East Asia

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China And Russia Tighten Strategic Alliance

The meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Beijing this week carried symbolism far beyond diplomacy. Coming only days after US President Donald Trump’s high-profile visit to China, the summit highlighted the increasingly complex balance of global power and demonstrated how Beijing is positioning itself […]

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Taiwan At The Center of U.S.-China Diplomacy

As U.S. President Donald Trump prepared for his high-stakes visit to Beijing, one issue was expected to dominate talks with Chinese President Xi Jinping: Taiwan. For the 23 million people living on the self-governed island, the summit could have become one of the most consequential diplomatic events of 2026 – […]

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Roses Of Zhongnanhai: How Beijing Sold Out Tehran

Springtime Beijing greeted Donald Trump with the full ceremonial treatment. Temple of Heaven, Confucian references, red flags fluttering, green tea, and the carefully tended roses in the historic gardens of Zhongnanhai. Trump, according to reports, was genuinely impressed by the flowers and asked Xi Jinping for seeds. Xi smiled and […]

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Five Reasons Why The US Should Withdraw From The Gulf

So long as the US is willing to accept Iran spinning this as an unprecedented strategic defeat of the “Great Satan”, it’ll arguably be able to advance its actual interests much more robustly as was explained, all while giving Iran the “face-saving” pretext for significant concessions to end the war. […]

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Trump-Xi Meeting Exposes American Weakness

Trump is traveling to Beijing in the hope of extinguishing fires that he himself has lit. At the negotiating table, Xi Jinping holds the better cards. From 13 to 15 May, Donald Trump will pay a state visit to President Xi Jinping in Beijing. Originally, the intention was to discuss the trade conflict between the […]

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Epic Interruptus: The Iranian Snare And American Defeat

On May 10, Robert Kagan, the high priest of neoconservative thought, the bell ringer for muscular interventionism and general American meddlesomeness, lamented in The Atlantic that the United States had suffered a unique defeat in its efforts to subjugate Iran.  The article says much about Kagan’s own identification with the […]

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Putin Warns Trump Not to Resume His Aggression Against Iran

Alexander Mercouris, who is perhaps the world’s leading analyst of international relations, and who was born into a Greek diplomatic family and is especially skilled at interpreting the meanings behind official read-outs of communications between heads-of-state, and other diplomatic communications, reported on April 30th that on April 29th, a historic […]