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JOHN BATCHELOR SHOW
Co-hosts: Gordon Chang, Forbes.com 
 
Hour One
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 1, Block A:  Cleo Paskal, visiting Trudeau Fellow, University of Montreal, and associate Fellow, Chatham House, in re:  Mid-Autumn Festival!  Eat mooncakes.  Yum.*
Australia has no law preventing political donations from foreigners, so oceans of Chines money have come in to buy (lease?) Aussie politicians.  . . . Five eyes intell alliance is critcally important to all, but with Chinese money going in to affect policy and undermine Western [ethos], hfe problem.
Beijing: if you still have family or bz interest back in China, you're Chinese and the govt has leverage over you. Sinophone press in Australia is intensely managed by the unelected tyrants of Beijing.
Revelation:  A Parliamentarian in New Zealand is a member of the Chinese Communist Party and moving to influence NZ legislation, on the Foreign Affairs and Defence Committee, in favor of Chinese tyranny and has been teaching spies.  The Kiwi [attorney general] dismisses this.  Five eyes are supposed to be taking the lead on one-fifth of the planet’s surface, Oceania.   https://www.chathamhouse.org/publications/twt/what-australia
* Tenderfoot foreigner prefers the fragrant version without hardboiled egg.
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 1, Block B:  Stephen Yates, CEO of D.C. International Advisory, former advisor to Vice President Dick Cheney, and candidate for the Republican nomination for lieutenant governor of Idaho, in re: Am now in Idaho Falls, seat of Bonneville Co.  Idaho.   President’s twitterstorm called out the Secy of State for endeavoring to negotiate with Kim, “a waste of time.”  President seems to like Tillerson as a person.  No one yet has presented a clear alternative foreign policy.  Imminent: the XIX Party Congress in China.  What are the ways Xi consolidates control?   Same for Hu and Jiang before.
Concern that if Xi does consolidate power, he’ll become much more aggressive. Only solace is that he’ll behave so awfully that he’ll force neighbors to ally and face him down.  Chinese aggression may very well generate a counter-response, and no countervailing force in China against Xi.
http://idahopoliticsweekly.com/politics/1737-poll-idahoans-say-north-korea-is-the-greatest-global-threat
https://www.thecipherbrief.com/column/expert-view/can-tillerson-sing-trumps-tune-north- korea
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 1, Block C:  Toshi Yoshihara, senior Fellow at the Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessment and co-author of Red Star over the Pacific: China's Rise and the Challenge to U.S. Maritime Strategy, in re: Report from Asia on Pagasa, three Filipino sandbars, where China is sending its non-mil vessels (coast guard), pressing around this “high tide elevation” –Law of the Sea caries an exclusive economic zone out several hundred km.   “Cabbage strategy” – grabbing territory sort of inch by inch. US must make it clear that the law is on the side of the Philippines, as the Permanent Court of Arbitration came down clearly last year that way US has always abided by the Law of the Sea regs.    Also continue its freedom of navigation ops. This island is inhabited by Filipinos; US has treaty obligations with Philippines.  Chinese have ignored the Permanent Curt and continue to ignore the ruling.  The original feature under he last island was a low-tide elevation and so cannot be seized. Now China is trying to reverse engineer legal status.  China hopes through cabbage strategy to seize by attrition. Because of its aggression . . . Creeping expansionism.  . .  Seizure of Spratleys, Mischief Reef, et [many] al.; a long record of Chinese predation. What China is doing is annexing ; son enough, even diplomatese will have to acknowledge this. Meanwhile Duterte thought he cold play nice with China and have his way; now, seeing that they're  working a sort of Anschluß, he’s suddenly speaking pleasantly of the US
China wants both to kick the US out, as the US continues freedom of navigation exercises f/b/o the rest of the world, and also to use the South China Sea as a stepping stone to move over to take power in the Indian Ocean.    http://news.abs-cbn.com/focus/10/03/17/chinese-ships-spotted-anew-near-pag-asa-island-lawmaker-says
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 1, Block D:  Isaac Stone Fish,  Asia Society andWashington Post, in re: what happens if there’s a war between China and Taiwan? See book by ____ Easton, from a DC think tank, found docs from China on “re-take Taiwan by force.”  Chinese Communist Party talk for, “It’s ours.”  Beijing thinks it's a domestic matter.  Of course, CCP Beijing has never ruled Taiwan, so “re-take” is bogus. It’d have to be unification, and it’d be highly unwilling.   Word usage here is critical.
Rohingya, persecuted in Burma by the junta.  Ethnic cleansing, incipient genocide.  North Korea: Beijing likes to pretend that it doesn't know what to do about North Korea, that it's an America problem.  Adding another distraction to America’s already much-distracted foreign policy.
 
Hour Two
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 2, Block A:  Bruce Bechtol, professor at Angelo State University and author of North Korea and Regional Security in the Kim Jong-un Era, in re: Mid-Autumn Festival– people who celebrate the lunar new year look up at this enormous moon: China, Vietnam, Korea.  Suddenly, North Korea isn't laughing any more: US issued a directive authorizing Treasury to prevent a person or bank guilty of _____ no longer to run their money through a US bank.  Everybody runs their money through US banks, so this is a financial disaster for DPRK. Expect a retaliation possibly a nuke exploded over the Pacific.  This is 21 Sept Executive Order that prevents any bank deeply involved with DPRK rom using US banks.  At present, this Adm doesn't have enough staff to enforce it completely  Need staffing up. Also, can this truly pressure Norks? YES. However need cooperation f Singapore, South Korea, Japan, others. This will prevent Kim Jong-un from showering his elites with lavish gifts; that lack will land him is trouble.    It’s been Chinese banks and enterprises laundering money and doing bz with Norks  These sanctions are basically directed at China Will rock Chinese banking and perhaps even political system. If that’s at risk, gosh.  “Washington doesn't have any ha-ha left about this.”  This constitutes a financial blockade. Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Iran, and even banks in Africa.   https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/trump-signed-presidential-directive-ordering-actions-to-pressure-north-korea/2017/09/30/97c6722a-a620-11e7-b14f-f41773cd5a14_story.html?utm_term=.422fcd6d8e76
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 2, Block B:  Richard McGregor, author of the newly-released Asia's Reckoning: China, Japan, and the Fate of U.S. Power in the Pacific Century, and former FT bureau chief in Beijing and Washington, in re: PM Abe, Japan, has been prescient  working with Pres Trump ab initio.   Now he’s working with Xi Jinping; celebrate the 45th anniversary of establishment of relations between Japan and China.  “Keeps your friends close and your enemies closer.” — Churchill.   Bldg up to a big confab in 2018. China wants territory occupied by Japan; Chinese are inflexible, while Japan isn't thinking of relinquishing its territory. Japan can't handle China by itself so depends on the US. Abe has forged close ties with India, Philippines, Vietnam, all as a edge against China.  “Helicopter destroyer” = aircraft carrier. Abe has been fir with China in face of Chinese demands that he back down, Note Tokyo outreach: incl Japanese friends, incl Indonesia and even Westward to India. Two powerful countries getting together.   Encircling China. Patchwork quilt of new security relations being built.  Cross currents of new security architecture in East Asia.  Abe “is taking to this”; not sure about  the rest of Japan.
https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2017/09/29/national/politics-diplomacy/abe-celebrates-anniversary-japan-china-ties-voices-hope-xi-visits/
https://www.wsj.com/articles/beijing-gets-a-new-face-to-usher-in-a-new-emperor-1507028467
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 2, Block C:  Francis Rose, Government Matters,  in Washington, D.C., in re: VA nominee.
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 2, Block D:  Harry Segall, New York Daily News, Daily Beast, in re: 
 
Hour Three
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 3, Block A:  Robert Zimmerman, BehindtheBlack.com and Capitalism n Space, in re: Hawaii TFT, and more.
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 3, Block B:  Robert Zimmerman, BehindtheBlack.com and Capitalism n Space, in re:  Hawaii TFT, and more.
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 3, Block C:  Odd Arne Westad, The Cold War: A World History  
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 3, Block D:  Odd Arne Westad, The Cold War: A World History  
 
Hour Four
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 4, Block A:  David Reynolds Ph.D., The Long Shadow: The Legacies of the Great War in the Twentieth Century
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 4, Block B:  David Reynolds Ph.D., The Long Shadow: The Legacies of the Great War in the Twentieth Century
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 4, Block C: Fredrik Logevall, Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam  
Wednesday  4 October 2017 / Hour 4, Block D: Fredrik Logevall, Embers of War: The Fall of an Empire and the Making of America's Vietnam