24 August 2019|The Canary|Mohamed Elmaazi
The US withdrawal from another key nuclear weapons agreement with Russia should be understood in the wider context of US attempts to contain the rise of China. An objective which experts say may ultimately lead to war.
Featured image via New China TV-YouTube
This is Part Two of an analysis of the US withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with Russia. Part One focuses on US-Russian relations.
On 2 August, the US formally withdrew from the landmark INF Treaty, in a move blasted as “idiotic” and “dangerous” by former US colonel Lawrence Wilkerson. Speaking exclusively to The Canary, the national security expert explained that“both parties are guilty of provocative policies”, but he emphasised that “no one has been more provocative than Washington”. Less discussed, however, is the role that US attempts to contain China may have played in the decision to leave the INF Treaty. This ‘containment’ policy, with the objective of maintaining “US primacy in Asia”, may ultimately lead to open military conflict between the two states – and their allies.
US wants missiles in Asia-Pacific “sooner rather than later”
In 2018, Mathew Kroenig (a former adviser to right-wing senator Marco Rubio) wrote that ending the INF was “necessary” and “prudent” in order to “restore a favourable military balance”. The senior fellow at the hawkish Atlantic Council explained that the US achieves this “balance” by deploying “large numbers of US ground-based and mobile conventional missiles” across ‘allied’ countries in Asia. John Bolton, the US national security adviser and “serial arms control killer“, recently echoed this view; as did new US defence secretary Mark Esper. Only one day after the end of the INF, Esper told reporters that the Department of Defense (DoD) would like to deploy medium-range missiles “sooner rather than later”.
Read the full article here: https://www.thecanary.co/feature/2019/08/12/us-desire-to-remain-a-superpower-ended-key-nuclear-treaty-and-may-lead-to-war-with-china/