readx;

Bidding farewell to Li Tingxuan, Liu Wei once again transferred to the United Kingdom to participate in the charity gala held by Princess Anne, and donated a sum of money before returning to Las Vegas. Pen @ fun @ pavilion wWw. ｂｉｑUｇE。 ｉｎｆｏ

The task arranged by Li Tingxuan is very simple: to make trouble for the US federal political axe, so that Cronin has no time to take care of anything else.

It was up to Liu Wei to decide what to do, and Li Tingxuan did not make a clear arrangement.

For Liu Wei, this is not a big deal. The election is approaching, and Scott has already received the Republican nomination to become the presidential candidate. Although Cronin, who was halfway through the election, did not participate in the general election, and the candidates nominated by the Mingzhu Party were Secretary of State Sternberg and the retiring Admiral Robert, in order to win the election, Cronin still had to focus a lot on the election, and Stenberg was even more so.

You know, the United States does not have a "foreign minister", and the secretary of state is in charge of foreign affairs.

As the search and rescue efforts enter the final stages and the aftermath of the Manhattan attacks is almost underway, the public is more concerned about who created the disaster than about who created the disaster and how the federal axe will retaliate against the enemy. As representatives of the people, members of Congress have clung to these two issues and have continuously put pressure on the federal political axe to release more information.

According to Liu Wei's arrangement, Scott did not blame the federal political axe, but focused on retaliation.

Unfortunately, finding the real culprit is not easy.

Although the Federals gained a lot of new clues about the weapons and equipment used by the attackers, the explosives and detonating devices used to create the mass explosions, and the assembly sites of the attackers in Manhattan, these clues can only show how the attackers attacked Manhattan and how they defeated the American forces in the ensuing battle, causing incalculable losses.

As for where the attackers came from and who supported them behind the scenes, there is still no clue.

This result did not surprise the federal agents involved in the investigation and Cronin, who had just moved into the White House, but it was obvious that there could be no ambiguity when it came to explaining to Congress.

Without a clear purpose, Congress will not accept any rhetoric of the federal axe.

If you can't find out the real murderer, you can only create a "real murderer".

After sending off Kojiro Ikawa, Cronin focused on the question of who should be held responsible for the attack, or who should be targeted.

This is not a simple multiple-choice question, but the future of the United States is at stake.

Even as a newly inaugurated president, Cronin knows very well that the impending war will determine the direction of the United States for decades to come.

Although almost everyone who knows the inside story knows that there are no more than three countries that have the ability and motive to carry out this attack, and all of them are powerful powers, it is impossible for the United States to target a major power without any conclusive evidence and must create an enemy. Even if it chooses a regional power with a slightly less powerful surname, it will be difficult for the United States to bear the huge losses caused by the war.

After clarifying this scope, the US authorities can only choose the target of retaliation based on their national interests.

As Lee said, there are only two countries that qualify to be targeted by the United States for retaliation and that would lead the world to believe that its attack on Manhattan is related to the attack on Manhattan, one at the eastern and western ends of Asia, namely North Korea and Iran.

At this point, the problem becomes complicated.

Purely for the purpose of retaliation, Iran is the best option. The reason is simple: after defeating Saddam's regime and capturing Afghanistan, the United States has completed its strategic encirclement of Iran, and including Turkey to the west, it can launch an attack on Iran from three directions. From the perspective of international relations, Iran does not have a reliable enough ally, and even Russia and the mainland, which have been fighting openly and covertly with the United States, will not stand up for Iran in the face of a big war against the United States. As long as the United States can produce convincing evidence, all the great powers will remain silent. More importantly, if it was a major power that caused the Manhattan disaster, it would have acquiesced in the U.S. retaliatory strike against Iran.

The problem is that it is difficult to bring the benefits of substance to the United States by striking Iran.

Although Iran is very rich in oil and gas resources, as well as rich in mineral resources, the United States has controlled international energy prices, and even if it occupies Iran, it is difficult to benefit from it. Militarily, Iran's land area and population are three times that of Iraq, and with the exception of the southern province of Khuzestan which is located on the plain of the two rivers, the rest are on the Iranian plateau, and the whole territory is mountainous, which is not suitable for large-scale ground operations.

It is conceivable that in order to defeat Iran, the United States will need to pay a very huge price, and the benefits will be very limited.

If it is only a retaliatory strike, the United States will not hesitate, but on the premise of selecting enemies, neither Calone, nor the senior federal politicians, nor the interest groups they represent, will accept this kind of strategic decision that the benefits are completely disproportionate to the risks.

The only one saved was North Korea.

Politically, the risk of attacking North Korea is even greater. In addition, the mainland and the DPRK signed the "Treaty of Peace, Friendship and Mutual Assistance," but at the end of the war more than 60 years ago, the two sides only signed an "armistice agreement" instead of a "peace treaty," so as long as the DPRK was invaded, the mainland would have a reason to send troops. According to the analysis report submitted by Lande, the possibility of the mainland sending troops to North Korea is very large, and it is very likely that it will face off with the United States again.

Although in this report, the international situation experts of Lande specifically mentioned that the mainland will not be as active as it was more than 60 years ago, nor will it break with the United States for the sake of North Korea, and the main purpose of its troops is still to maintain the surname of North Korea, not to help North Korea achieve reunification, thus limiting the combat operations of the mainland army, but the report also points out that even if it is a local war with a limited scope, the United States will still suffer incalculable losses in a head-on confrontation with a powerful power like the mainland. It will even completely change the international situation.

In addition to political risks, there are also certain military risks.

According to the Pentagon's assessment, North Korea has a large conventional military force that can play an active role for at least the first three months of the war. Although on the whole, the DPRK army, whose technology and equipment remained at Suiping in the 70s of the last century, is not at all an opponent of the US military, and can disintegrate the DPRK's defense capability before launching a ground war through prolonged air strikes, no one can ignore the DPRK's unconventional military strength, that is, the possible existence of nuclear warheads and millions of tons of biological and chemical weapons. If North Korea uses these unconventional military forces in a war, it will inevitably pose a serious threat to the US military and the ROK [***] team that is working together, and even pose a threat to its allies in the region, thus forcing some allies to withdraw from US war operations when their homeland security is threatened, or even not to give the United States due support, and let the United States bear the entire burden of war.

Strictly speaking, this military risk is not huge, and at least Pentagon officials are confident enough to defeat North Korea.

Compared to these two risks, the benefits appear to be more obvious.

In the long run, for a long time to come, the United States will inevitably enter a period of strategic contraction, and its global hegemony will no longer be so obvious, and as the most powerful potential competitor, the mainland will certainly seize this opportunity to surpass the United States economically in 15 to 20 years, and then rely on its position as the world's largest economy to challenge the United States' world hegemony and eventually replace the United States.

Perhaps, this is a very long process, and it is difficult to see results even in the twenty-first century.

However, from the standpoint of the US rulers, this is a very fast thing, and if the United States cannot be prepared at the beginning, it will be difficult for the United States to seize the initiative in the next competition, it will be even more difficult to prevent the all-round rise of the mainland, and it will be even more difficult to win in the next great power competition.

What the United States wants to do is to drag the mainland into the water so that the mainland will not be able to grasp this opportunity.

Unleashing a war against North Korea would be able to achieve just that.

According to the analysis report provided by Land, if the mainland does not send troops to North Korea to confront the United States, its international reputation and status will be dealt a heavy blow, and many countries with close relations with the mainland, such as Pakistan in South Asia, will reconsider their fundamental strategies; If the situation is just the opposite, the mainland will have to pay a huge price for this war, and even if it can finally keep North Korea, the economic price it will pay can greatly slow down the mainland's development, and even intensify the mainland's domestic contradictions, making it difficult for the mainland to surpass the United States in a short period of time. If the mainland loses the war after sending troops, the international position of the United States will be consolidated, and those countries that are ready to move will have some concerns.

It can be said that as long as the war is fought, the United States will be able to reap immeasurable benefits regardless of the outcome.

More importantly, the targeting of North Korea is supported by many interest groups in the United States, and these interest groups have put pressure on the White House in various ways.

It can be seen that Cronin has no leading power on this issue.

All he can do is stall as long as he can, leaving this major strategic decision that will affect the next occupant of the White House for decades to come.

At this point, the problem becomes complicated again.

Although the Republican Party used public opinion hype to appear aggressive in the polls before the election, and Scott's hardline stance won the support of many voters, the combination of Sternberg and Robert is also very attractive, and many voters believe that when the country is facing unprecedented major challenges, it should try to maintain policy coherence.

As long as the election results are not yet available, Cronin cannot act rashly.

The problem is that such a major decision must not be delayed. In particular, Congress and the public have been demanding that the federal government release the results of the investigation as soon as possible, and the results will determine the strategic direction of the United States. Failure to make the announcement will only undermine the prestige of the federal government.

With no other choice, Cronin had no choice but to come forward in person and invite Scott and Sternberg to Camp David.

In any case, an explanation must be given to the people.

(To be continued)