Word: straitly
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...island's defenses - after all, Beijing periodically threatens to invade whenever the "rebel province" makes noises about formal independence, and the Aegis vessels would make that threat even more implausible. (Military experts believe that even now China lacks the power to dominate in the air over the Taiwan Strait, without which an invasion becomes almost impossible...
...although Beijing was doing its best Tuesday to spin the defense budget increase as a warning shot, Taiwan may not be the primary motor driving Beijing's military spending. The primary function of the People's Liberation Army lies not across the Taiwan Strait or anywhere else in the region; China's military's primary purpose remains maintaining order at home. And as the social consequences of its transition to capitalism manifest in mounting threats to domestic stability, the military becomes an increasingly indispensable instrument of power to the leadership in Beijing. But the military is not unaffected...
...leaves the U.S. in something of a bind: Washington is bound, by its Taiwan Relations Act, to ensure the island's ability to defend itself. In 1996 that commitment brought Washington and Beijing to the precipice of confrontation, after President Clinton moved a naval battle group into the Taiwan Strait to avert an invasion. But the prospect of putting U.S. forces into harm's way on China's doorstep has never been an appealing one, which fuels the argument in Washington for enhancing Taiwan's own ability to defend itself. But Beijing is insisting that it would be forced...
...excuse CBS for Episode 2's immunity challenge, in which the contestants must eat "true Aboriginal food, what they call bush tucker." The mangrove worm, the wichity grub, the bug and the shellfish are all fair enough, says Ian Lilley, of the University of Queensland's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Unit. But cow brain and the lining of a cow's stomach? Kids, there were no cows before the white man came along. This stuff makes great television, no doubt about it. But it's not true Aboriginal food. Maybe Tina, who couldn't stomach the stomach, should talk...
...case. "Why did Pan Am 103 crash on Lockerbie, not into the Atlantic Ocean?" Swire asked. With that he pointed to a fundamentally different hypothesis for the bombing, based on two events earlier in 1988. On July 3 the U.S. cruiser Vincennes shot down an Iranian Airbus over the Strait of Hormuz, killing 290 people and fueling calls for revenge from hard-liners in the Iranian government. Pan Am 103 blew up less than six months after that incident, but more than two years after the bombing raids on Tripoli. The logic of revenge is inscrutable, certainly, but the idea...