analyst

Jan. 1 (Asia Today) — Kim Tae-woo, director of nuclear security research at the Korea Institute for Military Affairs, said the security outlook on the Korean Peninsula remains grave as North Korea continues missile activity and China advances new weapons systems.

In a column, Kim pointed to North Korea’s missile launches late last year and its unveiling of what he described as a nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarine under construction. He also cited reports of a Chinese hypersonic glide vehicle test.

Kim said the White House in December released a four-chapter National Security Strategy that he described as notably different in tone and language from past versions. He said it explicitly embraces “America First” and frames policy around U.S. national interests.

Kim said the strategy argues that post-World War II U.S. leaders wrongly believed taking on global burdens served U.S. interests. He said it criticizes free trade for weakening U.S. industry and portrays alliances in transactional terms, arguing some allies shifted security costs to Washington or drew it into conflicts not tied to core U.S. interests.

Kim wrote that the strategy’s stated goals include U.S. survival and security, neutralizing external threats and unfair trade, maintaining the strongest military and nuclear arsenal, developing next-generation missile defense, sustaining a dynamic economy, protecting industrial and energy capacity and preserving leadership in science, technology and soft power.

He said the document defines core U.S. interests as maintaining dominance in the Western Hemisphere, protecting freedom of navigation and supply lines in the Indo-Pacific, restoring what it calls Western civilization’s identity and self-reliance in Europe, preventing hostile forces from dominating Middle Eastern energy and preserving U.S. leadership in cutting-edge science.

Kim said the strategy lists U.S. political institutions, economic innovation, financial leadership, technological and military strength, alliance ties, geographic advantages and natural resources as key tools. He said it also lays out guiding principles including a focus on core security interests, “peace through strength,” a preference for non-intervention and demands for greater allied defense spending.

On regional policy, Kim said the strategy describes the Western Hemisphere as a zone where the United States will seek to maintain dominance, prevent external threats and block illegal immigration, drug trafficking and human trafficking, while expanding partnerships and, if needed, redeploying forces to address urgent threats.

For Asia, Kim said the strategy emphasizes economic security and military deterrence while criticizing past assumptions that integrating China into the global economy would lead it to accept a rules-based order. He said it targets China’s state-led industrial practices, intellectual property theft and efforts to restrict access to resources such as rare earths. He added that it also says the United States will not accept persistent trade deficits with allies including Japan, South Korea, Australia, Canada and European partners.

On deterrence, Kim said the document maintains existing U.S. declaratory policy on Taiwan and calls deterring conflict in the Taiwan Strait a U.S. interest, arguing this requires conventional military superiority and greater allied cost-sharing and roles. He said it also warns that rival control of the South China Sea would pose a serious threat to U.S. interests and calls for cooperation from Asian nations from India to Japan to keep sea lanes open.

Kim said the Europe section urges European countries to reclaim identity and self-reliance and criticizes what it calls weakening economic weight and lax immigration policies. He said it presses Europe to pursue strategic stability with Russia, treat NATO less as an ever-expanding alliance and open markets to U.S. goods while offering fair treatment to U.S. companies.

Kim said the Middle East and Africa sections are comparatively brief, focusing on burden-sharing and limiting long-term intervention. He said the document argues the Middle East’s strategic value has declined due to increased U.S. oil production, while emphasizing preventing hostile control of energy and maritime routes such as the Strait of Hormuz, countering terrorism, supporting Israel and expanding the Abraham Accords. On Africa, Kim said it calls for selective engagement tied to resource security.

Kim argued the strategy no longer reflects the image of the United States as an “Uncle Sam” defender of liberal democracy and human rights. He said it does not emphasize strengthened combined defense and extended deterrence, and he wrote that it does not mention North Korea’s nuclear program or the North Korean threat. He said South Korea appears only a few times, largely in contexts that call for greater allied defense burdens and fair trade.

Kim said South Korea has limited options, even if concerns grow about the reliability of U.S. commitments after what he described as a blunt statement that the era of America carrying the world order is over. He wrote that South Korea should treat a “changing America” as the new normal, keep the alliance as the cornerstone of its security and approach talks on tariffs, investment and alliance modernization as critical.

The views expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of this publication.

– Reported by Asia Today; translated by UPI

© Asia Today. Unauthorized reproduction or redistribution prohibited.

Most things in this world have their good points and their not-so-good points, and this is certainly true of “The Copenhagen Test,” a science-fiction spy story about a man whose brain has been hacked. Without his knowing it, everything he sees and hears is uploaded to an unknown party, in an unknown place, as if he were a living pair of smart glasses. Created by Thomas Brandon and premiering Saturday on Peacock, its conceit is dramatically clever, if, of course, impossible. What do you watch when you learn that what you’re watching is being watched?

In a preamble, we meet our hero, Andrew Hale (Simu Liu, “Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings”), a first-generation Chinese American Green Beret, rescuing hostages in Belarus. A voice in his headset instructs him that there is enough room for one on a departing helicopter and that he must prioritize an American citizen. Instead he picks a foreign child. This, we will learn, is the less-preferred choice.

Three years later, Hale is working for the Orphanage, a shadowy American intelligence agency that spies on all the less-shadowy American intelligence agencies — watching the watchers. (So much watching!) Its proud boast is that, since its inception in the Bush I administration, it has never been compromised. (Until someone started looking through Hale’s eyes, that is.) There is a secret entrance to their giant complex, accessed by locking eyes with a statue in a library — it’s thematically appropriate, but also very “Get Smart!” That is a compliment, obviously.

The lower floor is where the analysts toil; entry to the upper floor, where the action is, is by the sort of fancy key that might have been used to open an executive washroom in 1895. (The decor is better there, too, with something of the air of an 1895 executive washroom.) Hale, who has been been listening to and translating Korean and Chinese chatter, dreams of moving upstairs, which will come with the discovery that his head is not entirely his own.

Meanwhile, he has been suffering migraines, seizures and panic attacks. Ex-fiancée Rachel (Hannah Cruz), a doctor, has been giving him pills under the table. Other characters of continuing interest include Michelle (Melissa Barrera), a bartender who will spy on Hale from the vantage point of a girlfriend, sort of; Parker (Sinclair Daniel), a newly promoted “predictive analyst” with a gift for reading people and situations; Victor (Saul Rubinek), an ex-spook who runs a high-end restaurant and has known Hale forever; Cobb (Mark O’Brien), a rivalrous colleague whose Ivy League persona has been drawn in contrast to Hale’s; and Cobb’s uncle, Schiff (Adam Godley), who also has spy knowledge. Peter Moira (Brian d’Arcy James) runs the shop, and St. George (Kathleen Chalfant) floats above Moira.

As parties unknown look through Hale’s eyes, the Orphanage is watching Hale with the usual access to the world’s security cameras. (That bit of movie spycraft always strikes me as far-fetched; however, a conversation in the privacy of my kitchen will somehow translate into ads on my social feeds, so, who knows?) “The Copenhagen Test” isn’t selling a surveillance state metaphor, in any case; this is just one of those “Who Can You Trust?” stories, one that keeps flipping characters to keep the show going, somewhat past the point of profitability.

Like most eight-hour dramas, it’s too long — “Slow Horses,” the best of this breed, sticks to six — and over the course of the show, things grow muddied with MacGuffins and subplots. While it’s easy enough to enjoy what’s happening in the moment, it can be easy to lose the plot and harder to tell just who’s on what side, or even how many sides there are. (It doesn’t help that nearly everyone is ready to kill Hale.) I can’t go into details without crossing the dreaded spoiler line, but even accepting the impossible tech, much of “The Copenhagen Test” makes little practical sense, including the eponymous test. (Why “Copenhagen?” Det ved jeg ikke. Danish for “I don’t know.”) I spent so much time untwisting knots and keeping threads straight that, though I continued to root in a detached way for Hale, I ceased to care entirely about the fate of the Orphanage and the supposedly free world.

The show is well cast. While the characters on paper are pretty much types, each actor projects the essence of the part, adding enough extra personality to suggest a real person. (And they’re all nice to look at.) When not keeling over from pain, or engaged in a shootout or hand-to-hand combat, Liu is an even-keeled, quiet sort of protagonist — rather in the Keanu Reeves vein — and as a Chinese Canadian actor, still a novelty among American television action heroes. He does have a kind of chemistry with Barrera, who has screen chemistry all on her own, though it’s somewhat limited by the demands of the plot.

The ending, including a diminished-chord twist, is pretty pat, if happier than one might imagine given the ruckus that’s gone before. Neat bows are tied — though at least one has been left loose in hopes, according to my own predictive analysis, of a second season. And though releasing a series in the last week of the year doesn’t exactly betoken confidence, I can predict with some confidence that there might be one.

Katie Pavlich, a longtime contributor to Fox News, is leaving the network to join NewsNation.

Pavlich, a conservative political analyst, will have a nightly 10 p.m ET program starting early next year, the Nexstar-owned cable news channel announced Monday.

Pavlich, 37, will replace Ashleigh Banfield, who held down the time period since 2021. Banfield will partner with the network to create digital true crime content, including a podcast.

Pavlich has spent the last 16 years as news editor of the conservative website Townhall.com. She appeared regularly on cable ratings leader Fox News since 2013, appearing as a guest co-host on “The Five” and a fill-in host on its prime-time programs.

Pavlich becomes the latest Fox News alum to join NewsNation. Leland Vittert, a former correspondent for the network, is NewsNation’s 9 p.m. Eastern host. Chris Stirewalt, who was fired from Fox after the 2020 presidential election, is politics editor for the network.

Veteran cable news host Ashleigh Banfield joined NewsNation in March.

(NewsNation)

NewsNation was launched in 2020 as an alternative to the three major cable news networks at a time when all leaned heavily into opinion programming in prime time. But the network has moved toward political debate since Chris Cuomo became its highest rated host in prime time.

An Arizona native who grew up as an avid hunter, Pavlich is a strong advocate of the 2nd Amendment. She poses with firearms in a number of photos on her Instagram.

Pavlich is the author of several books, including New York Times bestsellers “Fast and Furious: Barack Obama’s Bloodiest Scandal” and “Assault and Flattery: The Truth About the Left and Their War on Women.”