Tuesday, April 12, 2016

Annual FilAm military exercize

The annual Philippine/American joint military exercize is going on, and China is having a fake hissy fit about it.

they aren't in danger from Obama, of course, but what about Hillary etc?

What is different this year is the presence of other countries:

The Philippine military said about 8,500 U.S. and Philippine troops are taking part in the exercises called Balikatan, or “shoulder to shoulder.” Officials added that between 80-95 Australian troops would also participate in a special operations exercise for the first time, with eight Japanese self-defense officers observing.
The Aussies have been deeply involved in rooting out terrorism in Indonesia (because of the Bali bombing, a pre 9-11 incident) but now they will help out here.

So why the Japanese? Well, partly because China is pushing to take some of their islands over, and of course, the Chinese push in the West Philippine sea is a major shipping lane to Japan.

I am old enough to remember when the problem was Russian trawlers spying on the USA etc.

But now, according the StrategyPage, the Chinese fishing trawlers are being used as a way to extend military control.

April 10, 2016: Here’s a little known fact. Chinese commercial ships, particularly freighters and ocean-going fishing ships, are considered part of a military maritime reserve force and are expected to follow orders from navy or coast guard ships whenever called upon. The commercial ships are expected to collect intelligence and even risk damage and injuries by using their ships to block the movement of foreign ships (including warships). In return the Chinese navy and coast guard will come to the assistance if Chinese commercial ships get in trouble with foreign navies or coast guards. 
Part of this is terrorizing Pinoy fishermen in their traditional fishing areas.

But now, China's factory ships are fishing illegally in other waters, and as their navy extends their reach, could cause an international incident.

SP relates a recent incident off the coast of Argentina where locals pushed back and succeeded in removing the illegal fishermen, but this might not be true of the many incidents with the Philippines or VietNam.

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Usually they do exercizes at the local military base, where usually our local Special Forces give training in jungle survival, but this year the only thing I have seen are occassional Apache helicopters wandering around, so maybe most of the troops are off the west coast, training locals to use new naval equipment...

a lot of the cooperation is planning for rescue and medical treatment during emergencies, which we have all the time.





in local news, the big news is still Duterte or Poe, both reform candidates...

It's Family Feud, Marcos edition.

Although Vice presdents here are elected seperatly, BongBong Marcos is running on the same party as Duterte, while Poe, of course was adopted but rumored to be fathered by someone in that family.

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