over what it sees as China’s ”coercion” and aggressiveness, particularly in the South China Sea.
The review comes amid heightened tension in East and Southeast Asia less than a month after an arbitration court in the Hague invalidated China’s sweeping claims in the disputed South China Sea.
An increasingly aggressive and militaristic China refuses to recognize the ruling.
Japan fears that Chinese military bases being built on shoals and tiny islands in the sea will dangerously expand Beijing’s influence over a region through which $5 trillion in trade passes every year, much of it to and from Japanese ports.
And so, notes Reuters, Japan provides equipment and training to Southeast Asian nations, including the Philippines and Vietnam, that “are most opposed to China’s territorial ambitions.”
To read the article and see the accompanying video, please hit this link.
by Robert Whitcomb | Aug 3, 2016 | Initiative
By Allan M. Cytryn, principal at Risk Masters International, and John E. Savage, An Wang Professor of Computer Science at Brown University. Both are members of The Boston Global Forum.
We recommend a series of short- and long-term actions to block cyberattacks in Vietnam. The ultimate goals of these actions are to 1) ensure that the appropriate international agencies are fully engaged in addressing this issue and its longer-term implications; 2) operationally address the issue immediately and restore reliable, safe operations for air travel, and 3) more broadly enhance Vietnam’s cyber-resilience so that it is less vulnerable to such incidents.
Ensure that the appropriate international agencies are engaged:
- This is an airline-security issue. We recommend reporting it to the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) and requesting its assistance. While that agency may not have cybersecurity expertise, its leaders are very concerned about security and thus may be able to help address the problem.
- We recommend reporting the late July incident affecting Vietnamese airports to FIRST, the global Forum for Incident Response and Security Teams. FIRST describes itself as the “premier organization and recognized global leader in (computer-security) incident response.” As you can see from its Web site, it can provide much help with long- and short-term solutions.
- This serious incident should also be reported to other international bodies, including ASEAN, the G7, the G20 and UNGA.
Address the issue immediately and restore reliable, safe operations:
- Consultants should be hired to do a forensic analysis of the affected systems. Friendly nations, such as the United States, can advise on companies that are highly qualified to do this analysis and that can be trusted as well.
- Companies that we would recommend include Crowdstrike and Fidelis.
Longer-term, more broadly enhance the cyber-resilience of Vietnam:
- Implement broad-based cybereducation at multiple levels.
- Train local specialists in computer security.
- The Vietnam Education Foundation (VEF) can help to develop university-level cybersecurity-education programs.
- The Boston Global Forum can also help with this effort.
- Vietnam could also emulate the U.S. Computer Science for All program, which encourages young Americans to acquire computer-science skills.
Educate policymakers and academics about Internet-governance issues.
- The DiPLO Foundation has cybersecurity programs to help diplomats acquire the knowledge necessary to participate in international policy development.
- The Boston Global Forum can also help with this matter.
- Develop programs in cyberhygiene for the general population and develop policies and practices to ensure that the general population is appropriately educated in this area:
- Begin classroom training in early education and continue through all levels of schooling.
- Provide online courses to let all persons, including those not in school, to be properly educated.
- Consider policies and incentives to encourage people to take the cyberhygiene courses.
- Develop a cyber-resilient infrastructure.
- Broadly adopt the principle of cyber-resilience across all the IT and communications infrastructure in Vietnam.
- Jumpstart the process by targeting key industries, individual businesses and other organizations that have the highest level of exposure and risk.
- Consider “pooling” or sharing resources and teams across multiple organizations where appropriate and practical to maximize the speed and effectiveness of the initial programs.
- Identify and address reasonable impediments to success, including funding, product availability, staff availability and training.
- Align these efforts with training goals, using these implementation activities to further the nation’s plan to train individuals who can then apply their learning to other enterprises.
by Robert Whitcomb | Aug 2, 2016 | News
Jane’s Defense Weekly looks at the European Union’s expansion of military operations to counter new threats from Islamic terrorists and Russia. The article starts:
“Over the past two years the EU’s military operations have increased considerably, with the latest counter-migrant mission in the Mediterranean illustrating its growing ambitions to protect the continent’s security. Tim Ripley reports on the expanding mission set that is putting the organisation to the test at all levels, politically, operationally, and tactically.”
To read the full story in Jane’s Defense Weekly, hit this link.
by Robert Whitcomb | Aug 2, 2016 | News
Why is China such a discouraging place for American technology companies? One reason, Robert Atkinson, president of the Information Technology and Innovation Foundation, told the Los Angeles that:
“Since President Xi Jinping took office, they have increasingly switched from an economic strategy that emphasizes attracting foreign direct investment to one that favors indigenous innovation and Chinese-owned firms.”
Mr. Atkinson noted that one of the easier places to do this is on the Internet, because it doesn’t require the cutting-edge technology of, say, the aerospace or automotive sectors.
To read the article on this, please hit this link.
by Robert Whitcomb | Aug 2, 2016 | News
Map by konact
Greek and Turkish Cypriot political leaders have made progress in talks aimed at the political reunification of the island (part of which is effectively occupied by Turkey) on the basis of establishing a two-zone, two-community federal state.The talks might be a model for settling other disputes between European Union members.
A broad agreement seems likely by the end of the year, after 42 years of the nation being divided between the Turkish northeast and the Greek rest of the island country.
To read The Wall Street Journal article on these developments, please hit this link.
by Robert Whitcomb | Aug 1, 2016 | News
China’s increasingly aggressive military is pushing the nation’s also aggressive Communist political leadership to be willing to attack the U.S. and other nations that are pushing back against China’s attempt to take over the South China Sea through military threats. But so far, anyway, the government of President Xi Jinping has shown some wariness of provoking a direct armed clash with the United States.
China has called for a peaceful resolution of South China Sea disputes through talks at the same time as it continued to build up its military in the sea, especially by militarizing reefs and shoals.
To read a Japan Times article on this, please hit this link.
by Robert Whitcomb | Aug 1, 2016 | News
South Africans will vote on Aug. 3 on elections for mayors and local councillors and in so doing they might end up redrawing the nation’s political map.
The Guardian reports that for the first time since taking power in 1994, the African National Congress (ANC) may win less than 60 percent of the votes. and lose control of the biggest cities.
“Surveys show the opposition Democratic Alliance (DA) – which calls for a total renewal of South African politics, but has so far had difficulty breaking out of its stronghold in the west of the country – ahead in the most important cities,” the paper reported.
To read The Guardian’s article, please hit this link.
by Robert Whitcomb | Jul 29, 2016 | News
French Prime Minister Manuel Valls said on July 29 that he would consider a temporary ban on foreign financing of mosques after a wave of lethal attacks by Muslim terrorists.
In an interview with French daily Le Monde, Mr. Valls said he was “open to the idea that — for a period yet to be determined — there should be no financing from abroad for the construction of mosques.”
Mr. Valls also called for imams to be “trained in France, not elsewhere.”
To read an article on this, please hit this link.
