EFTA02368871

From: Office of Terje Rod-Larsen < =1 Sent: Monday, February 11, 2013 10:50 PM Subject: February 11 update Articl= 2. <https://mail.google.com/mail/./0/html/compose/static_files/blank_quirks.html4b> Bloomberg The Silence of the Drones</=> Fouad Ajami Articl= 4. <https://mailgoogle.com/mailN0/html/compose/static_files/blank_quirks.htmIttd> The Wall Street Journal The Pharaoh Fell, but His Poisonou= Legacy Lingers Fouad Ajami <http://online.wsj.com/searchherm.html?KEYWORDS=FOUAD+AJAMI&bylinesearch=true> Articl= 6. <https://mail.google.com/mail/=/0/html/compose/static_files/blank_quirks.htmIttf> The Diplomat 7 Reasons China and Japan Won't Go To War <http://thediplomat.com/=013/02/10/7-reasons-china-and-japan-wont- go-to-wad> Trefor Moss Ar=icle 1. The Guardian <http://w=w.guardian.co.uk/theguardian> Israel: Washi=gton calling EFTA_R1_01368261 EFTA02368871 Editorial </=> 10 February 2013 --=It seems the first foreign visit <http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4341548,00.html> of Barack Obama <http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/barac=-obama>'s second term will be to Israel chttp://www.guardian.coruk/world/israel> . In making that choice, the president sends an important signal =nd one that is long overdue. What is optimistically still referred to as t=e peace process has been stalled for several years. There is plenty of bla=e to go around for that. But a small part of it rests with Mr Obama himself. In his first term h= didn't visit Israel once, not even, Israelis complain, when he was in the=neighbourhood. That was a mistake, limiting the influence he could exert o=er Israel's government and, more importantly perhaps, its people. As Bill Clinton, the last US president to come close =o a Middle East breakthrough, advises today's diplomats: Israelis need to =now that if the tanks were ever to start rolling in from across the Jordan= you'd be there in the trenches with them. An unlikely scenario these days perhaps, but the emotion is rea=. Still, an Obama vis=t can do more than offer reassurance of US solidarity. The mere announceme=t of the trip, scheduled for 21 March but liable to slip if there are dela=s in the formation of a new Israeli government, can itself have an impact. Some have argued <http://www.al-monitor.co=/pulse/originals/2013/02/why-is-obama-in-such-a-rush-to-visit- israel.html> that the White House published its travel plans now, e=rlier than necessary, in order to remind the parties to ongoing coalition =alks in Israel that peace should be a factor in their negotiations. With M= Obama coming, perhaps Binyamin Netanyahu and his potential partners will be obliged to think not only of =urrently dominant domestic issues but also of relations with their most im=ediate neighbours. If that was indeed the motive, it may be paying off. Is=ael's outgoing deputy foreign minister, the hawkish Danny Ayalon, now says Israel should accept the UN's recent up=rade of the Palestinians' status — a move he and his government fiercely=rejected last November. For Palestinians to=, an Obama visit should be a boost — especially if he visits the West Ba=k cities of Ramallah or, as has been mooted, Jericho. The message will be =hat, for all the talk of a Washington foreign policy pivot to Asia, the Middle East is still a US priority and t=e Palestinian issue has not been forgotten. The prestige of a presidential=visit will strengthen those Palestinians who advocate the path of diplomac= over the path of violence — welcome, given that events in recent months have tended to have the reverse effect.=/span> Bitter experience s=ggests no one should expect too much of a single visit, even if the speculation <http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,1-4342870,00.html> is right and Mr Obama chairs a mini-summit, perhaps in =ordan, between Mr Netanyahu and Mahmoud Abbas. But the fact that the presi=ent is coming, and that he has in John Kerry a new secretary of state long=engaged in the issue and bitten, says one colleague, by "the peace bug", are small grounds for ho=e in a region that does not have many. Articl= 2. Bloomberg The Silence o= the Drones Fouad Ajami =/p> 2 EFTA_R1_01368262 EFTA02368872 Feb 10, 2013 -- In =imes of war, the law is not silent. War is not a moral wilderness: At the =econd Lateran Council in 1139, the use of the crossbow was banned among Eu=opean knights. Throughout history, there have been codes that even the hell of war could not override. I own up to being c=nflicted about the use of drone strikes <http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-02-06/drone-war- needs-clear-r=les-instead-of-more-leaks.html> . Those 19 young Arabs who struck the U.S. on Sept. 11, 20=1, shredded the old notions and rules of war, erased the line between comb=tants and noncombatants, brought soot and ruin onto American soil. Our cou=try had to be made ready for this new kind of war. We waged big milita=y campaigns in Afghanistan and Iraq, but the terrorists waged a twilight w=r of their own, bereft of scruples and limits. There would be no treaty of=surrender we could enforce, no capital city to be subdued. Chased from Afghanistan, they turned up in Yemen and S=malia. They were soldiers of the catacombs, and they thrived in ungoverned=spaces. Targeted killing wa= the response <http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2013-01-10/bloomberg-=iew-obama-must- come-clean-on-drones> of a great military power to the frustrations of this "asymm=trical" war. We didn't know that larger world of Islam from which this=war arose. We were sandbagged by regimes and rulers that feigned friendshi= with us as they winked at the terror that came our way. What was one to mak= of the New Mexico-born radical imam Anwar al-Awlaki chttp://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Anwar%20al- Awlaki&sit==wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_n=_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF- 8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&am=;sort=date:D:S:dl&partialfields=-wnnis:NOAVSYND&Ir=-Iang_ja> inciting his devotees to a holy war -- all in good Amer=canese? He wore no uniform, slipped into the badlands of his ancestral Yem=n and mastered the new means of communication. Awlaki's Fate In the strict legal=sm of things he was an American citizen, but he bore this country a deadly=animus. No tears need be shed for him. The strike that killed him, in Yeme= in September 2011, was a deed of just retribution. Presidential spokesman Jay Carney <http://search.bloomberg.com=search?q=Jay%20Carney&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystyle=heet=wnews&output =xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&fil=er=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:dl&partialfields=-w=nis:NOAVSYND&Ir=- Iang 's defense of the drone strikes as legal, ethical and wise =an stand in the case of Awlaki. The executive had been granted broad power= under the Authorization for Use of Military Force in the aftermath of Sep=. 11, and two presidents were given the leeway to prosecute this war on terrorism. In truth, the publi= didn't want to look too closely into the doings of our government. We l=ft it to our intelligence agencies and our military to keep us safe. But t=ere came a time -- after the doings of the night shift at Abu Ghraib became public -- when the writ granted our o=ficials was withdrawn. Liberals declared an all-out ideological war agains= the administration of George W. Bush <http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=George%20W.%20Bush&si=e=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews &output=xml_=o_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&a=p;sort=date:D:S:dl&partialfields=- wnnis:NOAVSYND&Ir=-Iang_ja= title=> . The horror, the hor=or: The renditions and the enhanced interrogation techniques and, yes, the=50 or so drone strikes used during the Bush years became, to the liberals <http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-02-08/obama-s-drone- attack-on=your-due-process.html> , a matter of national shame. A rising politician in the Democr=tic Party, a former 3 EFTA_R1_01368263 EFTA02368873 teacher of constitutional law at the University of Chi=ago at that, rode this sense of outrage to the pinnacle of political power= He posed as a moralist. Barack Obama <http://s=arch.bloomberg.com/search?q=Barack%20Obama&site=wnews&client=3Dwnews&proxystylesheet=wnews& output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8=amp;oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1=amp;partialfields=- wnnis:NOAVSVND&Ir=-Iang_ja> was certain that rendition and waterboarding and the prison at G=antanamo Bay were recruiting tools of the jihadis. We had sullied America=92s reputation in lands beyond, and he would heal the damage. Our practice= had run afoul of time-tested traditions and institutions, and in his stewardship, he promised, our values would ag=in be a compass for our deeds abroad. In hindsight, the g=eat reckoning for Obama came at the end of the first year of his presidenc=. Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab <http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Umar%20Farouk%20Abdulmuta=lab&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystyles heet=wnews&ou=put=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfield==wnnis&sort=date:D:S:dl&partialfields=- wnnis:NOAVSVND&Ir=3D-langja> , a young Nigerian, a disciple of Awlaki, came=close to bringing down an airliner over Detroit on Christmas Day 2009. It =as farewell to Kumbaya foreign policy: The world was a menacing place. Against the backgro=nd of the stirring Obama oratory, and the euphoric claim that the presiden='s personal biography was a bridge to the world of Islam, the young Nige=ian could have snuffed out the promise of the Obama presidency. From that close call, the president emerged a det=rmined leader in the war on terrorism. Stealth War =/p> He had his trusted =ide, John Brennan <http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=John%20Brennan&=ite=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&out put=xm=_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis=amp;sort=date:D:S:dl&partialfields=- wnnis:NOAVSYND&Ir=-Iang2a> , in a windowless office in the White House, and Brennan kn=w the world of intelligence and terrorism. He knew the Arabian Peninsula, =s he had served as an intelligence officer in Saudi Arabia -- a country wh=re secrets and things unacknowledged are the coin of the realm. Together the presid=nt and the spook oversaw a stealth war, and the president became his own t=rgeting officer. (Obama going over kill lists recalls President Lyndon Johnson chttp://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=lyndon%20Johnson&site=3Dwnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews &output=xml_no=dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&gettields=wnnis&=sort=date:D:S:dl&partialfields=- wnnis:NOAVSYND&Ir=-Iangja> 's poring over the map of Khe Sanh in search of bombing=targets in Vietnam; the marked difference is the anguish of LBJ, and by th= telling, the serene confidence of Obama that this is a war of necessity a=d a just campaign.) The drone strikes w=re the choice of a president who had given up on winning "hearts and min=s" in the North-West Frontier of Pakistan. Secure in the knowledge that =e can't be outflanked from the right by the Republicans, Obama served up a policy that was economical -- and remot=. Congress didn't intrude, and save for the purists at the American Civi= Liberties Union, there was no powerful intellectual lobby calling for acc=untability. The passion had dra=ned out of the progressives who had hounded Bush, Dick Cheney <http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Dick%20Cheney&site==news&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output =xml nodt=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&so=t=date:D:S:dl&partialfields.-wnnis:NOAVSYND&Ir=- Iangja> and Scooter Libby <http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Scoot=r%20Libby&site=wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&=mp ;output=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-88toe=UTF-884filter=p&ge=fields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:dl&partialfields=- wnnis:NOAVSYND&=mp;Ir=-Iang_ja> . Brennan had to step aside once when he was put up to hea= the Central Intelligence Agency, as a man tainted with the Bush legacy. H=s confirmation is certain this time around. 4 EFTA_R1_01368264 EFTA02368874 There remains the d=screpancy between an extensive campaign of drones and a passive foreign por icy that maintains -- the president's very words -- that an era of war i= ending. Forgive those Syrians left at the mercy of their dictator's cruel war: It is hard to explain to them w=y those drones don't somehow find their way to Bashar al-Assad <http://search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Bashar%20al- Assad&sit==wnews&client=wnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&output=xml_n=_dtd&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF- 8&filter=p&getfields=wnnis&am=;sort=date:D:S:dl&partialfields.-wnnis:NOAVSYNID&Ir=dangja> 's bunker. We do anti- terrorism. Wars of rescue are n=t an American specialty nowadays. Fouad Ajami <http:=/search.bloomberg.com/search?q=Fouad%20Ajami&site=wnews&client=3Dwnews&proxystylesheet=wnews&ou tput=xml_no_dtd&ie=UTF-8=amp;oe=UTF-884filter=p&getfields=wnnis&sort=date:D:S:d1=amp;partialfields=- wnnis:NOAVSYND&Ir=-Iangja> is a senior fellow at the Stanford University's Hoover Institu=ion and author of 'The Syrian Rebellion." Articl= 3. The Wall Street Jou=nal Obama's Gift =o Iran Editorial February 10, 2013 President Obama has with rare exceptions shunned even modest U.S. interve=tion abroad, and last week we learned more details of his aversion: His ch=ef military advisers confirmed that last year the President personally killed a plan supported by his main sec=rity advisers to arm the Syrian rebels. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Chairman of the Joint Chief= General Martin Dempsey didn't elaborate on the President's reasons for ki=ling the proposal. But the two senior officials acknowledged under questioning on Thursday from Senator John McC=in that they had supported the Petraeus-Clinton plan. On Friday White Hou=e spokesman Jay Carney <http://topics.wsj.com/person/C/Jay-Carney/6498> was typically dodgy and wouldn't confirm the news. But he =id volunteer a roundabout justification, claiming that "a lack of wea=ons is not the problem in Syria right now." He added that "we don't want any weapons to fall into the wrong hands=and potentially further endanger the Syrian people, our ally, Israel, or t=e United States." But if the rebels are flush with weapons, aren't those weapons=already in danger of falling into the wrong hands? One point of U.S. milit=ry aid is to have some influence on rebel behavior, while increasing the clout of more moderate factions. By doing n=thing, Mr. Obama has guaranteed that the rebels will be supplied by Qatar,=the United Arab Emirates and the Saudis who don't mind arming Sunni Salafi=ts. That's one of the lessons of "leading from behind" in Libya, but in Syria we aren't even foll=wing from behind. 5 EFTA_R1_01368265 EFTA02368875 Syria is Iran's main regional ally, and the longer the Syrian =ivil war rages the more disorder spreads in the region. Late last month Is=ael bombed a convoy carrying heavy weapons into Lebanon to help Israel's enemy and Iran's Shiite proxy, Hezbollah. A =uicker victory for the rebels backed by the U.S. two years ago might have =ut off Syria as a conduit for Iranian arms to Hezbollah and thus reduced t=e threat to Israel. The Petraeus-Clinton proposal speaks well of Mr. Obama's first=term security team but also raises more alarm about his second-term choice=. John Kerry, Chuck Hagel and John Brennan all lack the independent standing of Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Panetta and former =eneral Petraeus. They aren't likely to challenge Mr. Obama with views he d=esn't want to hear. U.S. military actio= other than drone warfare isn't in favor these days, but Syria is showing =ow doing nothing has costs of its own. In overruling his advisers, Mr. Oba=a has prolonged Syria's civil war, increased regional instability, and delivered a strategic gift to Iran, th= main enemy of Israel and the U.S. Articl= 4. The Wall Street Jou=nal The Pharaoh F=II, but His Poisonous Legacy Lingers Fouad Ajami <http://online.wsj.com/search/term.html?KE=WORDS=FOUAD+AJAMI&bylinesearch=true> February 10, 2013 -= Two years ago, on Feb. 11, 2011, the Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak chttp://topics.wsj.com/person/M/Hosni-Mubarak/6479> stepped aside, overwhelmed by 18 days of protes=s. Silent and remote, he had ruled for three decades. He had offered his countrymen—and powers beyond—the sol= gift of stability. He was a gendarme on the banks of the Nile. Now his co=ntry was done with him, and the vaunted stability of his near 30-year reig= was torn asunder. Yet it is only against the backdrop of the sordid political la=dscape of today's Egypt—the hooliganism of the young, the lawlessness, t=e fault line between a feeble secular camp and a cynical Muslim Brotherhood bent on monopolizing political power—th=t the true work of the Mubarak tyranny can be fully appreciated. The "=deep state" he presided over—a Ministry of Interior with nearly two=million functionaries, a police force that ran amok—is Mubarak's true legacy. The disorder today in Egypt's streets is taken by some as proo= that the despot knew what he was doing, and that Egyptians are innately g=ven to tyranny. But that view misses the damage that this man and his greedy family and retainers inflicted on = nation of more than 80 million people that once had nobler ideas of its p=ace in the world. Grant the Egyptian =eople credit for their mercy and forbearance. The Pharaoh was deposed and =is two sons, who sat astride the country's economy and politics, were haul=d off to prison, but they were spared the gruesome end that was meted out next door to Moammar Gadhafi. A sickly=Mubarak was humbled, wheeled into court on a gurney. But he was not sent t= the gallows. True, some of the families of victims struck down during the=upheaval howled for his blood. But the day of his reckoning was deferred as the judiciary let the matter =un in the hope that the aged former ruler would succumb to a natural death= 6 EFTA_R1_01368266 EFTA02368876 It was odd, this tale of Hosni Mubarak. He had started out as = modest officer who had risen to power through the patronage and will of h=s predecessor, Anwar Sadat. Mubarak had not been imaginative or brave—and that was what recommended him to the f=amboyant Sadat. Where Sadat had been unabashedly open in his identificatio= with American power, the new man would be more discreet. Where Sadat had =een a trailblazer who had made that celebrated journey to Jerusalem, Mubarak would keep the peace with the Isr=elis, but keep them at arm's length. Throughout his reign, a toxic brew poisoned the life of Egypt=97a mix of anti-modernism, anti-Americanism and anti- Zionism. That trinity=ran rampant in the universities and the professional syndicates and the official media. As pillage had become the =bsession of the ruling family and its retainers, the underclass was left t= the rule of darkness and to a culture of conspiracy. The middle class was=tentative and timid, unsure of itself. It knew the defects of the regime but could not contest its power.= More important, wit= the Muslim Brotherhood quietly toiling in the shadows, broad segments of =he middle class succumbed to the theocratic temptation. Wealth accumulated=in the Arab states and the Gulf had remade the Brotherhood. Its members were sly: They accepted the subtle acc=mmodation offered them by the regime. The historical role=of the centralized state in Egypt as the principal agent of social change =as abandoned. No wonder the Brotherhood sat out the early and decisive pha=e of the 2011 protests in Tahrir Square. Courage was not the hallmark of the Brotherhood. Its theorists were still =aintaining that the ruler was due deference and obedience while a new gene=ation of activists was battling the security forces. Yet the Brotherhood=had no scruples about "hijacking" a revolution that was not thei=s. The annals of revolutions the world over bear testimony to the truth th=t the rule of the moderates in times of revolutions is always undone by the ascendancy of the extremists. (Think of the libera=s who rode with Ayatollah Khomeini in 1979—so many of them were cut down=by firing squads.) It was no surprise that the Egyptian liberals and secularists q=arreled among themselves and were feckless and divided. The dictatorship h=d not allowed them political space and experience. In hindsight, the tipping point in the ruin of Egypt came in 2=05. The dictator rigged yet another presidential election, his fifth in a =ow, and he ordered a decent young rival, Ayman Nour, to prison on trumped =p charges. The administration of George W. Bush grasped the importance of the moment, but Mubarak brushed t=eir entreaties aside. President Obama and his advisers had two years on their watch b=fore the upheaval. But they lacked the interest and the determination—an= the knowledge of matters Egyptian. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton described Mubarak as a friend of her family, and =ice President Joe Biden opined that the regime was stable even as millions=of Egyptians had gone out to push it into its grave. Today, a stalemate =aralyzes Egypt: The Brotherhood won a plurality in parliamentary elections=that began in 2011, but an activist judiciary declared the elections uncon=titutional and ordered parliament dissolved in June 2012. The Brotherhood drafted and secured the passage of a new con=titution by referendum in December, but those unreconciled to the reign of=the Brotherhood wanted nothing to do with it. Mohammed Morsi has the presidency, but he was defied some days=ago when he ordered a curfew in the cities of Ismailia, Suez and Port Said= Thousands went into the streets to sing and dance and play soccer in the night. From afar, those with a superficia= knowledge of Egypt think of it as a country willing to slip under the yok= of the Brotherhood. But Egypt is a skeptical, weary country; it wears its=faith lightly, and its people have an innate suspicion of those who overdo their religious zeal. The economy is wrecked and the government has run down its for=ign reserves as it attempts to maintain a system of costly subsidies. A $4=8 billion International Monetary Fund loan was tentatively agreed on, but the government was unwilling to put th=ough the austerity measures required by the loan. Only the remittances of =gyptians abroad, an 7 EFTA_R1_01368267 EFTA02368877 impressive total of $19 billion in 2012, averted catas=rophe. The ruling bargain that had the Egyptians give up their freedom for bread, and for the handouts of=the state, still obtains. The old regime fell, but its ways endure.=/p> Nowadays freedom is out of fashion in American official thinki=g, and the tumult in Arab lands serves as an alibi for abdication. But we =hould know that the bargain with the Arab dictatorships brought our way the jihadists. Two products of Mubarak'= Egypt must be figured into an audit of that regime: the Cairene al Qaeda =eader Ayman al- Zawahiri and the psychopath Mohammad Atta, who led the deat= pilots of 9/11. It was folly and naiveté to think that we really knew and could befriend the tyrants. Mr. Ajami is a s=nior fellow at Stanford's Hoover Institution and the author of "The S=rian Rebellion" (Hoover Institution Press, 2012). Articl= 5. The Washington Post= Asian tension= add urgency to Obama's 'pivot' Fred Hiatt <http://www.washingtonpost.com/fred-hiatt/=011/02/24/AB9dIXN_page.html> February 10,2013 -= As President Obama ponders his second-term foreign policy, he faces jihad=sts spreading across North Africa, Syria dissolving into chaos, Israelis a=d Palestinians further apart than ever, Ira= trending toward civil war <http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/middle_east/arab-spri=g-style-protests-take-hold-in- iraq/2013/02/08/f875ef7e-715f-11e2-b3f3-b263=708ca37_story.html> , Afghanistan mired in corruption and Iran relentlessly accelerating its nuc=ear program. That may turn out t= be the easy stuff. In Asia, things cou=d get really scary. Since he entered th= White House, Obama has wanted to shift attention and resources to the Pac=fic. The biggest opportunities are there: economic growth, innovation, pot=ntial for cross-border investment and trade. That the 21st century will be a Pacific century has become a cliche= The cliche may stil= prove out. But rather suddenly, the region of economic miracles has becom= a zone of frightening confrontation. The North Koreans are turning out videos depict=ng New York in flames <http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/02=05/that-crazy-north-korean-video-of-new-york- blowing-up-now-with-english-s=btitles/> . Chinese warships have fixed their weapon-targeting radar chttp://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/=apan-and-chinas-island-argument-is-a-us-concern/2013/02/05/fbc7ed62- 6999-1=e2-afS3-7b2b2a7510a8_story.html> on a Japanese ship and h=licopter. Quarrels have intensified between 8 EFTA_R1_01368268 EFTA02368878 South Korea and Japan, North K=rea and South Korea, China and the Philippines, India and China. Taiwan is=always a possible flashpoint. Any one of these could drag the United States in. The scariest develo=ment may be in North Korea, the world's only hereditary prison camp, whe=e the young leader — the third-generation Kim — seems determined to ex=and and improve his nuclear arsenal until he becomes a genuine threat not only to South Korea and Japan but to the United =tates chttp://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jan/24/n=rth-korea-nuclear-rocket-us> as well. Chinese officials are =aid to be alarmed by his intransigence but unwilling to try to rein him in= fearing even more the instability that might result. Obama in his first t=rm adopted a reasonable policy of ignoring North Korea as much as possible, while making clear that he would=reciprocate if it became more accommodating. Kim Jong Eun, who is thought =o be in his late 20s, could find ways to make that stance untenable. Meanwhile, China'= increasing assertiveness discomfits neighbors throughout Southeast and Ea=t Asia. China has claimed pretty much the whole South China Sea, though it= coastline is farther from much of it than that of Vietnam, Malaysia or the Philippines. It has sent planes and =hips to challenge Japan over a few rocky outcroppings that Japan calls the=Senkakus and China the Diaoyu Islands. It has been steadily increasing the=size and capability of its military forces; for the first time in many years, a neighbor, Japan, is following suit. If all this seems d=cidedly last century, maybe it's because new leaders in every key countr= are second- or third- generation, bearing the burdens of their past. Japan=se Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is the grandson of a leader of imperial Japan—including in occupied China — who remade=himself as a pro-American prime minister after World War II. South Korea=92s president-elect, Park Geun-hye, is the daughter of a longtime presiden=; her mother was killed by a devotee of North Korea <http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013.01-25/world/36548=30_1_park-geun-hye•first-lady- language-courses> <=pan style="font-size:18.0pt">. (The bullet was intended for her father, who was later assassinated by his intelligenc= chief.) Xi Jinping, China's new president, is the son of a revolutionar= colleague of Mao Tsetung who helped battle the Japanese during World War =1. North Korea's Kim Jong Eun is the grandson of Kim II-sung, who according to North Korean mythology fough= the Japanese in the 1930s and 1940s and the Americans and South Koreans i= the 1950s. It's intriguing t= speculate on the ghostly whisperings these leaders may hear. It may be mo=e useful, though, to focus on the national weaknesses that may propel them=to act. North Korea is a failed and hungry state for which blackmail and bluster have long been the only survival str=tegy. China is a rising power and a growing economy — but led by a one-p=rty regime that may be tempted to use nationalism to distract a restive po=ulation from domestic troubles. Japan has discarded one prime minister after another, pretty much on an annual b=sis, for most of the past decade, an instability that leaves it punching b=low its economic and military weight. All of this makes t=e region hungry for U.S. presence and leadership, which Obama understood w=th his first-term promise of a "pivot" to Asia. Regional leaders hope =e can make good on that promise in a second term but wonder whether U.S. policy, too, will be shaped by political weak=ess. 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