Humphrey Hawksley

Two flashpoints have emerged recently, threatening regional wars and pitting global powers against each other. They happen to be run by accidental dynastic heirs, each representing a new generation of dictatorship whereby sons inherited jobs which they might never have wanted. One is North Korea, which draws in the competing wills of Beijing and Washington

Like the deserts of the Middle East, the barren islands of the South China Sea now loom as a new theatre of war.  Asian countries, indeed America, too, are at odds over how to deal with this power-play by a rising China — if that’s what it is; or scramble for maritime minerals; or as recently