‘Not a reliable ally’: Japan eyes Nato as Trump erodes faith in US guarantees

It’s SCMP, a Hong Kong or (more appropriately Chinese) “news” outlet. Hong Kong’s democracy and free speech died in the late 2010s, with the recent jailing of Jimmy Lai being the nail in the coffin. Chinese “news” outlets have no credibility whatsoever

Welcome to listnook. Using headlines to misinform people like always. One of the reasons listnookors are in denial every election.

Yeah, it's bizarre to me so many trying to use SCMP as legit source.

He is making russia out of america

Yup. The only international relationship the US has now is a collar with Israel and Russia taking turns at the leash.

Well yeah, no one can trust the US any longer. The one thing that was consistent with the US across administrations was a common and long-term foreign policy, and the immense trust and soft power they built up over decades of meticulous work. Trump put a dent in it in his first term, but had too many actually decent advisors around him to do permanent damage. They then elected Biden who did his best to repair relations and rebuild trust, but after only 4 years the American public decided to re-elect Trump. This time he's been meticulous and consistent in his complete errancies, erraticness and arbitrary actions. It marks a paradigm shift in geopolitics, where it is evident that the US has changed course, and Americans to a large enough degree want this chaos and unpredictability. They want to tear down all good-will, trust, soft power and relationships the US has built over the last century. Probably not out of any deep thinking, but because they've been led to believe that ill-will is good. Recovering from the effort of this administration will take decades of effort, and will probably never actually recover. No one can trust Trump, or the US, to be true to their word, or to abide by any agreement or treaty any more. They've shown that, at the slightest change of wind or odor of profit, they won't hesitate to tear up anything.

Honestly in Europe Putin's impression is not complete lunatic, he does definitely has his own gameplan that he tries to advance and is definitely making calculated moves. Many, including me will call them evil but that's not the point I am trying to make.  Trump is just a complete lunatic, 100% agreed. 

To clarify my comment. When I refer to Russia, I mean Putin. It is clear Trump admires Putin and he emulates him and his style to the extent he can. However Trump is not nearly as clever. He's more impulsive - not strategic and has surrounded himself with yes-men. I am sure for his part Putin is playing him. Both Putin and Xi recognize that their country's power has peaked. Demographic trends show both nations will be in decline in the coming generations. Trump, and his retreat from being the world's only global superpower to being a continental power, is a gift for them.

Yup. Trump is destroying the US. Of course Russia can gain from that but not as much as it would from a functioning US allied to it. Trump does benefit Putin but not as much as the vultures Thiel, Sacks etc that are salivating (do vultures salivate?) at the prospect of ripping the carcass of the US apart.

And many of them wore “I’d rather be Russian than democrat” shirts

"The mobilization of millions cannot be improvised" - Helmuth von Moltke the Younger I guarantee it. He had his invasion set to start right at the start of what would have been trumps second term. You dobt just simply call something like an invasion off.  He went through with it anyway and immediately began strategizing how to ensure a trump victory in '24. 

I'm Canadian. So I don't have a horse in the race so to speak but I have a lot of American friends. I avoid talking politics so I can keep them as friends :), but occasionally it comes up. My friends are pretty evenly split between Dem / GOP. At first the Republicans would say "I like his policies, I just wish he wouldn't tweet so much." Now those same people are quieter. A little embarrassed about his antics but I suspect still like most of his "policies". I get it. When you are fed up you just want break everything and start over. Among other things he's a contrarian and some people like that. We hear "Russia is not our enemy" - perhaps, but it doesn't mean it is our friend and not a threat. There are still many Republicans who still view Russia is a threat, and this will not sit well. It is sad. I'd like to visit my friends but I won't travel to the US anymore - we meet in Mexico on vacations now. They don't understand how pissed the world is with the US. For now the animosity is focused on him and his entourage, not Americans in general. But that may change as we realize more that there are still mainy Americans who support him and MAGA.

Most of us Americans will never forget this shit. I know that I won't. Donald Trump is the great divider; He's torn America apart anf set us against each other, and he's absolutely alienated all of our allies, all while putting European countries in impossible situations while sowing division there as well. It's completely unconscionable. All this instability and strife because of some dumb f****** tabloid star and c**** TV personality. It boggles the mind.

Russian elect Trump is why you shouldn't allow other countries dictate your elections. And don't you f****** dare pretend they didn't do anything.

This Canadian will never forgive America for electing a man who has threatened to erase Canada from the map.

Yeah, because Trump would definitely not use the lack of support for his stupid war then subsequently declaring he's not trustworthy as an excuse not to defend historic allies.

To quote France’s Europe minister, “We cannot leave the security of Europe in the hands of voters in Wisconsin every 4 years”

To be fair. Last time was really bad. Do you remember January 6th? As if things couldn't get worse , they have The general public cared more about other topics rather than their own nation

agreed. screw the america uber alles crowd.

As european, not sure I agree. I would rather have the system as it was pre-Trump. It worked well for everybody involved. Now there will be much more uncertainty, the world will be more dangerous, less coordinated and there will be more conflicts, because instead of basically one massive block around USA, which was spread across the globe and was unchallengable you will have 3-4 different blocks fighting for power eventually added to the current powers. Even the system will be much worse, as it turned from "everybody can profit" into whatever Trump is twisting the world into. Which makes it worse for basically everybody. Hunger, diseases, local wars, unstability,... Everything. And I am not sure if Democrats are able to revert it. Even the tariffs.

>But as a Canadian I'm thankful this is happening. I think it serves Canada and other nations well in the long run. We always knew this was a possibility, and the cynics would argue that it was inevitable for the americans to elect a man so extreme that he would alienate the US from everyone else (I wouldn't have bet money on a pedophilic gameshow host versus someone smarter, but here we are). This is the "ripping off the band-aid" moment, all countries, and in particular Canada, need and needed to divest away from the US. It's great to see that finally happening now.

I think there will be more blocks, who will cooperate on certain issues, but in general they will be distributed based on key aspects. Creating too big alliance is kind of trap, as there is just not enough common interests. I dont think there are enough common interests to create a block like you say. EU has completely different problems and threats compared to other blocks as mentioned. There are very few common interests, basically only to counterweight USA/China. . * Japan, Korea, India (Philippines,...) are worried about China, they are not worried about Russia. * Europe has issues with Russia and potential migrant crises from middle east/Africa, we dont really care about China as a threat. * Its a question, where Canada will aim, but I would say they are more worried about Russia (in the arctics). * Gulf states will form their own block (potentially with Turkey) to solve their issues. And these blocks will cooperate depending on common grounds.

I agree with your conclusion, but Mexico just relabeled an existing healthcare program that's been around for a decade. They didn't actually change anything of note. 

China doesn't interrupt US from doing stupid things.

>FBI Uncovers Chinese Plot To Just Sit Back And Enjoy Collapse Of United States

They're laughing and making money from the sidelines.

They are chilling and waiting. I would not be surprised if they replaced USA in Gulf as the main partner for everything - investments, supplies of weapons and products,... On top of it, they can actually negotiate with Iran and help create some framework for them to cooperate. Yes, they will not be the policeman, but they dont need to. It just makes too much sense for both sides.

Canada doesn't have the projection capabilities to fight across the Pacific. I could potentially see them joining something if it also included the UK, Australia and New Zealand but I don't think Canada is going to be eager to fight China without significant allied support. Historically Japan and South Korea have been very adverse to working together although in the last couple years they started doing joint drills. They won't enter into a formal alliance but they're easing out some of the kinks so if they happened to find themselves on the same side of a war they could work together more effectively.

Just get everyone together to form a Global Defense Initiative. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Mash em! Stick em in a stew!

Yep. They were a reputable news source before China took over Hong Kong but now they're just another propaganda outlet.

Diaoyu/Senkaku/Diaoyutai island is disputed among Japan, China AND Taiwan. The name of the island - Diaoyutai was first given by Taiwan in fact. Taiwan also has disputes with the Philippines and Vietnam on Taiping island. Japan also has a huge dispute over Dokdo with South Korea. Therefore it is correct that Japan has dispute with all its neighbors, perhaps exclude the US since they are under the mercy of the US at the moment. People on Listnook are generally very ill-informed about things outside of the western world so I'm not surprised few know what's going on in Asia.

He's an Australian living in Japan. The South China Morning Post (SCMP), with its Sunday edition, the Sunday Morning Post, is a Hong Kong-based English-language newspaper owned by Alibaba Group. This article is literally CCP propaganda

I did and also noted he isn’t Japanese lmao this headline reads differently and you know that lol

Not to mention the recent global tariffs made the EU, Canada, and many other US allies move away from US reliance and shift towards China. There isn't a regional nation that is pro-Japan either, because of the unresolved matters from the Imperial days. South Korea and Japan's intelligence sharing was barely holding on to the threads, and was made possible because the US was forcing them to. That cooperation broke off whenever the US looked away or when Japan decided to launch a trade war against Korea, because they brought up the historical issues. I don't know, maybe Japan can reach out to the Philippines or Australia, but that wouldn't be enough. Japan might find itself isolated in the future against China. Their policy made sense under Biden, but not at all right now.

Indeed that is possible, I wonder why that isn’t already happening since I dont really see downsides to that.

Geography is more important in the military world than it is in the broadcasting world. Who has the ability to power project around Japan?

*taps forehead* The best defense is a good offense.

It's the one Takaichi wanted to get rid of for the longest time but ironically it's also the one she cited to Trump to brush off his request for Japan to send ships to Hormuz.

They don't have an army because they can't have a military force of their own. What they have is a ground self-defense force, much like they don't have a navy rather they have maritime self-defense force or no air force but they have air self-defense force instead. These are only meant for defending their sovereignty and territory, not to be used for striking assault or to a greater extent, invasion, of other sovereign states. or offer any kind of assistance in the context of military offense (because again, they aren't a military).