Epstein Secrets

over Iran. This comes at a time when U.S. relations with China have been tense. Indeed, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta used a recent visit to Vietnam to underscore how the United States intends to back its allies in the Asia-Pacific region and help them enforce their rights in the South China Sea

o allow intervention in Syria? Assad would still be one of Moscow's principal allies in the Middle East. Russia would still have port facilities at Tartus. It would still want to protect the principle that a government can suppress popular demonstrations by any means it chooses, including the kinds of

stan, the one for which he will be remembered in military history. Perhaps that's because things in Afghanistan are still muddled; will it end like Vietnam — an EFTA00659900 abject, helicopters-flying-out-of-Kabul, people-hanging-on-the-skids defeat — or in an unsatisfying and untidy sort-of victory,

f the Assad regime would almost inevitably decrease Russian power in the Middle East and the Mediterranean. Syria has hosted Russia's naval base in Tartus for several decades and, since 1971, Syria has been Moscow's closest Arab ally. Syria is the largest Arab purchaser of Russian weapons and is seen

wildly optimistic. These disparate EFTA00660762 estimates need to be resolved, yet recent efforts to survey fossil fuels reserves by states like Vietnam have been stalled by the China Maritime Safety Administration, which has taken to cutting survey cables of vessels chartered to provide better info

tal areas around the city of Lattakia -- where, incidentally, the last remaining Russian military base outside the former Soviet Union, the port of Tartus, happens to be located - - are their strongholds. Indeed, during the French Mandate period, there was a separate Alawite state based on these territ

a summer of blood David Ignatius June 22 -- "Peace is at hand," Henry Kissinger famously announced in October 1972 after a seeming breakthrough in Vietnam negotiations. But it wasn't at hand. It took three more months to complete the Paris Peace Accords, which collapsed in 1975 when North Vietnam ove

ossible, for the opposition to topple him. At the UN and elsewhere, Syria enjoys the protection of Russia -- perhaps concerned for its naval base at Tartus. The Russian view is that the Syrian crisis poses no threat to international peace and EFTA_R1_02031589 EFTA02690698 15 security. China, India,

s estimates are wildly optimistic. These disparate estimates need to be resolved, yet recent efforts to survey fossil fuels reserves by states like Vietnam have been stalled by the China Maritime Safety Administration, which has taken to cutting survey cables of vessels chartered to provide better inf

al areas around the city of Lattakia -- where, incidentally, the last remaining Russian military base outside the former Soviet Union, the port of Tartus, happens to be located -- are their strongholds. Indeed, during the French Mandate period, there was a separate Alawite state based on these territ

t. More recently, China sternly warned the overseas arm of India's Oil and Natural Gas Corp. against prospecting for hydrocarbons off the coast of Vietnam. None of these tensions is likely to abate anytime soon, especially because India remains acutely dependent on external energy sources. Despite th

ent in 2009 by killing hundreds, not thousands.) The Russians require stability in Damascus only partly for the sake of naval rights in the port of Tartus. Syria and Iran are the two remaining levers the Kremlin has in the Middle East. Moreover, the collapse of a pro-Moscow dictatorship in the Middle

ng a summer of blood David Ignatius June 22 -- "Peace is at hand," Henry Kissinger famously announced in October 1972 after a seeming breakthrough in Vietnam negotiations. But it wasn't at hand. It took three more months to complete the Paris Peace Accords, which collapsed in 1975 when North Vietnam overra

possible, for the opposition to topple him. At the UN and elsewhere, Syria enjoys the protection of Russia -- perhaps concerned for its naval base at Tartus. The Russian view is that the Syrian crisis poses no threat to international peace and HOUSE_OVERSIGHT_030169 --- PAGE BREAK --- 15 security. China