Adolf saw an interesting opinion piece the other day, on the possibility of a rapprochement between the USA and Russia. 

Later in another piece, there were a couple of phrases which, as I like to say, fell out and clattered onto the floor.

“……The Geneva Agreement had all the underpinnings of the Munich Agreement. The comparison is apt. Just as Munich gave Hitler more time to build up his Panzers, the Geneva Agreement gave the mullahs ten years to build the bomb.

Just as in 1930s the world failed to stop Hitler, while the viper was still in its crib, and tolerated Germany’s violations of the Treaties of Versailles to allow her to rearm, the world de facto allowed Iran to ignore United Nations Security Council resolutions and continue the development of a nuclear weapon. Just as Britain sold Czechoslovakia out in 1938 to appease Hitler, the United States sold Israel out in 2013 to appease Iran……..”

and

“Western democracies that failed to prevent two world wars suffer historical amnesia and appear to be unconcerned with the replay of Munich. Feeling safe under the American military umbrella, the leaders of the UK, France, and Germany have been imploring Trump to salvage the accord with Iran. Just as in the 1930s, the slippery slope of greed and appeasement is driving Europe toward more disasters. Paraphrasing Lenin, they are vying with each other for the rope contract.”


For some time now I’ve wondered about these and other similarities between geo-politics of the late 1930s and those of the present day.   Some of the similarities are, I think, remarkable.

The two Asian super-powers of their respective times, Imperial Japan and Communist China both were remarkably short of strategic resources.  Things like coal, oil and iron ore back then and now.  China uses it’s economic strength to buy what it needs while Japan used it’s military strength to steal what it needed.

Japan made plenty of noise about its military strength and was able to conquer many smaller and weaker nations and later eject the naive and foolish British from Singapore. However, when push came to shove Japan was defeated by the might of the US economy.  Yamamoto predicted as much straight after the pearl Harbour raid.

I suggest that is where China sits currently.

Today, China makes makes a prick of itself in the South China Sea while Japan, South Korea,The Philipines and others try to look the other way, as if to say “Well we can’t do much about it, so why worry?”

I suggest once Iran has been settled down by Israel, the US and their friends, the next venue for competition will be Asia with China as the centerpiece.   One sees little commentary on the relationship, if any, between China and Russia but with such a long mutual border there is potential for mischief from either side of it.  (Would China invade Russia?  Possibly.  There’s a  hell of a lot of oil and agricultural potential to be had.)

At one stage I wondered if we might wake up one morning to find Putin and Xi had done a Molotov/Ribbentrop deal.  But then, if you take that analogy a step further, you would not be surprised to see shortly thereafter, Russia, The US and Western Europe in an alliance, albeit tense, taking on Red China.

For me, the enigma in the whole shebang is trying to work out ‘What is China’s game?   What is it really after?

(‘Some Musings’ is what happens when you come out of hospital and have a day for the anesthetic to wear off.)