Dear Editor, Just two days before Friday's G20 summit in Hamburg Germany where a showdown is expected between Trump and Putin, Russia and China held an important meeting Wednesday in Moscow focusing on military cooperation between the two countries. Western capitals surely had their eyes and ears riveted on the occasion to find out what was going on inside the meeting and what were the public and secret outcomes. There always is what is said publicly during the press conferences and what remains secret between the two partners. A possible intelligent question that the US could be asking themselves is "Weren't we being screwed in that Moscow meeting?" To regions like Africa and the Middle East, whatever was happening in Moscow and the ensuing reactions from Western capitals is generally felt like too distant to our daily troubles. Yet by monitoring such developments, we can better leverage our development partnerships with all sides. Surely we are not going to refuse to work with anyone when it serves our best interests. It is therefore smart to do so from an informed position where we understand the wider concerns and interests of those we interface with so as not to be used on the cheap so to speak. It is quite interesting to observe the changing patterns of how the so-called global super-powers face-off these days. While the "spheres of influence", economics, and technologies have morphed from what prevailed globally until the late 1980's, in the fundamentals, nothing has really changed from the squabbles of the famous Cold War. Even though Communism has virtually disappeared as a contending ideology to capitalism, there is still the 'West versus Russia' conundrum, and a larger, more fluid 'Non-aligned movement'. This growing latter category is not based anymore on the Non-aligned movement that existed during the Cold war days. It is a more informal category of countries that themselves belong to several other regional political and economic groupings, and are able to simultaneously make multilateral arrangements with partners from all directions, in all sectors, and with any relevant players depending on different interests and whatever is at stake at any given moment. Basically a world full of ideological independents free from confinement under any political or economic godfathers. The big earth shifting difference in the global lines drawn today is the role, influence, and economic domination of China. A country that is increasingly a self-contained power block in itself. One that uas already busted the old economic status quo, and even going beyond any previously known economic stereotypes. Beijing has humbly but painstakingly established what someone might soon wake up to realise is actually a Chinese World Economic Order. A global phenomenon that is here to stay. An alreadt 'fait-accompli' in the Third World where nobody is really able to conclusively compete against them nor contain them for the foreseeable future. So while the US is resting with beer in hand on its military laureates as the sole remaining global super power since the collapse of the Soviet Union, todays world economics indicate China emerging as the new undefeatable economic super power that has managed to under-cut (or upper-cut) the old western economic expansionism, and there is little anyone can do to stop China's onslaught and their 9% GDP growth per annum. A figure almost five times greater than the 2% GDP growth average in all Western countries. As I watched a documentary on China recently, a former US Ambassador to Beijing said "China is aiming at becoming a comprehensive global power: economic, political, cultural and military force, all together". China consistent high growth rates indicate that they will probably be getting ever more powerful faster and on all fronts including in research & development, economic expansionism, and world affairs. This is a country that just invested $380 billion dollars in DNA medical research. What they could do with the results (wether to animals or humans) is open to any of their whims. This amount of money is five times the total foreign aid per annum given to all 54 countries in Africa in all fields where the continent needs assistance. The failure to contain China economically is pushing the Far East Asian subcontinent ever closer towards military confrontation. This has already taken the form of a new, separate modern arms race with the United States. China's latest technological success is a new missile system designed specifically to blow up American communications satellites in space. China knows that the US military without its satellite communications becomes literally blind and paralyzed in any battle field. That is why this new strategic Chinese capability is understandably causing headaches in the Pentagon who now have to devise a way to first neutralise these missiles if and when they ever have a direct military confrontation with China. Last month the US military reportedly tested a new system that shoots down missiles in the near space orbit. They must have been having the new Chinese missile in mind. That test reportedly failed miserably. Probably why Trump didn't tweet about it. However, acclaimed British journalist and documentary film-maker John Pilger, while recently presenting a paper entitled "The War has already started" to students at an Australian University, said "America has hang a noose on China." It is almost a fully-fledged American military blockade along the Chinese coast and into the Pacific ocean with military bases, navy destroyers, cruisers, and military aircraft carriers complete with navy battlegroups, and reconnaissance assets. A situation that is increasingly seeming as if we have a desperate US that has no other smart options against the rising China. In fact, according to the UK's Guardian newspaper, "the US owes China more than $1 trillion as of April 2017. And China could send America’s economy into a tailspin by sanctioning a dumping of US Treasury bonds." So Americans can chest-thump all they want, China only has to say "Give me back my money", and the US might suddenly become friendlier. But while their is new unprecedented concern over China, that doesn't stop the old Cold war rivalry where the West and Russia go for each others political necks at every subtle opportunity. Like the alleged interference in America's elections. Meanwhile, NATO is trying to justify its very existence in Europe. For that, it needs their old enemy to still be their enemy. They have therefore embarked on a strategy of surrounding Russia militarily by increasingly recruiting countries that were once part of the Warsaw pact under the former Soviet Union, and equipping them militarily to face Russia. Russia is thereby being made to appear as the bad guy again. However, the truth is that they are now being forced to prepare to defend themselves against undue provocation and exaggerated claims of "the Russian threat" as declared by NATO. This means that the old arms race of the cold war days and its alarm lights and nuclear buttons, are back. The logic is simple: For every new military technological capability developed by one side, the other has to either develop a similar weapon or find something that can counter/neutralize it. This means that industrial espionage for military technology secrets is also back as a thriving activity once again. And this time China is a bigger threat. Everyone has to protect their secrets from China at all costs. They've copied space technology and sent a woman to space. They copied the international space station and are now building their own. They just completed copying America's latest, and most advanced 5th generation fighter jet. They also just tested a quality looking copy of the European Airbus passenger jet. But Russia still has its good old KGB tricks and expertise that helped make the Soviet Union a formidable opponent. Obtaining technology secrets and using them to make Russian versions of Western innovations. And by any standards, any rapprochement between China and Russia is a big deal. Surely worrying for the NATO alliance. According to The Diplomat news magazine of June 30th, China and Russia are said to have signed a military cooperation roadmap agreement early last month. A statement from China said: "The military roadmap is a design and general plan for military cooperation between China and Russia in 2017-2020. It shows the high level mutual trust in strategic cooperation for both sides to jointly face new threats and challenges in the security field." When the president's of Russia and China met in Moscow, it was to confirm this cooperation. After the meeting, Putin stated: “We’ve agreed to promote our joint initiatives to simultaneously freeze North Korean nuclear and missile activities, and US and South Korean joint military drills.” The two countries are already quite strong individually, and coming together really shifts the balance of global power immensely in their favour. Together, they are emboldened enough to tell the US what to do or not to do in their back yard. On his part, Chinese President Xi Jinping stated after the meeting that: “We believe that the outer world is turbulent, local conflicts are emerging constantly, such issues as the Korean peninsula problem, Syrian question, Iran, all remain very complex.” Moscow and Beijing stressed the importance of taking North Korea’s concerns over its safety into consideration, calling them “ justified.” A joint statement reads: "The two sides stress that justified North Korean concerns should be respected.” In all honesty, if we look pragmatically at the issue of nuclear weapons proliferation, I fail to understand how Western countries can claim concern over North Korea but are silent on a country like Pakistan for example which not only is a Muslim country (the western islamophobia has peeked since 9/11), Pakistan has been an important hub for jihadists ever since the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. It is where all jihadists reside before going to Afghanistan and on to the Russian Caucuses. It remains the rear base for the Taliban to this day. It is also the country that gave sanctuary to the most wanted terrorist of all time, Osama bin Laden from where US special Forces had to trace and eliminate him from, in a house right next to a major Pakistani airforce academy. So one would think that the "international community" would be more concerned about Pakistan's nuclear weapons program more than they are concerned about North Korea which clearly is not a state sponsor of terrorism but has genuine security concerns given the expansionism of the US and it's allies in their neighbourhood. Comparing western relations with Pakistan and North Korea, one would think that in this day and age, terrorism would be more of a concern than communism. At the China-Russia meeting yesterday,Mr. Putin stressed that the two countries have either the same, or very close positions on many international issues, and "we intend to further develop our foreign policy coordination.” Putin said. This must be a more disturbing development in Western capitals, particularly in Washington and London. It is important to note that despite Russia's reduced military might since the fall of communism, the country is still as powerful as is necessary. In a yet-to-be released documentary, Putin reportedly says: "If the United States and Russia decided to use their nuclear weapons on each other, none of the two sides would survive to claim victory." The realism in that statement is daunting. Following the 1962 Cuba missile crisis between the US and the Soviet Union, we now know that the so-called "proxy wars" (like the one currently in Syria) could ignite such a showdown. For example, last month Russia unilaterally established a No-fly zone over Syria after the US shot down a Syrian airforce jet that was conducting air raids on ISIS terrorists. US Senator Ron Paul immediately went on record against his own country by saying: "Flying into Syrian airspace [to shoot down a Syrian government fighter jet] is an act of aggression." The head of the Communications Policy Committee in Russia's Parliament, Senator Aleksey Pushkov also weighed in and told Russian television that it was "an act of aggression". Today the million dollar question is, 'Does Russia have the political will and the weaponry that could enforce their No-fly zone?' Because that would mean shooting down any foreign plane that violates Syrian airspace. Global military observers and intelligence agencies in world capitals are probably waiting to see if Russia really has the technology that can detect and destroy particularly the most advanced US stealth fighter jets (invisible planes like the F22, the latest F-35, or the F-117 nighthawk). Remember that the Serbian army under Milosevic is the only entity known to have ever successfully shot down a US stealth aircraft. That incident took place in 1999 during the Bosnian war, and they did it using the Russian-made S-125 Surface-to-air missile. Hollywood would later make several movies and documentaries about the mission to retrieve the downed pilot in enemy territory. However shooting down that plane was a major achievement in Serbia. Today in Syria, Russia is reported to have deployed the much more advanced S-300 and/or S-400 anti-aircraft systems which have yet to prove their worth. The latest US jets since the Bosnia incident have also upgraded stealth capabilities, but if the S-125 missile was successful in 1999, chances are that it's new upgrades, the S-300 and S-400, could be even more successful today. The big looming danger is what happens after that. Retaliation by the US is most likely to occur and by then it would be a direct military confrontation between two nuclear powers. In 1963, John F. Kennedy, in a speech before the 18th General Assembly of the United Nations, already warned the world that: "Even little wars are dangerous in a nuclear world." 20 years later, another warning was made during the Italy nuclear Conference (1983) when the Chairman Mr. Antonino Zichichi said: "Sooner or later, a fool will come forth. A personality foolish enough to provoke a worldwide thermonuclear confrontation. When that fool appears on the scene, mankind risks finding itself with hundreds of millions of dead." Given todays circumstances let us not assume too quickly who Mr. Zichichi was predicting here. But we have to be conscious of reality. What would rush through an American mind if Russia starts shooting American pilots dead? A few weeks ago the new French President Emmanuel Macron re-iterated what everyone is silent about in regards to the conflicts in the Middle East. He said: "Europe must now back down before the rise of bigoted democracies. Democracy cannot be constructed from the outside, unbeknownst to peoples. France was wrong to participate in the Libyan war. Western intervention in Iraq and Libya resulted in failed states where terrorist groups prosper. I don't want to see that happen in Syria”. The French are therefore now out of the coalition that is fuelling war in Syria for the purpose of regime change. But given Mr. Putin's brutally truthful assessment about the mutually assured destruction in case of what I would call "a nuclear stupidity showdown" between the US and Russia, it is plausible to assume that sub-saharan Africa is at this moment not only the safest place on earth, but also humanity's best clean chance for survival. Clear from any possible nuclear holocaust that could erupt in Europe, the United States, possibly the Middle East, and maybe also the three known nuclear weapons countries in Asia.
By Hussein Lumumba Amin Kampala, Uganda 06/07/2017
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