US Submarine That Attacked Syria ‘NOT WELCOME’ Back To Italy After ‘Failed’ Strike

The United States nuclear submarine that took part in the attack on Syria over the alleged chemical weapons use is not allowed back in the waters near Naples, Italy, the mayor declared.  The mayor states that he designated the city a “denuclearized zone” in 2015 and wants to keep it that way.

Naples Mayor Luigi de Magistris wrote last week to Rear Admiral Arturo Faraone, head of the city’s port authority, complaining that the official had given permission to allow Virginia-class submarine USS John Warner to pass through the Gulf of Naples on March 20, following a two-week exercise by Western military alliance NATO. Magistris argued that he had designated the city a “denuclearized zone” in a 2015 act that sought to “prohibit docking and parking of any vessel that is nuclear-powered or contains nuclear weapons” and declared Naples a “city of peace,” according to Italian newspaper La Repubblica.

“Our administration is not against anyone but it is in favor of policies of peace, disarmament and international cooperation,” de Magistris told Italian news service Agenzia Nazionale Stampa Associata on Monday. “It is in favor of diplomacy so that international institutions like the U.S. are the lead players in moments of crisis.  The fact that it is the same submarine (involved in the Syria attack) further reinforces the rightness of the order with which we said ships of nuclear propulsion or carrying nuclear weapons are not welcome in the port of Naples and, therefore, they are not allowed to travel through or stay,” he added.

Adding further insult to injury, Israel has come out saying the US-led strike on Syria, which was coordinated with the help of France and the United Kingdom, was a failure. Based on their goals outlined, which was to prevent Bashar al-Assad from using chemical weapons in the future, the US-led strike on the war-torn nation won’t accomplish that. Israeli intelligence said that the US strike was, for all intents and purposes, a waste of money because it didn’t take out anything, really.

“If President Trump had ordered the strike only to show that the US responded to [Syrian President Bashar] Assad’s use of chemical weapons, then that goal has been achieved,” Israel’s Ynetnews quoted a senior defense official as saying. “But if there was another objective — such as paralyzing the ability to launch chemical weapons or deterring Assad from using it again — it’s doubtful any of these objectives have been met.”

China Ponders MILITARY ACTION As Response To US Legislation On Taiwan

A widely-read and a rather provocative mouthpiece for Beijing quoted Chinese observers who said the country would have no choice but to respond with “counter moves” if the U.S. were to press ahead and elevate its relations with Taiwan.  And one of those countermoves could include military action.

The legislation, known as the Taiwan Travel Act, is upsetting the Chinese. It came into effect Friday after President Donald Trump signed the bill and added to already bow tight tensions and a fear of a war. The Taiwan Travel Act allows US representatives to meet officials from the self-ruled island of Taiwan, but the Chinese government believes the newly signed legislation is a direct threat to them.

China has also recently threatened Taiwan for agreeing to be cordial and diplomatic with the US, saying the island’s independence will not be tolerated.

China’s threat to Taiwan is ratcheting up fears of a third world war. A comment by the Chinese government saying they will “never tolerate Taiwanese independence” has prompted fears an all-out invasion is imminent.

The chilling threat was made by Premier Li Keqiang as top Chinese officials met in Beijing for the annual meeting of parliament on Monday. “We will never tolerate any separatist schemes or activities for Taiwan independence,” Li Keqiang said. He also stated that China will promote the peaceful growth of relations across the Taiwan Strait and “advance China’s peaceful reunification. We will remain firm in safeguarding China’s sovereignty and territorial integrity and will never tolerate any separatist schemes or activities for Taiwan independence.” -SHTFPlan

China should and will take military action if the US decides to press ahead with the legislation designed to encourage high-level contact with Taiwanese officials, according to a report by state media outlet The Global Times.  Liu Weidong, a researcher at the Institute of American Studies of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, said the Chinese army would resume its military probes circling the island and send more military vessels and airplanes if any “Taiwan independence” secessionist forces perceive the U.S bill as a pro-independence signal.

In response to the bill, China said Saturday that it “firmly opposes” the move and demanded the U.S. “correct its mistake,” according to the Chinese Foreign Ministry’s website. The new legislation comes on the heels of president Donald Trump’s calls for tariffs and reduced trade imbalance with China.  It also comes shortly after the Chinese president, Communist dictator Xi Jinping gave himself the go-ahead to remain in power for as long as he wants. There are about 3,000 delegates to China’s National People’s Congress, and theoretically, they can vote any way they want. But in its history, it has never vetoed a proposal by China’s Communist Party.

South Korea: ‘It Won’t Be Easy For North Korea To Destroy Nuclear Arsenal’ Because It’s So Advanced

According to South Korean President Moon Jae-in, it won’t be a simple task for North Korea to destroy their nuclear arsenal even if they wanted to. Moon says that because the communist nation’s weaponry is so advanced and more developed than most realize, simple destruction isn’t possible.

North Korea is under heavy international pressure to end its weapons programs, pursued in defiance of U.N. Security Council resolutions. But it has vowed never to give up its nuclear arsenal giving a metaphorical middle finger to the United Nations. According to Reuters, speaking to reporters in the Philippines, Moon said that if North Korea agreed to hold talks, negotiations could be held with all options open.

“If talks begin to resolve the North Korea nuclear issue, I feel it will be realistically difficult for North Korea to completely destroy its nuclear capabilities when their nuclear and missile arsenal are at a developed stage,” Moon said in a briefing. “If so, North Korea’s nuclear program should be suspended, and negotiations could go on to pursue complete denuclearization.” But talks, according to Washington, aren’t in the works. 

Last week, the North said it did not oppose dialogue, but would “never put the issue related to the supreme interests of the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK)  and security of its people on the bargaining table”.

“We are not interested in such dialogue and negotiations in the least,” the North’s official news agency said, referring to the country by its official name, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea. The North defends the programs as a necessary defense against Washington’s plans to invade. The United States, which has 28,500 troops in South Korea, and a legacy of involvement in the 1950-53 Korean war, denies any such intention.

United States President Donald Trump has traded insults and threats with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un as North Korea races toward its goal of developing a nuclear-tipped missile capable of reaching the United States. Trump threatened in his maiden U.N. address to “totally destroy” North Korea if the United States was threatened and has said the time for talking, the policy of previous U.S. administrations, is over.

Moon also reiterated his stance that now was the time to increase pressure on North Korea so that it would come to talks. He said differences in understanding between South Korea and China, North Korea’s lone major ally, regarding the deployment of the U.S. Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) system on South Koran soil had not been resolved. “China has not said it has changed its stance to agree to THAAD and still says THAAD infringes on its security. We have, in turn, explained THAAD is not aimed at China but only toward curbing North Korea’s nuclear and missile provocations,” he said.

Government Officials Warn: Breakdown In Diplomacy With North Korea Is A Fast Track To War

Government officials are worried that a new breakdown in talks with North Korea could trigger a war.  With heated rhetoric taking the stage instead of diplomacy, it could only be a matter of time before the anger hits a boiling point.

Joseph Yun, a top American diplomat to North Korea, has been warning of the breakdown in meetings on Capitol Hill and seeking help to persuade the administration to prioritize diplomacy over the heated rhetoric that appears to be pushing the two nuclear powers closer toward conflict, sources familiar with the discussions told NBC News. Diplomatic efforts between the United States and North Korea are in peril with Pyongyang shunning talks in response to President Donald Trump’s increased public attacks on Kim Jong Un, according to multiple U.S. government and congressional officials. Yun claims the White House has “handicapped” the chances of diplomacy.

As Trump prepares for his first official trip to Asia next month, the tensions between the U.S. and North Korea continue to tighten. The government officials sounding the alarm also explain some of the worrisome comments that have been made by Republican and Democratic Senators in recent weeks, most notable Foreign Relations Committee chair Sen. Bob Corker who has said repeatedly that the president is undercutting diplomatic efforts.

“When you kneecap that effort you really move our country into a binary choice which could lead to a world war. So yes, I want him to support diplomatic efforts, not embarrass and really malign efforts that are underway,” Corker said on NBC’s TODAY on Tuesday.

Not many actually believe that Trump will be ordering a preemptive strike on North Korea, but a lack of communication between the two countries or through Chinese channels increases the chances of miscommunication, which would inevitably lead to further escalation of already bowstring tight tensions. Yun’s diplomatic efforts are on their “last legs,” one U.S. official said, adding that Yun is frustrated by an inability to communicate the urgency of the diplomatic situation to the White House.

“It is not so much that North Korea is shutting down, it’s that the message from the U.S. government is, ‘surrender without a fight or surrender with a fight,’” a separate U.S. official told NBC News.  North Korea feels backed into a corner and with a fascist leader with self-control issues like Kim Jong-Un at the helm, the choice could easily be to fight.

Yun was not available to comment, but East Asian and Pacific Affairs Bureau spokesman Justin Higgins told NBC News: “We can’t comment on allegations from anonymous sources. What I can say is that Ambassador Yun has been faithfully executing the Trump administration’s North Korea policy since Jan. 20, including his trip to North Korea at the president’s direction to bring American citizen Otto Warmbier back to the United States after a year in captivity.” The White House did not respond to a request for comment.

CIA Director Mike Pompeo said last week that North Korea is only months away from perfecting its nuclear weapons capabilities. “They are close enough now in their capabilities that from a U.S. policy perspective we ought to behave as if we are on the cusp of them achieving” their objective of being able to strike the United States.

Putin Accuses Ukraine Of Violence Flare Up, Extorting Cash From US; Trump Response Awaited

One of the more troubling geopolitical stories in the past week has been the renewed flaring of fighting in Eastern Ukraine, which culminated yesterday with Kiev accusing Moscow of shooting at its military transport airplane while flying over the Black Sea, an allegation Moscow denied. To some, this has been a test by Putin to gauge US resolve in condemning what the western media is quick to dub Russian provocations; to others this is merely the sad continuation of events unleashed with the violent presidential coup in Ukraine two years ago.

Whatever the ultimate strategy, on Thursday Russian President Vladimir Putin preempted the first argument, and accused Kiev of provoking this week"s flare up in fighting in eastern Ukraine, saying it was a ploy to win the support of the administration of U.S. President Donald Trump. Putin said that the Kiev government provoked the latest escalation of violence in east Ukraine as it needs money from its Western partners, which is easier to achieve when a nation pretends to be a victim and facing aggression.

“The Ukrainian leadership today needs money, and the best way to extort money is [to do that] from the European Union, from certain countries in Europe, from the United States and international institutions, presenting itself as a victim of aggression,” Putin said.

The Russian leader made the comments during a joint press conference with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban in Budapest.

Putin also noted that after supporting a particular candidate in the US presidential elections – hinting at Hillary Clinton – the Ukrainian government is now seeking to establish closer ties with the new administration under Donald Trump.

“The Ukrainian opposition has been more active amid clear [government] failures in the economic area and social policy,” Putin said. He noted that the ruling elite in Kiev is now seeking to silence the opposition and “mobilize” people around the government, which is easier to achieve “against the background of a renewal of some conflict.”

For now, the biggest question remains unanswered: what side of the Ukraine-Russian conflict will the new US State Department under Rex Tillerson side with, and will Trump slam the alleged Russian violence as his predecessor was so quick to do on virtually every single occasion.

2017: Change Can Be A Bitch

Submitted by Raul Ilargi Meijer via The Automatic Earth blog,

2016 brought a lot of changes, or rather, brought them to light. In reality, the world has been changing for many years, but many prominent actors benefitted from the changes remaining hidden. Simply because their wealth and power and worldviews are better served that way.

It’s entirely unclear whether we will ever get a chance to see to what extent the efforts to hide developments have been successful, or even been perpetrated at all, because we don’t know to what extent truth and reality will be accessible in the future.

What we can say at this point in time is that the changes 2016 delivered were urgently needed. There are many people out there who just want to turn back the clock, and change everything back to how it was, but they can’t, and that’s a good thing, because the way things were was hurting too many people.

2016 will go down in history as the year when a big divide between groups of people in the western world became visible, a divide that had until then been papered over by real or imaginary wealth, as well as by ignorance and denial.

When politics and media conspire to paint for the public a picture of their choosing, they can be very successful, especially if that picture is what people very much wish to see, true or not. But as we’ve seen recently, our traditional media have become completely useless when it comes to reporting news; the vast majority have switched to reporting their own opinions and pretending that is news.

On the one hand, there is a segment of society that either has noticed no changes, or is so desperate to hold on to what they have left, that they resist seeing them. On the other hand, there are those who feel left behind by that first group, and by the idea that the world that is still functioning and even doing well.

The first group has been captivated by, and believed in, the incessantly promoted message of recovery from an economic, financial and gradually also political crisis. The second see in their lives and that of their friends and neighbors that this recovery is an illusion.

It’s like the old saying goes: you can’t fool all of the people all of the time. And that’s why you have Brexit and Trump and why you’re going to have much more of that, certainly across Europe. Things are not going well, and there is no recovery, for a large enough percentage of people that their votes and voices now swing the debates and elections.

It’s not even complicated. This week there was a report from Elevate’s Center for the New Middle Class that concluded that half of Americans, 160 million people, can’t afford to have a broken arm treated (at $1,400). And sure, you can say that perhaps that number is a bit too high, but there have been many such reports, that for instance say the majority of Americans have less than $1000 in savings, and can’t even afford a car repair.

In Britain numbers are not much different. Over the past decade, the country has been very busy creating an entire new underclass. If your economy is not doing well, and your answer to that is budget cuts and austerity, it’s inevitable that this happens, that you create some kind of two-tier or three-tier society. And then come election time, you run the risk of losing.

Both Britain and the US boast low unemployment numbers, but as soon as you lift the veil, what you see is low participation rates, low wages and huge numbers of part-time jobs stripped of all the benefits a job used to guarantee. It allows those who still sit pretty to continue doing that, but it’ll come right back to haunt you if you don’t turn it around, and fast enough.

For many people, Obama, Merkel, Cameron and the EU cabal have been disasters. For too many, as we now know. That doesn’t mean that Trump will fix the economic problems, but that’s not the issue. People have voted for anything but more of the same. Which in Britain they’re not even getting either, so expect more mayhem there.

In most places, some variety of right wing alternative is the only option available that is far enough removed from ‘more of the same’. Moreover, many if not most incumbent parties are in a deep identity crisis. Trump did away with the Republicans AND the Democrats, and they had better understand why that is, or they’ll be wholly irrelevant soon.

In Britain, the most important votes in many decades was lost by the Tories, who subsequently performed a musical chairs act and stayed in power. You lost! Losers are not supposed to stay in power! But the other guys are all too busy infighting to notice.

That identity crisis, by the way, is not a new thing. If you look across the western political spectrum, there are all these left wing and right wing parties happily working together, either in coalition governments or through other ‘productive’ forms of cooperation. So who are people going to vote for when they’re unhappy with what they’ve got? Where is that ‘change’ that they want? Not on the traditional left or right.

So you get Podemos and M5S and Trump and UKIP and Le Pen. It’s not their fault, or the voters’ fault, it’s the political establishment that has tricked itself into believing in the same illusion it’s been promoting to voters.

And yes, they have now proven that it’s possible to stave off, for a number of years, a deeper crisis, depression, by borrowing and printing ‘money’. Especially if you can at the same time hit the poorest in your society with impunity.

But in the end no amount of fake or false news on the economic front will allow you to continue the facade for too long, because people know when they can’t afford things anymore. The evidence here is somewhat more direct than with regards to political fake news, though they may well both follow the same pattern of ‘discovery’.

Our societies are still run as if there is no real crisis, as if it’s all just a temporary glitch, as if the incumbent models function just fine, and as if recovery is just around the corner. And we can make it look as if that is true, but only for an ever smaller amount of time, and for an ever smaller amount of people.

The basic issue here is not a political one. It’s economic. Our economic systems have failed, and they can’t be repaired. We should always have realized that no growth is forever, but at least we now know. Or could know, it’ll take a while to sink in.

Next up is a redo and revamp of those economic systems, but that is not going to be easy, and may not get done at all. The resistance may be too strong, warfare -economic or physical- may seem like a way out, there are many unknowns. We could, ironically, get quite far in that redo if we simply cut all the waste for our economic processes, but then again, that would have us find out that much of the system runs entirely on wasting stuff, and wasting less kills the system.

However that may be, and however it may turn out, this is where we find ourselves. Protesting Trump and Brexit is inevitable, but it doesn’t address any core issues. From a purely economic point of view, Obama failed spectacularly, as did David Cameron, as does Angela Merkel. And as do, we will find out in 2017, many other incumbent ‘leaders’.

Their successors, whatever political colors they may come from, will all come to power promising, and subsequently attempting, to restart growth. Which is no longer feasible across an entire country, or even if it were, it would mean squeezing other countries. With corresponding risks.

Trump and Brexit are necessary, perhaps even long overdue, in order to break the illusion that things could go on as they were. But they are not solutions. America needs a big wake-up. Trump looks likely to deliver one. That is needed for the rest of the country to wake from its slumber. Ask yourself: are you going to get weaker from dealing with a Trump presidency? Maybe not the best question, or at least not before having asked: do you know how weak you are right now?

For Britain to leave the EU is a great first step. As I’ve said many times, centralization is not an option without growth. And Brussels has shown us quite a few of the worst consequences of centralization. Nobody should want to be a part of that.

Summarized: for most people, 2017 will be the year of the inability to understand where their favorite worldview flew off the rails. Change can be a bitch. But change is needed to keep life alive.

Obama's "Farewell To Arms" As War Presidency Ends

Submitted by Finian Cunningham via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

Eight straight years of warmongering come to an end as US President Barack Obama bows out with his «farewell to the nation» speech this week, as fawning American media dubbed his valediction.

In reality, Obama’s outgoing address should have been billed as a «farewell to arms» made by arguably one of the most belligerent presidents to ever have occupied the White House.

Only in exceptionally delusional America could such a pernicious paradox be presented as something honorable and sentimental.

Obama, the 44th US president, may have been the first black president and winner of a Nobel peace prize during his first year in office in 2009. But apart from those dubious accolades – championed by supposedly liberal Hollywood celebrities and media pundits – his actual record in office is one of blood-soaked disgrace. 

Instead of ending American overseas wars as he had promised back in 2008, Obama expanded on his predecessor George W Bush’s criminal foreign interventions. At least seven countries – Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Libya, Syria, Yemen and Somalia – have been routinely bombed under Obama’s watch as the US Commander-in-Chief. That’s one repugnant record.

Last year alone, the US military reportedly dropped over 26,000 bombs around the world killing countless thousands of people, the exact number buried under official secrecy and American mainstream media indifference. At that rate, American anti-war campaigner Medea Benjamin estimates that US forces deployed three bombs every hour of every day for the whole of 2016. This death from the skies included Obama’s personal ordering of drone assassinations during his weekly Terror Tuesday briefings from Pentagon chiefs, the use of which increased 10-fold under his command, killing thousands of innocent civilians as «collateral damage».

In Yemen, one of the poorest countries on Earth, where Obama fully backs an ongoing Saudi air war, it is reckoned that a child dies every 10 minutes from the American-supplied bombing campaign and blockade. Hardly a word about this US-backed genocide is permitted to intrude into public awareness by the Western corporate-controlled media.

Under the supposed Nobel peace laureate, the United States has sold an all-time record of $115 billion-worth of weaponry to Saudi Arabia – one of the most repressive regimes in the world – which has in turn fueled jihadist terrorism across the Middle East, Central Asia, Africa and Europe.

In Syria, just one of the countries to be afflicted by Obama’s policy of covert collusion with jihadist terrorism for regime-change machinations, the death toll is estimated to be around 400,000, with millions more displaced by the US-led proxy war that began in March 2011.

That war unleashed by the Obama administration to oust President Bashar al-Assad has only been arrested because of Russia’s military intervention at the end of 2015. At every step, Obama and his top diplomat John Kerry have sought to thwart Russia’s efforts to salvage the country from jihadist terror proxies. With warped logic, Obama and his British and French allies – all sponsors of the regime change war in Syria – have tried to paint Russia as a war criminal.

In his final year in office, Obama has overseen a massive escalation in US military special operations around the world. These covert forces are now reported to be operating in 138 countries – 70% of the world – a military deployment that represents a 130% increase on that under George W Bush. Self-declared liberal Americans consider Bush to be a warmongering disaster, yet somehow they hail Obama as some kind of progressive «peace president».

The Nobel prize awarded to Obama surely stands as an egregious offense to humankind’s intelligence and decency. With his typical rhetorical sophistry, Obama talked about abolishing nuclear weapons during his early days in the White House, only to subsequently commit his nation to a trillion-dollar upgrade of its nuclear arsenal. In stark violation of international obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty.

Under his watch, the «peace president» has pursued a bellicose collision course with nuclear-armed Russia that threatens a global conflagration. Relations between the US and Russia have sunk to new dangerous depths – never seen since the former Cold War – led largely by the Obama administration’s demonizing of Moscow with a litany of fraudulent charges. Charges amplified by the servile Western mass media of course instead of being debunked as they surely should be.

Rather than dialogue and diplomacy, Obama’s presidency has used subterfuge and relentless propaganda to antagonize Russia. From personal insults against Russian President Vladimir Putin being a «Hitler figure» to vilifying Moscow for regional conflicts that the Western powers have actually stoked, Obama has tempted all-out war through reckless sanctions and expansion of NATO forces on Russia’s borders. The last power to have menaced Russia with such flagrant aggression was Nazi Germany. Yet, Putin is caricatured as Hitler, while Obama is lauded in the Western media as a standard-bearer for world peace.

This week as Obama gave his self-preening farewell to the nation speech, thousands of new US troops and tanks were dispatched to buttress NATO forces already at unprecedented levels in Germany, Poland and the Baltic states. While his country endures economic austerity and social collapse from poverty, the White House has ordered $3.4 billion in extra military spend in Europe to bolster NATO aggression towards Russian. Part of that warmongering extravagance involves supporting a neo-Nazi junta in Kiev to continue its onslaught against the ethnic Russian people of eastern Ukraine, where the death toll has reached at least 10,000 since 2014.

Only in America, the «exceptional nation» as Obama repeatedly proclaims, is a warmongering president feted as a «peace leader». Whereas his successor, Donald Trump who will be inaugurated next week, is pilloried as a traitor because he has dared to call for restoring better relations with Russia.

Trump is by no means perfect. His reactionary and at times foul-mouthed populism may be deserving of mockery as it was this week at the Golden Globes film-awards ceremony held in Hollywood. Award-winning actress Meryl Streep won plaudits from the supposed liberal media for her rebuke of Trump over his alleged bigoted and bullying behavior.

But where is the appropriate condemnation of Obama for displaying far worse failings – as perhaps the most blood-soaked president to have sat in the «highest office of the nation»?

What makes the US the most dangerous nation on Earth to world peace is that so many of its so-called liberal intellectuals, artists and media evidently view Barack Obama as a man of peace and progress. When in reality, the 44th president should be prosecuted for multiple war crimes. Instead of being free to earn millions of dollars in future years giving sonorous speeches on «international relations» to sundry audiences, Obama should be earning time behind bars. (In the ignoble company of other US ex-presidents, it should be added.)

Obama’s Pivot to Asia Hits a Roadblock in the Philippines

October 25, 2016   |   admintam

(RPI) While the mainstream media continues its obsessive reporting on the mud-slinging campaign for the White House, a dramatic development in China last week brought President Obama’s “pivot to Asia” to a sudden halt. Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte, while in Beijing, announced his country’s “separation” from the United States. He told his Chinese audience, “Your honors, in this venue, I announce my separation from the United States … both in military, but also economics.’’

The State Department was stunned and asked for a clarification. The Philippines has been a virtual US protectorate since 1898, when it became US property after the Spanish-American war. Even after gaining independence after World War II it remained a close Cold War ally, hosting US military bases until 1992. Just this spring, as US tensions with China were heating up over a Chinese reclamation project in the South China Sea, the US signed a deal to open five military bases on Philippine territory. The deal was considered of major importance in an increasingly confrontational US approach to the region.

Suddenly it appeared the deal was off. Was the Philippines about to sever diplomatic relations with the United States?

Shortly after making the statement, the Philippine president walked back slightly from what appeared a break with the United States. He did not mean total separation, he said, but rather a desire to loosen his country from the firm grip of US foreign policy. But the point had been made. The Philippines was not happy in its current relationship with Washington.

President Obama’s “pivot to Asia” has turned out not to mean improved trade and diplomatic ties with the region, but an aggressive stance toward China over, among other issues, the South China Sea. The US has concluded military agreements with Vietnam and the Philippines, and maintains strong military ties with Japan and South Korea.

The Philippines has been used as a US cat’s paw in South China Sea dispute and Duterte’s surprise statement signaled that he felt the relationship was too one-sided.

But the tension has been rising and the mood souring for some time. The US State Department has been critical of President Duterte’s admittedly brutal crackdown on illegal drugs, which has cost perhaps 2,000 or more lives. In August, Secretary of State John Kerry conveyed the US government’s concerns. As elsewhere, such condemnation by the US likely seemed hypocritical to the Philippine president, as the US leads the world in prison population with a large percentage serving long terms for non-violent drug crimes.

Last week a large protest was held in front of the US embassy in Manila in support of the president’s move toward a foreign policy independent from Washington. Demonstrators burned American flags and demanded the departure of US troops from their country.

Will US-Philippine relations continue to spiral downward? Or will Washington begin to see that its aggressive foreign policy, in Asia and elsewhere, is beginning to alienate allies? Or perhaps the next US administration will decide that a CIA “regime change” is in order for the independent-minded Philippine president. A US pivot away from confrontation with China would go a long way toward repairing strained relations with the Philippines and beyond. Let’s hope that’s Washington’s next move.

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This article (Obama’s Pivot to Asia Hits a Roadblock in the Philippines) by Ron Paul originally appeared on RonPaulInstitute.org and was used with permission. Anti-Media Radio airs weeknights at 11pm Eastern/8pm Pacific. If you spot a typo, email edits@theantimedia.org.