Pictures are provided by the administrative office
for the Hong Kong-Zhuhai-Macao Bridge project.
Hong Kong citizens celebrating the opening of the new connection with Macao and Zhuhai.
Traffic being restricted on this sea bridge, most Chinese have to use regular bus services.
In the frame of Sino-US relations rapidly getting worse, here comes another
bad joke from Washington DC.
Only recently, in a speech held at the Hudson Institute, US vice-president
Mike Pence told the world that " America is rebuilding China ".
Anybody gifted with some common sense and who has a basic knowledge about China's
history could imagine such US ambitions as being far from
realistic. Even though some bad habits of early capitalism already swapped
into China since the times of Deng Xiao Ping and which could be classified
as America's "cultural contribution" to China's development, the Chinese
people are generally reputed for their affinity to hard work and their
efficiency while doing business, as long as they are not hampered by any
state doctrine or law. The idea of America rebuilding China therefore
remains mere wishful thinking.
I recently met with some Chinese saying of unknown origin and which goes :
" The Chinese make it with their engineers, the Americans with their lawyers. "
张文宗:“美国重建中国”?美国人自己都不信
Zhang WenZong: " America rebuilding China " ?
The Americans themselves don't believe it.
Zhang WenZong is a director of the Department of US Political
Affairs at the China Institute of Modern International Relations.
"Rebuilding" is often associated with a fast revival of economy after a war.
While reconstruction after America's Civil War relied on the Americans
themselves, the economic reconstruction of Europe and Japan after World War
II could not be separated from the help of the United States,
and which is generally consistent with historical facts.
During the past ten years (and even longer), the United States have launched
and participated in several wars, following each other in South Asia, the
Middle East and North Africa. However, [the US] have not been able up to
now to help Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, when ridden by the flames
of war and unrest, to complete post-war reconstruction. [The US] even more
officially abandoned their goal of reconstruction.
The United States are [therefore obviously] unable to "rebuild" a country of only
some ten million inhabitants, let alone China with its around one billion
inhabitants.
To speak of "rebuilding China" [therefore] means making big words without
shame out of an over-estimation of oneself.
[SINA economy 新浪财经
on October 15, 2018]
A similar article on that subject was printed today by
People's Daily 人民日报:
A brandnew painting in the White House fitting to the subject:
The Republican Club by Andy Thomas
showing Donald Trump in a meeting with former US presidents.
Some Arabic guy posted another version on Twitter and which could be named:
魔鬼的约会 Meeting of the Demons اللقاء من الأباليس
A masterpiece of post-modern realism !
..............................
Chicago visitor to "blueprint news" reminding of Donald Trump's pecularity of calling names.
Separate visitor statistics are available for another and much
older website of mine where an entry into "blueprint news" was
created on the main page from the very beginning of that news
blog.
Such statistics are far more professional than those offered
for free by the blog provider of "blueprint news". As visitors
to that older site can be expected to enter the latest posts on
"blueprint news" rather than any old stuff already published years
ago, the statistics for that access page might serve as an
additional indicator who is really visiting "blueprint news".
Between October 1st and October 17, 2018, such additional statistics
still recorded some thousand hits, many coming from Russian servers
like *.ru and *.su (for the former Soviet Union and still existing !)
and from the USA as well (28 hits alone from Washington servers
including one from Capitol Heights).
Visitors from China came about with several hundred page hits in
the same period of time. Chinese server access was detected from
15 destinations like Beijing, Chaoyang, Guizhou, Harbin, Shanghai,
and Wuhan, delivering a total of 546 page hits.
New national laws on the protection of private data and an increasing
trend among internet users to anonymize their appearance on the web
make it steadily harder to detect the origin of visitors. As such
detection is only intended to present the variety of visitors to
"blueprint news" without getting too personal and without financial
interest, anonymization can lead to the simple result that I lose
interest in the translation of high-quality news and comments from
Chinese and Arabic sources, and this would mean a loss of diversity
on the web.
In February 2018 a brandnew Chinese language blockbuster was released by film director Dante Lam. The plot of "Operation Red Sea" is essentially based on a military coup staged in some fictive North-African country and which leads to the need to evacuate Chinese citizens together with some other foreigners who are now endangered by militant Islamic terrorists decided to drive the world into chaos with a dirty bomb. The radioactive product needed for the bomb should be provided by the responsible person of some globally connected mining company and who has fallen into the hands of the terrorists.
The plot is related to a famous rescue operation carried out by China's navy in Yemen when a bloody conflict escalated between Yemen's national government and Houthy rebels in March 2015. Here now some remarks on the making of China's latest blockbuster:
Some key scenes were taken at Ait Ben Haddou, Morocco. As I happened to visit that location only some months before, I am able to provide pictures of the original place, an ancient fortified Kasbah that was erected at a place where the Atlas mountains open into the desert. While the Kasbah and the mountain fortress are original, the gate to be seen in the movie is a fake. It was built to serve as the background for another blockbuster movie.
电影在摩洛哥山地的旧村拍摄了,拍摄工作难堪在热度很高的天气。
Temperatures in 2017 were unusually high in that area, i.e. surpassing 40°C in September, and should have been still around 30°C in autumn. When I crossed the dried up valley and climbed to the upper terrace of the Kasbah, it came to my mind that acting in a film right in font of this site must be a murderous job.
Even more, acting in full combat gear would add to the hardships, let alone the need to undergo some basic weapons training before the compulsory combat stunts while acting under the merciless desert sun. No wonder that one of the female stars was wounded twice during some especially rough scenes. The Chinese involved must therefore be a tough species.
For the necessary infrastructure of filming there are studios at Ouarzazate, only some miles away.
Special Effects applied in Operation Red Sea.
电影特技在红海行动
The final sequence of Operation Red Sea might nourish some second thoughts about Chinese imperialism regarding the South China Sea problem. In fact, it's nothing more than what we got used from similar US productions in the blood and honor style. A call of patriotism wrapped into a gripping plot and enhanced with many special effects. Still worth to be watched even if you don't agree with the Chinese, however, up to now only available in the original Chinese version with English subtitles.
Historic rescue operation realized by China's navy in 2015.
Operation Red Sea is being presented to Chinese audiences as a gift for the 90th anniversary of the People's Liberation Army PLA and is dedicated to the 19th National Congress of China's Communist Party. This film is regarded as China's first modern naval film. The film has already become a 579 million US$ success. It was selected as the Hong Kong entry for the Best Foreign Language Film at the 91st Academy Awards.
US source reporting: China's hypersonic missile test and
a rare insight into China's South China Sea activities.
..............................
Breaking News on China's Cyber Warfare:
On October 5, 2018, the American Enterprise Institute in Washington DC came about with the following news:
Tensions between the United States and China have been rising, but the worst may be ahead.
The disclosure by Bloomberg Businessweek that the Chinese military allegedly implanted microchips onto thousands of motherboards used by the US government and major businesses is the most damning evidence to date of a massive Chinese espionage campaign. Shortly after the revelations were published, Vice President Mike Pence stated, “China is meddling in America’s democracy.”
This, on the heels of new tariffs and an “unsafe” military confrontation in the South China Sea.
For years, the US intelligence and national-security communities have warned that the Chinese Communist Party might interfere with electronics manufactured in China. Last year, the Defense Science Board went so far as to state that China’s offensive cyber capabilities “exceed the United States’ ability to defend key critical infrastructures.”
But Thursday’s revelations provide the first public evidence of extensive interference in both civilian and military supply chains.
The Chinese military allegedly inserted tiny microchips onto motherboards manufactured in China for Super Micro Computer Inc., based in San Jose, Calif. These chips were designed to evade detection and to create a backdoor for entry into sensitive systems. According to reports, thousands of motherboards were sent to 30 separate companies and the US government, where they were used by organizations ranging from Apple and Amazon to the Defense Department.
..........
The Risks of " Buying Cheap ".
US scholar: China became a veritable rival to America
and already surpassed the US in terms of GDP in 2014.
Wer sich heute ausschließlich über die Handelspolitik eines Donald Trump
aufregt, der übersieht dabei leicht die faschistischen Tendenzen, die sich
in den USA, dem einst "gelobten Land der Demokratie", bereits über einen
längeren Zeitraum entwickelt haben.
Die folgende Zusammenfassung des amerikanische Trauerspiels um die Trump-Administration, dessen
Zeitzeugen wir gezwungenermaßen sind, sollte jenen "alternativen" Protestwählern in Deutschland als ein Lehrstück dienen, die meinen, dass sich eine nötige politische Wende im Hauruck-Verfahren erzielen lässt, wenn man nur jenen lautstarken "Volksgenossen" vertraut, die behaupten, dass sie "dem Volk auf's Maul schauen" und die für alles und jeden eine einfache Lösung parat haben.
Ausdruck dieser Entwicklung ist ein US-Präsident, den man eher als einen
ungebildeten und von rassistischen Vorurteilen geprägten Sprössling aus reicher Familie
empfindet, und der es mit gezielter Verleumdung der Gegenkandidatin Clinton und
mit Hilfe eines veralteten Wahlsystems geschafft hat an die Macht zu kommen.
Dieses Wahlsystem, zum Zeitpunkt seiner Entstehung innovativ und wegweisend,
ist im Laufe der letzten 200 Jahre zu einem Stolperstein für die amerikanische Demokratie
geworden, weil es dem Grundsatz "ein Bürger eine Stimme" schon lange nicht
mehr gerecht wird. Die Gründe dafür sind anderweitig nachzulesen und
betreffen vor allem die unzeitgemäße Festlegung von Wahlkreisen und die
damit verbundene Zuordnung von Wahlmännern, aber auch die unvollständige
Registrierung von farbigen Bürgern bei den lokalen Wahlbehörden einiger
Bundesstaaten.
Vordergründige Nutznießer dieser Entwicklung sind jedenfalls die eher wenig gebildeten
weißen Bewohner der wirtschaftlichen Problemzonen in den Vereinigten Staaten, die in ihrem dumpfen Hass auf das
politische Establishment in Washington auf einen "Messias" vertrauen,
der den Großen dieser Welt endlich einmal sagt wo's langgeht.
Sehr persönliche Pöbeleien und unverhohlene Kriegsdrohungen sind zu einem Markenzeichen von Donald Trump, dem "Retter der Unzufriedenen" geworden.
Pöbeleien wie wir sie lange schon nicht mehr gehört haben seit Idi Amin,
dem ehemaligen Diktator von Uganda und selbsternannten "Bezwinger des
Britischen Weltreiches". Sein Zeitgenosse, der im betrunkenen Zustand
ebenfalls ungehemmt pöbelnde Häuptling der Bajuwaren Franz-Josef Strauss erhielt damals von der
Presse den Spitznamen "Idi Alpin" verpasst.
In Zusammenhang mit dem politischen Umfeld des US-Präsidenten steht auch,
dass so viele aktuelle und ehemalige Vertraute von Donald Trump in den
Fokus öffentlicher Ermittlungen vor Gerichten oder Senats-Ausschüssen
geraten konnten, so wie Trump's Wahlkampfmanager Paul Manafort,
sein langjähriger Rechtsbeistand und "Mann für's Grobe" Michael Cohen,
sowie seit Kurzem auch Trump's Kandidat Kavanaugh für das freigewordene Amt eines Bundesrichters. Manafort und Cohen bekannten sich übrigens
bereits für schuldig in den meisten ihnen zur Last gelegten Anklagepunkten.
Was die politischen "Erfolge" des autonomen "Ego-Shooters" Trump betrifft,
so sind diese eher von propagandistischer Bedeutung als substanziell.
Ob Nordkorea ernsthaft an eine nukleare Abrüstung denkt, ist nach wie vor unklar. Abgesehen von der Zerstörung einer Testanlage nach dem Gipfeltreffen mit Trump gibt es bislang nur Absichtserklärungen. Eine Einigung zwischen den Nachbarstaaten auf der koreanischen Halbinsel wäre schon eher denkbar, nachdem es bereits zwei persönliche Begegnungen zwischen Kim Jong-un und Südkoreas Präsident Moon in Panmunjon und Pyongyang gab.
Der Iran nimmt den US-Präsidenten offiziell nicht einmal mehr ernst, und Israel sieht alle Felle einer US-Unterstützung im Kriegsfall mit dem Iran davonschwimmen, während Netanyahu neuerdings wieder über eine Zweistaaten-Lösung im Konflikt mit den Palästinensern redet.
Auch das neue Handelsabkommen zwischen USA, Kanada und Mexico soll sich,
wie man hören konnte, nicht wesentlich von dem alten Abkommen unterscheiden.
Die Zugeständnisse der Partner an die USA mussten sich in engen Grenzen
halten, weil sonst überhaupt keine Einigung erzielt worden wäre, was eine
Katastrophe für alle Beteiligten bedeutet hätte.
Was den von Trump angezettelten globalen Handelskrieg betrifft, so wehren
sich einflussreiche US-Wirtschaftskreise vehement dagegen, wohl
wissend, dass sie selbst die Leidtragenden sein können. Sogar die
amerikanische Automobilindustrie lehnt Strafzölle auf europäische Fahrzeug-Importe öffentlich ab.
Weil sich China ohnehin nicht in die Suppe spucken lässt und seine eigenen Strafzölle auf landwirtschaftliche Produkte aus den USA verhängt hat und mit weiteren droht, dürften letzten Endes die amerikanischen Farmer
im Mittleren Westen der USA, die beflissenen Parteigänger Trumps mit
ihren Monokulturen, zu den Leidtragenden des Handelskrieges gehören. -
Wer hätte vor Jahren schon daran gedacht, dass die Sojabohnen für die
chinesische Sojasoße heute überwiegend aus Amerika kommen würden.
Schließlich hat die rigorose Einwanderungspolitik Donald Trump's nicht
nur im Ausland für Empörung gesorgt, sondern auch im eigenen Land eine
riesige und lautstarke Opposition auf die Straßen getrieben, was den
US-Präsidenten noch weiter diskreditierte.
Die desaströse Politik der Ignoranz eines Donald Trump hat also bereits
Schaden im eigenen Land angerichtet und wird dies auch weiterhin tun.
Sie hat auch zum Rücktritt erfahrener amerikanischer Berufsdiplomaten
geführt, die sich außerstande sahen, die Ausfälle Trumps insbesondere
gegen die NATO im Ausland zu rechtfertigen.
Irgendwann aber wird sich in diesem riesigen Land mit all seiner Vielfalt
und Kreativität auch wieder der Geist der Vernunft durchsetzen.
Was Deutschland mit seinen eingeschränkten, auch geopolitischen,
Möglichkeiten betrifft, wäre ich mir da nicht so sicher. Deshalb sollte
es gar nicht erst so weit kommen, dass irgendwelche inkompetenten
Kleinbürger in eine Machtposition gelangen, die es ihnen erlaubt, der
Mehrheit ihre unausgegorene Meinung aufzuzwingen.
In diesem Zusammenhang ist es geboten, sich an die Zeit der Wende in
der DDR zu erinnern, als es nicht nur um Reisefreiheit, D-Mark und
Bananen ging, sondern auch um die Ablösung eines faschistischen
Regimes, unter dem "wichtigtuerische kleine Männer" bestimmten, was
die Untertanen zu denken hatten.
P.S.: Das Zitat von den "wichtigtuerischen kleinen Männern" stammt
übrigens aus einer öffentlichen Lesung der bekannten DDR-Schriftstellerin
Christa Wolf im Rahmen einer Veranstaltung im Westen und noch zu Zeiten der DDR.
The Trump Organization's finance boss, Allen Weisselberg, has reportedly been granted legal immunity in the probe into Michael Cohen, Donald Trump's longtime former lawyer.
Mr Weisselberg is reportedly mentioned on a tape secretly recorded by Cohen in 2016 in which a hush money payment to an alleged lover of Mr Trump is discussed.
On Thursday August 21, it emerged that David Pecker, head of the company that publishes the National Enquirer tabloid, was also given immunity.
BBC - Al-Jazeera - US media on August 24, 2018.
After Trump's former lawyer Michael Cohen admitted in court his participation in the paying out of two playmates on behalf of his boss, Trump could do nothing else but officially state that such paying out was made with his own money and not with funds intended for his election campaign. While Cohen is now on the doorsteps of jail after having pleaded guilty on different charges regarding illegal financial behaviour and false statement, walls are further closing in on Trump whose former campaign manager Paul Manafort has been equally found guilty of illegal financial action. Cohen who paid off to the state attorney and Manafort who kept silent on Trump's involvement are differently treated in the president's public statements. While Manafort could even hope for Trump's personal support, Cohen is being described by his longstanding employer as a corrupt and treacherous liar and which raises the question why he has survived as an important member of Trump's inner circle for such a long time. At least some personal "qualities" of Cohen should have been of value for Trump.
Now, when the word goes about an impeachment process that could be started after the Democrats won enough additional seats in the House of Representatives in the midterm elections, Trump is threatening, both, opponents and followers with the cruel scenario of an economic breakdown. Such disaster should certainly follow as Trump, according to his own evaluation, has " made such a good job ".
Here now tomorrow's news on the impeachment subject :
Trump’s Strong-Dollar Weakness published on August 22, 2018, by Project Syndicate :
The Trump administration would like us to believe that the dollar’s rise reflects faster economic growth, driven by deregulation, tax cuts, and expanded defense spending. But, if anything, Trump's economic agenda is creating inflationary pressure and undercutting the "exorbitant privilege" that the dollar has long conferred on the US.
..........
After all, a strengthening dollar increases the price of exports abroad and lowers the domestic cost of imports, thus discouraging the former and encouraging the latter. That is directly at odds with Trump’s stated goal of reducing the US trade deficit.
Trump’s obsession with the trade deficit has led him to impose import tariffs on steel, aluminum, and a wide range of products from China. But, ironically, more expensive imports will also put upward pressure on the domestic inflation rate, which could force the Federal Reserve to raise interest rates even faster than planned. That, in turn, would produce still more dollar appreciation and even bigger trade deficits, as happened under Reagan and Bush.
[Project Syndicate: An organization providing high-quality commentaries written by prominent political leaders, policymakers, scholars, business leaders, and civic activists from around the world.]
..............................
" From Russia with Love " - A recent Moscow visitor to " blueprint news ".
After US vice-president Mike Pence and some time later president Donald Trump
announced an increase in spendings for the modernization of US
weapon systems, an almost forgotten project of the Reagan era is being seen
to surface again in US military plannings: Some kind of a "Star Wars Scenario"
where a newly formed "US military space unit" should ensure US domination of
space, - a provocation to all other nations peacefully engaged in space research.
" Star War Plannings 2.0 ? ", France International Radio
cried out in alarm, reporting that in the 1980ies, the
final period of the cold war, America's Reagan administration
had promoted their "star war plannings". About 40 years later,
what was consistently boosted during the Reagan era becomes
Trump's own model [to follow]. It has become the idea of an
"immediately formed US military space unit", already voiced
many times this year.
On August 9, after the development was made public by Pence, Trump soon afterwards came about with the
message: "May the military space unit advance to [accomplishment]."
The Chinese source is, as well, quoting a German and a Russian
news source.
[Zhejiang online浙江在线
quoting People's Daily foreign edition
on August 15, 2018]
Quoted from News Corp Australia Network 澳大利亚新闻网 on August 15, 2018
..............................
As PR China's internet can be complicated, it needs a Chinese provider
for web hosting and data transfer between China and US based servers.
The registration of visitor statistics for - blueprint news - started in May 2010 and reported about 250.000 site visits in August 2018. Here are some numbers that remain incomplete, however, because only the leading 10 visitor nations are given, together with information about browsers and systems applied by visitors. Some rare browsers that came to my attention during the years are not included in the overall statistics as they present only a low number of visitors i.e. < 1%. Same goes with the computer systems where the list is too long to integrate it entirely into the following chart, and there are, as well, some visitors who withhold part of the Information. An increasing trend to data anonymization makes it even more difficult to collect visitor data.
However, more important than mere numbers should be the following choice of highlights of visitor activity during all those years and which might give an idea of the global acceptance my rather tiny blog achieved.
Visitor Highlights
Chinese visitors coming from River Yangtse and from Hangzhou, both places being
near to Shanghai. A closer look on the satellite images provides interesting features.
The former Portuguese colony of Macao which is now a part of PR China. Two
long bridges, connecting the main parts of Macao, might attract your attention.
Living the Chinese Dream
Economic prosperity and military strength are integral parts of China's global dream. While
facing maritime disputes with other nations, China is enforcing a modernization of its navy.
Japan and North Korea
One visitor came from the diplomatic quarters of Tokyo (above) and which is near to
the Imperial Palace. Another visitor called from Ground Zero in Hiroshima where the
first atomic bomb had been dopped in 1945.
Earlier this year Japanese authorities launched a missile alert via Japan National TV
when a North Korean test missile was heading toward Japanese territory. As tensions
with North Korea were high at the time, I was just watching Japanese news on satellite
TV. I immediately took a photo from my TV screen and posted it. My blogspot was then
available on the internet while the North Korean missile was still in the air over Japan !
One of the rare visitors from North Korea is indicating he came from the Ryugyong
neighbourhood in Pyongyang and which is not far away from the central compound
of North Korea's ruling Workers Party. The internet access point, however, remains
difficult to localize in this case.
In August 2017 two US military bases on Guam were threatened by North Korea which said
it would create an "enveloping fire" around the US territory using four Hwasong-12 missiles
that should detonate 30-40 km off the island. The US side made clear this would mean war.
Nuclear Research
The CERN Institute in Geneva, Switzerland, is operating the greatest particle accelerator
ever built. It was there that a predicted elementary entity, the Higgs boson, was detected
for the first time.
US website quoting my graphics which I had prepared
to visualize how Higgs Bosons can come into being :
The center for nuclear research in Dubna is situated in the neighbourhood of
Moscow, Russia. In Soviet times it was the most important facility of its kind.
Washington and Israel
No, it's not at all a call from the President but rather from a
public hotspot facing the White House in Washington DC :
In the hustle of the 2016 pre-election times I simply forgot to publish the below picture.
Sorry for that ! The picture can be named "Grabber King at the Chicago Trump Tower".
The US Department of State noticed my translation of a political poem originally written by
Guenter Grass, one German laureate of the Nobel Price for Literature. It's all about Israeli
militarism directed against Arab neighbours (i.e. their Semitic brethren...) and against Iran.
In the week after the author's death, my translation
of his poem was addressed by different US visitors :
US - Iranian Enmity
The National Defense University NDU in Washington DC, a US government institution,
visited a blogspot of mine and which is dealing with a scenario of mutual threats that
has steadily developed between Iran and the USA.
All
All of Central Asia and the Middle East
is under control of The Empire.
Well, not entirely ..........
An Iranian visitor enjoyed, as well, my visualization of the conflict ...
... and some US opinion forum even quoted my blogspot on mutual US-Iranian threats :
One visitor coming from the faculty of law at Ain Shams University in Cairo, Egypt, made
a Google search by simply entering the timeless adage of justice to be found above the
entrance of a Cairo law court, and found ..... my blogspot about decisive battles in Syria.
What an amazing coincidence !
After the ousting of Libyan dictator Muammar al-Ghadafi, a visitor called from some
internet access point nearby to Martyrs Square in Tripoli, the former capital of Libya.
It is on Martyrs Square that a shrine was established for the heroes of the revolution.
A "postcard" from the holy places of Makkah in Saudi-Arabia :
In August 2014 Islamic fighters were threatening Kurdish residents in the
Kirkuk region of Northern Iraq. People fled into the nearby mountaineous
area while Islamists headed further to Mosul. After the fall of Mosul, the
Islamist leader al-Baghdadi declared his caliphate in the great mosque
of Mosul.
Visitors coming from Northern Pakistan took immediate interest in the Iraqi developments.
They came from Islamabad, its southern environment, from Quetta and Peshawar (below).
Mongolia - Chingis Khan and the "Art of War"
A smiling Mogolian leader once presented his Mongolian horsemen to US president Bush.
When a Mongol horde invaded and destroyed the Caliphate of Baghdad in 1258, they left
a gigantic regional chaos similar to what did the US Cavalry under US president Bush. The
difference, however, is: The Mongol horde robbed what they could carry on horseback and
returned home, while the US sat and waited as oil wells cannot be so easily carried away.
Other "cold warriors" can be found on Elmendorf Air Base in Alaska, USA, .....
..... while some people are peacefully fighting the cold in an Inuit community on Greenland :
The "University of the South Pacific" on the lonesome island of Fiji, however, is a real "hotspot".
No wonder they provide a swimming pool needed to cool off the heated brains of young folks.
In comparison, the "Harvard Business School" in Cambridge,
Massachusetts, might make a point with a better reputation.