Superpower

Re "In an Era of Only One Superpower, We're All Safer," Commentary, March 13: I will accept Arthur Herman's argument that having only one superpower is a good thing on one premise: that he will accept the one superpower if it someday becomes China, North Korea, Russia, Japan or Pakistan. Christina Waldeck Torrance I must strongly object to Herman's analysis regarding the alleged benefits of the U.S. status as the world's single superpower. He cites as a precedent more than 100 years of "peace, prosperity and stability" that reigned when the British were the only global superpower from the early 19th century.

Serge Ibaka's vicious right hand to the groin of Blake Griffin late in the fourth quarter Sunday served as only a prelude to the real smackdown administered by the Oklahoma City Thunder. Boom! Russell Westbrook accelerated past a bevy of defenders for a layup, the Thunder point guard wiping out a Clippers lead that lasted all of five seconds. Whack! Ibaka took a pass from Westbrook and made a layup while drawing Griffin's sixth foul, the final indignity of a maddening afternoon for the Clippers power forward.

We stand alone as the world's first democratic superpower. The tragic incident in East Africa speaks to this status. ROBERT WILKINS Apple Valley

Senate committees will soon be asked to vote on President Obama's nominees to head the departments of State and Defense and the Central Intelligence Agency. Many, if not most, of the senators' questions will be focused on the nominees' views on the pressing security problems the United States faces in the greater Middle East and Afghanistan. But it would be a mistake for the committees to let the hearings pass without also examining the administration's own stated policy priority - the "pivot" or "rebalance" to the Asia-Pacific region.

The suggestion by President Vaclav Havel to hold the next superpower summit meeting in Prague is an excellent idea. A summit in Prague would stress the importance of the new revolutionary process going on in East Europe and it would give international recognition to their new governments. With the leaders of the two superpower nations meeting in Prague, it would encourage the new governments to become involved in world affairs and it would demonstrate to the world that political change is supported, and can be brought about peacefully.

Mayor Maureen O'Connor's comparison of San Diego to Lithuania attempting to fight off an attack by a Russian-style superpower during the April 24 utility merger hearings deserves pity rather than ridicule. Such paranoia in the office of mayor unbefits a city with hopes for a bright future. Once she is no longer in a position of political power, those hopes have a better chance of fulfillment. JOSEPH R. GRANT Oceanside

The ruler of Kuwait, who is seeking superpower protection for his country's vital oil exports, says the Persian Gulf War is spreading and that this is cause for international concern. "The war has extended even to the big powers," the emir, Sheik Jabbar al Ahmed al Sabah, said in an address Saturday night.

MILOVAN DJILAS Communist-turned-critic, Yugoslavia America is starting to be the first global civilization. America is the center for new ideas. I rebelled against communism (in Yugoslavia)--but I found the market for my books in America. Why? I think the next century will be American.' YASUHIRO NAKASONE Former Japanese prime minister 'I think it is excessive that Americans are losing confidence.

Re "U.S. and Poland reach arms deal," Aug. 15 After reading of the plan to erect a missile shield in Poland, I wonder at the Bush administration's sensitivity to Russian concerns. The administration says the shield is directed at rogue states such as Iran and not at Russia. How do we expect Russia to believe that? How would we react if Russia announced it had concluded a deal with Mexico to install a 10-interceptor shield in Tijuana? Would we be understanding about it? No superpower will tolerate any kind of rocketry installed on its doorstep.

Maybe its premature to call the Soviet coup's reported failure a victory for the forces of reform and openness, but it should help us to understand how slippery Mikhail Gorbachev's high-wire act over the opposing forces of hard-line rightists and impatient radicals has been. Pollyanna herself would blush at the notion that only sweetness and light will now prevail while bitter nationalist and ethnic disputes throughout Eastern Europe continue and may now even intensify. But wouldn't it be great if wise leadership in all the seats of power gave us the prospect of an era in which superpower status was irrelevant, self-determination was not a euphemism for Balkanization and economic and environmental interdependence were universally acknowledged?

China's more assertive foreign policy over the last two years has played a key role in getting two arch-conservatives - Japan's Shinzo Abe and South Korea's Park Geun-hye - elected to lead their respective countries. Some Chinese observers believe that Abe and Park will be forced by China's inexorable rise to come to terms with their giant neighbor. Don't count on it. To much of its region, China's behavior as it is coming of age as a modern superpower is eerily reminiscent of its past policy as a regional hegemon.

- I am upset with Kobe Bryant , and when am I not? I've been interviewing the guy for maybe 15 or 20 minutes after an easy win over the Philadelphia 76ers when a reporter walks up and starts talking to Kobe in Italian. Right away, Kobe starts jabbering back in Italian, and so I explode. "Why is it you are giving this guy all the good quotes?" And my good buddy starts laughing, and he's been doing that a lot lately, and this is not the Kobe I've known in recent years.

Heavier and more brooding than typical magical girl stories in Japanese fantasy, the anime "Puella Magi Madoka Magica," a multiple-feature repackaging of the 2011 television series, gives voice to the notion that superpowers aren't always a gift. Creator Gen Urobuchi's concept begins with cheery schoolgirl Madoka offered the chance to spice up her humdrum life with otherworldly powers, as bestowed by an odd catlike creature. Less enamored with her own transformative status is the mysterious Homura, who knows about the real responsibilities in store for Madoka if she changes who she is. Studded with colorfully trippy sequences that dramatize the battles between magical girls and doom-spreading villains known as "witches," "Puella Magi Madoka Magica" is episodic, strange, at times numbingly repetitive and, when least expected, thematically intriguing about the rules behind this all-girl parallel world of freedom and risk.

NEW DELHI - On one level, the power outage that stalled trains, snarled traffic and left hospitals scrambling across much of India was an example of business as usual - except, of course, that this time it covered an area including nearly 10% of the world's population. But taken another way, Tuesday's massive blackout, the second in two days, underscored the yawning gap between India's superpower dreams and a sweltering, gritty reality. Problems with an aging electrical grid, pricing system and inefficient mining practices combined to darken a stretch of northern and eastern India that is home to 600 million people, in the process illustrating the nation's deep structural problems.

Was it Superman's, Spider-Man's or Socrates' uncle who said, "With great power comes great responsibility?" Regardless, it would have proved sound advice for the suddenly telekinetic teens at the center of the raw, electrical charge of "Chronicle. " Thankfully, it's wisdom the filmmakers took to heart. This mind-and-fork-bending sci-fi saga comes from the freaky imaginations of director Josh Trank and screenwriter Max Landis, who've packed their feature debut with smartness. Don't let its DIY sensibility fool you: "Chronicle" is ultimately telling a meta-story, built around the age-old conundrum - if you had superpowers that would let you do just about anything, would you do good or evil?

When Vice President Joe Biden slipped into Baghdad this month to commemorate the end of eight bloody years of war in Iraq, there was one face conspicuously absent from the host of solemn ceremonies and farewell meetings he attended: that of Ahmad Chalabi. The Iraqi politician, who lived in exile before Saddam Hussein's ouster, is shunned by Washington these days. But there has never been a foreigner more crucially involved in a decision by the United States to go to war than Ahmad Chalabi.

To me, the knocking down in the Persian Gulf of two Iranian oil platforms, as well as a number of warships and gunboats by the overwhelming armada of the United States was far short of a victory as some hard-liners in the U.S. Administration with a heart full of hatred for Tehran's regime have tried to describe (Part I, April 19). In fact, the unequal confrontation of a superpower with a wartorn country such as Iran proves nothing but it is a defeat in winning the hearts of a nation--a practice that Americans have always been keen to achieve.

A high Zimbabwean official on Wednesday accused the United States of deep-rooted hostility against the Nonaligned Movement, but Singapore said the 101-member group has lost credibility because it constantly attacks Washington while shielding Moscow.

The Redcoats are coming! The Redcoats are coming! Remember what your elementary school teacher taught you about the War of Independence? The British wore scarlet coats, which made them easy marks and symbolized institutional pomposity, adherence to status over efficiency and an out-of-touch empire bent on doing things the old way. The rebellious American colonists, on the other hand, wore whatever; they were nimble, unencumbered by institutional baggage...

With every new trough in U.S.-Pakistan relations, talk among Pakistanis of paring down their dependence on Washington and throwing in with China grows louder. Just days after the U.S. accused Pakistan's premier spy agency of aiding insurgent attacks against U.S. targets in Afghanistan, Chinese Vice Premier Meng Jianzhu appeared this week in Islamabad reassuring Pakistani leaders that China backed Pakistan's efforts to protect its sovereignty. The vice premier's comments apparently referred to Pakistani worries of a future U.S. airstrike or targeted ground operation against Taliban-allied insurgents in the tribal belt along the border with Afghanistan.