U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s late March visit to Manila – his first since assuming office – has elicited firm opposition from China, leading Beijing to express strong diplomatic and military concerns. Despite Hegseth’s assurances during his Asia-Pacific tour – which also took him to Guam and Japan – thatContinue Reading
PANAMA CITY: US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth warned during a visit to Panama on Tuesday (Apr 8) that the United States will not allow China to jeopardise the operations of the country’s vital interoceanic canal. “Today, the Panama Canal faces ongoing threats,” Hegseth said in a speech at a policeContinue Reading
Throughout the Joe Biden presidency, it became a common refrain amongst policy analysts that his administration’s approach to foreign policy could be characterized as “America First, with a smile.” It reflected what many saw as a “strange continuity” in substance, if not style, between the first Trump administration and theContinue Reading
While there is wide-spread speculation about what the second administration of U.S. President Donald Trump will do with regard to its massive troop presence in Europe, the administration has made it clear that it intends to maintain and strengthen the U.S. military presence in Japan vis-a-vis an increasingly aggressive ChinaContinue Reading
China’s military says that it conducted a patrol in the South China Sea on Friday, the same day that U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth arrived in Manila and reaffirmed Washington’s “ironclad” commitment to its alliance with the Philippines. On Saturday, a spokesperson for the Southern Theater Command of the People’sContinue Reading
Attorney General Pam Bondi said on Thursday that Boasberg should not be on the Signal case and other cases involving the Trump administration, describing him as among several federal judges “trying to obstruct Donald Trump’s agenda”. “He cannot be objective. He’s made that crystal clear,” Bondi said during an interviewContinue Reading
U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth will visit the Philippines later this week, the first stop on a regional tour that will also take him to Hawai’i, Guam, and Japan and aimed at bolstering relations with “like-minded countries.” Hegseth will visit Manila on March 28-29, to “advance security objectives with PhilippineContinue Reading
Trump’s “America First” foreign policy thrust has triggered concerns about the scale and depth of US commitment to the region under his new term. “It’s a strong message to China on solid bilateral relations” between the US and the Philippines,” Romualdez said of Hegseth’s upcoming visit. China claims virtually theContinue Reading
“Civilizations die by suicide, not by murder.”—Arnold Toynbee This observation by historian Arnold Toynbee encapsulates the strategic risk now facing U.S. power in the Indo-Pacific. While U.S. naval vessels continue their patrols and military hardware flows to allies, a dangerous pattern has emerged: the institutional foundations that translate military presenceContinue Reading
