Breaking News: Subversiveness Beckons...

I am notified by a correspondent that my blog has now been blocked by the Great Firewall of China. All I can say is, what took them so long?

Should Burma Be Invaded?

Sunny Hundal is suggesting we start thinking about invading Burma. Having read the BBC article he links to HERE, it is easy to see why. However, military action against a country so close to China would be a big step indeed. Isn't it issues like this which show the United Nations to be such a useless and toothless organisation? Whatever China's failings - and it has many - its response to its own devastating earthquake has been in marked contrast to the lamentable failure of the Burmese regime to help its people.

While an invasion by western countries in unthinkable, a pan Asian force is something which could be considered. Discuss.

Brown Praises Chinese Premier's "Commitment to Local Democracy"

Rachel Sylvester has an excellent article in the Telegraph today contrasting the differences in approach to foreign policy of Tony Blair and Gordon Brown. In essence, she labels Blair a crusader and Brown a plodding pragmatist. Towards the end of the piece she comes out with this corker...

While Blair championed a Gladstonian moralistic approach, Mr Brown prefers the more cautious Palmerstonian attitude. When he returned from China recently, he commented on how impressed he had been by President Hu Jintao's commitment to local democracy.

Tell that to the Dalai Lama and the people of Tibet!!! What an astonishing thing for Brown to say. And wasn't Palmerston the architect of 'gunboat diplomacy'? I'd hardly describe that as cautious.